A Little Cook Book for a Little Girl

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French Benton
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Title: A Little Cook Book for a Little Girl
Author: French Benton
Release Date: August 12, 2005 [eBook #16514]
Language: English
Character set encoding: ISO-8859-1
***START OF THE PROJECT GUTENBERG EBOOK A
LITTLE COOK BOOK FOR A LITTLE GIRL***
This eBook was prepared by Setwart A. Levin.
A LITTLE COOK-BOOK FOR A LITTLE GIRL
by
CAROLINE FRENCH BENTON
Author of ``Gala Day
Luncheons''
Boston, The Page Company, Publishers
Copyright, 1905
by Dana Estes & Company
For
Katherine, Monica and Betty
Three Little Girls
Who Love To
Do
``Little Girl Cooking''
Thanks are due to the editor of Good Housekeeping for
permission to
reproduce the greater part of this book
from that magazine.
INTRODUCTION

Once upon a time there was a little girl named Margaret, and she
wanted to cook, so she went into the kitchen and tried and tried, but she
could not understand the cook-books, and she made dreadful messes,
and spoiled her frocks and burned her fingers till she just had to cry.
One day she went to her grandmother and her mother and her Pretty
Aunt and her Other Aunt, who were all sitting sewing, and asked them
to tell here about cooking.
``What is a roux,'' she said, ``and what's a mousse and what's an entrée?
What are timbales and sautés and ingredients, and how do you mix 'em
and how long do you bake 'em? Won't somebody please tell me all
about it?''
And her Pretty Aunt said, ``See the flour all over that new frock!'' and
her mother said, ``Dear child, you are not old enough to cooks yet;'' and
her grandmother said, ``Just wait a year or two, and I'll teach you
myself;'' and the Other Aunt said, ``Some day you shall go to
cooking-school and learn everything; you know little girls can't cook.''
But Margaret said, ``I don't want to wait till I'm big; I want to cook
now; and I don't want to do cooking-school cooking, but little girl
cooking, all by myself.''
So she kept on trying to learn, but she burned her fingers and spoiled
her dresses worse than ever, and her messes were so bad they had to be
thrown out, every one of them; and she cried and cried. And then one
day her grandmother said, ``It's a shame that child should not learn to
cook if she really wants to so much;'' and her mother said ``Yes, it is a
shame, and she shall learn! Let's get her a small table and some tins and
aprons, and make a little cook-book all her own out of the old ones we
wrote for ourselves long ago,--just the plain, easy things anybody can
make.'' And both her aunts said, ``Do! We will help, and perhaps we
might put in just a few cooking-school things beside.''
It was not long after this that Margaret had a birthday, and she was
taken to the kitchen to get her presents, which she thought the funniest
thing in the world. There they all were, in the middle of the room: first

her father's present, a little table with a white oilcloth cover and casters,
which would push right under the big table when it was not being used.
Over a chair her grandmother's present, three nice gingham aprons,
with sleeves and ruffled bibs. On the little table the presents of the
aunties, shiny new tins and saucepans, and cups to measure with, and
spoons, and a toasting-fork, and ever so many things; and then on one
corner of the table, all by itself, was her mother's present, her own little
cook-book, with her own name on it, and that was best of all.
When Margaret had looked at everything, she set out in a row the big
bowl and the middle-sized bowl and the little wee bowl, and put the
scalloped patty-pans around them, and the real egg-beater in front of all,
just like a picture, and then she read a page in her cook-book, and
began to believe it was all true. So she danced for joy, and put on a
gingham apron and began to cook that very minute, and before another
birthday she had cooked every single thing in the book.
This is Margaret's cook-book.
PART I.
THE THINGS MARGARET MADE FOR BREAKFAST
A LITTLE COOK BOOK FOR A LITTLE GIRL
CEREALS
1 quart of boiling water.
4 tablespoonfuls of cereal.
1 teaspoonful of
salt.
When you are to use a cereal made of oats or wheat, always begin to
cook it the night