The success of her little book entitled "Seventy-five Receipts in
Cakes, Pastry, and Sweetmeats." has encouraged the author to
attempt a larger and more miscellaneous work on the subject of
cookery, comprising as far as practicable whatever is most useful
in its various departments; and particularly adapted to the
domestic economy of her own country. Designing it as a manual of
American housewifery, she has avoided the insertion of any dishes
whose ingredients cannot be procured on our side of the Atlantic,
and which require for their preparation utensils that are rarely
found except in Europe. Also, she has omitted every thing which
may not, by the generality of tastes, be considered good of its
kind, and well worth the trouble and cost of preparing.
The author has spared no pains in collecting and arranging,
perhaps the greatest number of practical and original receipts
that have ever appeared in a similar work; flattering herself that
she has rendered them so explicit as to be easily understood, and
followed, even by inexperienced cooks. The directions are given as
minutely as if each receipt was "to stand alone by itself," all
references to others being avoided; except in some few instances
to the one immediately preceding; it being a just cause of
complaint that in some of the late cookery books, the reader,
before finishing the article, is desired to search out pages and
numbers in remote parts of the volume.
In the hope that her system of cookery may be consulted with equal
advantage by families in town and in country, by those whose
condition makes it expedient to practise economy, and by others
whose circumstances authorize a liberal expenditure, the author
sends it to take its chance among the multitude of similar
publications, satisfied that it will meet with as much success as
it may be found to deserve,--more she has no right to expect.
_Philadelphia, April 15th, 1837_.