Manuscript Location

New York Academy of Medicine, Rare Book Room

Place of Origin

England

Date of Composition

circa 1830 - 1850

Description

This 116-page manuscript is of the first half of nineteenth century, likely after 1830 given the inclusion of two recipes for "soda cake." It is mostly written in a single hand. The volume contains approximately eighty-six culinary recipes, in addition to about a dozen non-culinary (mostly household) recipes, most of which are clustered toward the end of the manuscript. The manuscript is divided into three main parts, which are headed, in the following order, "Soups" (17 recipes, including mulligatawny, white soup, carrot soup, and Flemish soup); "Creams and Jellies" (38 recipes, including custard, lemon cream, and punch jelly); and "Puddings" (12 recipes). A handful of recipes of other kinds, both culinary (mostly meats, fish, and pickled dishes) and non-culinary, appear between these parts. The recipes vary a great deal in style, some seeming to have been jotted down in haste and others fairly polished. Some of the latter may have been copied from published sources. One clutch of recipes towards the back of the book includes many attributions to individuals; the rest do not.