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Links to Old Recipe Books

Here I have included links to the full copies of the old cookery & recipe books referenced in this blog. These links allow you to access the entire book at your leisure. I have also added the introduction or preface from each book, as it provides insight into the history behind the book and the societal audience it was intended for, which is always an interesting read!

To see some of the recipes from these books, do have a look at our Old Recipes Collections and try re-creating a historical recipe in your own kitchen! You will be pleasantly surprised by the old recipes, as many are easy, tasty, and simple to adapt to everyday ingredients. I have tried quite a few, and many have been added to my family’s regular meals.

More books will be added so do check back soon.

Table of Contents

A HANDBOOK OF COOKERY FOR A SMALL HOUSE BY JESSIE CONRAD [1923]

PREFACE

Of all the books produced since the most remote ages by human talents and industry those only that treat of cooking are, from a moral point of view, above suspicion. The intention of every other piece of prose may be discussed and even mistrusted; but the purpose of a cookery book is one and unmistakable. Its object can conceivably be no other than to increase the happiness of mankind.

This general consideration, and also a feeling of affectionate interest with which I am accustomed to view all the actions of the writer, prompt me to set down these few words of introduction for her book. Without making myself responsible for her teaching (I own that I find it impossible to read through a cookery book) I come forward modestly but gratefully as a Living Example of her practice. That practice I dare pronounce most successful. It has been for many priceless years adding to the sum of my daily happiness.

Good cooking is a moral agent. By good cooking I mean the conscientious preparation of the simple food of every-day life, not the more or less skillful [Pg vi]concoction of idle feasts and rare dishes. Conscientious cooking is an enemy to gluttony. The trained delicacy of the palate like a cultivated delicacy of sentiment stands in the way of unseemly excesses.

The decency of our life is for a great part a matter of good taste, of the correct appreciation of what is fine in simplicity. The intimate influence of conscientious cooking by rendering easy the processes of digestion promotes the serenity of mind, the graciousness of thought, and that indulgent view of our neighbours’ failings which is the only genuine form of optimism. Those are its titles to our reverence.

A great authority upon North American Indians accounted for the sombre and excessive ferocity characteristic of these savages by the theory that as a race they suffered from perpetual indigestion. The Noble Red Man was a mighty hunter but his wives had not mastered the art of conscientious cookery. And the consequences were deplorable. The Seven Nations around the Great Lakes and the Horse-tribes of the Plains were but one vast prey to raging dyspepsia. The Noble Red Men were great warriors, great orators, great masters of outdoor pursuits; but the domestic life of their wigwams was clouded by the morose irritability which follows the consumption of ill-cooked food. The gluttony of their indigestible feasts was a direct incentive to counsels of unreasonable[Pg vii] violence. Victims of gloomy imaginings, they lived in abject submission to the wiles of a multitude of fraudulent medicine men—quacks—who haunted their existence with vain promises and false nostrums from the cradle to the grave.

It is to be remarked that the quack of modern civilisation, the vendor of patent medicine, preys mainly upon the races of Anglo-Saxon stock who are also great warriors, great orators, mighty hunters, great masters of outdoor pursuits.

No virtues apparently will avail for happiness if the righteous art of cooking be neglected by the national conscience.

We owe much to the fruitful meditations of our sages, but a sane view of life is, after all, elaborated mainly in the kitchen—the kitchen of the small house, the abode of the preponderant majority of the people. And a sane view of life excludes the belief in patent medicine.

The conscientious cook is the natural enemy of the quack without a conscience; and thus his labours make for the honesty and favour the amenity of our existence. For a sane view of life can be no other than kindly and joyous, but a believer in patent medicine is steeped in the gloom of vague fears, the sombre attendants of disordered digestion.

Strong in this conviction I introduce this little book to the inhabitants of the little houses who are the[Pg viii] arbiters of the nation’s destiny. Ignorant of the value of its methods I have no doubt whatever as to its intention. It is highly moral. There cannot be the slightest question as to that; for is it not a cookery book?—the only product of the human mind altogether above suspicion.

In that respect no more need, or indeed can, be said. As regards the practical intention I gather that no more than the clear and concise exposition of elementary principles has been the author’s aim. And this too is laudable, because modesty is a becoming virtue in an artist. It remains for me only to express the hope that by correctness of practice and soundness of precept this little book will be able to add to the cheerfulness of nations.

Joseph Conrad.

Allied Cookery: British, French, Italian, Belgian, Russian by Harrison et al. [1916]

THE PURPOSE

of this little book is to procure funds in aid of the farmers in that part of France which was devastated by the invasion of the German armies and subsequently regained by the French. This region, in part, one of the most fertile in France, and which sustained hundreds of thousands of inhabitants engaged in agricultural pursuits, has been left desolate, with all buildings destroyed and all farming implements, cattle, and farm products taken off by the invaders for military uses. Its old men, women, and children, who survived the slaughter of invasion, are now undertaking the labour of restoring their farms. To help in the supply of seeds, farm implements, and other simple but essential means of enabling these suffering people to regain by their own efforts the necessaries of life, the compilers offer to the public this book on Cookery.Its proceeds will be distributed by Le Secours National, of France, whose effective organization assures its best and most helpful disposition. An acknowledgment must be made for the kind assistance of friends in securing desirable recipes. There are some that will be novel to many households, and all of them will give satisfaction when exactly followed. The compilers will gladly answer requests for information from any one wishing further to support this cause.

The Healthy Life Cook Book by Florence Daniel Second Edition 1915

Preface

This little book has been compiled by special and repeated request. Otherwise, I should have hesitated to add to the already existing number of vegetarian cookery books. It is not addressed to the professional cook, but to those who find themselves, as I did, confronted with the necessity of manufacturing economical vegetarian dishes without any previous experience of cooking. An experienced cook will doubtless find many of the detailed instructions superfluous.

The original idea was to compile a cookery book for those vegetarians who are non-users of milk and eggs. But as this would have curtailed the book’s usefulness, especially to vegetarian beginners, the project was abandoned. At the same time, non-users of milk and eggs will find that their interests have been especially considered in very many of the recipes.

All the recipes have been well tested. Many of them I evolved myself after repeated experiments. Others I obtained from friends. But all of them are used in my own little household. So that if any reader experiences difficulty in obtaining the expected results, if she will write to me, at 3, Tudor Street, London, E.C., and enclose a stamped envelope for reply, I shall be glad to give any assistance in my power.

I desire to record my gratitude here to the friends who have sent me recipes; to the graduate of the Victoria School of Cookery, who assisted me with much good advice; to Cassell’s large Dictionary of Cookery, from which I gathered many useful hints; to the Herald of Health, which first published recipes for the Agar-agar Jellies and Wallace Cheese; and to E. and B. May’s Cookery Book, from whence emanates the idea of jam without sugar. Lastly, I would thank Mrs. Hume, of “Loughtonhurst,” Bournemouth, with whom I have spent several pleasant holidays, and who kindly placed her menus at my disposal.

FLORENCE DANIEL.

Preface to Second Edition

This little cookery book was originally published for that “straiter” sect of food-reformers who abstain from the use of salt, yeast, etc. But, owing to repeated requests from ordinary vegetarians, who find the book useful, I am now including recipes for yeast bread, cheese dishes, nutmeat dishes, etc. I have put all these in the chapter entitled “Extra Recipes.” To go to the opposite extreme there is a short chapter for “unfired feeders.” Other new recipes have also been added.

The note re Salads has been borrowed from E.J. Saxon, and the Vegetable
Stew in Casserole Cookery from R. & M. Goring, in The Healthy Life.

FLORENCE DANIEL.

Dr Allinson’s Cookery Book [1858-1918]

Introduction:

This book is written with the object of laying before the public a cookery book which will be useful not only to vegetarians, but also to flesh eaters, who are often at a loss for recipes for non-flesh dishes. Nowadays most people admit that “too much meat is eaten”; but when the housewife tries to put before her family or friends a meal in which meat is to be conspicuous by its absence, she is often at a loss how to set about it.

Vegetarians also frequently stay with non-vegetarian friends, or lodge with others who do not understand how to provide for them. For such this book will especially prove useful, for in it will be found a set of thirty menus, one for each day in a month, giving suitable recipes with quantities for one person only. Throughout this book it will be found that the use of wholemeal has been introduced in the place of white flour. Those persons who do not care to follow the hygienic principle in its entirety can easily substitute white flour if preferred. The recipes have been written bearing in mind the necessity for a wholesome diet; and they will be found to be less rich than those in most of the cookery books published. Should any one wish to make the dishes richer, it can easily be done by an addition of butter, eggs, or cream.

Let me draw the attention of vegetarians to the use of soaked sago in many dishes. This is a farinaceous food which should be used much more largely in vegetarian cookery than it is. Thoroughly soaked sago should be used in all dishes, savouries or sweets, in which a substitute for suet is required to lighten the mixture; that is, in boiled savouries or sweets which are largely made of wholemeal, as, for instance, in vegetable haggis, roly-poly pudding, and all fruit or vegetable puddings which are boiled in a paste. When soaked sago is used (taking a teacupful of dry sago to two breakfastcupfuls of meal) a light paste will be obtained which would mislead any meat eater into the belief that suet or, at any rate, baking powder had been used. Baking powder, tartaric acid, soda and bicarbonate of soda, are all most injurious to the system, and these chemicals have been left out of this book entirely. In breads and cakes I have used a small quantity of yeast for the rising of the dough; those who once have got accustomed to the use of yeast will not find it any more trouble than using baking powder. It may here be beneficial to give a few hints as to the harm done by the use of the most commonly introduced chemicals, namely, soda, bicarbonate of soda, baking powder, tartaric acid, and citric acid. Not only do they delay the digestion of the foods in which they are used, and give rise to various stomach troubles, but also cause rheumatism and gout, and often are the primary cause of stone in the kidney and bladder. Another danger lies in the fact that these chemicals are too dear to be supplied pure to the public, which always demands cheap goods, and the result is that many of the chemicals in the market are mixed with other still worse poisons, like arsenic, for instance. Self-raising flour, which is liked by so many on account of its convenience, is nothing but ordinary flour mixed with some sort of baking powder; in the same way egg powders are simply starch powders, coloured and flavoured, mixed with baking powder. Tartaric acid and citric acid also belong to the class of injurious chemicals. They are often used in the making of acid drinks, when lemons are not handy. They irritate the stomach violently, and often cause acute dyspepsia. These few remarks will, I hope, convince the readers that all these chemicals are best avoided in culinary preparations. Even salt and spices are best used in great moderation; if our dishes could be prepared without them it would be far the best; but it takes a long time to wean people entirely from the use of condiments; the first step towards it is to use them as sparingly as possible.

I have tried to make this a hygienic cookery book; but there are a number of dishes introduced which can hardly claim to be hygienic; it has to be left to the good judgment of the readers to use them on rare occasions only, and it will be better for the health of each individual if the plainer dishes only are prepared for the daily table. I wish here to impress on vegetarians, and those who wish to give the diet a trial, not to eat much pulse; this is the rock on which many “would-be vegetarians” come to grief. They take these very concentrated, nitrogenous foods in rather large quantities, because they have an idea that only they will support them when the use of meat is abandoned. They are foods which, to be beneficial to the system of the consumer, require a great deal of muscular exertion on his part. The results to persons of sedentary habits of eating pulse foods often are indigestion, heavy and dull feelings, and general discomfort. In my own household butter beans, the most concentrated of all foods, come on the table perhaps once a month, lentils or peas perhaps once a week. None but those persons who have strong digestive organs should eat pulse foods at all; and then only when they have plenty of physical work to do. I have known several people who tried vegetarianism who have given up the trial in despair, and, when I inquired closely into the causes, the abuse of pulse food was generally the chief one.

I will now give a list of the composition of the various foods, which may be instructive and useful to those to whom the study of dietetics is new, as well as to vegetarians who may wish to use it for reference. The list is copied from a little pamphlet by A.W. Duncan, published by the Vegetarian Society in Manchester.

Fast Day Cookery or Meals Without Meat by Grace Johnston [1893]

Preface:

Encouraged by the kindly manner in which the Press has dealt with my “Anglo-Indian and Oriental Cookery,” and at the repeated request of friends, I am writing this little book.

In its compilation, I have had in view both the Anglican and Roman communions.

There are many who keep the Fasts and Abstinences prescribed by their Church, and there are many more who would do so if their food was served up and cooked in a healthy way. As a rule, fish and vegetables are very little understood in this country, and even in the houses of the better class one sees little else than the eternal boiled and fried fish. As to vegetables, they are out of it altogether. If this be the case where money is no object, how much harder is it for those who are obliged to make the most of everything?

I do not pretend to teach in this little book, only to give a few novel and useful recipes that most housewives will find really good and economical, and also to show that a non-flesh diet can be and is both healthy and appetising.

The book will be found useful by others than those for whom it is specially written, and most of the recipes will be practicable at all times of the year.

A word in conclusion to the careful housewife in getting tinned fish. Always get the best brand; it is not wise to go in for cheap goods in this line.

I cannot speak too highly of Edwards’ Desiccated Soups. They make delicious soups of themselves, and in conjunction with other things they have no equal. Their tomato is simply invaluable; I would not be without it for anything.

To those who find pastry indigestible I would recommend them to try “Coombs’ Eureka Flour”; it makes delicious pastry, and requires no baking powder, and it has the advantage of being thoroughly digestible. I have mentioned how to use all these in most of the recipes. I have not made any pretence to make this what is called a high-class cookery book; my aim and object is to bring it within the range of most people, while many of the dishes are good enough for any high-class table, and would be found a welcome and novel addition.

Grace Johnson.

New Vegetarian Dishes by Mrs Bowdich [1892]

WITH PREFACE BY ERNEST BELL, M.A. TREASURER OF THE LONDON VEGETARIAN SOCIETY:

There are already a good many vegetarian cookery books, ranging in price from one penny to half-a-crown, but yet, when I am asked, as not unfrequently happens, to recommend such a book, I know of only one which at all fulfils the requirements, and even that one is, I find, rather severely criticised by ladies who know anything about the matter.

To have to live by some of them would almost make a vegetarian turn meat-eater. Most are compilations from other books with the meat dishes left out, and a little porridge and a few beans and peas thrown in. All of them, I believe, contain a lot of puddings and sweets, which certainly are vegetarian, but which can be found in any ordinary cookery book.

What is required is a book that will enable us to provide something to take the place of meat, which, while nourishing, shall at the same time be palatable. This the present book aims at doing. Of the 221 recipes given, upwards of 200 are viabsolutely original, having been carefully thought out and tested by the author herself, and not hitherto published anywhere. Many of them are as nourishing, weight for weight, as ordinary dishes made with meat, those containing beans, peas, eggs, and the various sorts of grain, being the most nourishing. If they are not all found to be palatable, the fault must be in the individual cook, who cannot have put in the important ingredient of feeling, without which no work can be wholly good.

The thorough-going vegetarian, to whom abstinence from meat is part of his ethical code and his religion,—who would as soon think of taking his neighbour’s purse as helping himself to a slice of beef,—is by nature a man of frugal habits and simple tastes. He prefers a plain diet, and knows that the purest enjoyment is to be found in fruits of all kinds as nature supplies them. He needs but little cookery, and that of the simplest. To him this book will be of little use, except when he wishes to entertain his friends.

But there are others who, while not feeling that any moral principle is immediately involved in the matter of diet, yet would like to be relieved from the necessity of eating flesh, possibly on æsthetic grounds, or it may be from hygienic reasons, or in some cases, I hope, because they would willingly diminish the sufferings involved in the transport and slaughter of animals, inevitable as long as they are used for food. To these it is hoped that this viilittle book may act as an encouragement and help.

Nor need our carnivorous friends be afraid of it. A good deal of nonsense is talked (by meat-eaters I mean, of course) about the properties of food, and they would have us believe that they eat a beef-steak mainly because it contains 21.5 per cent. of nitrogen. But we know better. They have eaten steaks for many years, but it was only last week, in working up for a debate, that they found out about the nitrogen. It is not the chemical ingredients which determine the diet, but the flavour; and it is quite remarkable, when some tasty vegetarian dishes are on the table, how soon the percentages of nitrogen are forgotten, and how far a small piece of meat will go. If this little book shall succeed in thus weaning away a few from a custom which is bad—bad for the suffering creatures that are butchered—bad for the class set apart to be the slaughterers—bad for the consumers physically, in that it produces disease, and morally, in that it tends to feed the lower and more ferocious qualities of mind, and also for ever prevents our treating the animal creation with that courtesy (as Sir Arthur Helps put it) which is their due—then I know that it will not have wholly failed in carrying out the author’s benevolent intention.

Recipes from Cassell’s Vegetarian Cookery, A Manual of Cheap and Wholesome Diet [1891]

Preface:

The present work, though written upon strictly vegetarian principles, is by no means addressed to vegetarians only. On the contrary, we hope that the following pages of recipes will be read by that enormous class throughout the country who during the last few years have been gradually changing their mode of living by eating far less meat, and taking vegetables and farinaceous food as a substitute.

Where there are thousands who are vegetarians from choice, there are tens of thousands who are virtually vegetarians from necessity. Again, there is another large class who from time to time adopt a vegetarian course of diet on the ground of health, and as a means of escaping from the pains attendant on gout, liver complaint, or dyspepsia.

The class we most wish to reach, however, is that one, increasing we fear, whose whole life is one continual struggle not merely to live, but to live decently.

It may seem a strong statement, but we believe it to be a true one, that only those who have tried a strictly vegetarian course of diet know what real economy means. Should the present work be the means of enabling even one family to become not only better in health but richer in pocket, it will not have been written in vain.

A.G. PAYNE.

MODERN COOKERY FOR PRIVATE FAMILIES (New Edition) by ELIZA ACTON [1855, 1882 edition]

PREFACE.

It cannot be denied that an improved system of practical domestic cookery, and a better knowledge of its first principles, are still much needed in this country; where, from ignorance, or from mismanagement in their preparation, the daily waste of excellent provisions almost exceeds belief.

This waste is in itself a very serious evil where so large a portion of the community often procure—as they do in England—with painful difficulty, and with the heaviest labour, even sufficient bread to sustain existence; but the amount of positive diseasewhich is caused amongst us by improper food, or by food rendered unwholesome by a bad mode of cooking it, seems a greater evil still. The influence of diet upon health is indeed a subject of far deeper importance than it would usually appear to be considered, if we may judge by the profound indifference with which it is commonly treated. It has occupied, it is true, the earnest attention of many eminent men of science, several of whom have recently investigated it with the most patient and laborious research, the results of which they have made known to the world in their writings, accompanied, in some instances, by information of the highest value as to the most profitable and nutritious modes of preparing various kinds of viands. In arranging the present enlarged edition of this volume for publication, I have gladly taken advantage of such of their instructions (those of Baron Liebig especially) as have seemed to me adapted to its character, and likely to increase its real utility.

These, I feel assured, if carefully followed out, will much assist our progress in culinary art, and diminish the unnecessary ivdegree of expenditure which has hitherto attended its operations; for it may safely be averred that good cookery is the best and truest economy, turning to full account every wholesome article of food, and converting into palatable meals, what the ignorant either render uneatable, or throw away in disdain. It is a popular error to imagine that what is called good cookery is adapted only to the establishments of the wealthy, and that it is beyond the reach of those who are not affluent.

On the contrary, it matters comparatively little whether some few dishes, amidst an abundant variety, be prepared in their perfection or not; but it is of the utmost consequence that the food which is served at the more simply supplied tables of the middle classes should all be well and skilfully prepared, particularly as it is from these classes that the men principally emanate to whose indefatigable industry, high intelligence, and active genius, we are mainly indebted for our advancement in science, in art, in literature, and in general civilisation.

When both the mind and body are exhausted by the toils of the day, heavy or unsuitable food, so far from recruiting their enfeebled powers, prostrates their energies more completely, and acts in every way injuriously upon the system; and it is no exaggeration to add, that many a valuable life has been shortened by disregard of this fact, or by the impossibility of obtaining such diet as nature imperatively required. It may be urged, that I speak of rare and extreme cases; but indeed it is not so; and the impression produced on me by the discomfort and the suffering which have fallen under my own observation, has rendered me extremely anxious to aid in discovering an efficient remedy for them.

With this object always in view, I have zealously endeavoured to ascertain, and to place clearly before my readers, the most rational and healthful methods of preparing those simple and essential kinds of nourishment which form the staple of our common daily fare; and have occupied myself but little with the elegant superfluities or luxurious novelties with which I might perhaps more attractively, though not more usefully, have vfilled my pages.

Should some persons feel disappointed at the plan I have pursued, and regret the omissions which they may discover, I would remind them, that the fashionable dishes of the day may at all times be procured from an able confectioner; and that part of the space which I might have allotted to them is, I hope and believe, better occupied by the subjects, homely as they are, to which I have devoted it—that is to say, to ample directions for dressing vegetables, and for making what cannot be purchased in this country—unadulterated bread of the most undeniably wholesome quality; and those refreshing and finely-flavoured varieties of preserved fruit which are so conducive to health when judiciously taken, and for which in illness there is often such a vain and feverish craving when no household stores of them can be commanded.[1]

1.  Many of those made up for sale are absolutely dangerous eating; those which are not adulterated are generally so oversweetened as to be distasteful to invalids.

Merely to please the eye by such fanciful and elaborate decorations as distinguish many modern dinners, or to flatter the palate by the production of new and enticing dainties, ought not to be the principal aim, at least, of any work on cookery. “Eat,—to live” should be the motto, by the spirit of which all writers upon it should be guided. I must here obtrude a few words of personal interest to myself.

At the risk of appearing extremely egotistic, I have appended “Author’s Receipt” and “Author’s Original Receipt” to many of the contents of the following pages; but I have done it solely in self-defence, in consequence of the unscrupulous manner in which large portions of my volume have been appropriated by contemporary authors, without the slightest acknowledgment of the source from which they have been derived.

I have allowed this unfairness, and much beside, to pass entirely unnoticed until now; but I am suffering at present too severe a penalty for the over-exertion entailed on me by the plan which I adopted for the work, longer to see with perfect composure strangers coolly taking the credit and the profits viof my toil.

The subjoined passage from the preface of my first edition will explain in what this toil—so completely at variance with all the previous habits of my life, and, therefore, so injurious in its effects—consisted; and prevent the necessity of recapitulating here, in another form, what I have already stated in it. “Amongst the large number of works on cookery which we have carefully perused, we have never yet met with one which appeared to us either quite intended for, or entirely suited to the need of the totally inexperienced! none, in fact, which contained the first rudiments of the art, with directions so practical, clear, and simple, as to be at once understood, and easily followed, by those who had no previous knowledge of the subject. This deficiency, we have endeavoured in the present volume to supply, by such thoroughly explicit and minute instructions as may, we trust, be readily comprehended and carried out by any class of learners; our receipts, moreover, with a few trifling exceptions which are scrupulously specified, are confined to such as may be perfectly depended on, from having been proved beneath our own roof and under our own personal inspection.

We have trusted nothing to others; but having desired sincerely to render the work one of general usefulness, we have spared neither cost nor labour to make it so, as the very plan on which it has been written must of itself, we think, evidently prove. It contains some novel features, calculated, we hope, not only to facilitate the labours of the kitchen, but to be of service likewise to those by whom they are directed. The principal of these is the summary appended to the receipts, of the different ingredients which they contain, with the exact proportion of each, and the precise time required to dress the whole.

This shows at a glance what articles have to be prepared beforehand, and the hour at which they must be ready; while it affords great facility as well, for an estimate of the expense attending them. The additional space occupied by this closeness of detail has necessarily prevented the admission of so great a variety of receipts as the book might otherwise have comprised; but a limited number, thus viicompletely explained, may perhaps be more acceptable to the reader than a larger mass of materials vaguely given.

“Our directions for boning poultry, game, &c., are also, we venture to say, entirely new, no author that is known to us having hitherto afforded the slightest information on the subject; but while we have done our utmost to simplify and to render intelligible this, and several other processes not generally well understood by ordinary cooks, our first and best attention has been bestowed on those articles of food of which the consumption is the most general, and which are therefore of the greatest consequence; and on what are usually termed plain English dishes. With these we have intermingled many others which we know to be excellent of their kind, and which now so far belong to our national cookery, as to be met with commonly at all refined modern tables.”

Since this extract was written, a rather formidable array of works on the same subject has issued from the press, part of them from the pens of celebrated professional gastronomers; others are constantly appearing; yet we make, nevertheless, but slight perceptible progress in this branch of our domestic economy.

Still, in our cottages, as well as in homes of a better order, goes on the “waste” of which I have already spoken. It is not, in fact, cookery-books that we need half so much as cooks really trained to a knowledge of their duties, and suited, by their acquirements, to families of different grades. At present, those who thoroughly understand their business are so few in number, that they can always command wages which place their services beyond the reach of persons of moderate fortune. Why should not all classes participate in the benefit to be derived from nourishment calculated to sustain healthfully the powers of life?

And why should the English, as a people, remain more ignorant than their continental neighbours of so simple a matter as that of preparing it for themselves? Without adopting blindly foreign modes in anything merely because they are foreign, surely we should be wise to learn from other nations, who excel us in aught good or useful, all that we can which may tend to remedy viiiour own defects; and the great frugality, combined with almost universal culinary skill, or culinary knowledge, at the least—which prevails amongst many of them—is well worthy of our imitation. Suggestions of this nature are not, however, sufficient for our purpose.

Something definite, practical, and easy of application, must open the way to our general improvement. Efforts in the right direction are already being made, I am told, by the establishment of well-conducted schools for the early and efficient training of our female domestic servants. These will materially assist our progress; and if experienced cooks will put aside the jealous spirit of exclusiveness by which they are too often actuated, and will impart freely the knowledge they have acquired, they also may be infinitely helpful to us, and have a claim upon our gratitude which ought to afford them purer satisfaction than the sole possession of any secrets—genuine or imaginary—connected with their craft.

The limits of a slight preface do not permit me to pursue this or any other topic at much length, and I must in consequence leave my deficiencies to be supplied by some of the thoughtful, and, in every way, more competent writers, who, happily for us, abound at the present day; and make here my adieu to the reader.

ELIZA ACTON

London, May, 1855.

HIGH-CLASS COOKERY MADE EASY. [Economical Cookery] By Mrs. J Hart [1880]

PREFATORY NOTE. I have written this book for Young Ladies and inexperienced Cooks, as a simple guide for them in Cookery. I have had a practical cooking-class for some time in various towns, where I have proved my recipes by cooking them for the ladies. I have been asked to form a book of these recipes, as most Cookery Books are not suitable for economical households; and the result is now submitted to the public. I have learnt from experience what is wanted in a kitchen, and therefore the instructions given are such that any one can follow them without difficulty. I intend, as soon as possible, to publish another little work, with additional recipes, as time has failed me to give, in the present publication, all the recipes that I think of importance

Mrs Beeton’s Book of Household Management [1861]

I must frankly own, that if I had known, beforehand, that this book would have cost me the labour which it has, I should never have been courageous enough to commence it. What moved me, in the first instance, to attempt a work like this, was the discomfort and suffering which I had seen brought upon men and women by household mismanagement. I have always thought that there is no more fruitful source of family discontent than a housewife’s badly-cooked dinners and untidy ways. Men are now so well served out of doors,—at their clubs, well-ordered taverns, and dining-houses, that in order to compete with the attractions of these places, a mistress must be thoroughly acquainted with the theory and practice of cookery, as well as be perfectly conversant with all the other arts of making and keeping a comfortable home.

In this book I have attempted to give, under the chapters devoted to cookery, an intelligible arrangement to every recipe, a list of the ingredients, a plain statement of the mode of preparing each dish, and a careful estimate of its cost, the number of people for whom it is sufficient, and the time when it is seasonable. For the matter of the recipes, I am indebted, in some measure, to many correspondents of the “Englishwoman’s Domestic Magazine,” who have obligingly placed at my disposal their formulas for many original preparations. A large private circle has also rendered me considerable service. A diligent study of the works of the best modern writers on cookery was also necessary to the faithful fulfilment of my task. Friends in England, Scotland, Ireland, France, and Germany, have also very materially aided me. I have paid great attention to those recipes which come under the head of “COLD MEAT COOKERY.” But in the department belonging to the Cook I have striven, too, to make my work something more than a Cookery Book, and have, therefore, on the best authority that I could obtain, given an account of the natural history of the animals and vegetables which we use as food. I have followed the animal from his birth to his appearance on the table; have described the manner of feeding him, and of slaying him, the position of his various joints, and, after giving the recipes, have described the modes of carving Meat, Poultry, and Game. Skilful artists have designed the numerous drawings which appear in this work, and which illustrate, better than any description, many important and interesting items. The coloured plates are a novelty not without value.

Besides the great portion of the book which has especial reference to the cook’s department, there are chapters devoted to those of the other servants of the household, who have all, I trust, their duties clearly assigned to them.

Towards the end of the work will be found valuable chapters on the “Management of Children”——”The Doctor,” the latter principally referring to accidents and emergencies, some of which are certain to occur in the experience of every one of us; and the last chapter contains “Legal Memoranda,” which will be serviceable in cases of doubt as to the proper course to be adopted in the relations between Landlord and Tenant, Tax-gatherer and Tax-payer, and Tradesman and Customer.

These chapters have been contributed by gentlemen fully entitled to confidence; those on medical subjects by an experienced surgeon, and the legal matter by a solicitor.

I wish here to acknowledge the kind letters and congratulations I have received during the progress of this work, and have only further to add, that I trust the result of the four years’ incessant labour which I have expended will not be altogether unacceptable to some of my countrymen and countrywomen.

ISABELLA BEETON.

A Plain Cookery Book for the Working Classes BY CHARLES ELMÉ FRANCATELLI, [1852]

Introduction: My object in writing this little book is to show you how you may prepare and cook your daily food, so as to obtain from it the greatest amount of nourishment at the least possible expense; and thus, by skill and economy, add, at the same time, to your comfort and to your comparatively slender means. The Recipes which it contains will afford sufficient variety, from the simple every-day fare to more tasty dishes for the birthday, Christmas-day, or other festive occasions.

THE LADY’S OWN COOKERY BOOK, AND NEW DINNER-TABLE DIRECTORY; [1844]

PREFACE: The Receipts composing the Volume here submitted to the Public have been collected under peculiarly favourable circumstances by a Lady of distinction, whose productions in the lighter department of literature entitle her to a place among the most successful writers of the present day. Moving in the first circles of rank and fashion, her associations have qualified her to furnish directions adapted to the manners and taste of the most refined Luxury; whilst long and attentive observation, and the communications of an extensive acquaintance, have enabled her equally to accommodate them to the use of persons of less ample means and of simpler and more economical habits

English Housewifry by Elizabeth Moxon [1764]

The preface:

It is not doubted but the candid Reader will find the following BOOK in correspondence with the title, which will supersede the necessity of any other recommendation that might be given it.

As the complier of it engaged in the undertaking at the instance and importunity of many persons of eminent account and distinction, so she can truly assure them, and the world, that she has acquitted herself with the utmost care and fidelity.

And she entertains the greater hopes that her performance will meet with the kinder acceptance, because of the good opinion she has been held in by those, her ever honour’d friends, who first excited her to the publication of her BOOK, and who have been long eye-witnesses of her skill and behaviour in the business of her calling.

She has nothing to add, but her humblest thanks to them, and to all others with whom she has received favour and encouragement.

The Accomplisht Cook, or The Art & Mystery of Cookery, by Robert May [1685]

To the Master Cooks, and to such young Practitioners of the Art of Cookery, to whom this Book may be useful.

TO you first, most worthy Artists, I acknowledg one of the chief Motives that made me to adventure this Volume to your Censures, hath been to testifie my gratitude to your experienced Society; nor could I omit to direct it to you, as it hath been my ambition, that you should be sensible of my Proficiency of Endeavours in this Art. To all honest well intending Men of our Profession, or others, this Book cannot but be acceptable, as it plainly and profitably discovers the Mystery of the whole Art; for which, though I may be envied by some that only value their private Interests above Posterity, and the publick good, yet God and my own Conscience would not permit me to bury these my Experiences with my Silver Hairs in the Grave: and that more especially, as the advantages of my Education hath raised me above the Ambitions of others, in the converse I have had with other Nations, who in this Art fall short of what I have known experimented by you my worthy Country men. Howsoever, the French by their Insinuations, not without enough of Ignorance, have bewitcht some of the Gallants of our Nation with Epigram Dishes, smoakt rather than drest, so strangely to captivate the Gusto, theirMushroom’d Experiences for Sauce rather than Diet, for the generality howsoever called A-la-mode, not worthy of being taken notice on. As I live in France, and had the Language and have been an eye-witness of their Cookeries as well, as a Peruser of their Manuscripts, and Printed Authors whatsoever I found good in them, I have inserted in this Volume. I do acknowledg my self not to be a little A4vbeholding to the Italian and Spanish Treatises; though without my fosterage, and bringing up under the Generosities and Bounties of my Noble Patrons and Masters, I could never have arrived to this Experience. To be confined and limited to the narrowness of a Purse, is to want the Materials from which the Artist must gain his knowledge. Those Honourable Persons, my Lord Lumley, and others, with whom I have spent a part of my time, were such whose generous cost never weighed the Expence, so that they might arrive to that right and high esteem they had of their Gusto’s. Whosoever peruses this Volume shall find it amply exemplified in Dishes of such high prices, which only these Noblesses Hospitalities did reach to: I should have sinned against their (to be perpetuated) Bounties, if I had not set down their several varieties, that the Reader might be as well acquainted with what is extraordinary, as what is ordinary in this Art; as I am truly sensible, that some of those things that I have set down will amaze a not thorow-paced Reader in the Art of Cookery, as they are Delicates, never till this time made known to the World.

The Queen-like Closet or Rich Cabinet by Hannah Woolley Stored with all manner of RARE RECEIPTS For Preserving, Candying and Cookery. Very Pleasant and Beneficial to all Ingenious Persons of the FEMALE SEX. [1670] 2nd Edition

To all Ladies, Gentlewomen, and to all other of the Female Sex who do delight in, or be desirous of good Accomplishments.

Ladies and Gentlewomen,

_I Presume those Bookes which have passed from me formerly, have got me some little credit and esteem amongst you.

But there being so much time past since they were Printed, that methinks, I hear some of you say_ I wish Mrs. Wolley would put forth some New Experiments and to say the Truth, I have been importun’d by divers of my Friends and Acquaintance to do so.

I shall not give an Apish Example every Day or Week to follow ridiculous and foolish Fancies, nor could I be too like the Spaniard, always to keep in one Dress: I am not ashamed, nor do I disown what I have already Printed, but some of you being so perfect in your practises, and I very desirous still to serve you, do now present you with this Queen-like Closet: I do assure you it is worthy of the Title it bears, for the very precious things you will find in it.

Thus beseeching your kind Acceptance of this Book, and of my earnest Desires to you, I take my Leave, but shall always be to all who have esteem for me,

Their Faithful and

Humble Servant,

HANNAH WOLLEY.

Ladies, I do here present you (yet)
    That which sure will well content
    A Queen-like Closet rich and brave
    (Such) not many Ladies have:
    Or Cabinet, in which doth set
    Jems richer than in Karkanet;
    (They) only Eies and Fancies please,
    These keep your Bodies in good ease;
    They please the Taste, also the Eye;
    Would I might be a stander by:
    Yet rather I would wish to eat,
    Since ’bout them I my Brains do beat:
    And ’tis but reason you may say,
    If that I come within your way;
    I sit here sad while you are merry,
    Eating Dainties, drinking Perry;
    But I’m content you should so feed,
    So I may have to serve my deed.

Hannah Wolley.

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