Manuscript Location

Place of Origin

Date of Composition

Description

This manuscript comprises sixteen loose pages of recipes that were originally part of a notebook. The large pages are now housed in Mylar sleeves and bound into an album, as the original book no longer exists.

Comparison with other handwritten manuscripts in the possession of Historic Hudson Valley suggests that this manuscript was written by four individuals with relations to the illustrious Dutch-American Van Cortlandt family. The book was likely begun by Anna de Peyster (1701-1774), of Albany. She was a maternal aunt of Pierre Van Cortlandt I (1721-1814), a great-grandson of Oloff Van Cortlandt (ca. 1600-1684), the first Van Cortlandt to come America. Pierre was also an accomplished man in his own right, serving in the Revolutionary War and, later, as the first lieutenant governor of New York. Mrs. De Peyster’s one child having died by the time of her death, the book passed into Pierre’s hands. He added more recipes to the book, as did his wife, Joanna Livingston Van Cortlandt (1722-1808), and the youngest of their eight children, Anne de Peyster Van Cortlandt, later Mrs. Philip Van Rensselaer (1766-1855).

Reflecting the Van Cortlandt family’s Dutch heritage, the book contains Dutch recipes for puffert (a sort of coffee cake), “hard” and “soft” waffles (meaning, respectively, paper-thin iron-baked wafers and waffles as Americans now think of them), and bollebujsyes, an old name for poffertjes, puffy pancakes made in a specialized pan. (A poffertjes pan is listed in Anna de Peyster’s estate inventory). The book also shows the progressive assimilation of the Van Cortlandt family in that it also includes many recipes of English origin. The book glosses a mix of sophisticated and plain dishes using both exotic (often imported) and common ingredients, suggesting that the Van Cortlandts were discriminating eaters. The recipes call for a variety of meats, fish, fowl, fruits, vegetables, herbs, and spices, as well as staples such as flour, milk, eggs, molasses, and rice. Both the Dutch and the English being fond of sweets, sugar is a much-used ingredient in the book. Judging from the care they took in preserving this book and passing it down to future generations, these recipes must have been of great value to the Van Cortlandt family. It is a critical resource in understanding the rich foodways of the historic Hudson Valley.

Pierre Van Cortlandt and his wife and daughter probably compiled their portion of the book at Van Cortlandt Manor House, in Croton-on-Hudson, New York. The house was originally built as a hunting lodge, in the late seventeenth century, by Pierre’s grandfather, Stephanus Van Cortlandt (1643-1700), on an 86,000 acre tract of land that Stephanus purchased from Native Americans. Pierre Van Cortlandt I expanded and remodeled the manor and made it his family’s residence in 1749. The house remained in the Van Cortlandt family into the twentieth century. In 1953 it was purchased and restored by John D. Rockefeller and is now one of the five historic sites operated by Historic Hudson Valley, a historic preservation society headquartered in Pocantico Hills, New York.

This manuscript is held in the library and collections museum of Historic Hudson Valley, which is located in in Tarrytown, New York. The library is open by appointment.