Dear Bill and All, This is an extract from Elizabeth David's book, 'Italian Food' (1954). My wife and I have found that her recipes are well researched and practical to produce.
This is what she says about Measuring and Weighing. ** 'How much cheese is a handful? How much more or less is a cupful? What is the capacity of a glass, a tumbler, a soup ladle? How much is a pinch? How much greater is a good pinch? 'In the Introduction to this edition I have referred to the rather rough and-ready methods by which Italian cooks tend to measure their ingredients. To a certain extent all household cooks everywhere use such methods. (In the Middle East, I remember, an English round fifty cigarette tin was a common kitchen measuring unit; simply as 'a tin' of this or that ingredient I have come across this unit in published recipes, to me obviously authentic, but baffling to anyone not familiar with kitchen procedure in the countries concerned.) 'In Italy there is an explanation over and above the question of a tradition which grew up in the days when so many cooks could neither read nor write and measured by instinct and memory. It is to be found in the method by which household shopping is (or was) conducted - which I have also described in the chapter on Italian Dishes for English Kitchens, page 29-32 - which means that over and over again, perhaps even twice a day for years, the cook has bought the same weight of cheese, so many bunches of spinach, so many grams of tunny fish or anchovies from the huge open tin on the grocer's counter. She has just the amount she wants, and so has no need for scales to weigh these commodities at home. When it comes to store-cupboard ingredients such as flour or rice, she uses her hands, a glass, a cup. And there's the rub. Her cup and her glass are not necessarily the same capacity as yours or mine. Such things as standard measuring cups, spoons, and glasses may exist in Italy. If so, I certainly never saw any; and so far as I know not even the Americans, with their passion for measuring everything down to a sixteenth of a teaspoon of pepper and the ultimate three drops of lemon juice, have laid down a standard handful of rice, grated cheese, or parsley. 'While I was writing this book and still much under the influence of Italian cooking as practised in Italy, some of these vague terms did, I am afraid, creep into my recipes. Nowadays I would probably write them quite differently. They would be more precise, they would fill a volume twice the size of this one; in the transition, I think, they would also lose something of their authenticity and spontaneity. So I have left them substantially as I first wrote them, appending here and there a footnote when it seemed necessary for the sake of clarity. Below, also, are tables of comparative measurements which I hope will provide further guidance to readers who feel in need of it. 'While I think that the degree of precision required is largely a question of the individual temperament of each cook (some are positively irritated by the appearance of a lengthy list of ounces and tablespoons, half-teaspoons, grains, and quarter-cups on a page), I would also remind readers that reliance on precise recipes alone can be a trap. 'The dangerous person in the kitchen,' wrote Marcel Boulestin, 'is the one who goes rigidly by weights, measurements, thermometers, and scales! 'That was well put. It is like this. Suppose that I tell you to put two tablespoons of olive oil into a pan before starting off say a vegetable stew or a pot-roast. Then what pan are you using? How wide is it? How thick is it? With what kind of fuel are you cooking? What, in fact, you need is enough oil to cover the bottom surface of your pan; enough for your onions and other vegetables to be evenly spread out in it, neither swimming in oil because there is too much nor rapidly drying out, catching, and burning because there is not enough. So if I am going to tell you precisely how much oil you must use, then I must also tell you precisely the dimensions and weight of the pan you require, qualify the instructions with mention of varying grades of olive oil, thick or thin, refined or unrefined, and take into consideration the differences between solid fuel, gas burners, and electric hot plates. 'If recipes were all written on these lines there would be no end to them. Nobody would use cookery books. They would be too dull, too forbidding, and too bulky to handle. To specify therefore, 'enough oil to cover the bottom of your saucepan' or 'about a teacup of olive oil' is a short cut. It is also an indication that a precise quantity is not of great moment. Except for sauces, one does not often measure oil by tablespoons. one pours it out of a bottle into the pan. One uses one's eyes and one's loaf. The same may be said when one is adding a glass of wine, a handful of parsley. A little more, a little less - it is up to you. Of course there are the exceptions which prove the rule. Ingredients for sauces, pastries, and ice-cream recipes, for example, should be carefully weighed and measured. I would never advocate that a kitchen should be without scales. (I find the kind with weights more satisfactory than the spring-balance type.) And one of the most frequently used utensils in my own kitchen is a measuring jug marked with both English ounces and pints and metric grams. For those who use French, Italian, and other European-language cookery books as well as English ones, or who employ continental cooks, such a measuring utensil is invaluable, and when we convert to the metric system will become essential. Such jugs can now be found in any well-stocked hardware or kitchen shop'. ** It is interesting that Elizabeth David, a UK writer, uses the words, 'and when we convert to the metric system' as early as 1954. Cheers, Pat Naughtin LCAMS Geelong, Australia -- on 22/2/04 11:59 AM, Bill Hooper at [EMAIL PROTECTED] wrote: > chimpsarecute wrote: >> My point is and will always be that no noticeable change occurs in the >> outcome of a recipe when you use a 250 mL cup instead of a 236 mL. >> None >> what-so-ever!!!! > > What specific recipes have you tried twice, once measuring with 250 mL > to a cup and once with 236 mL to a cup? How did each turn out? > > Some things quite clearly would not be expected to be noticeably > affected. Others might be. > > How much sugar I put in my coffee can be varied without serious > consequences. How much sugar a put in my beer when I bottle it can make > the beer either flat and weak if I add too little, or strong and highly > carbonated (perhaps enough to make the bottles explode!) if I add too > much. (The amounts are in teaspoons instead of cups, but the principle > is the same.) > > Regards, > Bill Hooper > Fernandina Beach, Florida, USA >
