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At the request of several persons of distinction, who have visited the
Reform Club,--particularly the ladies, to whom I have always made it a
rule never to refuse anything in my power, for indeed it must have been
the fair sex who have had the majority in this domestic argument to gain
this gastronomical election,--Why do you not write and publish a
Cookery-book? was a question continually put to me. For a considerable
time this scientific word caused a thrill of horror to pervade my frame,
and brought back to my mind that one day, being in a most superb library
in the midst of a splendid baronial hall, by chance I met with one of
Milton’s allegorical works, the profound ideas of Locke, and several
chefs-d’œuvre of one of the noblest champions of literature,
Shakspeare; when all at once my attention was attracted by the
nineteenth edition of a voluminous work: such an immense success of
publication caused me to say, “Oh! you celebrated man, posterity counts
every hour of fame upon your regretted ashes!” Opening this work with
intense curiosity, to my great disappointment what did I see,--a receipt
for Ox-tail Soup! The terrifying effect produced upon me by this
succulent volume made me determine that my few ideas, whether culinary
or domestic, should never encumber a sanctuary which should be entirely
devoted to works worthy of a place in the Temple of the Muses.
But you must acknowledge, respected readers, how changeable and
uncertain are our feeble ideas through life; to keep the promise above
mentioned, I have been drawn into a thousand gastronomic reflections,
which have involved me in the necessity of deviating entirely from my
former opinion, and have induced me to bring before the public the
present volume, under the title of ‘The Gastronomic Regenerator,’
throughout which I have closely followed the plain rules of simplicity,
so that every receipt can not only clearly be understood, but easily
executed.
I now sincerely hope, Ladies, that I have not only kept my promise, but
to your satisfaction paid tribute to your wishes.
You have not forgotten, dear reader, the effect that monstrous volume,
the said nineteenth edition, produced upon me, therefore I now sincerely
beg of you to put my book in a place suited to its little merit, and not
with Milton’s sublime Paradise, for there it certainly would be doubly
lost.
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