"I must say I enjoy an ice at dinner," said Lady Considine. "I
know the doctors abuse them, but I notice they always eat them when
they get the chance."

"Ah, that is merely human inconsistency," said Sir John. "I am
inclined to agree with the Marchesa that ice at dinner is an
incongruity, and may well be dispensed with. I think I am correct,
Marchesa, in assuming that Italy, which has showered so many boons
upon us, gave us also the taste for ices."

"I fear I must agree," said the Marchesa. "I now feel what a
blessing it would have been for you English if you had learnt from
us instead the art of cooking the admirable vegetables your gardens
produce. How is it that English cookery has never found any better
treatment for vegetables than to boil them quite plain? French
beans so treated are tender, and of a pleasant texture on the
palate, but I have never been able to find any taste in them. They
are tasteless largely because the cook persists in shredding them
into minute bits, and I maintain that they ought to be cooked
whole--certainly when they are young--and sautez, a perfectly plain
and easy process, which is hard to beat. Plain boiled cauliflower
is doubtless good, but cooked alla crema it is far better; indeed,
it is one of the best vegetable dishes I know. But perhaps the
greatest discovery in cookery we Italians ever made was the
combination of vegetables and cheese. There are a dozen excellent
methods of cooking cauliflower with cheese, and one of these has
come to you through France, choux-fleurs au gratin, and has become
popular. Jerusalem artichokes treated in the same fashion are
excellent; and the cucumber, nearly always eaten raw in England,