Hand-Book of Practical Cookery

Published in 1868 by renowned cooking teacher Pierre Blot, The Handbook of Practical Cookery for Ladies and Professional Cooks is a masterwork of French Cookery. An enigmatic figure, Blot came to America as a refugee from Napoleonic France and in 1865 he opened Professor Blot's Culinary Academy of Design in New York City, arguably the first French cooking school in America. This book is an extension of these classes, in which he taught that French cookery emphasized the "good things in life" making one's mind and body better.