Manuscript Location

Johns Hopkins University, Milton S. Eisenhower Library

Place of Origin

England

Date of Composition

1780-1800

Description

This lovely eighteenth-century English cookbook contains 202 consecutively numbered recipes written, in brown ink, on approximately 64 pages, in a single clear hand. The book is rigorously organized, indicating that it is fair copy of recipes gathered over a period time. The sections proceed as follows: meat and fish dishes, recipes 1-26; soups, recipes 27-36; sauces and condiments, recipes 37-55; "made dishes" (diverse sauced dishes such as fricassees, hashes, vegetable ragouts, and macaroni and cheese), recipes 108-129; pie and tart pastes and meat and fish pies, recipes 108-129; puddings, recipes 130-139; cakes, small cakes, and biscuits, recipes 140-151; potting, collaring, pickling, and fruit preserving, recipes 152-174; ornamental gelatin jellies, sweet and savory, recipes 175-181; dessert creams (including raspberry ice cream), recipes 182-185; and more fruit preserving plus fruit wines, recipes 186-202. The book concludes with a complete page index, written with a different squib, in black ink, and possibly in a different hand.

The spirit of Elizabeth Raffald's The Experienced English Housekeeper, first published in 1769 and republished in innumerable editions into the nineteenth century, pervades this cookbook. The book's "observations" on made dishes, potting and collaring, and drying and candying (of fruits) are all paraphrased from Raffald, as are many of the book's recipes. The book does contains many recipes not found in Raffald, but these recipes echo Raffald in their general approach and their phrasing. Interestingly, there appears to be no verbatim copying of Raffald in this cookbook. The author has slightly altered ingredients and seasonings and has added techniques and advice throughout, making the recipes her own.

This cookbook originated in a wealthy, sophisticated household. This is particularly evidenced by the section of recipes for ornamental gelatin jellies, which were set out in the center of the table, as centerpieces, in the second course of eighteenth-century company dinner parties. This section includes an uncommon dish titled "Beehive of Savory Cake" that is particularly showy. The dish is made by baking a highly seasoned forcemeat in a stewpan that is slightly wider at the bottom than the top, making a meatloaf that, when turned out, is at least vaguely like a beehive in shape. After the meatloaf has been allowed to cool, a piece is carved out of the base to simulate an entryway, the whole loaf is covered in butter to imitate straw, and shredded fresh bay leaves are deployed in some unspecified way to imitate the "briars" with which beehives are bound. Finally, some sort of saffron-tinted clear jelly (presumably of fruit; the word is unclear) is poured around the "hive" to imitate honey. 

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