Manuscript Location

New York Public Library, Schwarzman Building - Manuscripts & Archives Division

Place of Origin

England

Date of Composition

ca. 1650

Description

Lady Anne Percy(1633-1654) must have copied this 167-page cookbook within a span of just a year or two, as she died at age 21, two years after she had married. She likely copied the recipes from her mother's cookbook, as her husband wrote on the inside front cover of the manuscript notebook that the receipts had "long been kept as secrets" in the Northumberland family, from which his wife was descended. The recipes may not have been quite as old Lady Anne Percy's husband seems to have believed. While some originated as early as the mid-sixteenth century, none were old-fashioned at the time this manuscript was copied. The recipes are unusually clearly written, in complete sentences, with standard (and quite modern) usage and spelling. As is typical of English manuscript cookbooks of this period, most of the recipes are for banqueting stuff, particularly preserved, dried, and candied fruits, fruit pastes, sweet biscuits, cracknels, cheesecakes, and fresh cheeses. Among the last is a recipe for slipcoat cheese, which is first seen in print Sir Kenelme Digby's cookbook of 1668. There are a few savory recipes, also, including an interesting one for smelt salad, which is actually pickled smelts. A number of recipes for home medicines and cordial waters appear in the second half of the manuscript, mixed in with culinary material. A full page of text is allotted to "A Receipt of an excellent cordiall water, most approved against melancholy," which is attributed to Lady Northumberland, perhaps Lady Anne's mother. The recipe calls for steeping eight varieties of flowers in a quart of sack and then distilling the water with spices.