Manuscript Location

New York University Bobst Library, Fales Special Collections

Place of Origin

United States ➔ New York ➔ New York

Date of Composition

ca. 1850-1880

Description

The recipes on the first 22 pages of this little notebook are written in the same neat hand that wrote, on the flyleaf, "Mrs. Linus Bridsey's Book." All of these recipes are for cakes, tea cakes, cookies, and tea breads (muffins, cornbread). Most are leavened with saleratus, the typical baking alkali of the 1840s and 1850s, and many call for saleratus in combination with cream of tartar, a mark of the decade leading up to the Civil War. The recipe called "Puffets for Tea" (probably from the Dutch poffertjes, which are small pancakes) suggests that Mrs. Bridsey may have been from New York City or somewhere along the Hudson Valley, where Dutch culinary influence was strong.

The remaining recipes in this book are in at least three different hands, the first writing in the ink (through page 26) and the rest mostly (but not entirely) writing in pencil. These recipes are later, for they include "Corn Starch Pie" and "Cream Pie," which became popular in the 1870s. Most of the later recipes are cakes and pies but there are also recipes for sausage seasoning and sweet cucumber pickles as well as several home remedies. Some of these later recipes may have been written by E. L. Roberts and John Hempstead, whose names appear on the last page of the notebook.