To make a tomato salad you must not slice the fruit in a dish and then
pour on it a little vinegar and then a little oil; that is not salad
--that is ignorance.

Take some red tomatoes, and, if you can procure them, some golden ones
also. Plunge each for a moment in boiling water, peel off the skin, but
carefully, so as not to cut through the flesh with the juice. Take some
raw onion cut in slices; if you do not like the strong taste, use
shallot; and lay four or five flat slices on the bottom of the salad
dish. Put the tomato slices over them, sprinkle with salt and just a dust
of castor sugar. In four hours lift the tomatoes and remove the onions
altogether. Make in a cup the following sauce: Dissolve a salt-spoonful
of salt in a teaspoonful of tarragon vinegar. Stir in a dessert-spoonful
of oil, dropping it slowly in, add a very little mustard, some pepper and
a sprinkle of chopped chervil. Some people like chopped chives. Pour this
over the tomato salad and leave it for an hour at least before serving
it.



POTATOES AND CHEESE

Every one likes this nourishing dish, and it is a cheap one. Peel some
potatoes and cut them in rounds. In a fireproof dish put a layer of
these, sprinkle them with flour, grated cheese, pepper, salt, a few pats
of butter. Then some more potatoes, and so on till the dish is full. Beat
the yolks of two eggs in a pint of milk, add pepper and salt and pour it
over the dish. Leave it on the top of the stove for five minutes, then
cook it for half-an-hour in a moderate oven. Less time may be required if