This section is from the book "Real Cookery", by Grid. Also available from Amazon: Real Cookery.
Best materials only to be used, including butter and everything that enters your kitchen.
Whetheb your dinner be for yourself alone or for a party, choose your dishes with an eye to their lightness and digestibility, as well as with a view to careful opposition of colour and flavour, and never attempt to serve a dinner except with the very Best materials that can possibly be procured.
I do not mean so-called first-class articles, but those of the highest degree of excellence. Make it your business to find out where the finest can be had, and, if you be frightened by the price, serve fewer dishes and really first-rate rather than a larger number not quite so good.
When I say " Best materials," I mean everything that is used for cooking. If it be butter, let it be the best, such as you would yourself eat for breakfast. Your cooking butter cannot be too good, because the inferior article is apt to spoil any dish beyond hope, and you would only be " spoiling the ship for a ha'p'orth of tar." Now, this principle applies to all materials used in cooking.
 
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