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diff --git a/old/12293-8.txt b/old/12293-8.txt new file mode 100644 index 0000000..158f968 --- /dev/null +++ b/old/12293-8.txt @@ -0,0 +1,5730 @@ +The Project Gutenberg eBook, Old Cookery Books and Ancient Cuisine, by +William Carew Hazlitt + + +This eBook is for the use of anyone anywhere at no cost and with +almost no restrictions whatsoever. You may copy it, give it away or +re-use it under the terms of the Project Gutenberg License included +with this eBook or online at www.gutenberg.org + + + + + +Title: Old Cookery Books and Ancient Cuisine + +Author: William Carew Hazlitt + +Release Date: May 7, 2004 [eBook #12293] + +Language: English + +Character set encoding: iso-8859-1 + + +***START OF THE PROJECT GUTENBERG EBOOK OLD COOKERY BOOKS AND ANCIENT +CUISINE*** + + +E-text prepared by David Starner, Alicia Williams, and the Project +Gutenberg Online Distributed Proofreading Team + + + +Note: Project Gutenberg also has an HTML version of this + file which includes the original illustrations. + See 12293-h.htm or 12293-h.zip: + (https://www.gutenberg.org/1/2/2/9/12293/12293-h/12293-h.htm) + or + (https://www.gutenberg.org/1/2/2/9/12293/12293-h.zip) + + + + + +The Book-Lover's Library + +Edited by Henry B. Wheatley, F.S.A. + + + + +OLD COOKERY BOOKS AND ANCIENT CUISINE + +BY + +W. CAREW HAZLITT + +London + +1902 + + + + + + +_THE BOOK-LOVERS LIBRARY_ was first published in the following styles: + +No. 1.--Printed on antique paper, in cloth bevelled with rough edges, +price 4s. 6d. + +No. 2.--Printed on hand-made paper, in Roxburgh, half morocco, with +gilt top: 250 only are printed, for sale in England, price 7s. 6d. + +No. 3.--Large paper edition, on hand-made paper; of which 50 copies +only are printed, and bound in Roxburgh, for sale in England, price £1 +1s. + +There are a few sets left, and can be had on application to the +Publisher. + + + + +INTRODUCTORY + + +Man has been distinguished from other animals in various ways; but +perhaps there is no particular in which he exhibits so marked a +difference from the rest of creation--not even in the prehensile +faculty resident in his hand--as in the objection to raw food, meat, +and vegetables. He approximates to his inferior contemporaries only in +the matter of fruit, salads, and oysters, not to mention wild-duck. +He entertains no sympathy with the cannibal, who judges the flavour of +his enemy improved by temporary commitment to a subterranean +larder; yet, to be sure, he keeps his grouse and his venison till it +approaches the condition of spoon-meat. + +It naturally ensues, from the absence or scantiness of explicit or +systematic information connected with the opening stages of such +inquiries as the present, that the student is compelled to draw his +own inferences from indirect or unwitting allusion; but so long as +conjecture and hypothesis are not too freely indulged, this class of +evidence is, as a rule, tolerably trustworthy, and is, moreover, open +to verification. + +When we pass from an examination of the state of the question as +regarded Cookery in very early times among us, before an even +more valuable art--that of Printing--was discovered, we shall find +ourselves face to face with a rich and long chronological series of +books on the Mystery, the titles and fore-fronts of which are often +not without a kind of fragrance and _goût_. + +As the space allotted to me is limited, and as the sketch left by +Warner of the convivial habits and household arrangements of +the Saxons or Normans in this island, as well as of the monastic +institutions, is more copious than any which I could offer, it may be +best to refer simply to his elaborate preface. But it may be pointed +out generally that the establishment of the Norman sway not only +purged of some of their Anglo-Danish barbarism the tables of the +nobility and the higher classes, but did much to spread among the +poor a thriftier manipulation of the articles of food by a resort to +broths, messes, and hot-pots. In the poorer districts, in Normandy +as well as in Brittany, Duke William would probably find very little +alteration in the mode of preparing victuals from that which was in +use in his day, eight hundred years ago, if (like another Arthur) +he should return among his ancient compatriots; but in his adopted +country he would see that there had been a considerable revolt from +the common saucepan--not to add from the pseudo-Arthurian bag-pudding; +and that the English artisan, if he could get a rump-steak or a leg of +mutton once a week, was content to starve on the other six days. + +Those who desire to be more amply informed of the domestic economy +of the ancient court, and to study the _minutiae_, into which I am +precluded from entering, can easily gratify themselves in the pages +of "The Ordinances and Regulations for the Government of the Royal +Household," 1790; "The Northumberland Household Book;" and the +various printed volumes of "Privy Purse Expenses" of royal and +great personages, including "The Household Roll of Bishop Swinfield +(1289-90)." + +The late Mr. Green, in his "History of the English People" (1880-3, 4 +vols. 8vo), does not seem to have concerned himself about the kitchens +or gardens of the nation which he undertook to describe. Yet, what +conspicuous elements these have been in our social and domestic +progress, and what civilising factors! + +To a proper and accurate appreciation of the cookery of ancient times +among ourselves, a knowledge of its condition in other more or +less neighbouring countries, and of the surrounding influences and +conditions which marked the dawn of the art in England, and its slow +transition to a luxurious excess, would be in strictness necessary; +but I am tempted to refer the reader to an admirable series of papers +which appeared on this subject in Barker's "Domestic Architecture," +and were collected in 1861, under the title of "Our English Home: its +Early History and Progress." In this little volume the author, who +does not give his name, has drawn together in a succinct compass the +collateral information which will help to render the following pages +more luminous and interesting. An essay might be written on the +appointments of the table only, their introduction, development, and +multiplication. + +The history and antiquities of the Culinary Art among the Greeks +are handled with his usual care and skill by M.J.A. St. John in his +"Manners and Customs of Ancient Greece," 1842; and in the _Biblia_ +or Hebrew Scriptures we get an indirect insight into the method of +cooking from the forms of sacrifice. + +The earliest legend which remains to us of Hellenic gastronomy is +associated with cannibalism. It is the story of Pelops--an episode +almost pre-Homeric, where a certain rudimentary knowledge of dressing +flesh, and even of disguising its real nature, is implied in the tale, +as it descends to us; and the next in order of times is perhaps +the familiar passage in the _Odyssey_, recounting the adventures of +Odysseus and his companions in the cave of Polyphemus. Here, again, +we are introduced to a rude society of cave-dwellers, who eat human +flesh, if not as an habitual diet, yet not only without reluctance, +but with relish and enjoyment. + +The _Phagetica_ of Ennius, of which fragments remain, seems to be the +most ancient treatise of the kind in Roman literature. It is supposed +to relate an account of edible fishes; but in a complete state the +work may very well have amounted to a general Manual on the subject. +In relation even to Homer, the _Phagetica_ is comparatively modern, +following the _Odyssey_ at a distance of some six centuries; and in +the interval it is extremely likely that anthropophagy had become +rarer among the Greeks, and that if they still continued to be cooking +animals, they were relinquishing the practice of cooking one another. + +Mr. Ferguson, again, has built on Athenaeus and other authorities a +highly valuable paper on "The Formation of the Palate," and the late +Mr. Coote, in the forty-first volume of "Archaeologia," has a second +on the "Cuisine Bourgeoise" of ancient Rome. These two essays, with +the "Fairfax Inventories" communicated to the forty-eighth volume of +the "Archaeologia" by Mr. Peacock, cover much of the ground which had +been scarcely traversed before by any scientific English inquirer. The +importance of an insight into the culinary economy of the Romans lies +in the obligations under which the more western nations of Europe are +to it for nearly all that they at first knew upon the subject. The +Romans, on their part, were borrowers in this, as in other, sciences +from Greece, where the arts of cookery and medicine were associated, +and were studied by physicians of the greatest eminence; and to Greece +these mysteries found their way from Oriental sources. But the school +of cookery which the Romans introduced into Britain was gradually +superseded in large measure by one more agreeable to the climate and +physical demands of the people; and the free use of animal food, which +was probably never a leading feature in the diet of the Italians as +a community, and may be treated as an incidence of imperial luxury, +proved not merely innocuous, but actually beneficial to a more +northerly race. + +So little is to be collected--in the shape of direct testimony, next +to nothing--of the domestic life of the Britons--that it is only by +conjecture that one arrives at the conclusion that the original diet +of our countrymen consisted of vegetables, wild fruit, the honey of +wild bees--which is still extensively used in this country,--a coarse +sort of bread, and milk. The latter was evidently treated as a very +precious article of consumption, and its value was enhanced by the +absence of oil and the apparent want of butter. Mr. Ferguson supposes, +from some remains of newly-born calves, that our ancestors sacrificed +the young of the cow rather than submit to a loss of the milk; but it +was, on the contrary, an early superstition, and may be, on obvious +grounds, a fact, that the presence of the young increased the yield +in the mother, and that the removal of the calf was detrimental. The +Italian invaders augmented and enriched the fare, without, perhaps, +materially altering its character; and the first decided reformation +in the mode of living here was doubtless achieved by the Saxon and +Danish settlers; for those in the south, who had migrated hither +from the Low Countries, ate little flesh, and indeed, as to certain +animals, cherished, according to Caesar, religious scruples against +it. + +It was to the hunting tribes, who came to us from regions even bleaker +and more exacting than our own, that the southern counties owed the +taste for venison and a call for some nourishment more sustaining than +farinaceous substances, green stuff and milk, as well as a gradual +dissipation of the prejudice against the hare, the goose, and the +hen as articles of food, which the "Commentaries" record. It is +characteristic of the nature of our nationality, however, that while +the Anglo-Saxons and their successors refused to confine themselves +to the fare which was more or less adequate to the purposes of +archaic pastoral life in this island, they by no means renounced their +partiality for farm and garden produce, but by a fusion of culinary +tastes and experiences akin to fusion of race and blood, laid the +basis of the splendid _cuisine_ of the Plantagenet and Tudor periods. +Our cookery is, like our tongue, an amalgam. + +But the Roman historian saw little or nothing of our country except +those portions which lay along or near the southern coast; the rest of +his narrative was founded on hearsay; and he admits that the people in +the interior--those beyond the range of his personal knowledge, more +particularly the northern tribes and the Scots--were flesh-eaters, +by which he probably intends, not consumers of cattle, but of the +venison, game, and fish which abounded in their forests and rivers. +The various parts of this country were in Caesar's day, and very long +after, more distinct from each other for all purposes of communication +and intercourse than we are now from Spain or from Switzerland; and +the foreign influences which affected the South Britons made no mark +on those petty states which lay at a distance, and whose diet was +governed by purely local conditions. The dwellers northward were by +nature hunters and fishermen, and became only by Act of Parliament +poachers, smugglers, and illicit distillers; the province of the male +portion of the family was to find food for the rest; and a pair of +spurs laid on an empty trencher was well understood by the goodman as +a token that the larder was empty and replenishable. + +There are new books on all subjects, of which it is comparatively easy +within a moderate compass to afford an intelligible, perhaps even +a sufficient, account. But there are others which I, for my part, +hesitate to touch, and which do not seem to be amenable to the law +of selection. "Studies in Nidderland," by Mr. Joseph Lucas, is one of +these. It was a labour of love, and it is full of records of singular +survivals to our time of archaisms of all descriptions, culinary and +gardening utensils not forgotten. There is one point, which I may +perhaps advert to, and it is the square of wood with a handle, which +the folk in that part of Yorkshire employed, in lieu of the ladle, for +stirring, and the stone ovens for baking, which, the author tells us, +occur also in a part of Surrey. But the volume should be read as a +whole. We have of such too few. + +Under the name of a Roman epicure, Coelius Apicius, has come down +to us what may be accepted as the most ancient European "Book of +Cookery." I think that the idea widely entertained as to this work +having proceeded from the pen of a man, after whom it was christened, +has no more substantial basis than a theory would have that the +"Arabian Nights" were composed by Haroun al Raschid. Warner, in the +introduction to his "Antiquitates Culinariae," 1791, adduces as a +specimen of the rest two receipts from this collection, shewing how +the Roman cook of the Apician epoch was wont to dress a hog's paunch, +and to manufacture sauce for a boiled chicken. Of the three persons +who bore the name, it seems to be thought most likely that the one who +lived under Trajan was the true godfather of the Culinary Manual. + +One of Massinger's characters (Holdfast) in the "City Madam," 1658, +is made to charge the gourmets of his time with all the sins of +extravagance perpetrated in their most luxurious and fantastic +epoch. The object was to amuse the audience; but in England no "court +gluttony," much less country Christmas, ever saw buttered eggs which +had cost £30, or pies of carps' tongues, or pheasants drenched with +ambergris, or sauce for a peacock made of the gravy of three fat +wethers, or sucking pigs at twenty marks each. + +Both Apicius and our Joe Miller died within £80,000 of being +beggars--Miller something the nigher to that goal; and there was this +community of insincerity also, that neither really wrote the books +which carry their names. Miller could not make a joke or understand +one when anybody else made it. His Roman foregoer, who would certainly +never have gone for his dinner to Clare Market, relished good dishes, +even if he could not cook them. + +It appears not unlikely that the Romish clergy, whose monastic +vows committed them to a secluded life, were thus led to seek some +compensation for the loss of other worldly pleasures in those of the +table; and that, when one considers the luxury of the old abbeys, one +ought to recollect at the same time, that it was perhaps in this case +as it was in regard to letters and the arts, and that we are under a +certain amount of obligation to the monks for modifying the barbarism +of the table, and encouraging a study of gastronomy. + +There are more ways to fame than even Horace suspected. The road to +immortality is not one but manifold. A man can but do what he can. As +the poet writes and the painter fills with his inspiration the +mute and void canvas, so doth the Cook his part. There was formerly +apopular work in France entitled "Le Cuisinier Royal," by MM. Viard +and Fouret, who describe themselves as "Hommes de Bouche." The +twelfth edition lies before me, a thick octavo volume, dated 1805. The +title-page is succeeded by an anonymous address to the reader, at the +foot of which occurs a peremptory warning to pilferers of dishes or +parts thereof; in other words, to piratical invaders of the copyright +of Monsieur Barba. There is a preface equally unclaimed by signatures +or initials, but as it is in the singular number the two _hommes +de bouche_ can scarcely have written it; perchance it was M. Barba +aforesaid, lord-proprietor of these not-to-be-touched treasures; but +anyhow the writer had a very solemn feeling of the debt which he had +conferred on society by making the contents public for the twelfth +time, and he concludes with a mixture of sentiments, which it is very +difficult to define: "Dans la paix de ma conscience, non moins que +dans l'orgueil d'avoir si honorablement rempli cette importante +mission, je m'ecrierai avec le poete des gourmands et des amoureux: + + "Exegi monumentum aere perennius + Non omnis moriar." + + + + + +THE EARLY ENGLISHMAN AND HIS FOOD. + + +William of Malmesbury particularly dwells on the broad line of +distinction still existing between the southern English and the folk +of the more northerly districts in his day, twelve hundred years after +the visit of Caesar. He says that they were then (about A.D. 1150) +as different as if they had been different races; and so in fact they +were--different in their origin, in their language, and their diet. + +In his "Folk-lore Relics of Early Village Life," 1883, Mr. Gomme +devotes a chapter to "Early Domestic Customs," and quotes Henry's +"History of Great Britain" for a highly curious clue to the primitive +mode of dressing food, and partaking of it, among the Britons. Among +the Anglo-Saxons the choice of poultry and game was fairly wide. +Alexander Neckani, in his "Treatise on Utensils (twelfth century)" +gives fowls, cocks, peacocks, the cock of the wood (the woodcock, not +the capercailzie), thrushes, pheasants, and several more; and pigeons +were only too plentiful. The hare and the rabbit were well enough +known, and with the leveret form part of an enumeration of wild +animals (_animalium ferarum_) in a pictorial vocabulary of the +fifteenth century. But in the very early accounts or lists, although +they must have soon been brought into requisition, they are not +specifically cited as current dishes. How far this is attributable to +the alleged repugnance of the Britons to use the hare for the table, +as Caesar apprises us that they kept it only _voluptatis causâ_, it +is hard to say; but the way in which the author of the "Commentaries" +puts it induces the persuasion that by _lepus_ he means not the hare, +but the rabbit, as the former would scarcely be domesticated. + +Neckam gives very minute directions for the preparation of pork for +the table. He appears to have considered that broiling on the grill +was the best way; the gridiron had supplanted the hot stones or +bricks in more fashionable households, and he recommends a brisk fire, +perhaps with an eye to the skilful development of the crackling. He +died without the happiness of bringing his archi-episcopal nostrils in +contact with the sage and onions of wiser generations, and thinks +that a little salt is enough. But, as we have before explained, Neckam +prescribed for great folks. These refinements were unknown beyond the +precincts of the palace and the castle. + +In the ancient cookery-book, the "Menagier de Paris," 1393, which +offers numerous points of similarity to our native culinary lore, the +resources of the cuisine are represented as amplified by receipts +for dressing hedgehogs, squirrels, magpies, and jackdaws--small deer, +which the English experts did not affect, although I believe that the +hedgehog is frequently used to this day by country folk, both here and +abroad, and in India. It has white, rabbit-like flesh. + +In an eleventh century vocabulary we meet with a tolerably rich +variety of fish, of which the consumption was relatively larger in +former times. The Saxons fished both with the basket and the net. +Among the fish here enumerated are the whale (which was largely used +for food), the dolphin, porpoise, crab, oyster, herring, cockle, +smelt, and eel. But in the supplement to Alfric's vocabulary, and in +another belonging to the same epoch, there are important additions +to this list: the salmon, the trout, the lobster, the bleak, with the +whelk and other shell-fish. But we do not notice the turbot, sole, and +many other varieties, which became familiar in the next generation +or so. The turbot and sole are indeed included in the "Treatise on +Utensils" of Neckam, as are likewise the lamprey (of which King John +is said to have been very fond), bleak, gudgeon, conger, plaice, +limpet, ray, and mackerel. + +The fifteenth century, if I may judge from a vocabulary of that date +in Wright's collection, acquired a much larger choice of fish, and +some of the names approximate more nearly to those in modern use. We +meet with the sturgeon, the whiting, the roach, the miller's thumb, +the thomback, the codling, the perch, the gudgeon, the turbot, the +pike, the tench, and the haddock. It is worth noticing also that +a distinction was now drawn between the fisherman and the +fishmonger--the man who caught the fish and he who sold it--_piscator_ +and _piscarius_; and in the vocabulary itself the leonine line is +cited: "Piscator prendit, quod piscarius bene vendit." + +The whale was considerably brought into requisition for gastronomic +purposes. It was found on the royal table, as well as on that of the +Lord Mayor of London. The cook either roasted it, and served it up on +the spit, or boiled it and sent it in with peas; the tongue and the +tail were favourite parts. + +The porpoise, however, was brought into the hall whole, and was carved +or _under-tranched_ by the officer in attendance. It was eaten with +mustard. The _pièce de résistance_ at a banquet which Wolsey gave +to some of his official acquaintances in 1509, was a young porpoise, +which had cost eight shillings; it was on the same occasion that His +Eminence partook of strawberries and cream, perhaps; he is reported to +have been the person who made that pleasant combination fashionable. +The grampus, or sea-wolf, was another article of food which bears +testimony to the coarse palate of the early Englishman, and at +the same time may afford a clue to the partiality for disguising +condiments and spices. But it appears from an entry in his Privy Purse +Expenses, under September 8, 1498, that Henry the Seventh thought a +porpoise a valuable commodity and a fit dish for an ambassador, for on +that date twenty-one shillings were paid to Cardinal Morton's servant, +who had procured one for some envoy then in London, perhaps the French +representative, who is the recipient of a complimentary gratuity of +£49 10s. on April 12, 1499, at his departure from England. + +In the fifteenth century the existing stock of fish for culinary +purposes received, if we may trust the vocabularies, a few accessions; +as, for instance, the bream, the skate, the flounder, and the bake. + +In "Piers of Fulham (14th century)," we hear of the good store of fat +eels imported into England from the Low Countries, and to be had cheap +by anyone who watched the tides; but the author reprehends the growing +luxury of using the livers of young fish before they were large enough +to be brought to the table. + +The most comprehensive catalogue of fish brought to table in the time +of Charles I. is in a pamphlet of 1644, inserted among my "Fugitive +Tracts," 1875; and includes the oyster, which used to be eaten at +breakfast with wine, the crab, lobster, sturgeon, salmon, ling, +flounder, plaice, whiting, sprat, herring, pike, bream, roach, dace, +and eel. The writer states that the sprat and herring were used in +Lent. The sound of the stock-fish, boiled in wort or thin ale till +they were tender, then laid on a cloth and dried, and finally cut into +strips, was thought a good receipt for book-glue. + +An acquaintance is in possession of an old cookery-book which exhibits +the gamut of the fish as it lies in the frying-pan, reducing its +supposed lament to musical notation. Here is an ingenious refinement +and a delicate piece of irony, which Walton and Cotton might have +liked to forestall. + +The 15th century _Nominale_ enriches the catalogue of dishes then in +vogue. It specifies almond-milk, rice, gruel, fish-broth or soup, +a sort of _fricassee_ of fowl, collops, a pie, a pasty, a tart, a +tartlet, a charlet (minced pork), apple-juice, a dish called jussell +made of eggs and grated bread with seasoning of sage and saffron, and +the three generic heads of sod or boiled, roast, and fried meats. In +addition to the fish-soup, they had wine-soup, water-soup, ale-soup; +and the flawn is reinforced by the _froise_. Instead of one Latin +equivalent for a pudding, it is of moment to record that there are now +three: nor should we overlook the rasher and the sausage. It is +the earliest place where we get some of our familiar articles of +diet--beef, mutton, pork, veal--under their modern names; and about +the same time such terms present themselves as "a broth," "a browis," +"a pottage," "a mess." + +Of the dishes which have been specified, the _froise_ corresponded to +an _omelette au lard_ of modern French cookery, having strips of bacon +in it. The tansy was an omelette of another description, made chiefly +with eggs and chopped herbs. As the former was a common dish in the +monasteries, it is not improbable that it was one grateful to the +palate. In Lydgate's "Story of Thebes," a sort of sequel to the +"Canterbury Tales," the pilgrims invite the poet to join the +supper-table, where there were these tasty omelettes: moile, made of +marrow and grated bread, and haggis, which is supposed to be identical +with the Scottish dish so called. Lydgate, who belonged to the +monastery of Bury St. Edmunds, doubtless set on the table at +Canterbury some of the dainties with which he was familiar at home; +and this practice, which runs through all romantic and imaginative +literature, constitutes, in our appreciation, its principal worth. +We love and cherish it for its very sins against chronological and +topographical fitness--its contempt of all unities. Men transferred +local circumstances and a local colouring to their pictures of distant +countries and manners. They argued the unknown from what they saw +under their own eyes. They portrayed to us what, so far as the scenes +and characters of their story went, was undeceivingly false, but what +on the contrary, had it not been so, would never have been unveiled +respecting themselves and their time. + +The expenditure on festive occasions seems, from some of the entries +in the "Northumberland Household Book," to present a strong contrast +to the ordinary dietary allowed to the members of a noble and wealthy +household, especially on fish days, in the earlier Tudor era (1512). +The noontide breakfast provided for the Percy establishment was of a +very modest character: my lord and my lady had, for example, a loaf of +bread, two manchets (loaves of finer bread), a quart of beer and one +of wine, two pieces of salt fish, and six baked herrings or a dish +of sprats. My lord Percy and Master Thomas Percy had half a loaf of +household bread, a manchet, a pottle of beer, a dish of butter, a +piece of salt fish, and a dish of sprats or three white herrings; and +the nursery breakfast for my lady Margaret and Master Ingram Percy was +much the same. But on flesh days my lord and lady fared better, for +they had a loaf of bread, two manchets, a quart of beer and the same +of wine, and half a chine of mutton or boiled beef; while the nursery +repast consisted of a manchet, a quart of beer, and three boiled +mutton breasts; and so on: whence it is deducible that in the Percy +family, perhaps in all other great houses, the members and the ladies +and gentlemen in waiting partook of their earliest meal apart in their +respective chambers, and met only at six to dine or sup. + +The beer, which was an invariable part of the _menu_, was perhaps +brewed from hops which, according to Harrison elsewhere quoted, were, +after a long discontinuance, again coming into use about this time. +But it would be a light-bodied drink which was allotted to the +consumption at all events of Masters Thomas and Ingram Percy, and +even of my Lady Margaret. It is clearly not irrelevant to my object +to correct the general impression that the great families continued +throughout the year to support the strain which the system of keeping +open house must have involved. For, as Warner has stated, there were +intervals during which the aristocracy permitted themselves to unbend, +and shook off the trammels imposed on them by their social rank and +responsibility. This was known as "keeping secret house," or, in other +words, my lord became for a season incognito, and retired to one of +his remoter properties for relaxation and repose. Our kings in some +measure did the same; for they held their revels only, as a rule, at +stated times and places. William I. is said to have kept his Easter +at Winchester, his Whitsuntide at Westminster, and his Christmas at +Gloucester. Even these antique grandees had to work on some plan. It +could not be all mirth and jollity. + +A recital of some of the articles on sale in a baker's or +confectioner's shop in 1563, occurs in Newbery's "Dives Pragmaticus": +simnels, buns, cakes, biscuits, comfits, caraways, and cracknels: and +this is the first occurrence of the bun that I have hitherto been able +to detect. The same tract supplies us with a few other items germane +to my subject: figs, almonds, long pepper, dates, prunes, and nutmegs. +It is curious to watch how by degrees the kitchen department was +furnished with articles which nowadays are viewed as the commonest +necessaries of life. + +In the 17th century the increased communication with the Continent +made us by degrees larger partakers of the discoveries of foreign +cooks. Noblemen and gentlemen travelling abroad brought back with them +receipts for making the dishes which they had tasted in the course +of their tours. In the "Compleat Cook," 1655 and 1662, the beneficial +operation of actual experience of this kind, and of the introduction +of such books as the "Receipts for Dutch Victual" and "Epulario, or +the Italian Banquet," to English readers and students, is manifest +enough; for in the latter volume we get such entries as these: "To +make a Portugal dish;" "To make a Virginia dish;" "A Persian dish;" "A +Spanish olio;" and then there are receipts "To make a Posset the +Earl of Arundel's way;" "To make the Lady Abergavenny's Cheese;" +"The Jacobin's Pottage;" "To make Mrs. Leeds' Cheesecakes;" "The Lord +Conway His Lordship's receipt for the making of Amber Puddings;" "The +Countess of Rutland's receipt of making the Rare Banbury Cake, which +was so much praised as her daughter's (the Right Honourable Lady +Chaworth) Pudding," and "To make Poor Knights"--the last a medley in +which bread, cream, and eggs were the leading materials. + +Warner, however, in the "Additional Notes and Observations" to his +"Antiquitates Culinariae," 1791, expresses himself adversely to +the foreign systems of cookery from an English point of view. +"Notwithstanding," he remarks, "the partiality of our countrymen +to French cookery, yet that mode of disguising meat in this kingdom +(except perhaps in the hottest part of the hottest season of the year) +is an absurdity. It is _here_ the art of _spoiling good meat_. The +same art, indeed, in the South of France; where the climate is much +warmer, and the flesh of the animal lean and insipid, is highly +valuable; it is the art of making _bad meat eatable_." At the same +time, he acknowledges the superior thrift and intelligence of the +French cooks, and instances the frog and the horse. "The frog is +considered in this country as a disgusting animal, altogether unfit +for the purposes of the kitchen; whereas, by the efforts of French +cookery, the thighs of this little creature are converted into a +delicate and estimable dish." So sings, too (save the mark!), _our_ +Charles Lamb, so far back as 1822, after his visit to Paris. It +seems that in Elizabeth's reign a _powdered_, or pickled horse was +considered a suitable dish by a French general entertaining at dinner +some English officers. + +It is difficult to avoid an impression that Warner has some reason, +when he suggests that the immoderate use of condiments was brought +to us by the dwellers under a higher temperature, and was not really +demanded in such a climate as that of England, where meat can be +kept sweet in ordinary seasons, much longer even than in France or in +Italy. But let us bear in mind, too, how different from our own the +old English _cuisine_ was, and how many strange beasts calling for +lubricants it comprehended within its range. + +An edifying insight into the old Scottish _cuisine_ among people of +the better sort is afforded by Fynes Morisoh, in his description of a +stay at a knight's house in North Britain in 1598. + +"Myself," he says, "was at a knight's house, who had many servants +to attend him, that brought in his meat with their heads covered +with blue caps, the table being more than half furnished with great +platters of porridge, each having a little piece of sodden meat; and +when the tables were served, the servants did sit down with us; but +the upper mess, instead of porridge, had a pullet with some prunes in +the broth. And I observed no art of cookery, or furniture of +household stuff, but rather rude neglect of both, though myself and +my companion, sent by the Governor of Berwick upon bordering affairs, +were entertained in the best manner. The Scots ... vulgarly eat +hearth-cakes of oats, but in cities have also wheaten bread, which, +for the most part, was bought by courtiers, gentlemen, and the best +sort of citizens. When I lived at Berwick, the Scots weekly upon the +market day _obtained leave in writing of the governor_ to buy peas and +beans, whereof, as also of wheat, their merchants to this day (1617) +send great quantities from London into Scotland. They drink pure wine, +not with sugar, as the English, yet at feasts they put comfits in the +wine, after the French manner: but they had not our vintners' fraud to +mix their wines." + +He proceeds to say that he noticed no regular inns, with signs hanging +out, but that private householders would entertain passengers on +entreaty, or where acquaintance was claimed. The last statement is +interestingly corroborated by the account which Taylor the Water-Poet +printed in 1618 of his journey to Scotland, and which he termed his +"Penniless Pilgrimage or Moneyless Perambulation," in the course of +which he purports to have depended entirely on private hospitality. + +A friend says: "The Scotch were long very poor. Only their fish, +oatmeal, and whiskey kept them alive. Fish was very cheap." This +remark sounds the key-note of a great English want--cheaper fish. +Of meat we already eat enough, or too much; but of fish we might eat +more, if it could be brought at a low price to our doors. It is a +noteworthy collateral fact that in the Lord Mayor of London's Pageant +of 1590 there is a representation of the double advantage which would +accrue if the unemployed poor were engaged to facilitate and cheapen +the supply of fish to the City; and here we are, three centuries +forward, with the want still very imperfectly answered. + +Besides the bread and oatmeal above named, the bannock played its +part. "The Land o' Cakes" was more than a trim and pretty phrase: +there was in it a deep eloquence; it marked a wide national demand and +supply. + +The "Penny Magazine" for 1842 has a good and suggestive paper on +"Feasts and Entertainments," with extracts from some of the early +dramatists and a woodcut of "a new French cook, to devise fine +kickshaws and toys." One curious point is brought out here in the +phrase "boiled _jiggets_ of mutton," which shews that the French +_gigot_ for a leg of mutton was formerly in use here. Like many other +Gallicisms, it lingered in Scotland down to our own time. + +The cut of the French cook above mentioned is a modern composition; +and indeed some of the excerpts from Ben Jonson and other writers are +of an extravagant and hyperbolical cast,--better calculated to amuse +an audience than to instruct the student. + +Mr. Lucas remarks: "It is probable that we are more dependent upon +animal food than we used to be. In their early days, the present +generation of dalesmen fed almost exclusively upon oatmeal; either as +'hasty-pudding,'--that is, Scotch oatmeal which had been _ground over +again_, so as to be nearly as fine as flour;... or 'lumpy,'--that is, +boiled quickly and not thoroughly stirred; or else in one of the +three kinds of cake which they call 'fermented,' viz., 'riddle cake,' +'held-on cake,' or 'turn-down cake,' which is made from oatcake batter +poured on the 'bak' ston'' from the ladle, and then spread with the +back of the ladle. It does not rise like an oatcake. Or of a fourth +kind called 'clap cake.' They also made 'tiffany cakes' of wheaten +flour, which was separated from the bran by being worked through a +hair-sieve _tiffany_, or _temse_:--south of England _Tammy_,--with a +brush called the _Brush shank_." + + + + +ROYAL FEASTS AND SAVAGE POMP. + + +In Rose's "School of Instructions for the Officers of the Mouth," +1682, the staff of a great French establishment is described as a +Master of the Household, a Master Carver, a Master Butler, a Master +Confectioner, a Master Cook, and a Master Pastryman. The author, who +was himself one of the cooks in our royal kitchen, tells Sir Stephen +Fox, to whom he dedicates his book, that he had entered on it after +he had completed one of a very different nature: "The Theatre of the +World, or a Prospect of Human Misery." + +At the time that the "School of Instructions" was written, the French +and ourselves had both progressed very greatly in the Art of Cookery +and in the development of the _menu_. DelaHay Street, Westminster, +near Bird-Cage Walk, suggests a time when a hedge ran along the +western side of it towards the Park, in lieu of brick or stone walls; +but the fact is that we have here a curious association with the +office, just quoted from Rose, of Master Confectioner. For of the plot +of ground on which the street, or at any rate a portion of it stands, +the old proprieter was Peter DelaHaye, master confectioner of Charles +II. at the very period of the publication of Rose's book. His name +occurs in the title-deeds of one of the houses on the Park side, which +since his day has had only five owners, and has been, since 1840, the +freehold of an old and valued friend of the present writer. + +It may be worth pointing out, that the Confectionery and Pastry were +two distinct departments, each with its superintendent and staff. The +fondness for confections had spread from Italy--which itself in turn +borrowed the taste from the East--to France and England; and, as we +perceive from the descriptions furnished in books, these were often of +a very elaborate and costly character. + +The volume is of the less interest for us, as it is a translation from +the French, and consequently does not throw a direct light on our own +kitchens at this period. But of course collaterally it presents +many features of likeness and analogy, and may be compared with +Braithwaite's earlier view to which I shall presently advert. + +The following anecdote is given in the Epistle to Fox: "Many do +believe the French way of working is cheapest; but let these examine +this book, and then they may see (for their satisfaction) which is the +best husbandry, to extract gold out of herbs, or to make a pottage of +a stone, by the example of two soldiers, who in their quarters were +minded to have a pottage; the first of them coming into a house and +asking for all things necessary to the making of one, was as soon told +that he could have none of these things there, whereupon he went away, +and the other coming in with a stone in his knap-sack, asked only for +a Pot to boil his stone in, that he might make a dish of broth of it +for his supper, which was quickly granted him; and when the stone had +boiled a little while, then he asked for a small bit of beef, then for +a piece of mutton, and so for veal, bacon, etc., till by little and +little he got all things requisite, and he made an excellent pottage +of his stone, at as cheap a rate (it may be) as the cook extracted +Gold from Herbs." + +The kitchen-staff of a noble establishment in the first quarter of the +seventeenth century we glean from Braithwaite's "Rules and Orders for +the Government of the House of an Earl," which, if the "M.L." for whom +the piece was composed was his future wife, Mistress Lawson, cannot +have seen the light later than 1617, in which year they were married. +He specifies--(1) a yeoman and groom for the cellar; (2) a yeoman and +groom for the pantry; (3) a yeoman and groom for the buttery; (3a) +a yeoman for the ewery; (4) a yeoman purveyor; (5) a master-cook, +under-cooks, and three pastry-men; (6) a yeoman and groom in the +scullery, one to be in the larder and slaughter-house; (7) an +achator or buyer; (8) three conducts [query, errand-boys] and three +kitchen-boys. + +The writer also admits us to a rather fuller acquaintance with the +mode in which the marketing was done. He says that the officers, among +other matters, "must be able to judge, not only of the prices, but +also of the goodness of all kinds of corn, cattle, and household +provisions; and the better to enable themselves thereto, are +oftentimes to ride to fairs and great markets, and there to have +conference with graziers and purveyors." The higher officers were to +see that the master was not deceived by purveyors and buyers, and that +other men's cattle did not feed on my lord's pastures; they were to +take care that the clerk of the kitchen kept his day-book "in that +perfect and good order, that at the end of every week or month it be +pied out," and that a true docket of all kinds of provisions be set +down. They were to see that the powdered and salted meats in the +larder were properly kept; and vigilant supervision was to be +exercised over the cellar, buttery, and other departments, even to the +prevention of paring the tallow lights. + +Braithwaite dedicates a section to each officer; but I have only space +to transcribe, by way of sample, the opening portion of his account +of "The Officer of the Kitchen:" "The Master-Cook should be a man of +years; well-experienced, whereby the younger cooks will be drawn the +better to obey his directions. In ancient times noblemen contented +themselves to be served with such as had been bred in their own +houses, but of late times none could please some but Italians and +Frenchmen, or at best brought up in the Court, or under London cooks: +nor would the old manner of baking, boiling, and roasting please them, +but the boiled meats must be after the French fashion, the dishes +garnished about with sugar and preserved plums, the meat covered over +with orangeade, preserved lemons, and with divers other preserved and +conserved stuff fetched from the confectioner's: more lemons and sugar +spent in boiling fish to serve at one meal than might well serve +the whole expense of the house in a day." He goes on to describe and +ridicule the new fashion of placing arms and crests on the dishes. +It seems that all the refuse was the perquisite of the cook and his +subordinates in a regulated proportion, and the same in the bakery and +other branches; but, as may be supposed, in these matters gross abuses +were committed. + +In the "Leisure Hour" for 1884 was printed a series of papers on +"English Homes in the Olden Times." The eleventh deals with service +and wages, and is noticed here because it affords a recital of the +orders made for his household by John Harington the elder in 1566, +and renewed by John Harington the younger, his son and High Sheriff of +Somersetshire, in 1592. + +This code of domestic discipline for an Elizabethan establishment +comprises the observance of decorum and duty at table, and is at least +as valuable and curious as those metrical canons and precepts which +form the volume (Babees' Book) edited for the Early English Text +Society, etc. + +There is rather too general a dislike on the part of antiquaries +to take cognisance of matter inserted in popular periodicals upon +subjects of an archaeological character; but of course the loose and +flimsy treatment which this class of topics as a rule receives in the +light literature of the day makes it perilous to use information +so forthcoming in evidence or quotation. Articles must be rendered +palatable to the general reader, and thus become worthless for all +readers alike. + +Most of the early descriptions and handbooks of instruction turn, +naturally enough, on the demands and enjoyments of the great. There +is in the treatise of Walter de Bibblesworth (14th century) a very +interesting and edifying account of the arrangement of courses for +some important banquet. The boar's head holds the place of honour in +the list, and venison follows, and various dishes of roast. Among the +birds to be served up we see cranes, peacocks, swans, and wild geese; +and of the smaller varieties, fieldfares, plovers, and larks. There +were wines; but the writer only particularises them as white and red. +The haunch of venison was then an ordinary dish, as well as kid. They +seem to have sometimes roasted and sometimes boiled them. Not only +the pheasant and partridge appear, but the quail,--which is at present +scarcer in this country, though so plentiful abroad,--the duck, and +the mallard. + +In connection with venison, it is worth while to draw attention to a +passage in the "Privy Purse Expenses of Henry VII" where, under date +of August 8, 1505, a woman receives 3s. _d_. for clarifying deer suet +for the King. This was not for culinary but for medicinal purposes, as +it was then, and much later, employed as an ointment. + +Both William I. and his son the Red King maintained, as Warner shews +us, a splendid table; and we have particulars of the princely scale on +which an Abbot of Canterbury celebrated his installation in 1309. The +archbishops of those times, if they exercised inordinate authority, at +any rate dispensed in a magnificent manner among the poor and infirm +a large portion of their revenues. They stood in the place of +corporations and Poor Law Guardians. Their very vices were not without +a certain fascinating grandeur; and the pleasures of the table in +which our Plantagenet rulers outstripped even their precursors, the +earlier sovereigns of that line, were enhanced and multiplied by the +Crusades, by the commencing spirit of discovery, and by the foreign +intermarriages, which became so frequent. + +A far more thorough conquest than that which the day of Hastings +signalised was accomplished by an army of a more pacific kind, which +crossed the Channel piecemeal, bringing in their hands, not bows and +swords, but new dishes and new wines. These invaders of our soil were +doubtless welcomed as benefactors by the proud nobles of the Courts +of Edward II. and Richard II., as well as by Royalty itself; and the +descriptions which have been preserved of the banquets held on special +occasions in the fourteenth and fifteenth centuries, and even of +the ordinary style of living of some, make our City feasts of to-day +shrink into insignificance. But we must always remember that the +extravagant luxury and hospitality of the old time were germane and +proper to it, component parts of the social framework. + +It is to be remarked that some of the most disturbed and disastrous +epochs in our annals are those to which we have to go for records of +the greatest exploits in gastronomy and lavish expenditure of public +money on comparatively unprofitable objects. During the period from +the accession of Rufus to the death of Henry III., and again under the +rule of Richard II., the taste for magnificent parade and sumptuous +entertainments almost reached its climax. The notion of improving the +condition of the poor had not yet dawned on the mind of the governing +class; to make the artizan and the operative self-supporting and +self-respectful was a movement not merely unformulated, but a +conception beyond the parturient faculty of a member of the Jacquerie. +The king, prince, bishop, noble, of unawakened England met their +constituents at dinner in a fashion once or twice in a lifetime, and +when the guests below the salt had seen the ways of greatness, they +departed to fulfil their several callings. These were political +demonstrations with a clear and (for the age) not irrational object; +but for the modern public dinner, over which I should be happy to +preach the funeral sermon, there is not often this or any other plea. + +The redistribution of wealth and its diversion into more fruitful +channels has already done something for the people; and in the future +that lies before some of us they will do vastly more. All Augaea will +be flushed out. + +In some of these superb feasts, such as that at the marriage of Henry +IV. in 1403, there were two series of courses, three of meat, and +three of fish and sweets; in which we see our present fashion to a +certain extent reversed. But at the coronation of Henry V. in 1421, +only three courses were served, and those mixed. The taste for what +were termed "subtleties," had come in, and among the dishes at this +latter entertainment occur, "A pelican sitting on her nest with her +young," and "an image of St. Catherine holding a book and disputing +with the doctors." These vagaries became so common, that few dinners +of importance were accounted complete without one or more. + +One of the minor "subtleties" was a peacock in full panoply. The bird +was first skinned, and the feathers, tail, head and neck having been +laid on a table, and sprinkled with cummin, the body was roasted, +glazed with raw egg-yolk, and after being left to cool, was sewn back +again into the skin and so brought to table as the last course. In +1466, at the enthronement of Archbishop Nevile, no fewer than 104 +peacocks were dressed. + +The most extraordinary display of fish at table on a single occasion +took place at the enthronement feast of Archbishop Warham in 1504; it +occurred on a fast day; and consequently no meat, poultry or game was +included in the _menu_, but ample compensation was found in the lavish +assortment of confectionery, spices, beer and wine. Of wine of various +vintages there were upwards of 12 pipes, and of ale and beer, thirty +tuns, including four of London and six of Kentish ale. + +The narratives which have descended to us of the prodigious banquets +given on special occasions by our early kings, prelates and nobles, +are apt to inspire the general reader with an admiration of the +splendid hospitality of bygone times. But, as I have already +suggested, these festivities were occasional and at long intervals, +and during the intervening space the great ones and the small ones of +mediaeval and early England did not indulge in this riotous sort of +living, but "kept secret house," as it was called, both after their +own fashion. The extremes of prodigality and squalor were more +strongly marked among the poorer classes while this country was in +a semi-barbarous condition, and even the aristocracy by no means +maintained the same domestic state throughout the year as their modern +representatives. There are not those ostentatious displays of wealth +and generosity, which used to signalise certain political events, such +as the coronation of a monarch or the enthronement of a primate; the +mode of living has grown more uniform and consistent, since between +the vilain and his lord has interposed himself the middle-class +Englishman, with a hand held out to either. + +A few may not spend so much, but as a people we spend more on our +table. A good dinner to a shepherd or a porter was formerly more than +a nine days' wonder; it was like a beacon seen through a mist. But now +he is better fed, clothed and housed than the bold baron, whose serf +he would have been in the good old days; and the bold baron, on his +part, no longer keeps secret house unless he chooses, and observes, if +a more monotonous, a more secure and comfortable tenor of life. +This change is of course due to a cause which lies very near the +surface--to the gradual effacement of the deeply-cut separating lines +between the orders of society, and the stealthy uprise of the class, +which is fast gathering all power into its own hands. + + + + +COOKERY BOOKS + +PART 1. + + +The first attempt to illustrate this branch of the art must have been +made by Alexander Neckam in the twelfth century; at least I am not +aware of any older treatise in which the furniture and apparatus of a +kitchen are set forth. + +But it is needless to say that Neckam merely dealt with a theme, which +had been familiar many centuries before his time, and compiled +his treatise, "De Utensilibus," as Bishop Alfric had his earlier +"Colloquy," with an educational, not a culinary, object, and with a +view to facilitate the knowledge of Latin among his scholars. It is +rather interesting to know that he was a native of St. Albans, where +he was born in 1157. He died in 1217, so that the composition of this +work of his (one of many) may be referred to the close of the twelfth +century. Its value is, in a certain sense, impaired by the almost +complete absence of English terms; Latin and (so called) Norman-French +being the languages almost exclusively employed in it. But we have +good reason indeed to be grateful for such a legacy in any shape, and +when we consider the tendency of ways of life to pass unchanged from +one generation to another, and when we think how many archaic and +(to our apprehension) almost barbarous fashions and forms in domestic +management lingered within living recollection, it will not be +hazarding much after all to presume that the particulars so casually +supplied to us by Neckam have an application alike before and after. + +A student should also bear in mind that, from the strong Anglo-Gallic +complexion of our society and manners in early days, the accounts +collected by Lacroix are largely applicable to this country, and the +same facilities for administering to the comfort and luxuries of the +table, which he furnishes as illustrative of the gradual outgrowth +from the wood fire and the pot-au-feu among his own countrymen, +or certain classes of them, may be received as something like +counterparts of what we possessed in England at or about the same +period. We keep the phrase _pot luck_; but, for most of those who use +it, it has parted with all its meaning. This said production of +Neckam of St. Albans purports to be a guide to young housekeepers. +It instructs them what they will require, if they desire to see their +establishment well-ordered; but we soon perceive that the author has +in view the arrangements indispensable for a family of high rank and +pretensions; and it may be once for all observed that this kind of +literature seldom proves of much service to us in an investigation +of the state of the poor, until we come to the fifteenth or even +sixteenth century, when the artists of Germany and the Low Countries +began to delineate those scenes in industrial and servile life, which +time and change have rendered so valuable. + +Where their superiors in rank regarded them as little more than +mechanical instruments for carrying on the business of life, the poor +have left behind them few records of their mode of sustenance and of +the food which enabled them to follow their daily toil. The anecdotes, +whatever they may be worth, of Alfred and the burnt cakes, and of Tom +Thumb's mamma and her Christmas pudding, made in a bowl, of which the +principal material was pork, stand almost alone; for we get, wherever +we look, nothing but descriptions by learned and educated men of their +equals or betters, how they fed and what they ate--their houses, their +furniture, their weapons, and their dress. Even in the passage of +the old fabliau of the "King and the Hermit" the latter, instead of +admitting us to a cottage interior, has a servant to wait on him, +brings out a tablecloth, lights two candles, and lays before his +disguised guest venison and wine. In most of our own romances, and +in the epics of antiquity, we have to be satisfied with vague and +splendid generalisations. We do not learn much of the dishes which +were on the tables, how they were cooked, and how [Greek: oi polloi] +cooked theirs. + +The _Liber_, or rather _Codex, Princeps_ in the very long and +extensive catalogue of works on English Cookery, is a vellum roll +called the Form of Cury, and is supposed to have been written about +the beginning of the fifteenth century by the master-cook of Richard +II who reigned from 1377 to 1399, and spent the public money in eating +and drinking, instead of wasting it, as his grandfather had done, in +foreign wars. This singular relic was once in the Harleian collection, +but did not pass with the rest of the MSS. to the British Museum; +it is now however, Additional MS. 5016, having been presented to the +Library by Mr. Gustavus Brander. It was edited by Dr. Pegge in 1780, +and included by Warner in his "Antiquitates Culinariae," 1791. The +Roll comprises 196 receipts, and commences with a sort of preamble +and a Table of Contents. In the former it is worth noting that the +enterprise was undertaken "by the assent and avisement of masters of +physic and of philosophy, that dwelled in his (Richard II.'s) court," +which illustrates the ancient alliance between medicine and cookery, +which has not till lately been dissolved. The directions were to +enable a man "to make common pottages and common meats for the +household, as they should be made, craftily and wholesomely;" so that +this body of cookery was not prepared exclusively for the use of the +royal kitchen, but for those who had not the taste or wish for what +are termed, in contra-distinction, in the next sentence, "curious +pottages, and meats, and subtleties." It is to be conjectured that +copies of such a MS. were multiplied, and from time to time reproduced +with suitable changes; but with the exception of two different, though +nearly coeval, collections, embracing 31 and 162 receipts or nyms, and +also successively printed by Pegge and Warner, there is no apparent +trace of any systematic compilation of this nature at so remote a +date. + +The "Form of Cury" was in the 28 Eliz., in the possession of the +Stafford family, and was in that year presented to the Queen by +Edward, Lord Stafford, as is to be gathered from a Latin memorandum +at the end, in his lordship's hand, preserved by Pegge and Warner in +their editions. The fellowship between the arts of healing and cooking +is brought to our recollection by a leonine verse at the end of one of +the shorter separate collections above described:-- + + "Explicit de Coquina + Quae est optima Medicina." + +The "Form of Cury" will amply remunerate a study. It presents the +earliest mention, so far as I can discern, of olive oil, cloves, mace, +and gourds. In the receipts for making Aigredouce and Bardolf, sugar, +that indispensable feature in the _cuisine_, makes its appearance; but +it does so, I should add, in such a way as to lead to the belief +that the use of sugar was at this time becoming more general. The +difficulty, at first, seems to have been in refining it. We encounter +here, too, onions under the name borrowed from the French instead of +the Anglo-Saxon form "ynne leac"; and the prescriptions for making +messes of almonds, pork, peas, and beans are numerous. There is +"Saracen sauce," moreover, possibly as old as the Crusades, and pig +with sage stuffing (from which it was but one step to duck). More +than one species of "galantine" was already known; and I observe the +distinction, in one of the smaller collections printed by Warner, +between the tartlet formed of meat and the tartlet _de fritures_, +of which the latter approaches more nearly our notion. The imperfect +comprehension of harmonies, which is illustrated by the prehistoric +bag-pudding of King Arthur, still continued in the unnatural union of +flesh with sweets. It is now confined to the cottage, whence Arthur +may have himself introduced it at Court and to the Knights of the +Round Table. + +In this authority, several of the dishes were to be cooked in _white +grease_, which Warner interprets into _lard_; others demanded olive +oil; but there is no allusion to butter. Among the receipts are +some for dishes "in gravy"; rabbits and chickens were to be treated +similarly; and the gravy appears to have consisted merely of the +broth in which they were boiled, and which was flavoured with pounded +almonds, powdered ginger, and sugar. + +The "Liber Cure Cocorum," which is apparently extant only in a +fifteenth century MS., is a metrical treatise, instructing its +readers how to prepare certain dishes, condiments and accessories; and +presents, for the most part, a repetition of what has already occurred +in earlier and more comprehensive undertakings. It is a curious aid +to our knowledge of the manner in which the table of the well-to-do +Englishman was furnished in the time of Henry VI., and it is so far +special, that it deals with the subject more from a middle-class point +of view than the "Regulations for the Royal Household," and other +similar compilations, which I have to bring under notice. The names, +as usual, are often misleading, as in _blanc manger_, which is very +different from our _blanc-mange_; and the receipt for "goose in a hog +pot" leaves one in doubt as to its adaptability to the modern +palate. The poetical ambition of the author has proved a source of +embarrassment here and there; and in the receipt "for a service on a +fish-day" the practitioner is prayed within four lines to cover his +white herring for God's sake, and lay mustard over his red for God's +love, because _sake_ and _love_ rhyme with _take_ and _above_. + +The next collection of receipts, which exists in a complete and +homogeneous shape, is the "Noble Book of Cookery," of which an early +MS. copy at Holkham was edited in 1882 by Mrs. Napier, but which +had already been printed by Pynson in 1500, and subsequently by +his successor, John Byddell. This interesting and important volume +commences with a series of descriptions of certain royal and noble +entertainments given on various occasions from the time of Henry +IV. to that of Edward IV., and then proceeds to furnish a series +of directions for the cook of a king's or prince's household; for, +although both at the outset and the conclusion we are told that these +dishes were calculated for all estates, it is abundantly obvious that +they were such as never then, or very long subsequently, reached much +lower than the court or the aristocracy. There is a less complete copy +here of the feast at the enthronement of Archbishop Nevile. I regret +that neither of the old printed copies is at present accessible. That +of 1500 was formerly in the library at Bulstrode, and I was given by +the late Mr. Bradshaw to understand that the same copy (no other +being known) is probably at Longleat. By referring to Herbert's +"Typographical Antiquities," anyone may see that, if his account (so +far as it goes) is to be trusted, the printed copy varies from the +Holkham MS. in many verbal particulars, and gives the date of Nevile's +Feast as 1465. + +The compilation usually known as the "Book of St. Albans," 1486, is, +perhaps, next to the "Noble Book of Cookery," the oldest receptacle +for information on the subject in hand. The former, however, deals +with cookery only in an incidental and special way. Like Arnold's +Chronicle, the St. Albans volume is a miscellany comprehending nearly +all the matters that were apt to interest the few educated persons +who were qualified to peruse its pages; and amid a variety of allied +topics we come here across a catalogue of terms used in speaking of +certain dishes of that day. The reference is to the prevailing methods +of dressing and carving. A deer was said to be broken, a cony unlaced, +a pheasant, partridge, or quail winged, a pigeon or a woodcock +thighed, a plover minced, a mallard unbraced. They spoke of a salmon +or a gurnard as chined, a sole as loined, a haddock as sided, an eel +as trousoned, a pike as splatted, and a trout as gobbeted. + +It must, I think, be predicated of Tusser's "Husbandry," of which the +last edition published in the writer's lifetime is that of 1580, that +it seems rather to reproduce precepts which occur elsewhere than to +supply the reader with the fruits of his own direct observation. But +there are certain points in it which are curious and original. He +tells the ploughman that, after confession on Shrove Tuesday, he may +go and thresh the fat hen, and if he is blindfold, kill her, and then +dine on fritters and pancakes. At other times, seed-cakes, wafers, and +other light confections. + +It appears to have been usual for the farmer at that date to allow his +hinds roast meat twice a week, on Sundays and on Thursday nights; but +perhaps this was a generous extreme, as Tusser is unusually liberal in +his ideas. + +Tobias Venner, a Somersetshire man, brought out in 1620 his "Via Recta +ad Vitam Longam." He was evidently a very intelligent person, and +affords us the result of his professional experience and personal +observation. He considered two meals a day sufficient for all +ordinary people,--breakfast at eleven and supper at six (as at the +universities); but he thought that children and the aged or infirm +could not be tied by any rule. He condemns "bull's beef" as rank, +unpleasant, and indigestible, and holds it best for the labourer; +which seems to indicate more than anything else the low state of +knowledge in the grazier, when Venner wrote: but there is something +beyond friendly counsel where our author dissuades the poor from +eating partridges, because they are calculated to promote asthma. +"Wherefore," he ingenuously says, "when they shall chance to meet with +a covey of young partridges, they were much better to bestow them upon +such, for whom they are convenient!" + +Salmon, turbot, and sturgeon he also reckoned hard of digestion, and +injurious, if taken to excess; nor does he approve of herrings and +sprats; and anchovies he characterises as the meat of drunkards. It is +the first that we have heard of them. + +He was not a bad judge of what was palatable, and prescribes as an +agreeable and wholesome meal a couple of poached eggs with a little +salt and vinegar, and a few corns of pepper, some bread and butter, +and a draught of pure claret. He gives a receipt--the earliest I have +seen in print--for making metheglin or hydromel. He does not object +to furmety or junket, or indeed to custards, if they are eaten at +the proper seasons, and in the middle or at the end of meals. But he +dislikes mushrooms, and advises you to wash out your mouth, and rub +your teeth and gums with a dry cloth, after drinking milk. + +The potato, however, he praises as nutritious and pleasant to the +taste, yet, as Gerarde the herbalist also says, flatulent. Venner +refers to a mode of sopping them in wine as existing in his time. They +were sometimes roasted in the embers, and there were other ways of +dressing them. John Forster, of Hanlop, in Bucks, wrote a pamphlet in +1664 to shew that the more extended cultivation of this root would be +a great national benefit. + +Venner, who practised in the spring and autumn at Bath as a physician, +had no relish for the poorer classes, who did not fare well at the +hands of their superiors in any sense in the excellent old days. But +he liked the Quality, in which he embraced the Universities, and he +tenders them, among other little hints, the information that green +ginger was good for the memory, and conserve of roses (not the salad +of roses immortalised by Apuleius) was a capital posset against +bed-time. "A conserve of rosemary and sage," says he, "to be often +used by students, especially mornings fasting, doth greatly delight +the brain." + +The military ascendency of Spain did not fail to influence the +culinary civilisation of those countries to which it temporarily +extended its rule; and in a Venetian work entitled "Epulario, or the +Italian Banquet," printed in 1549, we recognise the Spanish tone which +had in the sixteenth century communicated itself to the cookery of the +Peninsula, shewing that Charles V. and his son carried at least one +art with them as an indemnity for the havoc which they committed. + +The nursery rhyme of "Sing a song of sixpence" receives a singular and +diverting illustration from the pages of this "Epulario," where occurs +a receipt "to make Pies that the Birds may be alive in them, and fly +out when it is cut up." Some of the other more salient beads relate +to the mode of dressing sundry dishes in the Roman and Catalonian +fashion, and teach us how to seethe gourds, as they did in Spain, and +to make mustard after the manner of Padua. + +I propose here to register certain contributions to our acquaintance +with early culinary ideas and practices, which I have not specifically +described:-- + +1. The Book of Carving. W. de Worde. 4to, 1508, 1513. Reprinted down +to 1613. + +2. A Proper New Book of Cookery. 12mo, 1546. Often reprinted. It is a +recension of the "Book of Cookery," 1500. + +3. The Treasury of Commodious Conceits and Hidden Secrets. By John +Partridge. 12mo, 1580, 1586; and under the title of "Treasury of +Hidden Secrets," 4to, 1596, 1600, 1637, 1653. + +4. A Book of Cookery. Gathered by A.W. 12mo, 1584, 1591, etc. + +5. The Good Housewife's Jewel. By Thomas Dawson. In two Parts, 12mo, +1585. A copy of Part 2 of this date is in the British Museum. + +6. The Good Housewife's Treasury. 12 mo, 1588. + +7. Cookery for all manner of Dutch Victual. Licensed in 1590, but not +otherwise known. + +8. The Good Housewife's Handmaid for the Kitchen. 8vo, 1594. + +9. The Ladies' Practice; or, a plain and easy direction for ladies and +gentlewomen. By John Murrell. Licensed in 1617. Printed in 1621, and +with additions in 1638, 1641, and 1650. + +10. A Book of Cookery. By George Crewe. Licensed in 1623, but not +known. + +11. A Closet for Ladies and Gentlewomen. 12mo, 1630. + +12. The Ladies' Cabinet Opened. By Patrick, Lord Ruthven. 4to, 1639; +8vo, 1655. + +13. A Curious Treasury of Twenty Rare Secrets. Published by La +Fountaine, an expert Operator. 4to, 1649. + +14. A New Dispensatory of Fourty Physical Receipts. Published by +Salvatore Winter of Naples, an expert Operator. 4to, 1649. Second +edition, enlarged: same date. + +The three last are rather in the class of miscellanies. + +15. Health's Improvement; or, Rules comprising the discovering the +Nature, Method, and Manner of preparing all sorts of Food used in this +Nation. By Thomas Muffet (or Moffat), M.D. Corrected and enlarged by +Christopher Bennett, M.D. 4to, 1655. + +16. The Queen's Closet opened. Incomparable secrets in physick, +chirurgery, Preserving, Candying, and Cookery.... Transcribed from the +true copies of her Majesties own Receipt Books. By W.M., one of her +late Servants.... London, 1655, 8vo. The same, corrected and revised, +with many new and large Additions. 8vo, 1683. + +17. The Perfect Cook: being the most exact directions for the making +all kinds of pastes, with the perfect way teaching how to raise, +season, and make all sorts of pies.... As also the Perfect English +Cook.... To which is added the way of dressing all manner of Flesh. By +M. Marmette. London, 1686, 12mo. + +The writer of the "French Gardener," of which I have had occasion to +say a good deal in my small volume on that subject, also produced, +"Les Délices de la Campagne," which Evelyn excused himself from +translating because, whatever experience he had in the garden, he had +none, he says, in the shambles; and it was for those who affected +such matters to get it done, but not by him who did the "French Cook" +[Footnote: I have not seen this book, nor is it under that title +in the catalogue of the British Museum]. He seems to imply that the +latter, though an excellent work in its way, had not only been marred +in the translation, but was not so practically advantageous to us +as it might have been, "for want of skill in the kitchen"--in +other words, an evil, which still prevails, was then appreciated +by intelligent observers--the English cook did not understand her +business, and the English mistress, as a rule, was equally ignorant. + +One of the engravings in the "French Gardener" represents women +rolling out paste, preparing vegetables, and boiling conserves. + +There is a rather quaint and attractive class of miscellaneous +receipt-books, not made so on account of any particular merit in +their contents, but by reason of their association with some person +of quality. MS. Sloane 1367, is a narrow octavo volume, for instance, +containing "My Lady Rennelagh's choice Receipts: as also some of Capt. +Gvilt's, who valued them above gold." The value for us, however, is +solely in the link with a noble family and the little touch about the +Captain. There are many more such in public and private libraries, and +they are often mere transcripts from printed works--select assemblages +of directions for dressing food and curing diseases, formed for +domestic reference before the advent of Dr. Buchan, and Mrs. Glasse, +and Mrs. Rundell. + +Among a valuable and extensive assemblage of English and foreign +cookery books in the Patent Office Library, Mr. Ordish has obligingly +pointed out to me a curious 4to MS., on the cover of which occurs, +"Mrs. Mary Dacres her booke, 1666." + +Even in the latter part of the seventeenth century the old-fashioned +dishes, better suited to the country than to the Court taste, remained +in fashion, and are included in receipt-books, even in that published +by Joseph Cooper, who had been head-cook to Charles I, and who styles +his 1654 volume "The Art of Cookery Refined and Augmented." He gives +us two varieties of oatmeal pudding, French barley pudding, and hasty +pudding in a bag. There is a direction for frying mushrooms, which +were growing more into favour at the table than in the days when +Castelvetri, whom I cite in my monograph on Gardening, was among us. +Another dainty is an ox-palate pie. + +Cooper's Preface is quaint, and surely modest enough. "Though the +cheats," says he, "of some preceding pieces that treated on this +subject (whose Title-pages, like the contents of a weekly Pamphlet, +promised much more than the Books performed) may have provided this +but a cold intertainment at its first coming abroad; yet I know it +will not stay long in the world, before every rational reader will +clear it of all alliance to those false pretenders. Ladies, forgive +my confidence, if I tell you, that I know this piece will prove your +favourite." + +Yet Cooper's performance, in spite of its droll, self-complacent vein +in the address to the Reader, is a judicious and useful selection, +and was, in fact, far more serviceable to the middle-class gentry +than some of those which had gone before. It adapted itself to sundry +conditions of men; but it kept in view those whose purses were not +richly lined enough to pay for dainties and "subtleties." It is +pleasant to see that, after the countless centuries which had run +out since Arthur, the bag-pudding and hot-pot maintained their +ground--good, wholesome, country fare. + +After the fall of the Monarchy in 1648, the _chef de cuisine_ probably +found his occupation gone, like a greater man before him; and the +world may owe to enforced repose this condescension to the pen by the +deposed minister of a king. + +Soon after the Restoration it was that some Royalist brought out a +small volume called "The Court and Kitchen of Elizabeth, commonly +called Joan Cromwell, the wife of the late Usurper, truly described +and represented," 12mo, 1664. Its design was to throw ridicule on the +parsimony of the Protectoral household. But he recites some excellent +dishes which made their appearance at Oliver's table: Dutch puddings, +Scotch collops of veal, marrow puddings, sack posset, boiled +woodcocks, and warden pies. He seems to have understood that eight +stone of beef were cooked every morning for the establishment, and all +scraps were diligently collected, and given alternately to the poor +of St. Margaret's, Westminster, and St. Martin's-in-the-Fields. The +writer acquaints us that, when the Protector entertained the French +ambassador and the Parliament, after the Sindercome affair, he only +spent £1,000 over the banquet, of which the Lady Protectress managed +to save £200. Cromwell and his wife, we are told, did not care for +suppers, but contented themselves with eggs and slops. + +A story is told here of Cromwell and his wife sitting down to a +loin of veal, and his calling for an orange, which was the sauce he +preferred to that joint, and her highness telling him that he could +not have one, for they were not to be had under a groat. + +The Mansion House still retains the ancient usage of distributing the +relics of a great feast afterwards among the poor, as Cromwell is said +just above to have made a rule of his household. It was a practice +highly essential in the absence of any organised system of relief. + +The reign of Charles II., which witnessed a relationship with France +of a very different character from that which the English maintained +during the Plantagenet and earlier Tudor rule, was favourable to the +naturalisation of the Parisian school of cookery, and numerous works +were published at and about that time, in which the development of +knowledge in this direction is shown to have taken place _pari passu_ +with the advance in gardening and arboriculture under the auspices of +Evelyn. + +In 1683 we come to a little volume entitled "The Young Cook's +Monitor," by M.H., who made it public for the benefit of his (or her) +scholars; a really valuable and comprehensive manual, wherein, without +any attempt at arrangement, there is an ample assemblage of directions +for preparing for the table all kinds of joints, made dishes, soups +and broths, _frigacies_, puddings, pies, tarts, tansies, and jellies. +Receipts for pickling are included, and two ways are shown how we +should treat turnips after this wise. Some of the ingredients +proposed for sauces seem to our ears rather prodigious. In one place +a contemporary peruser has inserted an ironical calculation in MS. to +the effect that, whereas a cod's head could be bought for fourpence, +the condiments recommended for it were not to be had for less than +nine shillings. The book teaches us to make Scotch collops, to pickle +lemons and quinces, to make French bread, to collar beef, pork, or +eels, to make gooseberry fool, to dry beef after the Dutch fashion, to +make sack posset two ways, to candy flowers (violets, roses, etc.) for +salads, to pickle walnuts like mangoes, to make flummery, to make a +carp pie, to pickle French beans and cucumbers, to make damson and +quince wines, to make a French pudding (called a Pomeroy pudding), to +make a leg of pork like a Westphalia ham, to make mutton as beef, and +to pot beef to eat like venison. + +These and many other precepts has M.H. left behind him; and a sort of +companion volume, printed a little before, goes mainly over the same +ground, to wit, "Rare and Excellent Receipts Experienced and Taught +by Mrs. Mary Tillinghast, and now printed for the use of her scholars +only," 1678. The lady appealed to a limited constituency, like M.H.; +but her pages, such as they are (for there are but thirty), are now +_publici juris_. The lesson to be drawn from Mistress Tillinghast's +printed labours is that, among our ancestors in 1678, pies and pasties +of all sorts, and sweet pastry, were in increased vogue. Her slender +volume is filled with elucidations on the proper manufacture of paste +of various sorts; and in addition to the pies designated by M.H. we +encounter a Lombard pie, a Battalia pie, an artichoke pie, a potato +(or secret) pie, a chadron [Footnote: A pie chiefly composed of a +calf's chadroa] pie, and a herring pie. The fair author takes care +to instruct us as to the sauces or dressings which are to accompany +certain of her dishes. + +"The Book of Cookery," 1500, of which there was a reprint by John +Byddell about 1530 was often republished, with certain modifications, +down to 1650, under the titles of "A Proper New Book of Cookery," +or "The Book of Cookery." Notwithstanding the presence of many +competitors, it continued to be a public favourite, and perhaps +answered the wants of those who did not desire to see on their tables +the foreign novelties introduced by travellers, or advertised in +collections of receipts borrowed from other languages. + +In fact, the first half of the seventeenth century did not witness +many accessions to the store of literature on this subject. But from +the time of the Commonwealth, the supply of works of reference for the +housekeeper and the cook became much more regular and extensive. In +1653, Selden's friend, the Countess of Kent, brought out her "Choice +Manual of Physic and Chirurgery," annexing to it receipts for +preserving and candying; and there were a few others, about the same +time, of whose works I shall add here a short list:-- + +1. The Accomplished Cook. By Robert May. 8vo, 1660. Fifth edition, +8vo, 1685. + +2. The Whole Body of Cookery Dissected. By Will. Rabisha. 8vo, 1661. + +3. The Queen-like Closet: a Rich Cabinet, stored with all manner of +rare receipts. By Hannah Wolley. 8vo, 1670. + +4. The True Way of Preserving and Candying, and making several sorts +of Sweetmeats. Anon. 8vo, 1681. + +5. The Complete Servant-Maid. 12 mo, 1682-3. + +6. A Choice Collection of Select Remedies.... Together with excellent +Directions for Cooking, and also for Preserving and Conserving. By G. +Hartman [a Chemist]. 8vo, 1684. + +7. A Treatise of Cleanness in Meats and Drinks, of the Preparation of +Food, etc. By Thomas Tryon. 4to, 1682. + +8. The Genteel Housekeeper's Pastime; or, The mode of Carving at the +Table represented in a Pack of Playing Cards. 8vo, 1693. + +9. A New Art of Brewing Beer, Ale, and other sorts of Liquors. By T. +Tryon. 12mo, 1690-91. + +10. The Way to get Wealth; or, A New and Ready Way to make +twenty-three sorts of Wines, equal to that of France ... also to make +Cyder.... By the same. 12mo, 1702. + +11. A Treatise of Foods in General. By Louis Lemery. Translated into +English. 8vo, 1704. + +12. England's Newest Way in all sorts of Cookery. By Henry Howard, +Free Cook of London. Second edition, 8vo, 1708. + +13. Royal Cookery; or, the Complete Court-Cook. By Patrick Lamb, Esq., +near 50 years Master-Cook to their late Majesties King Charles II., +King James II., King William, Mary, and to her present Majesty, Queen +Anne. 8vo, 1710. Third edition, 8vo, 1726. + +14. The Queen's Royal Cookery. By J. Hall, Free Cook of London. 12mo, +1713-15. + +15. Mrs. Mary Eales' Receipts, Confectioner to her late Majesty, Queen +Anne. 8vo, 1718. + +16. A Collection of three hundred Receipts in Cookery, Physic, and +Surgery. In two parts, 8vo, 1729. + +17. The Complete City and Country Cook. By Charles Carter. 8vo, 1732. + +18. The Complete Housewife. Seventh edition, 8vo, 1736. + +19. The Complete Family Piece: A very choice Collection of Receipts. +Second edition, 8vo, 1737. + +20. The Modern Cook. By Vincent La Chapelle, Cook to the Prince of +Orange. Third edition. 8vo, 1744. + +21. A Treatise of all sorts of Foods. By L. Lemery. Translated by D. +Hay, M.D. 8vo, 1745. + +This completes the list of books, so far as they have fallen in my +way, or been pointed out by the kindness of friends, down to the +middle of the last century. + +It was probably Charles, Duke of Bolton (1698-1722), who was at one +time Lord-Lieutenant of Ireland, and who in the beginning of his ducal +career, at all events, resided in St. James's Street, that possessed +successively as head-cooks John Nott and John Middleton. To each of +these artists we owe a volume of considerable pretensions, and the +"Cook's and Confectioner's Dictionary," 1723, by the former, is +positively a very entertaining and cyclopedic publication. Nott +inscribes his book "To all Good Housewives," and declares that he +placed an Introduction before it merely because fashion had made it +as strange for a book to appear without one as for a man to be seen +in church without a neckcloth or a lady without a hoop-petticoat. He +congratulates himself and his readers on living in a land flowing with +milk and honey, quotes the saw about God sending meat and somebody +else sending cooks, and accounts for his omission of pigments by +saying, like a gallant man, that his countrywomen little needed such +things. Nott opens with _Some Divertisements in Cookery, us'd at +Festival-Times, as Twelfth-Day, etc._, which are highly curious, +and his dictionary itself presents the novelty of being arranged, +lexicon-wise, alphabetically. He seems to have been a fairly-read and +intelligent man, and cites, in the course of his work, many celebrated +names and receipts. Thus we have:--To brew ale Sir Jonas Moore's way; +to make Dr. Butler's purging ale; ale of health and strength, by the +Viscount St. Albans; almond butter the Cambridge way; to dress a leg +of mutton _à la Dauphine_; to dress mutton the Turkish way; to stew +a pike the City way. Dr. Twin's, Dr. Blacksmith's, and Dr. Atkin's +almond butter; an amber pudding, according to the Lord Conway's +receipt; the Countess of Rutland's Banbury cake; to make Oxford cake; +to make Portugal cakes; and so on. Nott embraces every branch of his +subject, and furnishes us with bills of fare for every month of the +year, terms and rules of carving, and the manner of setting out +a dessert of fruits and sweetmeats. There is a singular process +explained for making China broth, into which an ounce of china is +to enter. Many new ways had been gradually found of utilising the +materials for food, and vegetables were growing more plentiful. The +carrot was used in soups, puddings, and tarts. Asparagus and spinach, +which are wanting in all the earlier authorities, were common, and the +barberry had come into favour. We now begin to notice more frequent +mention of marmalades, blanc-manges, creams, biscuits, and sweet +cakes. There is a receipt for a carraway cake, for a cabbage pudding, +and for a chocolate tart. + +The production by his Grace of Bolton's other _chef_, John Middleton, +is "Five Hundred New Receipts in Cookery, Confectionary, Pastry, +Preserving, Conserving, Pickling," and the date is 1734. Middleton +doubtless borrowed a good deal from his predecessor; but he also +appears to have made some improvements in the science. We have here +the methods, to dress pikes _à la sauce Robert_, to make blackcaps +(apples baked in their skins); to make a Wood Street cake; to make +Shrewsbury cakes; to dress a leg of mutton like a gammon of bacon; +to dress eggs _à la Augemotte_; to make a dish of quaking pudding of +several colours; to make an Italian pudding, and to make an Olio. The +eye seems to meet for the first time with hasty pudding, plum-porridge +(an experiment toward the solidification of the older plum-broth), +rolled beef-steaks, samphire, hedgehog cream (so called from its +shape, currants being used for the eyes, and cut almonds for the +bristles), cocks'-combs, orange, spinach and bean tarts, custards +in cups (the 1723 book talks of jellies served on china plates), and +lastly, jam--the real jam of these days, made to last, as we are +told, the whole year. There is an excellent prescription for making +elderberry wine, besides, in which Malaga raisins are to be largely +used. "In one year," says our _chef_, "it will be as good and as +pleasant as French wine." + +Let us extract the way "to make Black-caps":--"Take a dozen of good +pippins, cut them in halves, and take out the cores; then place them +on a right Mazarine dish with the skins on, the cut side downwards; +put to them a very little water, scrape on them some loaf sugar, put +them in a hot oven till the skins are burnt black, and your apples +tender; serve them on Plates strew'd over with sugar." + +Of these books, I select the preface to "The Complete Housewife," by +E. Smith, 1736, because it appears to be a somewhat more ambitious +endeavour in an introductory way than the authors of such undertakings +usually hazard. From the last paragraph we collect that the writer was +a woman, and throughout she makes us aware that she was a person of +long practical experience. Indeed, as the volume comprehends a variety +of topics, including medicines, Mrs. or Miss Smith must have been +unusually observant, and have had remarkable opportunities of making +herself conversant with matters beyond the ordinary range of culinary +specialists. I propose presently to print a few samples of her +workmanship, and a list of her principal receipts in that section of +the book with which I am just now concerned. First of all, here is the +Preface, which begins, as we see, by a little piece of plagiarism from +Nott's exordium:-- + + +"_PREFACE._ + +"It being grown as unfashionable for a book now to appear in publick +without a preface, as for a lady to appear at a ball without a +hoop-petticoat, I shall conform to custom for fashion-sake, and not +through any necessity. The subject being both common and universal, +needs no arguments to introduce it, and being so necessary for the +gratification of the appetite, stands in need of no encomiums +to allure persons to the practice of it; since there are but few +now-a-days who love not good eating and drinking. Therefore I entirely +quit those two topicks; but having three or four pages to be filled +up previous to the subject it self, I shall employ them on a subject I +think new, and not yet handled by any of the pretenders to the art of +cookery; and that is, the antiquity of it; which if it either instruct +or divert, I shall be satisfied, if you are so. + +"Cookrey, confectionary, &c., like all other sciences and arts, had +their infancy, and did not arrive at a state of maturity but by slow +degrees, various experiments, and a long tract of time: for in the +infant-age of the world, when the new inhabitants contented themselves +with the simple provision of nature, viz. the vegetable diet, the +fruits and production of the teeming ground, as they succeeded one +another in their several peculiar seasons, the art of cookery was +unknown; apples, nuts, and herbs, were both meat and sauce, and +mankind stood in no need of any additional sauces, ragoes, &c., but a +good appetite; which a healthful and vigorous constitution, a clear, +wholesome, odoriferous air, moderate exercise, and an exemption from +anxious cares, always supplied them with. + +"We read of no palled appetites, but such as proceeded from the decays +of nature by reason of an advanced old age; but on the contrary a +craving stomach, even upon a death-bed, as in Isaac: nor no sicknesses +but those that were both the first and the last, which proceeded from +the struggles of nature, which abhorred the dissolution of soul and +body; no physicians to prescribe for the sick, nor no apothecaries +to compound medicines for two thousand years and upwards. Food and +physick were then one and the same thing. + +"But when men began to pass from a vegetable to an animal diet, and +feed on flesh, fowls, and fish, then seasonings grew necessary, both +to render it more palatable and savoury, and also to preserve that +part which was not immediately spent from stinking and corruption: and +probably salt was the first seasoning discover'd; for of salt we read, +Gen. xiv. + +"And this seems to be necessary, especially for those who were +advanced in age, whose palates, with their bodies, had lost their +vigour as to taste, whose digestive faculty grew weak and impotent; +and thence proceeded the use of soops and savoury messes; so that +cookery then began to become a science, though luxury had not brought +it to the height of an art. Thus we read, that Jacob made such +palatable pottage, that Esau purchased a mess of it at the extravagant +price of his birthright. And Isaac, before by his last will and +testament he bequeathed his blessing to his son Esau, required him +to make some savoury meat, such as his soul loved, i.e., such as was +relishable to his blunted palate. + +"So that seasonings of some sort were then in use; though whether +they were salt, savoury herbs, or roots only; or spices, the fruits +of trees, such as pepper, cloves, nutmeg; bark, as cinnamon; roots, as +ginger, &c., I shall not determine. + +"As for the methods of the cookery of those times, boiling or stewing +seems to have been the principal; broiling or roasting the next; +besides which, I presume scarce any other were used for two thousand +years and more; for I remember no other in the history of Genesis. + +"That Esau was the first cook, I shall not presume to assert; for +Abraham gave order to dress a fatted calf; but Esau is the first +person mentioned that made any advances beyond plain dressing, as +boiling, roasting, &c. For though we find indeed, that Rebecca his +mother was accomplished with the skill of making savoury meat as +well as he, yet whether he learned it from her, or she from him, is a +question too knotty for me to determine. + +"But cookery did not long remain a simple science, or a bare piece +of housewifry or family ceconomy, but in process of time, when luxury +entered the world, it grew to an art, nay a trade; for in I Sam. viii. +13. when the Israelites grew fashionists, and would have a king, that +they might be like the rest of their neighbours, we read of cooks, +confectioners, &c. + +"This art being of universal use, and in constant practice, has been +ever since upon the improvement; and we may, I think, with good reason +believe, is arrived at its greatest height and perfection, if it +is not got beyond it, even to its declension; for whatsoever new, +upstart, out-of-the-way messes some humourists have invented, such as +stuffing a roasted leg of mutton with pickled herring, and the like, +are only the sallies of a capricious appetite, and debauching rather +than improving the art itself. + +"The art of cookery, &c., is indeed diversified according to the +diversity of nations or countries; and to treat of it in that latitude +would fill an unportable volume; and rather confound than improve +those that would accomplish themselves with it. I shall therefore +confine what I have to communicate within the limits of practicalness +and usefulness, and so within the compass of a manual, that shall +neither burthen the hands to hold, the eyes in reading, nor the mind +in conceiving. + +"What you will find in the following sheets, are directions generally +for dressing after the best, most natural, and wholesome manner, such +provisions as are the product of our own country, and in such a manner +as is most agreeable to English palates: saving that I have so far +temporized, as, since we have to our disgrace so fondly admired the +French tongue, French modes, and also French messes, to present you +now and then with such receipts of French cookery, as I think may not +be disagreeable to English palates. + +"There are indeed already in the world various books that treat on +this subject, and which bear great names, as cooks to kings, princes, +and noblemen, and from which one might justly expect something more +than many, if not most of these I have read, perform, but found +my self deceived in my expectations; for many of them to us are +impracticable, others whimsical, others unpalatable, unless to +depraved palates; some unwholesome, many things copied from old +authors, and recommended without (as I am persuaded) the copiers ever +having had any experience of the palatableness, or had any regard to +the wholesomness of them; which two things ought to be the standing +rules, that no pretenders to cookery ought to deviate from. And I +cannot but believe, that those celebrated performers, notwithstanding +all their professions of having ingenuously communicated their art, +industriously concealed their best receipts from the publick. + +"But what I here present the world with is the product of my own +experience, and that for the space of thirty years and upwards; during +which time I have been constantly employed in fashionable and noble +families, in which the provisions ordered according to the following +directions, have had the general approbation of such as have been at +many noble entertainments. + +"These receipts are all suitable to English constitutions and +English palates, wholesome, toothsome, all practicable and easy to +be performed. Here are those proper for a frugal, and also for a +sumptuous table, and if rightly observed, will prevent the spoiling +of many a good dish of meat, the waste of many good materials, the +vexation that frequently attends such mismanagements, and the curses +not unfrequently bestowed on cooks with the usual reflection, that +whereas God sends good meat, the devil sends cooks. + +"As to those parts that treat of confectionary, pickles, cordials, +English wines, &c., what I have said in relation to cookery is equally +applicable to them also. + +"It is true, I have not been so numerous in receipts as some who have +gone before me, but I think I have made amends in giving none but what +are approved and practicable, and fit either for a genteel or a noble +Table; and altho' I have omitted odd and fantastical messes, yet I +have set down a considerable number of receipts. + +"The treatise is divided into ten parts: cookery contains above an +hundred receipts, pickles fifty, puddings above fifty, pastry above +forty, cakes forty, creams and jellies above forty, preserving an +hundred, made wines forty, cordial waters and powders above seventy, +medicines and salves above two hundred; in all near eight hundred. + +"I have likewise presented you with schemes engraven on copper-plates +for the regular disposition or placing the dishes of provision on the +table according to the best manner, both for summer and winter, first +and second courses, &c. + +"As for the receipts for medicines, salves, ointments, good in several +diseases, wounds, hurts, bruises, aches, pains, &c., which amount to +above two hundred, they are generally family receipts, that have never +been made publick; excellent in their kind, and approved remedies, +which have not been obtained by me without much difficulty; and of +such efficacy in distempers, &c., to which they are appropriated, that +they have cured when all other means have failed; and a few of them +which I have communicated to a friend, have procured a very handsome +livelihood. + +"They are very proper for those generous, charitable, and Christian +gentlewomen that have a disposition to be serviceable to their poor +country neighbours, labouring under any of the afflicted circumstances +mentioned; who by making the medicines, and generously contributing +as occasions offer, may help the poor in their afflictions, gain +their good-will and wishes, entitle themselves to their blessings and +prayers, and also have the pleasure of seeing the good they do in this +world, and have good reason to hope for a reward (though not by way of +merit) in the world to come. + +"As the whole of this collection has cost me much pains and a thirty +years' diligent application, and I have had experience of their use +and efficacy, I hope they will be as kindly accepted, as by me they +are generously offered to the publick: and if they prove to the +advantage of many, the end will be answered that is proposed by her +that is ready to serve the publick in what she may." + + + + +COOKERY BOOKS. + +PART II. + +SELECT EXTRACTS FROM AN EARLY RECEIPT-BOOK. + + +The earliest school of English Cookery, which had such a marked +Anglo-Norman complexion, has been familiarised to us by the +publication of Warner's _Antiquitates Culinaricae_, 1791, and more +recently by the appearance of the "Noble Book of Cookery" in Mrs. +Napier's edition, not to mention other aids in the same way, which are +accessible; and it seemed to be doing a better service, when it became +a question of selecting a few specimens of old receipts, to resort +to the representative of a type of culinary philosophy and sentiment +somewhere midway between those which have been rendered easy of +reference and our own. I have therefore given in the few following +pages, in a classified shape, some of the highly curious contents of +E. Smith's "Compleat Housewife," 1736, which maybe securely taken to +exhibit the state of knowledge in England upon this subject in the +last quarter of the seventeenth century and first quarter of the +succeeding one. In the work itself no attempt at arrangement is +offered. + + +I.--MEAT, POULTRY, ETC. + +_To make Dutch-beef_:--Take the lean part of a buttock of beef raw; +rub it well with brown sugar all over, and let it lie in a pan or tray +two or three hours, turning it three or four times; then salt it well +with common salt and salt-petre, and let it lie a fortnight, turning +it every day; then roll it very strait in a coarse cloth, and put it +in a cheese-press a day and a night, and hang it to dry in a chimney. +When you boil it, you must put it in a cloth: when 'tis cold, it will +cut out into shivers as Dutch-beef. + +_To dry Mutton to cut out in Shivers as Dutch-Beef_:--Take a middling +leg of mutton, then take half a pound of brown sugar, and rub it hard +all over your mutton, and let it lie twenty-four hours; then take an +ounce and half of saltpetre, and mix it with a pound of common salt, +and rub that all over the mutton every other day, till 'tis all on, +and let it lie nine days longer; keep the place free from brine, then +hang it up to dry three days, then smoke it in a chimney where wood is +burnt; the fire must not be too hot; a fortnight will dry it. Boil +it like other hams, and when 'tis cold, cut it out in shivers like +Dutch-beef. + +_To stuff a Shoulder or Leg of Mutton with Oysters_:--Take a little +grated bread, some beef-suet, yolks of hard eggs, three anchovies, +a bit of an onion, salt and pepper, thyme and winter-savoury, twelve +oysters, some nutmeg grated; mix all these together, and shred them +very fine, and work them up with raw eggs like a paste, and stuff your +mutton under the skin in the thickest place, or where you please, and +roast it; and for sauce take some of the oyster-liquor, some claret, +two or three anchovies, a little nutmeg, a bit of an onion, the rest +of the oysters: stew all these together, then take out the onion, and +put it under the mutton. + +_To marinade a Leg of Lamb_:--Take a leg of lamb, cut it in pieces the +bigness of a half-crown; hack them with the back of a knife; then take +an eschalot, three or four anchovies, some cloves, mace, nutmeg, all +beaten; put your meat in a dish, and strew the seasoning over it, and +put it in a stew-pan, with as much white-wine as will cover it, and +let it be two hours; then put it all together in a frying-pan, and let +it be half enough; then take it out and drain it through a colander, +saving the liquor, and put to your liquor a little pepper and salt, +and half a pint of gravy; dip your meat in yolks of eggs, and fry it +brown in butter; thicken up your sauce with yolks of eggs and +butter, and pour it in the dish with your meat: lay sweet-breads and +forc'd-meat balls over your meat; dip them in eggs, and fry them. +Garnish with lemon. + +_A Leg of Mutton à-la-Daube_:--Lard your meat with bacon through, but +slant-way; half roast it; take it off the spit, and put it in a small +pot as will boil it; two quarts of strong broth, a pint of white-wine, +some vinegar, whole spice, bay-leaves, green onions, savoury, +sweet-marjoram; when 'tis stew'd enough, make sauce of some of the +liquor, mushrooms, lemon cut like dice, two or three anchovies: +thicken it with browned butter. Garnish with lemon. + +_To fry Cucumbers for Mutton Sauce_:--You must brown some butter in a +pan, and cut the cucumbers in thin slices; drain them from the water, +then fling them into the pan, and when they are fried brown, put in a +little pepper and salt, a bit of an onion and gravy, and let them stew +together, and squeeze in some juice of lemon; shake them well, and put +them under your mutton. + +_To make Pockets_:--Cut three slices out of a leg of veal, the length +of a finger, the breadth of three fingers, the thickness of a thumb, +with a sharp penknife; give it a slit through the middle, leaving the +bottom and each side whole, the thickness of a straw; then lard the +top with small fine lards of bacon; then make a forc'd-meat of marrow, +sweet-breads, and lamb-stones just boiled, and make it up after 'tis +seasoned and beaten together with the yolks of two eggs, and put it +into your pockets as if you were filling a pincushion; then sew up the +top with fine thread, flour them, and put melted butter on them, and +bake them; roast three sweet-breads to put between, and serve them +with gravy-sauce. + +_To make a Florendine of Veal_:--Take the kidney of a loin of veal, +fat and all, and mince it very fine; then chop a few herbs, and put to +it, and add a few currants; season it with cloves, mace, nutmeg, and +a little salt; and put in some yolks of eggs, and a handful of grated +bread, a pippin or two chopt, some candied lemon-peel minced small, +some sack, sugar, and orange-flower-water. Put a sheet of puff-paste +at the bottom of your dish; put this in, and cover it with another; +close it up, and when 'tis baked, scrape sugar on it; and serve it +hot. + +_To make a Tureiner_:--Take a china pot or bowl, and fill it as +follows: at the bottom lay some fresh butter; then put in three or +four beef-steaks larded with bacon; then cut some veal-steaks from +the leg; hack them, and wash them over with the yolk of an egg, and +afterwards lay it over with forc'd-meat, and roll it up, and lay it +in with young chickens, pigeons and rabbets, some in quarters, some in +halves; sweet-breads, lamb-stones, cocks-combs, palates after they +are boiled, peeled, and cut in slices: tongues, either hogs or +calves, sliced, and some larded with bacon: whole yolks of hard eggs, +pistachia-nuts peeled, forced balls, some round, some like an olive, +lemon sliced, some with the rind on, barberries and oysters: season +all these with pepper, salt, nutmeg, and sweet-herbs, mix'd together +after they are cut very small, and strew it on every thing as you put +it in your pot: then put in a quart of gravy, and some butter on the +top, and cover it close with a lid of puff-paste, pretty thick. Eight +hours will bake it. + +_To make Hams of Pork like Westphalia_:--To two large hams, or three +small ones, take three pounds of common salt, and two pounds and half +of brown coarse sugar; mix both together, and rub it well into the +hams, and let them lie seven days, turning them every day, and rub the +salt in them, when you turn them; then take four ounces of salt-petre +beat small, and mix with two handfuls of common salt, and rub that +well in your hams, and let them lie a fortnight longer: then hang them +up high in a chimney to smoke. + +_To make a Ragoo of Pigs-Ears_:--Take a quantity of pigs-ears, and +boil them in one half wine and the other water; cut them in small +pieces, then brown a little butter, and put them in, and a pretty deal +of gravy, two anchovies, an eschalot or two, a little mustard, and +some slices of lemon, some salt, and nutmeg; stew all these together, +and shake it up thick. Garnish the dish with barberries. + +_To collar a Pig_:--Cut off the head of your pig; then cut the body +asunder; bone it, and cut two collars off each side; then lay it in +water to take out the blood; then take sage and parsley, and shred +them very small, and mix them with pepper, salt, and nutmeg, and strew +some on every side, or collar, and roll it up, and tye it with coarse +tape; so boil them in fair water and salt, till they are very tender: +put two or three blades of mace in the kettle, and when they are +enough, take them up, and lay them in something to cool; strain out +some of the liquor, and add to it some vinegar and salt, a little +white-wine, and three or four bay-leaves; give it a boil up, and when +'tis cold put it to the collars, and keep them for use. + +_A Fricasy of Double Tripe_:--Cut your tripe in slices, two inches +long, and put it into a stew-pan; put to it a quarter of a pound of +capers, as much samphire shred, half a pint of strong broth, as much +white-wine, a bunch of sweet-herbs, a lemon shred small; stew all +these together till 'tis tender; then take it off the fire, and +thicken up the liquor with the yolks of three or four eggs, a little +parsley boiled green and chopp'd, some grated nutmeg and salt; shake +it well together. Serve it on sippets. Garnish with lemon. + +_To pot a Swan_:--Bone and skin your swan, and beat the flesh in a +mortar, taking out the strings as you beat it; then take some clear +fat bacon, and beat with the swan, and when 'tis of a light flesh +colour, there is bacon enough in it; and when 'tis beaten till 'tis +like dough, 'tis enough; then season it with pepper, salt, cloves, +mace, and nutmeg, all beaten fine; mix it well with your flesh, and +give it a beat or two all together; then put it in an earthen pot, +with a little claret and fair water, and at the top two pounds of +fresh butter spread over it; cover it with coarse paste, and bake it +with bread; then turn it out into a dish, and squeeze it gently to get +out the moisture; then put it in a pot fit for it; and when 'tis cold, +cover it over with clarified butter, and next day paper it up. In this +manner you may do goose, duck, or beef, or hare's flesh. + +_To make a Poloe_:--Take a pint of rice, boil it in as much water as +will cover it; when your rice is half boiled, put in your fowl, with a +small onion, a blade or two of mace, some whole pepper, and some salt; +when 'tis enough, put the fowl in the dish, and pour the rice over it. + +_To make a Pulpatoon of Pigeons_:--Take mushrooms, palates, oysters, +sweet-breads, and fry them in butter; then put all these into a strong +gravy; give them a heat over the fire, and thicken up with an egg and +a bit of butter; then half roast six or eight pigeons, and lay them +in a crust of forc'd-meat as follows: scrape a pound of veal, and two +pounds of marrow, and beat it together in a stone mortar, after 'tis +shred very fine; then season it with salt, pepper, spice, and put in +hard eggs, anchovies and oysters; beat all together, and make the +lid and sides of your pye of it; first lay a thin crust into your +pattipan, then put on your forc'd-meat; then lay an exceeding thin +crust over them; then put in your pigeons and other ingredients, with +a little butter on the top. Bake it two hours. + +_To keep Green Peas till Christmas_:--Shell what quantity you please +of young peas; put them in the pot when the water boils; let them have +four or five warms; then first pour them into a colander, and then +spread a cloth on a table, and put them on that, and dry them well +in it: have bottles ready dry'd, and fill them to the necks, and pour +over them melted mutton-fat, and cork them down very close, that no +air come to them: set them in your cellar, and when you use them, put +them into boiling water, with a spoonful of fine sugar, and a good +piece of butter: and when they are enough, drain and butter them. + + +II.--MEAT PIES AND PUDDINGS. + +_A Battalia Pye_:--Take four small chickens, four squab pigeons, four +sucking rabbets; cut them in pieces, season them with savoury spice, +and lay 'em in the pye, with four sweet-breads sliced, and as many +sheep's-tongues, two shiver'd palates, two pair of lamb-stones, twenty +or thirty coxcombs, with savoury-balls and oysters. Lay on butter, and +close the pye. A lear. + +_To make an Olio Pye_:--Make your pye ready; then take the thin +collops of the but-end of a leg of veal; as many as you think will +fill your pye; hack them with the back of a knife, and season them +with pepper, salt, cloves, and mace; wash over your collops with +a bunch of feathers dipped in eggs, and have in readiness a good +hand-full of sweet-herbs shred small; the herbs must be thyme, +parsley, and spinage; and the yolks of eight hard eggs, minced, and a +few oysters parboiled and chopt; some beef-suet shred very fine. +Mix these together, and strew them over your collops, and sprinkle +a little orange-flower-water on them, and roll the collops up very +close, and lay them in your pye, strewing the seasoning that is left +over them; put butter on the top, and close up your pye; when 'tis +drawn, put in gravy, and one anchovy dissolved in it, and pour it in +very hot: and you may put in artichoke-bottoms and chesnuts, if you +please, or sliced lemon, or grapes scalded, or what else is in season; +but if you will make it a right savoury pye leave them out. + +_To make a Lumber Pye_:--Take a pound and a half of veal, parboil it, +and when 'tis cold chop it very small, with two pound of beef-suet, +and some candied orange-peel; some sweet-herbs, as thyme, +sweet-marjoram, and an handful of spinage; mince the herbs small +before you put them to the other; so chop all together, and a pippin +or two; then add a handful or two of grated bread, a pound and a half +of currants, washed and dried; some cloves, mace, nutmeg, a little +salt, sugar and sack, and put to all these as many yolks of raw eggs, +and whites of two, as will make it a moist forc'd-meat; work it with +your hands into a body, and make it into balls as big as a turkey's +egg; then having your coffin made put in your balls. Take the marrow +out of three or four bones as whole as you can: let your marrow lie a +little in water, to take out the blood and splinters; then dry it, and +dip it in yolk of eggs; season it with a little salt, nutmeg grated, +and grated bread; lay it on and between your forc'd-meat balls, and +over that sliced citron, candied orange and lemon, eryngo-roots, +preserved barberries; then lay on sliced lemon, and thin slices of +butter over all; then lid your pye, and bake it; and when 'tis drawn, +have in readiness a caudle made of white-wine and sugar, and thicken'd +with butter and eggs, and pour it hot into your pye. + +_Very fine Hogs Puddings_:--Shred four pounds of beef-suet very fine, +mix with it two pounds of fine sugar powder'd, two grated nutmegs, +some mace beat, and a little salt, and three pounds of currants wash'd +and pick'd; beat twenty-four yolks, twelve whites of eggs, with a +little sack; mix all well together, and fill your guts, being clean +and steep'd in orange-flower-water; cut your guts quarter and half +long, fill them half full; tye at each end, and again thus oooo. Boil +them as others, and cut them in balls when sent to the table. + +_To make Plumb-Porridge_:--Take a leg and shin of beef to ten gallons +of water, boil it very tender, and when the broth is strong, strain it +out, wipe the pot, and put in the broth again; slice six penny-loaves +thin, cutting off the top and bottom; put some of the liquor to it, +cover it up, and let it stand a quarter of an hour, and then put it in +your pot, let it boil a quarter of an hour, then put in five pounds of +currants, let them boil a little, and put in five pounds of raisins, +and two pounds of prunes, and let them boil till they swell; then put +in three quarters of an ounce of mace, half an ounce of cloves, two +nutmegs, all of them beat fine, and mix it with a little liquor cold, +and put them in a very little while, and take off the pot, and put in +three pounds of sugar, a little salt, a quart of sack, and a quart of +claret, the juice of two or three lemons; you may thicken with sagoe +instead of bread, if you please; pour them into earthen pans, and keep +them for use. + + +III.--SWEET-PUDDINGS, PIES, ETC. + +_To make New-College Puddings_:--Grate a penny stale loaf, and put to +it a like quantity of beef-suet finely shred, and a nutmeg grated, a +little salt, some currants, and then beat some eggs in a little sack, +and some sugar, and mix all together, and knead it as stiff as for +manchet, and make it up in the form and size of a turkey-egg, but a +little flatter; then take a pound of butter, and put it in a dish, and +set the dish over a clear fire in a chafing-dish, and rub your butter +about the dish till 'tis melted; put your puddings in, and cover the +dish, but often turn your puddings, until they are all brown alike, +and when they are enough, scrape sugar over them, and serve them up +hot for a side dish. + +You must let the paste lie a quarter of an hour before you make up +your puddings. + +_To make a Spread-Eagle pudding_:--Cut off the crust of three +half-penny rolls, then slice them into your pan; then set three pints +of milk over the fire, make it scalding hot, but not boil; so pour it +over your bread, and cover it close, and let it stand an hour; then +put in a good spoonful of sugar, a very little salt, a nutmeg grated, +a pound of suet after 'tis shred, half a pound of currants washed and +picked, four spoonfuls of cold milk, ten eggs, but five of the whites; +and when all is in, stir it, but not till all is in; then mix it well, +butter a dish; less than an hour will bake it. + +_To make a Cabbage Pudding_:--Take two pounds of the lean part of a +leg of veal; take of beef-suet the like quantity; chop them together, +then beat them together in a stone mortar, adding to it half a little +cabbage, scalded, and beat that with your meat; then season it with +mace and nutmeg, a little pepper and salt, some green gooseberries, +grapes, or barberries in the time of year. In the winter put in a +little verjuice; then mix all well together, with the yolks of four or +five eggs well beaten; then wrap it up in green cabbage leaves; tye a +cloth over it, boil it an hour: melt butter for sauce. + +_To make a Calf's Foot Pudding_:--Take two calf's feet finely shred; +then of biskets grated, and stale mackaroons broken small, the +quantity of a penny loaf; then add a pound of beef-suet, very finely +shred, half a pound of currants, a quarter of a pound of sugar; some +cloves, mace and nutmeg, beat fine; a very little salt, some sack and +orange-flower-water, some citron and candied orange-peel; work all +these well together, with yolks of eggs; if you boil it, put it in the +caul of a breast of veal, and tie it over with a cloth; it must boil +four hours. For sauce, melt butter, with a little sack and sugar; if +you bake it, put some paste in the bottom of the dish, but none on the +brim; then melt half a pound of butter, and mix with your stuff, and +put it in your dish, and stick lumps of marrow in it; bake it three or +four hours; scrape sugar over it, and serve it hot. + +_To make a Chestnut Pudding_:--Take a dozen and half of chestnuts, put +them in a skillet of water, and set them on the fire till they will +blanch; then blanch them, and when cold, put them in cold water, then +stamp them in a mortar, with orange-flower-water and sack, till they +are very small; mix them in two quarts of cream, and eighteen yolks of +eggs, the whites of three or four; beat the eggs with sack, rose-water +and sugar; put it in a dish with puff-paste; stick in some lumps of +marrow or fresh butter, and bake it. + +_To make a Brown-bread Pudding_:--Take half a pound of brown bread, +and double the weight of it in beef-suet; a quarter of a pint of +cream, the blood of a fowl, a whole nutmeg, some cinnamon, a spoonful +of sugar, six yolks of eggs, three whites: mix it all well together, +and boil it in a wooden dish two hours. Serve it with sack and sugar, +and butter melted. + +_To make a baked Sack Pudding_:--Take a pint of cream, and turn it to +a curd with a sack; then bruise the curd very small with a spoon; then +grate in two Naples-biskets, or the inside of a stale penny-loaf, and +mix it well with the curd, and half a nutmeg grated; some fine +sugar, and the yolks of four eggs, the whites of two, beaten with two +spoonfuls of sack; then melt half a pound of fresh butter, and stir +all together till the oven is hot. Butter a dish, and put it in, and +sift some sugar over it, just as 'tis going into the oven half an hour +will bake it. + +_To make an Orange Pudding_:--Take two large Sevil oranges, and grate +off the rind, as far as they are yellow; then put your oranges in fair +water, and let them boil till they are tender; shift the water three +or four times to take out the bitterness; when they are tender, cut +them open, and take away the seeds and strings, and beat the other +part in a mortar, with half a pound of sugar, till 'tis a paste; then +put in the yolks of six eggs, three or four spoonfuls of thick cream, +half a Naples-biscuit grated; mix these together, and melt a pound of +very good fresh butter, and stir it well in; when 'tis cold, put a bit +of fine puff-paste about the brim and bottom of your dish, and put it +in and bake it about three quarters of an hour. + +_Another sort of Orange Pudding_:--Take the outside rind of three +Sevil oranges, boil them in several waters till they are tender; then +pound them in a mortar with three quarters of a pound of sugar; then +blanch and beat half a pound of almonds very fine, with rose-water to +keep them from oiling; then beat sixteen eggs, but six whites, and +a pound of fresh butter; beat all these together very well till 'tis +light and hollow; then put it in a dish, with a sheet of puff-paste at +the bottom, and bake it with tarts; scrape sugar on it, and serve it +up hot. + +_To make a French-Barley Pudding_:--Take a quart of cream, and put to +it six eggs well beaten, but three of the whites; then season it with +sugar, nutmeg, a little salt, orange-flower-water, and a pound of +melted butter; then put to it six handfuls of French-barley that has +been boiled tender in milk: butter a dish, and put it in, and bake it. +It must stand as long as a venison-pasty, and it will be good. + +_To make a Skirret Pye_:--Boil your biggest skirrets, and blanch them, +and season them with cinamon, nutmeg, and a very little ginger and +sugar. Your pye being ready, lay in your skirrets; season also the +marrow of three or four bones with cinamon, sugar, a little salt and +grated bread. Lay the marrow in your pye, and the yolks of twelve hard +eggs cut in halves, a handful of chesnuts boiled and blanched, and +some candied orange-peel in slices. Lay butter on the top, and lid +your pye. Let your caudle be white-wine, verjuice, some sack and +sugar; thicken it with the yolks of eggs, and when the pye is baked, +pour it in, and serve it hot. Scrape sugar on it. + +_To make a Cabbage-Lettuce Pye_:--Take some of the largest and hardest +cabbage-lettuce you can get; boil them in salt and water till they are +tender; then lay them in a colander to drain dry; then have your paste +laid in your pattipan ready, and lay butter on the bottom; then lay +in your lettuce and some artichoke-bottoms, and some large pieces of +marrow, and the yolks of eight hard eggs, and some scalded sorrel; +bake it, and when it comes out of the oven, cut open the lid; and pour +in a caudle made with white-wine and sugar, and thicken with eggs; so +serve it hot. + +_Potato, or Lemon Cheesecakes_:--Take six ounces of potatoes, four +ounces of lemon-peel four ounces of sugar, four ounces of butter; boil +the lemon-peel til tender, pare and scrape the potatoes, and boil them +tender and bruise them; beat the lemon-peel with the sugar, then beat +all together very well, and melt all together very well, and let it +lie till cold: put crust in your pattipans, and fill them little more +than half full: bake them in a quick oven half an hour, sift some +double-refined sugar on them as they go into the oven; this quantity +will make a dozen small pattipans. + +_To make Almond Cheesecakes_:--Take a good handful or more of almonds, +blanch them in warm water, and throw them in cold; pound them fine, +and in the pounding put a little sack or orange-flower-water to keep +them from oiling; then put to your almonds the yolks of two hard eggs, +and beat them together: beat the yolks of six eggs, the whites of +three, and mix with your almonds, and half a pound of butter melted, +and sugar to your taste; mix all well together, and use it as other +cheesecake stuff. + +_To make the light Wigs_:--Take a pound and half of flour, and half a +pint of milk made warm; mix these together, and cover it up, and let +it lie by the fire half an hour; then take half a pound of sugar, and +half a pound of butter; then work these in the paste, and make it into +wigs, with as little flour as possible. Let the oven be pretty quick, +and they will rise very much. + +_To make very good Wigs_:--Take a quarter of a peck of the finest +flour, rub into it three quarters of a pound of fresh butter, till +'tis like grated bread, something more than half a pound of sugar, +half a nutmeg, and half a race of ginger grated; three eggs, yolks +and whites beaten very well, and put to them half a pint of thick +ale-yeast, three or four spoonfuls of sack. Make a hole in your flour, +and pour in your yeast and eggs, and as much milk just warm, as will +make it into a light paste. Let it stand before the fire to rise half +an hour; then make it into a dozen and half of wigs; wash them over +with eggs just as they go into the oven; a quick oven, and half an +hour will bake them. + +_To make Carrot or Parsnip Puffs_:--Scrape and boil your carrots or +parsnips tender; then scrape or mash them very fine, add to a pint of +pulp the crumb of a penny-loaf grated, or some stale biscuit, if +you have it, some eggs, but four whites, a nutmeg grated, some +orange-flower-water, sugar to your taste, a little sack, and mix it up +with thick cream. They must be fry'd in rendered suet, the liquor very +hot when you put them in; put in a good spoonful in a place. + +_A Tansy_:--Boil a quart of cream or milk with a stick of cinamon, +quarter'd nutmeg, and large mace; when half cold, mix it with twenty +yolks of eggs, and ten whites; strain it, then put to it four grated +biskets, half a pound of butter, a pint of spinage-juice, and a little +tansy, sack, and orange-flower-water, sugar, and a little salt; then +gather it to a body over the fire, and pour it into your dish, being +well butter'd. When it is baked, turn it on a pye-plate; squeeze on +it an orange, grate on sugar, and garnish it with slic'd orange and a +little tansy. Made in a dish; cut as you please. + +_To make Sack Cream_:--Take the yolks of two eggs, and three spoonfuls +of fine sugar, and a quarter of a pint of sack: mix them together, and +stir them into a pint of cream; then set them over the fire till 'tis +scalding hot, but let it not boil. You may toast some thin slices of +white bread, and dip them in sack or orange-flower-water, and pour +your cream over them. + +_To make Quince Cream_:--Take quinces, scald them till they are soft; +pare them, and mash the clear part of them, and pulp it through a +sieve; take an equal weight of quince, and double-refin'd sugar beaten +and sifted, and the whites of eggs, and beat it till it is as white as +snow, then put it in dishes. + +_To make Pistachia Cream_:--Peel your pistachias, and beat them very +fine, and boil them in cream; if 'tis not green enough, add a little +juice of spinage; thicken it with eggs, and sweeten to your taste; +pour it in basons, and set it by till 'tis cold. + +_To make white Jelly of Quinces_:--Pare your quinces, and cut them in +halves; then core them and parboil your quinces; when they are soft, +take them up, and crush them through a strainer, but not too hard, +only the clear juice. Take the weight of the juice in fine sugar; +boil the sugar candy-height, and put in your juice, and let it scald +awhile, but not boil; and if any froth arise, scum it off, and when +you take it up, have ready a white preserved quince cut in small +slices, and lay them in the bottom of your glasses, and pour your +jelly to them, it will candy on the top and keep moist on the bottom a +long time. + +_To make Hart's-Horn Jelly_:--Take a large gallipot, and fill it full +of hart's-horn, and then fill it full with spring-water, and tie a +double paper over the gallipot, and set it in the baker's oven with +household bread; in the morning take it out, and run it through a +jelly-bag, and season it with juice of lemons, and double-refin'd +sugar, and the whites of eight eggs well beaten; let it have a boil, +and run it thro' the jelly-bag again into your jelly-glasses; put a +bit of lemon-peel in the bag. + + +IV.--CHEESES. + +_The Queen's Cheese_:--Take six quarts of the best stroakings, and +let them stand till they are cold; then set two quarts of cream on the +fire till 'tis ready to boil; then take it off, and boil a quart of +fair water, and take the yolks of two eggs, and one spoonful of sugar, +and two spoonfuls of runnet; mingle all these together, and stir it +till 'tis blood warm: when the cheese is come, use it as other cheese; +set it at night, and the third day lay the leaves of nettles under and +over it: it must be turned and wiped, and the nettles shifted every +day, and in three weeks it will be fit to eat. This cheese is made +between Michaelmas and Alhallontide. + +_To make a Slip-coat Cheese_:--Take new milk and runnet, quite cold, +and when 'tis come, break it as little as you can in putting it into +the cheese-fat, and let it stand and whey itself for some time; then +cover it, and set about two pound weight on it, and when it will hold +together, turn it out of that cheese-fat, and keep it turning upon +clean cheese-fats for two or three days, till it has done wetting, +and then lay it on sharp-pointed dock-leaves till 'tis ripe: shift the +leaves often. + +_To make a New-market Cheese to cut at two Years old_:--Any morning +in September, take twenty quarts of new milk warm from the cow, and +colour it with marigolds: when this is done, and the milk not cold, +get ready a quart of cream, and a quart of fair water, which must be +kept stirring over the fire till 'tis scalding hot, then stir it well +into the milk and runnet, as you do other cheese; when 'tis come, lay +cheese-cloths over it, and settle it with your hands; the more hands +the better; as the whey rises, take it away, and when 'tis clean gone, +put the curd into your fat, breaking it as little as you can; then put +it in the press, and press it gently an hour; take it out again, and +cut it in thin slices, and lay them singly on a cloth, and wipe them +dry; then put it in a tub, and break it with your hands as small as +you can, and mix with it a good handful of salt, and a quart of cold +cream; put it in the fat, and lay a pound weight on it till next day; +then press and order it as others. + + +V.--CAKES. + +_To make Shrewsbury Cakes_:--Take to one pound of sugar, three pounds +of the finest flour, a nutmeg grated, some beaten cinamon; the sugar +and spice must be sifted into the flour, and wet it with three eggs, +and as much melted butter, as will make it of a good thickness to roll +into a paste; mould it well and roll it, and cut it into what shape +you please. Perfume them, and prick them before they go into the oven. + +_To make Whetstone Cakes_:--Take half a pound of fine flour, and half +a pound of loaf sugar searced, a spoonful of carraway-seeds dried, +the yolk of one egg, the whites of three, a little rose-water, with +ambergrease dissolved in it; mix it together, and roll it out as thin +as a wafer; cut them with a glass; lay them on flour'd paper, and bake +them in a slow oven. + +_To make Portugal Cakes_:--Take a pound and a quarter of fine flour +well dried, and break a pound of butter into the flour and rub it in, +add a pound of loaf-sugar beaten and sifted, a nutmeg grated, four +perfumed plums, or some ambergrease; mix these well together, and +beat seven eggs, but four whites, with three spoonfuls of +orange-flower-water; mix all these together, and beat them up an hour; +butter your little pans, and just as they are going into the oven, +fill them half full, and searce some fine sugar over them; little more +than a quarter of an hour will bake them. You may put a handful of +currants into some of them; take them out of the pans as soon as they +are drawn, keep them dry, they will keep good three months. + +_To make Jumbals_:--Take the whites of three eggs, beat them well, and +take off the froth; then take a little milk, and a little flour, near +a pound, as much sugar sifted, a few carraway-seeds beaten very fine; +work all these in a very stiff paste, and make them into what form you +please bake them on white paper. + +_To make March-pane_:--Take a pound of Jordan almonds, blanch and beat +them in a marble mortar very fine; then put to them three-quarters +of a pound of double-refin'd sugar, and beat with them a few drops of +orange-flower-water; beat all together till 'tis a very good paste, +then roll it into what shape you please; dust a little fine sugar +under it as you roll it to keep it from sticking. To ice it, searce +double-refined sugar as fine as flour, wet it with rose-water, and mix +it well together, and with a brush or bunch of feathers spread it +over your march-pane: bake them in an oven that is not too hot: put +wafer-paper at the bottom, and white paper under that, so keep them +for use. + +_To make the Marlborough Cake_:--Take eight eggs, yolks and whites, +beat and strain them, and put to them a pound of sugar beaten and +sifted; beat it three-quarters of an hour together; then put in +three-quarters of a pound of flour well dried, and two ounces of +carraway-seeds; beat it all well together, and bake it in a quick oven +in broad tin-pans. + +_To make Wormwood Cakes_:--Take one pound of double-refin'd sugar +sifted; mix it with the whites of three or four eggs well beat; into +this drop as much chymical oil of wormwood as you please. So drop them +on paper; you may have some white, and some marble, with specks of +colours, with the point of a pin; keep your colours severally in +little gallipots. For red, take a dram of cochineel, a little cream of +tartar, as much of allum; tye them up severally in little bits of fine +cloth, and put them to steep in one glass of water two or three hours. +When you use the colour, press the bags in the water, and mix some +of it with a little of the white of egg and sugar. Saffron colours +yellow; and must be tyed in a cloth, as the red, and put in water. +Powder-blue, mix'd with the saffron-water, makes a green; for blue, +mix some dry powder-blue with some water. + +_A French Cake to eat hot_:--Take a dozen of eggs, and a quart of +cream, and as much flour as will make it into a thick batter; put to +it a pound of melted butter, half a pint of sack, one nutmeg grated, +mix it well, and let it stand three or four hours; then bake it in +a quick oven, and when you take it out, split it in two, and pour a +pound of butter on it melted with rose-water; cover it with the other +half, and serve it up hot. + +_To make the thin Dutch Bisket_:--Take five pounds of flour, and two +ounces of carraway-seeds, half a pound of sugar, and something more +than a pint of milk. Warm the milk, and put into it three-quarters of +a pound of butter; then make a hole in the middle of your flour, and +put in a full pint of good ale-yeast; then pour in the butter and +milk, and make these into a paste, and let it stand a quarter of an +hour by the fire to rise; then mould it, and roll it into cakes pretty +thin; prick them all over pretty much or they will blister; so bake +them a quarter of an hour. + +_To make Dutch Ginger-bread_:--Take four pounds of flour, and mix with +it two ounces and a half of beaten ginger; then rub in a quarter of +a pound of butter, and add to it two ounces of carraway-seeds, +two ounces of orange-peel dried and rubb'd to powder, a few +coriander-seeds bruised, two eggs: then mix all up in a stiff paste, +with two pounds and a quarter of treacle; beat it very well with +a rolling-pin, and make it up into thirty cakes; put in a candied +citron; prick them with a fork: butter papers three double, one white, +and two brown; wash them over with the white of an egg; put them into +an oven not too hot, for three-quarters of an hour. + +_To make Cakes of Flowers_:--Boil double-refin'd sugar candy-high, and +then strew in your flowers, and let them boil once up; then with your +hand lightly strew in a little double-refin'd sugar sifted; and then +as quick as may be, put it into your little pans, made of card, and +pricked full of holes at bottom. You must set the pans on a pillow, or +cushion; when they are cold, take them out. + + +VI.--CAUDLES AND POSSETS. + +_To make a Posset with Ale: King-William's Posset_:--Take a quart of +cream, and mix with it a pint of ale, then beat the yolks of ten eggs, +and the whites of four; when they are well beaten, put them to the +cream and ale, sweeten it to your taste, and slice some nutmeg in it; +set it over the fire, and keep it stirring all the while, and when +'tis thick, and before it boils, take it off, and pour it into the +bason you serve it in to the table. + +_To make the Pope's Posset_:--Blanch and beat three-quarters of a +pound of almonds so fine, that they will spread between your fingers +like butter, put in water as you beat them to keep them from oiling; +then take a pint of sack or sherry, and sweeten it very well with +double-refin'd sugar, make it boiling hot, and at the same time put +half a pint of water to your almonds, and make them boil; then take +both off the fire, and mix them very well together with a spoon; serve +it in a china dish. + +_To make Flummery Caudle_:--Take a pint of fine oatmeal, and put to it +two quarts of fair water: let it stand all night, in the morning stir +it, and strain it into a skillet, with three or four blades of mace, +and a nutmeg quartered; set it on the fire, and keep it stirring, +and let it boil a quarter of an hour; if it is too thick, put in +more water, and let it boil longer; then add a pint of Rhenish or +white-wine; three spoonfuls of orange-flower-water, the juice of two +lemons and one orange, a bit of butter, and as much fine sugar as will +sweeten it; let all these have a warm, and thicken it with the yolks +of two or three eggs. Drink it hot for a breakfast. + +_To make Tea Caudle_:--Make a quart of strong green tea, and pour it +out into a skillet, and set it over the fire; then beat the yolks of +four eggs and mix with them a pint of white-wine, a grated nutmeg, +sugar to your taste, and put all together; stir it over the fire till +'tis very hot, then drink it in china dishes as caudle. + + +VII.--CONSERVES, DRIED AND CAN-DIED FRUITS, MARMALADES, ETC. + +_To dry Apricocks like Prunella's_:--Take a pound of Apricocks; being +cut in halves or quarters, let them boil till they be very tender in +a thin syrup; let them stand a day or two in the stove, then take +them out of the syrup, and lay them drying till they be as dry as +prunello's, then box them: you may make your syrup red with the juice +of red plums; if you please you may pare them. + +_To candy Angelica_:--Take angelica that is young, and cut it in +fit lengths, and boil it till it is pretty tender, keeping it close +covered; then take it up and peel off all the strings; then put it in +again, and let it simmer and scald till 'tis very green; then take it +up and dry it in a cloth, and weigh it, and to every pound of angelica +take a pound of double-refin'd sugar beaten and sifted; put your +angelica in an earthen pan, and strew the sugar over it, and let it +stand two days; then boil it till it looks very clear, put it in a +colander to drain the syrup from it, and take a little double-refin'd +sugar and boil it to sugar again; then throw in your angelica, and +take it out in a little time, and put it on glass plates. It will dry +in your stove, or in an oven after pyes are drawn. + +_To candy Orange-Flowers_:--Take half a pound of double-refin'd +sugar finely beaten, wet it with orange-flower-water, then boil +it candy-high, then put in a handful of orange-flowers, keeping it +stirring, but let it not boil, and when the sugar candies about them, +take it off the fire, drop it on a plate, and set it by till 'tis +cold. + +_To make Conserve of Red-Roses, or any other Flowers_:--Take +rose-buds, and pick them, and cut off the white part from the red, +and put the red flowers, and sift them through a sieve to take out the +seeds; then weigh them, and to every pound of flowers take two pounds +and a half of loaf-sugar, beat the flowers pretty fine in a stone +mortar; then by degrees put the sugar to them, and beat it very well +till 'tis well incorporated together; then put it into gallipots, and +tye it over with paper, and over that leather, and it will keep seven +years. + +_To preserve white Pear Plumbs_:--Take pear plumbs when they are +yellow, before they are too ripe; give them a slit in the seam, and +prick them behind; make your water almost scalding hot, and put a +little sugar to it to sweeten it, and put in your plumbs and cover +them close; set them on the fire to coddle, and take them off +sometimes a little, and set them on again: take care they do not +break; have in readiness as much double-refin'd sugar boiled to a +height as will cover them, and when they are coddled pretty tender, +take them out of that liquor, and put them into your preserving-pan to +your syrup, which must be but blood-warm when your plumbs go in. Let +them boil till they are clear, scum them and take them off, and let +them stand two hours; then set them on again and boil them, and when +they are thoroughly preserved, take them up and lay them in glasses; +boil your syrup till 'tis thick; and when 'tis cold, put in your +plumbs; and a month after, if your syrup grows thin, you must boil it +again, or make a fine jelly of pippins, and put on them. This way +you may do the pimordian plumb, or any white plumb, and when they are +cold, paper them up. + +_To preserve Mulberries whole_:--Set some mulberries over the fire +in a skillet, and draw from them a pint of juice, when 'tis strained. +Then take three pounds of sugar, beaten very fine; wet the sugar with +the pint of juice; boil up your sugar, and scum it, and put in two +pounds of ripe mulberries, and let them stand in the syrup till they +are thoroughly warm; then set them on the fire, and let them boil very +gently; do them but half enough, so put them by in the syrup till next +day; then boil them gently again, and when the syrup is pretty thick, +and will stand in a round drop when 'tis cold, they are enough; so put +all together in a gallipot for use. + +_To preserve whole Quinces white_:--Take the largest quinces of the +greenest colour, and scald them till they are pretty soft; then pare +them and core them with a scoop; then weigh your quinces against so +much double-refin'd sugar, and make a syrup of one half, and put in +your quinces, and boil them as fast as you can; then you must have +in readiness pippin liquor; let it be very strong of the pippins, and +when 'tis strained out, put in the other half of your sugar, and make +it a jelly, and when your quinces are clear, put them into the jelly, +and let them simmer a little; they will be very white; so glass them +up, and when they are cold, paper them and keep them in a stove. + +_To make white Quince Marmalade_:--Scald your quinces tender, take off +the skin and pulp them from the core very fine, and to every pound +of quince have a pound and half of double-refin'd sugar in lumps, and +half a pint of water; dip your sugar in the water and boil and scum it +till 'tis a thick syrup: then put in your quince, boil and scum it on +a quick fire a quarter of an hour, so put it in your pots. + +_To make red Quince Marmalade_:--Pare and core a pound of quince, beat +the parings and cores and some of your worst quinces, and strain out +the juice; and to every pound of quince take ten or twelve spoonfuls +of that juice, and three-quarters of a pound of loaf-sugar; put all +into your preserving-pan, cover it close, and let it stew over a +gentle fire two hours; when 'tis of an orange-red, uncover and boil it +up as fast as you can: when of a good colour, break it as you like it, +give it a boil, and pot it up. + +_To make Melon Mangoes_:--Take small melons, not quite ripe, cut +a slip down the side, and take out the inside very clean; beat +mustard-seeds, and shred garlick, and mix with the seeds, and put in +your mangoes; put the pieces you cut out into their places again, and +tye them up, and put them into your pot, and boil some vinegar (as +much as you think will cover them) with whole pepper, and some salt, +and Jamaica pepper, and pour in scalding hot over your mangoes, and +cover them close to keep in the steam; and so do every day for nine +times together, and when they are cold cover them with leather. + +_To make Conserve of Hips_:--Gather the hips before they grow soft, +cut off the heads and stalks, slit them in halves, and take out all +the seed and white that is in them very clean; then put them in an +earthen pan, and stir them every day, else they will grow mouldy; +let them stand till they are soft enough to rub through a coarse +hair-sieve; as the pulp comes, take it off the sieve; they are a dry +berry, and will require pains to rub it through; then add its weight +in sugar, and mix it well together without boiling; keeping it in deep +gallipots for use. + +_To make clear Cakes of Gooseberries_:--Take your white Dutch +gooseberries when they are thorough ripe, break them with your fingers +and squeeze out all the pulp into a fine piece of cambrick or thick +muslin to run thro' clear; then weigh the juice and sugar one against +the other; then boil the juice a little while, then put in your sugar +and let it dissolve, but not boil; scum it and put it into glasses, +and stove it in a warm stove. + +_To make white Quince Paste_:--Scald the quinces tender to the core, +and pare them, and scrape the pulp clean from the core, beat it in +a mortar, and pulp it through a colander; take to a pound of pulp a +pound and two ounces of sugar, boil the sugar till 'tis candy-high; +then put in your pulp, stir it about constantly till you see it come +clear from the bottom of the preserving-pan; then take it off, and lay +it on plates pretty thin: you may cut it in what shape you please, or +make quince chips of it; you must dust it with sugar when you put it +into the stove, and turn it on papers in a sieve, and dust the other +side; when they are dry, put them in boxes with papers between. You +may make red quince paste the same way as this, only colour the quince +with cochineel. + +_To make Syrup of any flower_:--Clip your flowers, and take their +weight in sugar; then take a high gallipot, and a row of flowers, and +a strewing of sugar, till the pot is full; then put in two or three +spoonfuls of the same syrup or still'd water; tye a cloth on the top +of the pot, and put a tile on that, and set your gallipot in a kettle +of water over a gentle fire, and let it infuse till the strength is +out of the flowers, which will be in four or five hours; then strain +it thro' a flannel, and when 'tis cold bottle it up. + + +VIII.--PICKLES. + +_To pickle Nasturtium-Buds_:--Gather your little knobs quickly after +your blossoms are off; put them in cold water and salt for three days, +shifting them once a day; then make a pickle (but do not boil it +at all) of some white-wine, some white-wine vinegar, eschalot, +horse-radish, pepper, salt, cloves, and mace whole, and nutmeg +quartered; then put in your seeds and stop them close; they are to be +eaten as capers. + +_To keep Quinces in Pickle_:--Cut five or six quinces all to pieces, +and put them in an earthen pot or pan, with a gallon of water and two +pounds of honey; mix all these together well, and then put them in +a kettle to boil leisurely half an hour, and then strain your liquor +into that earthen pot, and when 'tis cold, wipe your quinces clean, +and put them into it: they must be covered very close, and they will +keep all the year. + +_To pickle Ashen-keys_:--Take ashen-keys as young as you can get them, +and put them in a pot with salt and water; then take green whey, when +'tis hot, and pour over them; let them stand till they are cold before +you cover them, so let them stand; when you use them, boil them in +fair water; when they are tender take them out, and put them in salt +and water. + +_To pickle Pods of Radishes_:--Gather the youngest pods, and put them +in water and salt twenty-four hours; then make a pickle for them of +vinegar, cloves, mace, whole pepper: boil this, and drain the pods +from the salt and water, and pour the liquor on them boiling hot: put +to them a clove of garlick a little bruised. + +_To pickle Broom-Buds_:--Put your broom-buds into little linnen-bags, +tie them up, and make a pickle of bay-salt and water boiled, and +strong enough to bear an egg; put your bags in a pot, and when your +pickle is cold, put it to them; keep them close, and let them lie till +they turn black; then shift them two or three times, till they change +green; then take them out, and boil them as you have occasion for +them: when they are boiled, put them out of the bag: in vinegar they +will keep a month after they are boiled. + +_To pickle Purslain Stalks_:--Wash your stalks, and cut them in pieces +six inches long; boil them in water and salt a dozen walms; take +them up, drain them, and when they cool, make a pickle of stale beer, +white-wine vinegar, and salt, put them in, and cover them close. + + +IX.--WINES. + +_To make strong Mead_:--Take of spring-water what quantity you please, +and make it more than blood-warm, and dissolve honey in it till 'tis +strong enough to bear an egg, the breadth of a shilling; then boil +it gently near an hour, taking off the scum as it rises; then put to +about nine or ten gallons, seven or eight large blades of mace, three +nutmegs quarter'd, twenty cloves, three or four sticks of cinamon, two +or three roots of ginger, and a quarter of an ounce of Jamaica pepper; +put these spices into the kettle to the honey and water, a whole +lemon, with a sprig of sweet-briar, and a sprig of rosemary; tie the +briar and rosemary together, and when they have boiled a little while, +take them out and throw them away; but let your liquor stand on the +spice in a clean earthen pot till the next day; then strain it into a +vessel that is fit for it; put the spice in a bag, and hang it in the +vessel, stop it, and at three months draw it into bottles. Be sure +that 'tis fine when 'tis bottled; after 'tis bottled six weeks 'tis +fit to drink. + +_To make small White Mead_:--Take three gallons of spring-water and +make it hot, and dissolve in it three quarts of honey and a pound of +loaf sugar; and let it boil about half an hour, and scum it as long +as any rises, then pour it out into a tub, and squeeze in the juice of +four lemons; put in the rinds of but two; twenty cloves, two races of +ginger, a top of sweet-briar, and a top of rosemary. Let it stand in +a tub till 'tis but blood warm; then make a brown toast and spread it +with two or three spoonfuls of ale-yeast, put it into a vessel fit for +it; let it stand four or five days, then bottle it out. + +_To make Frontiniac Wine_:--Take six gallons of water and twelve +pounds of white sugar, and six pounds of raisins of the sun cut small; +boil these together an hour; then take of the flowers of elder, when +they are falling and will shake off, the quantity of half a peck; +put them in the liquor when 'tis almost cold, the next day put in six +spoonfuls of syrup of lemons, and four spoonfuls of ale-yeast, and +two days after put it in a vessel that is fit for it, and when it has +stood two months bottle it off. + +_To make English Champagne, or the fine Currant Wine_:--Take to three +gallons of water nine pounds of Lisbon sugar; boil the water and sugar +half an hour, scum it clean, then have one gallon of currants pick'd, +but not bruised, pour the liquor boiling-hot over them, and when cold, +work it with half a pint of balm two days; then pour it through a +flannel or sieve, then put it into a barrel fit for it with half an +ounce of ising-glass well bruised; when it has done working, stop +it close for a month, then bottle it, and in every bottle put a very +small lump of double-refin'd sugar. This is excellent wine, and has a +beautiful colour. + +_To make Saragossa Wine, or English Sack_:--To every quart of water, +put a sprig of rue, and to every gallon a handful of fennel-roots, +boil these half an hour, then strain it out, and to every gallon of +this liquor put three pounds of honey; boil it two hours, and scum +it well, and when 'tis cold pour it off and turn it into a vessel, or +such cask that is fit for it; keep it a year in the vessel, and then +bottle it; 'tis a very good sack. + +_Mountain Wine_:--Pick out the big stalks of your Malaga raisins, +then chop them very small, five gallons to every gallon of cold +spring-water, let them steep a fortnight or more, squeeze out the +liquor and barrel it in a vessel fit for it; first fume the vessel +with brimstone; don't stop it up till the hissing is over. + +_To make Quince Wine_;--Take your quinces when they are thorough ripe, +wipe off the fur very clean; then take out the cores and bruise them +as you do apples for cyder, and press them, and to every gallon of +juice put two pounds and a half of fine sugar, stir it together till +'tis dissolved; then put it in your cask, and when it has done working +stop it close; let it stand till March before you bottle it. You may +keep it two or three years, it will be better. + +_To make Plumb Wine_:--Take twenty pounds of Malaga raisins, pick, +rub, and shred them, and put them into a tub; then take four gallons +of fair water and boil it an hour, and let it stand till 'tis +blood-warm; then put it to your raisins; let it stand nine or ten +days, stirring it once or twice a day, strain out your liquor, and mix +with it two quarts of damson juice, put it in a vessel, and when it +has done working, stop it close; at four or five months bottle it. + +_To make Birch Wine_:--In March bore a hole in a tree, and put in a +faucet, and it will run two or three days together without hurting the +tree; then put in a pin to stop it, and the next year you may draw as +much from the same hole; put to every gallon of the liquor a quart of +good honey, and stir it well together, boil it an hour, scum it well, +and put in a few cloves, and a piece of lemon-peel; when 'tis almost +cold, put to it so much ale-yeast as will make it work like new ale, +and when the yeast begins to settle, put it in a runlet that will +just hold it: so let it stand six weeks or longer if you please; then +bottle it, and in a month you may drink it. It will keep a year or +two. You may make it with sugar, two pounds to a gallon, or something +more, if you keep it long. This is admirably wholesome as well as +pleasant, an opener of obstructions, good against the phthisick, and +good against the spleen and scurvy, a remedy for the stone, it will +abate heat in a fever or thrush, and has been given with good success. + +_To make Sage Wine_:--Boil twenty-six quarts of spring-water a quarter +of an hour, and when 'tis blood-warm, put twenty-five pounds of Malaga +raisins pick'd, rubb'd and shred into it, with almost half a bushel of +red sage shred, and a porringer of ale-yeast; stir all well together, +and let it stand m a tub cover'd warm six or seven days, stirring it +once a day; then strain it out, and put it in a runlet. Let it work +three or four days, stop it up; when it has stood six or seven days +put in a quart or two of Malaga sack, and when 'tis fine bottle it. + +_Sage Wine another way_:--Take thirty pounds of Malaga raisins pick'd +clean, and shred small, and one bushel of green sage shred small, then +boil five gallons of water, let the water stand till 'tis luke-warm; +then put it in a tub to your sage and raisins; let it stand five or +six days, stirring it twice or thrice a day; then strain and press the +liquor from the ingredients, put it in a cask, and let it stand six +months: then draw it clean off into another vessel; bottle it in two +days; in a month or six weeks it will be fit to drink, but best when +'tis a year old. + +_To make Ebulum_:--To a hogshead of strong ale, take a heap'd bushel +of elder-berries, and half a pound of juniper-berries beaten; put in +all the berries when you put in the hops, and let them boil together +till the berries brake in pieces, then work it up as you do ale; when +it has done working, add to it half a pound of ginger, half an ounce +of cloves, as much mace, an ounce of nutmegs, and as much cinamon +grosly beaten, half a pound of citron, as much eringo-root, and +likewise of candied orange-peel; let the sweetmeats be cut in pieces +very thin, and put with the spice into a bag and hang it in the vessel +when you stop it up. So let it stand till 'tis fine, then bottle it up +and drink it with lumps of double-refined sugar in the glass. + +_To make Cock Ale_:--Take ten gallons of ale, and a large cock, the +older the better, parboil the cock, flea him, and stamp him in a stone +mortar till his bones are broken, (you must craw and gut him when you +flea him) put the cock into two quarts of sack, and put to it three +pounds of raisins of the sun stoned, some blades of mace, and a few +cloves; put all these into a canvas bag, and a little before you find +the ale has done working, put the ale and bag together into a vessel; +in a week or nine days' time bottle it up, fill the bottles but just +above the necks, and leave the same time to ripen as other ale. + +_To make it Elder Ale_:--Take ten bushels of malt to a hogshead, then +put two bushels of elder-berries pickt from the stalks into a pot or +earthen pan, and set it in a pot of boiling water till the berries +swell, then strain it out and put the juice into the guile-fat, and +beat it often in, and so order it as the common way of brewing. + +_To clear Wine_:--Take half a pound of hartshorn, and dissolve it in +cyder, if it be for cyder, or Rhenish-wine for any liquor: this is +enough for a hogshead. + +_To fine Wine the Lisbon way_:--To every twenty gallons of wine take +the whites of ten eggs, and a small handful of salt, beat it together +to a froth, and mix it well with a quart or more of the wine, then +pour it in the vessel, and in a few days it will be fine. + + + + +COOKERY BOOKS. + +PART III. + + +In 1747 appeared a thin folio volume, of which I will transcribe the +title: "The Art of Cookery, Made Plain and Easy, which far Exceeds +Every Thing of the Kind Ever yet Published ... By a Lady. London: +Printed for the Author; and sold at Mrs. Ashburn's, a China Shop, the +Corner of Fleet Ditch. MDCCXLVII." The lady was no other than Mrs. +Glasse, wife of an attorney residing in Carey Street; and a very +sensible lady she was, and a very sensible and interesting book hers +is, with a preface showing that her aim was to put matters as plainly +as she could, her intention being to instruct the lower sort. "For +example," says she, "when I bid them lard a fowl, if I should bid them +lard with large lardoons they would not know what I meant; but when +I say they must lard with little pieces of Bacon, they know what +I mean." I have been greatly charmed with Hannah Glasse's "Art of +Cookery," 1747, and with her "Complete Confectioner" likewise in a +modified degree. The latter was partly derived, she tells you, from +the manuscript of "a very old experienced housekeeper to a family of +the first distinction." But, nevertheless, both are very admirable +performances; and yet the compiler survives scarcely more than in +an anecdote for which I can see no authority. For she does not say, +"First catch your hare" [Footnote: Mrs. Glasse's cookery book was +reprinted at least as late as 1824]. + +Mrs. Glasse represents that, before she undertook the preparation +of the volume on confectionery, there was nothing of the kind for +reference and consultation. But we had already a curious work by E. +Kidder, who was, according to his title-page, a teacher of the art +which he expounded eventually in print. The title is sufficiently +descriptive: "E. Kidder's Receipts of Pastry and Cookery, for the use +of his Scholars, who teaches at his School in Queen Street, near St. +Thomas Apostle's, [Footnote: In another edition his school is in +St. Martin's Le Grand] on Mondays, Tuesdays and Wednesdays, in the +afternoon. Also on Thursdays, Fridays and Saturdays, in the afternoon, +at his School next to Furnivalls Inn in Holborn. Ladies may be taught +at their own Houses." It is a large octavo, consisting of fifty pages +of engraved text, and is embellished with a likeness of Mr. Kidder. +For all that Mrs. Glasse ignores him. + +I have shown how Mrs. Glasse might have almost failed to keep a place +in the public recollection, had it not been for a remark which that +lady did not make. But there is a still more singular circumstance +connected with her and her book, and it is this--that in Dr. Johnson's +day, and possibly in her own lifetime, a story was current that the +book was really written by Dr. Hill the physician. That gentleman's +claim to the authorship has not, of course, been established, but at a +dinner at Dilly's the publisher's in 1778, when Johnson, Miss Seward, +and others were present, a curious little discussion arose on the +subject. Boswell thus relates the incident and the conversation:--"The +subject of cookery having been very naturally introduced at a table, +where Johnson, who boasted of the niceness of his palate, avowed that +'he always found a good dinner,' he said, 'I could write a better book +about cookery than has ever yet been written; it should be a book +upon philosophical principles. Pharmacy is now made much more simple. +Cookery may be so too. A prescription, which is now compounded of five +ingredients, had formerly fifty in it. So in Cookery. If the nature of +the ingredients is well known, much fewer will do. Then, as you cannot +make bad meat good, I would tell what is the best butcher's meat, +the best beef, the best pieces; how to choose young fowls; the proper +seasons of different vegetables; and then how to roast, and boil, and +compound." + +DILLY:--"Mrs. Glasse's 'Cookery,' which is the best, was written by +Dr. Hill. Half the trade know this." + +JOHNSON:--"Well, Sir, that shews how much better the subject of +cookery may be treated by a philosopher. I doubt if the book be +written by Dr Hill; for in Mrs. Glasse's Cookery, which I have +looked into, saltpetre and salt-prunella are spoken of as different +substances, whereas salt-prunella is only saltpetre burnt on charcoal; +and Hill could not be ignorant of this. However, as the greatest part +of such a book is made by transcription, this mistake may have been +carelessly adopted. But you shall see what a book of cookery I could +make. I shall agree with Mr. Dilly for the copyright." + +Miss SEWARD:--"That would be Hercules with the distaff indeed!" + +JOHNSON:--"No, Madam. Women can spin very well; but they cannot make a +good book of cookery." + +But the Doctor's philosophical cookery book belongs to the voluminous +calendar of works which never passed beyond the stage of proposal; he +did not, so far as we know, ever draw out a title-page, as Coleridge +was fond of doing; and perhaps the loss is to be borne with. The +Doctor would have pitched his discourse in too high a key. + +Among the gastronomical enlargements of our literature in the +latter half of the last century, one of the best books in point of +classification and range is that by B. Clermont, of which the third +edition made its appearance in 1776, the first having been anonymous. +Clermont states that he had been clerk of the kitchen in some of the +first families of the kingdom, and lately to the Earl of Abingdon. But +elsewhere we find that he had lived very recently in the establishment +of the Earl of Ashburnham, for he observes in the preface: "I beg the +candour of the Public will excuse the incorrectness of the Language +and Diction. My situation in life as an actual servant to the Earl of +Ashburnham at the time of the first publication of this Book will I +trust plead my Apology." He informs his readers on the title-page, and +repeats in the preface, that a material part of the work consists of a +translation of "Les Soupers de la Cour," and he proceeds to say, +that he does not pretend to make any further apology for the title of +_supper_, than that the French were, in general, more elegant in their +suppers than their dinners. In other words, the late dinner was still +called supper. + +The writer had procured the French treatise from Paris for his own +use, and had found it of much service to him in his capacity as clerk +of the kitchen, and he had consequently translated it, under the +persuasion that it would prove an assistance to gentlemen, ladies, +and others interested in such matters. He specifies three antecedent +publications in France, of which his pages might be considered the +essence, viz., "La Cuisine Royale," "Le Maître d'Hôtel Cuisinier," and +"Les Dons de Comus"; and he expresses to some of his contemporaries, +who had helped him in his researches, his obligations in the following +terms:--"As every country produces many Articles peculiar to itself, +and considering the Difference of Climates, which either forward or +retard them, I would not rely on my own Knowledge, in regard to such +Articles; I applied therefore to three Tradesmen, all eminent in their +Profession, one for Fish, one for Poultry, and one for the productions +of the Garden, viz., Mr. Humphrey Turner, the Manager in St. James's +Market; Mr. Andrews, Poulterer in ditto; and Mr. Adam Lawson, many +years chief gardener to the Earl of Ashburnham; in this article I +was also assisted by Mr. Rice, Green-Grocer, in St. Albans Street." +Clermont dates his remarks from Princes Street, Cavendish Square. + +While Mrs. Glasse was still in the middle firmament of public favour, +a little book without the writer's name was published as by "A Lady." +I have not seen the first or second editions; but the third appeared +in 1808. It is called "A New System of Domestic Cookery, Formed upon +Principles of Economy, and Adapted to the use of Private Families." +The author was Helene Rundell, of whom I am unable to supply any +further particulars at present. Mrs. Rundell's cookery book, according +to the preface, was originally intended for the private instruction of +the daughters of the authoress in their married homes, and specially +prepared with an eye to housekeepers of moderate incomes. Mrs. Rundell +did not write for professed cooks, or with any idea of emolument; and +she declared that had such a work existed when she first set out in +life it would have been a great treasure to her. The public shared +the writer's estimate of her labours, and called for a succession +of impressions of the "New System," till its run was checked by +Miss Acton's still more practical collection. Mrs. Rundell is little +consulted nowadays; but time was when Mrs. Glasse and herself were the +twin stars of the culinary empyrean. + +Coming down to our own times, the names most familiar to our ears +are Ude, Francatelli, and Soyer, and they are the names of foreigners +[Footnote: A fourth work before me has no clue to the author, but +it is like the others, of an alien complexion. It is called "French +Domestic Cookery, Combining Elegance and Economy. In twelve Hundred +Receipts, 12mo, 1846." Soyer's book appeared in the same year. In +1820, an anonymous writer printed a Latin poem of his own composition, +called "Tabella Cibaria, a Bill of Fare, etc., etc., with Copious +Notes," which seem more important than the text]. No English school of +cookery can be said ever to have existed in England. We have, and +have always had, ample material for making excellent dishes; but if +we desire to turn it to proper account, we have to summon men from a +distance to our aid, or to accept the probable alternative--failure. +The adage, "God sends meat, and the devil sends cooks," must surely +be of native parentage, for of no country is it so true as of our own. +Perhaps, had it not been for the influx among us of French and +Italian experts, commencing with our Anglo-Gallic relations under +the Plantagenets, and the palmy days of the monastic orders, culinary +science would not have arrived at the height of development which it +has attained in the face of great obstacles. Perchance we should +not have progressed much beyond the pancake and oatmeal period. But +foreign _chefs_ limit their efforts to those who can afford to pay +them for their services. The middle classes do not fall within the +pale of their beneficence. The poor know them not. So it happens that +even as I write, the greater part of the community not only cannot +afford professional assistance in the preparation of their meals, +which goes without saying, but from ignorance expend on their larder +twice as much as a Parisian or an Italian in the same rank of life, +with a very indifferent result. There are handbooks of instruction, +it is true, both for the middle and for the lower classes. These books +are at everybody's command. But they are either left unread, or if +read, they are not understood. I have before me the eleventh edition +of Esther Copley's "Cottage Comforts," 1834; it embraces all the +points which demand attention from such as desire to render a humble +home comfortable and happy. The leaves have never been opened. I will +not say, _ex hoc disce omnes_; but it really appears to be the +case, that these works are not studied by those for whom they are +written--not studied, at all events, to advantage. + +Dr. Kitchener augmented this department of our literary stores in +1821 with his "Cook's Oracle," which was very successful, and passed +through a series of editions. + +In the preface to that of 1831, the editor describes the book as +greatly enlarged and improved, and claims the "rapid and steady sale +which has invariably attended each following edition" as a proof +of the excellence of the work. I merely mention this, because in +Kitchener's own preface to the seventh issue, l2mo, 1823, he says: +"This last time I have found little to add, and little to alter." Such +is human fallibility! + +The "Cook's Oracle" was heralded by an introduction which very few +men could have written, and which represents the Doctor's method +of letting us know that, if we fancy him an impostor, we are much +mistaken. "The following Recipes," says he, "are not a mere marrowless +collection of shreds and patches, of cuttings and pastings--but a +bonâ-fide register of practical facts--accumulated by a perseverance, +not to be subdued or evaporated by the igniferous Terrors of a +Roasting Fire in the Dog-days:--in defiance of the odoriferous +and calefaceous repellents of Roasting, Boiling,--Frying, and +Broiling;--moreover, the author has submitted to a labour no preceding +Cookery-Book-maker, perhaps, ever attempted to encounter,--having +eaten each Receipt before he set it down in his Book." + +What could critics say, after this? One or two large editions must +have been exhausted before they recovered their breath, and could +discover how the learned Kitchener set down the receipts which he had +previously devoured. But the language of the Preface helps to console +us for the loss of Johnson's threatened undertaking in this direction. + +Dr. Kitchener proceeded on different lines from an artist who closely +followed him in the order of publication; and the two did not probably +clash in the slightest degree. The cooking world was large enough to +hold Kitchener and the _ci-devant chef_ to the most Christian King +Louis XVI. and the Right Honourable the Earl of Sefton, Louis Eustache +Ude. Ude was steward to the United Service Club, when he printed his +"French Cook" in 1822. A very satisfactory and amusing account of this +volume occurs in the "London Magazine" for January 1825. But whatever +may be thought of Ude nowadays, he not only exerted considerable +influence on the higher cookery of his day, but may almost be said to +have been the founder of the modern French school in England. + +Ude became _chef_ at Crockford's Club, which was built in 1827, the +year in which his former employer, the Duke of York, died. There is a +story that, on hearing of the Duke's illness, Ude exclaimed, "Ah, mon +pauvre Duc, how much you shall miss me where you are gone!" + +About 1827, Mrs. Johnstone brought out her well-known contribution +to this section of literature under the title of "The Cook and +Housewife's Manual," veiling her authorship under the pseudonym of +Mistress Margaret Dods, the landlady in Scott's tale of "St. Ronan's +Well," which appeared three years before (8vo, 1824). + +Mrs. Johnstone imparted a novel feature to her book by investing it +with a fictitious history and origin, which, like most inventions of +the kind, is scarcely consistent with the circumstances, however it +may tend to enliven the monotony of a professional publication. + +After three prefaces in the fourth edition before me (8vo, 1829) we +arrive at a heading, "Institution of the Cleikum Club," which narrates +how Peregrine Touchwood, Esquire, sought to cure his _ennui_ and +hypochondria by studying Apician mysteries; and it concludes with the +syllabus of a series of thirteen lectures on cookery, which were to +be delivered by the said Esquire. One then enters on the undertaking +itself, which can be readily distinguished from an ordinary manual by +a certain literary tone, which certainly betrays a little the hand or +influence of Scott. + +But though the present is a Scottish production, there is no narrow +specialism in its scheme. The title-page gives a London publisher as +well as an Anglo-Athenian one, and Mrs. Johnstone benevolently adapted +her labours to her countrywomen and the unworthier Southrons alike. + +I imagine, however, that of all the latter-day master-cooks, Alexis +Soyer is most remembered. His "Gastronomic Regenerator," a large and +handsome octavo volume of between 700 and 800 pages, published in +1846, lies before me. It has portraits of the compiler and his wife, +and many other illustrations, and is dedicated to a Royal Duke. It was +produced under the most influential patronage and pressure, for Soyer +was overwhelmed with engagements, and had scruples against appearance +in print. He tells us that in some library, to which he gained access, +he once found among the works of Shakespeare and other _chefs_ in a +different department, a volume with the words "Nineteenth Edition" +upon it, and when he opened it, he saw to his great horror "A receipt +for Ox-tail Soup!" Why this revelation exercised such a terrifying +effect he proceeds to explain. It was the incongruity of a cookery +book in the temple of the Muses. But nevertheless, such is the frailty +of our nature, that he gradually, on regaining his composure, and at +such leisure intervals as he could command, prepared the "Gastronomic +Regenerator," in which he eschewed all superfluous ornaments of +diction, and studied a simplicity of style germane to the subject; +perchance he had looked into Kitchener's Preface. He lets us know that +he had made collections of the same kind at an earlier period of his +career, but had destroyed them, partly owing to his arduous duties +at the Reform Club, and partly to the depressing influence of the +nineteenth edition of somebody else's cookery book--probably, by +the way, Ude's. The present work occupied some ten months, and was +prepared amid the most stupendous interruptions from fair visitors to +the Club (15,000), dinners for the members and their friends (25,000), +dinner parties of importance (38), and the meals for the staff (60). +He gives a total of 70,000 dishes; but it is not entirely clear +whether these refer to the 38 dinner parties of importance, or to +the 25,000 of inferior note, or to both. The feeling of dismay at the +nineteenth edition of somebody must have been sincere, for he winds +up his preface with an adjuration to his readers (whom, in the +"Directions for Carving," he does not style Gentle, or Learned, or +Worshipful, but HONOURABLE) not to place his labours on the same shelf +with "Paradise Lost." + +Soyer had also perhaps certain misgivings touching too close an +approximation to other _chefs_ besides Milton and Shakespeare, for he +refers to the "profound ideas" of Locke, to which he was introduced, +to his vast discomfort, "in a most superb library in the midst of a +splendid baronial hall." But the library of the Reform Club probably +contained all this heterogeneous learning. Does the "Gastronomic +Regenerator," out of respect to the fastidious sentiments of its +author, occupy a separate apartment in that institution with a +separate curator? + +It seems only the other day to me, that Soyer took Gore Lodge, and +seemed in a fair way to make his removal from the Reform Club a +prosperous venture. But he lost his wife, and was unfortunate in other +ways, and the end was very sad indeed. "Soyez tranquille," was the +epitaph proposed at the time by some unsentimental wagforpoor Madame +Soyer; it soon served for them both. + +But nearly concurrent with Soyer's book appeared one of humble +pretensions, yet remarkable for its lucidity and precision, Eliza +Acton's "Modern Cookery in all its Branches reduced to an easy +practice," 16mo, 1845. I have heard this little volume highly +commended by competent judges as exactly what it professes to be; and +the quantities in the receipts are particularly reliable. + +The first essay to bring into favourable notice the produce of +Colonial cattle was, so far as I can collect, a volume published +in 1872, and called "Receipts for Cooking Australian Meat, with +Directions for preparing Sauces suitable for the same." This +still remains a vexed question; but the consumption of the meat +is undoubtedly on the increase, and will continue to be, till the +population of Australasia equalises supply and demand. + + + + +COOKERY BOOKS. + +PART IV. + + +Besides the authorities for this branch of the inquiry already cited, +there are a few others, which it may assist the student to set down +herewith:-- + +1. A Collection of Ordinances and Regulations for the Government of +the Royal Household (Edward III. to William and Mary). 4to, 1790. + +2. The book of Nurture. By Hugh Rhodes, of the King's Chapel. Printed +in the time of Henry VIII. by John Redman. 4to. + +3. A Breviate touching the Order and Government of the House of a +Nobleman. 1605. _Archaeologia_, xiii. + +4. Orders made by Henry, Prince of Wales, respecting his Household. +1610. _Archaeologia_, xiv. + +5. The School of Good Manners. By William Phiston or Fiston. 8vo, +1609. + +6. The School of Virtue, the Second Part. By Richard West. 12mo, 1619. + +7. The School of Grace; or, A Book of Nurture. By John Hart. 12mo. +(About 1680.) + +8. England's Newest Way in all Sorts of Cookery. By Henry Howard, Free +Cook of London. 8vo, London, 1703. + +9. A Collection of above three hundred Receipts in Cookery, Physick +and Surgery, for the use of all Good Wives, Tender Mothers, and +Careful Nurses. By several Hands. The second edition, to which is +added a second part. 8vo, London, 1729. Fifth edition, 8vo, London, +1734. + +10. The Compleat City and Country Cook. By Charles Carter. 8vo, +London, 1732. + +11. The Compleat Housewife: or, Accomplish'd Gentlewomans Companion: +Being a collection of upwards of Five Hundred of the most approved +Receipts in Cookery, Pastry, Confectionery, Preserving, Pickles, +Cakes, Creams, Jellies, Made Wines, Cordials. With Copper Plates.... +And also Bills of Fare for every month in the year.... By E. Smith. +Seventh edition, with very large additions, near fifty Receipts +being communicated just before the author's death. 8vo, London, 1736. +Eleventh edition. 8vo, London, 1742. + +12. The Complete Family Piece: A very Choice Collection of Receipts +in... Cookery. Seventh Edition. 8vo, London, 1737. + +13. The Modern Cook. By Vincent La Chapelle, cook to the Prince of +Orange. Third edition. 8vo, London, 1744. + +14. A Treatise of all Sorts of Foods, both Animal and Vegetable, and +also of Drinkables, written originally in French by the Learned M.L. +Lemery. Translated by D. Hay, M.D. 8vo, London, 1745. + +15. The Housekeeper's Pocket-Book. By Sarah Harrison. Sixth edition, 2 +vols. 12mo, London, 1755. + +16. Professed Cookery. By Ann Cook. Third edition. 8vo, London (about +1760). + +17. The Experienced English Housekeeper. By Elizabeth Raffald. Second +edition. 8vo, London, 1771. There were an eighth, tenth, and eleventh +editions, and two others, described as "New Editions," between this +date and 1806. The compiler dedicates her book to "The honourable Lady +Elizabeth Warburton," in whose service she had been. She mentions that +the volume was published by subscription, and that she had obtained +eight hundred names. In the preface Mrs. Raffald begins by observing: +"When I reflect upon the number of books already in print upon this +subject, and _with what contempt they are read_, I cannot but be +apprehensive that this may meet the same fate with some who will +censure before they either see it or try its value." She concludes by +saying that she had not meddled with physical receipts, "leaving them +to the physician's superior judgment, whose proper province they are." +The author of the "Experienced Housekeeper" tells us that she had not +only filled that post in noble families during fifteen years, but +had travelled with her employers, and so widened her sphere of +observation. + +18. The Young Ladies' Guide in the Art of Cookery. By Elizabeth +Marshall. 8vo, Newcastle, 1777. + +19. English Housewifery Exhibited in above 450 Receipts. By Elizabeth +Moxon. Fourth edition. 8vo, Leeds (about 1780). + +20. The Practice of Modern Cookery. By George Dalrymple. 8vo, +Edinburgh, 1781. + +21. The Ladies' Assistant for Regulating and Supplying the Table. By +Charlotte Mason. 8vo, London, 1786. + +22. The Compleat Family Companion. 8vo, London, 1787 (?). + +23. The Honours of the Table; or, Rules for Behaviour during Meals, +with the whole Art of Carving.... By the Author of "Principles of +Politeness," etc. (Trusler). Second edition. Woodcuts by Bewick. 12mo, +London, 1791. + +24. The French Family Cook: being a complete system of French Cookery. +From the French. 8vo, London, 1793. + +25. The British Housewife; or, The Cook's, Housekeeper's, and +Gardener's Companion. By Martha Bradley. 8vo. + +26. Cookery and Pastry. By Mrs. Macivey. New edition, 12mo, Edinburgh, +1800. + +27. The London Art of Cookery. By John Farley. Fourth edition. 8vo, +London, 1807. + +28. The School of Good Living; or, A Literary and Historical Essay on +the European Kitchen, beginning with Cadmus, the Cook and King, and +concluding with the Union of Cookery and Chymistry. 12 mo, London, +1804. + +29. _Culina Famulatur Medicina_. Receipts in Modern Cookery, with +a Medical Commentary by Ignotus, and revised by A. Hunter, M.D., +F.A.S.L. and E. Fourth edition, 12mo, York, 1806. + +30. The Universal Cook. By Francis Collingwood and T. Woollams. Fourth +edition. 8vo, London, 1806. + +31. A Complete System of Cookery. By John Simpson, Cook. 8vo, London, +1806. Again, 8vo, London, 1816. + +32. Simpson's Cookery Improved and Modernised. By H.W. Brand. 8vo, +London, 1834. + +33. The Imperial and Royal Cook. By Frederick Nutt, Esquire, Author of +the "Complete Confectioner." 8vo, London, 1809. + +34. The Housekeeper's Domestic Library. By Charles Millington. 8vo, +London, 1810. + +35. The Housekeeper's Instructor; or, Universal Family Book. By W.A. +Henderson. Seventeenth edition. By S.C. Schrubbelie, Cook to the +Albany, London. 8vo, London, 1811. + +36. The Art of Preserving all kinds of animal and vegetable Substances +for several years. By M. Appert. Translated from the French. Second +edition. 8vo, London, 1812. With a folding Plate. + +37. Domestic Economy and Cookery, for Rich and Poor. By a Lady. +8vo, London, 1827. In the preface the author apprises us that a long +residence abroad had enabled her to become a mistress of the details +of foreign European cookery; but she adds: "The mulakatanies and +curries of India; the sweet pillaus, yahourt, and cold soups of +Persia; the cubbubs, sweet yaughs and sherbets of Egypt; the cold +soups and mixed meats of Russia, the cuscussous and honeyed paste +of Africa, have been inserted with the view of introducing a less +expensive and more wholesome and a more delicate mode of cookery." + +38. Apician Morsels; or, Tales of the Table, Kitchen, and Larder. By +Dick Humelbergius Secundus. 8vo, London, 1834. + +39. Cottage Economy and Cookery. 8vo, London, 1844.[Footnote: +Reprinted from the Journal of the Agricultural Society, 1843, vol. +iii, part I]. + + + + +DIET OF THE YEOMAN AND THE POOR. + + +The staple food among the lower orders in Anglo-Saxon and the +immediately succeeding times was doubtless bread, butter, and +cheese, the aliment which goes so far even yet to support our rural +population, with vegetables and fruit, and occasional allowances of +salted bacon and pancakes, beef, or fish. The meat was usually boiled +in a kettle suspended on a tripod [Footnote: The tripod is still +employed in many parts of the country for a similar purpose] over a +wood-fire, such as is used only now, in an improved shape, for fish +and soup. + + +The kettle which is mentioned, as we observe, in the tale of "Tom +Thumb," was the universal vessel for boiling purposes [Footnote: An +inverted kettle was the earliest type of the diving-bell], and the +bacon-house (or larder), so called from the preponderance of that +sort of store over the rest, was the warehouse for the winter stock of +provisions [Footnote: What is called in some places the keeping-room +also accommodated flitches on the walls, and hams ranged along the +beams overhead; and it served at the same time for a best parlour]. +The fondness for condiments, especially garlic and pepper, among the +higher orders, possibly served to render the coarser nourishment of +the poor more savoury and flavorous. "It is interesting to remark," +says Mr. Wright [Footnote: "Domestic Manners and Sentiments," 1862, +p. 91], "that the articles just mentioned (bread, butter, and cheese) +have preserved their Anglo-Saxon names to the present time, while all +kinds of meat--beef, veal, mutton, pork, even bacon--have retained +only the names given to them by the Normans; which seems to imply that +flesh-meat was not in general use for food among the lower classes of +society." + +In Malory's compilation on the adventures of King Arthur and his +knights, contemporary with the "Book of St. Alban's," we are expressly +informed in the sixth chapter, how the King made a great feast at +Caerleon in Wales; but we are left in ignorance of its character. The +chief importance of details in this case would have been the excessive +probability that Malory would have described an entertainment +consonant with the usage of his own day, although at no period of +early history was there ever so large an assemblage of guests at one +time as met, according to the fable, to do honour to Arthur. + +In the tenth century Colloquy of Archbishop Alfric, the boy is made to +say that he is too young to eat meat, but subsists on cabbages, +eggs, fish, cheese, butter, beans, and other things, according to +circumstances; so that a vegetable diet was perhaps commoner in those +days even among the middle classes than at present. This youth, when +he is asked what he drinks, replies, water, or ale if he can get it. +The dish so deftly constructed by King Arthur, according to one of +his numerous biographers, exhibited that wedlock of fruit with animal +matter--fat and plums--which we post-Arthurians eye with a certain +fastidious repugnance, but which, notwithstanding, lingered on to +the Elizabethan or Jacobaean era--nay, did not make the gorge of our +grandsires turn rebellious. It survives among ourselves only in the +modified shape of such accessories as currant jelly and apple sauce. + +But the nursery rhyme about Arthur and the bag-pudding of barley +meal with raisins and meat has a documentary worth for us beyond the +shadowy recital of the banquet at Caerleon, for, _mutato nomine_, +it is the description of a favourite article of popular diet in the +fifteenth and sixteenth centuries. The narrative of Mrs. Thumb and +her pudding is more circumstantial than that of King Alfred and the +housewife; and if the tradition is worthless, it serves us so far, +that it faithfully portrays a favourite item of rustic consumption in +old times. We are told that the pudding was made in a bowl, and that +it was chiefly composed of the flesh and blood of a newly-killed hog, +laid in batter; and then, when all was ready, the bag with all its +savoury burden was put into a kettle. + +As we are already on the threshold of legend and myth, we may linger +there a moment to recall to memory the resemblance between the +description of this piece of handiwork and that ascribed to good King +Arthur, who lived in days when monarchs were their own _chefs_, +for the Arthurian dish was also prepared in a bag, and consisted, +according to the ditty, of barley-meal and fat. Soberly speaking, the +two accounts belong, maybe, to something like the same epoch in the +annals of gastronomy; and a large pudding was, for a vast length +of time, no doubt, a prevailing _piece de résistance_ in all +frugal British households. It was the culinary forefather of +toad-in-the-hole, hot-pot, Irish stew, and of that devil-dreaded +Cornish pasty. The Elizabethan transmitters of these two Apician +nuggets possibly antedated the popular institution of the bag-pudding; +but the ancientest gastronomical records testify to the happy +introduction of the frying-pan about the era when we were under +Alfred's fatherly sway. It may have even preceded the grill, just +as the fork lagged behind the spoon, from which it is a seeming +evolution. That no reader may doubt the fact, that Tom's mother made +the pudding, and that Tom held the candle, we refer to the old edition +of this choice piece of chapman's ware, where an accurate drawing of +Mrs. Thumb, and the board, and the bowl, and Tom with the candle, may +be inspected. The _prima stamina_ of the modern fruit-pudding really +appear to be found in the ancient bag-pudding, of which Tom Thumb had +such excellent reason to be acquainted with the contents. The mode +of construction was similar, and both were boiled in a cloth. The +material and subsidiary treatment of course differed; but it is +curious that no other country possesses either the tart or the +pudding, as we understand them, and as the latter has perhaps been +developed from the dish, of the making of which Tom Thumb was +an eye-witness to his sorrow, so the covered fruit tart may not +improbably be an outgrowth from the old coffin pasty of venison or +game, with the superaddition of a dish for the safe custody of the +juice. + +Another rather prominent factor in the diet of the poor classes, not +only in Scotland but in the North of England, was oatmeal variously +prepared. One very favourable and palatable way was by grinding the +meal a second time as fine as flour, boiling it, and then serving it +with hot milk or treacle. There is something in the nature of this +food so peculiarly satisfying and supporting, that it seems to have +been destined to become the staple nourishment of a poor population +in a cold and bracing climate. The fourteenth and fifteenth centuries +unquestionably saw a great advance in the mystery of cookery and +in the diversity of dishes, and the author of "Piers of Fulham" +complains, that men were no longer satisfied with brawn and powdered +beef, which he terms "store of house," but would have venison, wild +fowl, and heronshaw; and men of simple estate, says he, will have +partridges and plovers, when lords lack. He adds quaintly: + + "A mallard of the dunghill is good enough for me, + With pleasant pickle, or it is else poison. pardy." + +We have for our purpose a very serviceable relic of the old time, +called "A Merry Jest, how the Ploughman learned his Paternoster." The +scene purports to be laid in France, and the general outline may have +been taken from the French; but it is substantially English, with +allusions to Kent, Robin Hood, and so forth, and it certainly +illustrates the theme upon which we are. This ploughman was in fact a +farmer or husbandman, and the account of his dwelling and garden-stuff +is very interesting. We are told that his hall-roof was full of +bacon-flitches, and his store-room of eggs, butter, and cheese. He had +plenty of malt to make good ale-- + + "And Martlemas beef to him was not dainty; + Onions and Garlic had he enough, + And good cream, and milk of the cow." + +But in "Vox Populi Vox Dei," written about 1547, and therefore +apparently not from the pen of Skelton, who died in 1529, it is said +that the price of an ox had risen to four pounds, and a sheep without +the wool to twelve shillings and upwards, so that the poor man could +seldom afford to have meat at his table. This evil the writer ascribes +to the exactions of the landlord and the lawyer. The former charged +too highly for his pastures, and the latter probably advanced money on +terms. The old poem depicts in sad colours the condition of the +yeoman at the same period, that had had once plenty of cows and cream, +butter, eggs, cheese, and honey; all which had gone to enrich upstarts +who throve by casting-counters and their pens. The story of the "King +and a poor Northern Man," 1640, also turns upon the tyranny of the +lawyers over ignorant clients. + +The "Serving-man's Comfort," 1598, draws a somewhat gloomy picture +of the times. The prices of all provisions, among other points, had +trebled since the good old days, when his father and grandfather kept +house. Then people could buy an ox for 20s., a sheep for 3s., a calf +for 2s., a goose for 6d., a capon for 4d., a hen for 2d., a pig for +the same, and all other household provisions at a like rate. The +reason given by the farmer was that the landlords had raised their +rent. Let them have the land on the old terms, and the former prices +would pay. This plea and demand have come back home to us in 1886. + +The tradition is, that when Queen Elizabeth received the intelligence +of the defeat of the Armada, she was dining off a goose--doubtless +about eleven o'clock in the morning. It was an anxious moment, and +perhaps her majesty for the moment had thrown ceremony somewhat aside, +and was "keeping secret house." + +The author of the "Serving-man's Comfort," 1598, also laments the +decay of hospitality. "Where," he inquires "are the great chines +of stalled beef, the great, black jacks of double beer, the long +hall-tables fully furnished with good victuals?" But he seems to have +been a stickler for the solid fare most in vogue, according to his +complaint, formerly; and he represents to us that in lieu of it one +had to put up with goose-giblets, pigs' pettitoes, and so many other +boiled meats, forced meats, and made dishes. Things were hardly so +very bad, however, if, as he states previously, the curtailment of the +expenditure on the table still left, as a medium repast, two or three +dishes, with fruit and cheese after. The black jack here mentioned was +not discarded till comparatively modern days. Nares, who published his +Glossary in 1822, states that he recollects them in use. + +"A meal's meat twice a week, worth a groat," is mentioned as the farm +servant's portion in "Civil and Uncivil Life," 1579. In "A Piece of +Friar Bacon's Brasen-heads Prophesie," a unique poem, 1604, we read +that at that time a cheesecake and a pie were held "good country +meat." The author adds: + + "Ale and Spice, and Curdes and Creame, + Would make a Scholler make a Theame." + +Breton, in his "Fantasticks," 1626, observes: "Milk, Butter and Cheese +are the labourers dyet; and a pot of good Beer quickens his spirits." + +Norfolk dumplings were celebrated in John Day the playwright's time. +He has put into the mouth of his east-country yeoman's son, Tom +Strowd, in "The Blind Beggar of Bethnal Green," written long before +it was printed in 1659, the following:--"As God mend me, and ere +thou com'st into Norfolk, I'll give thee as good a dish of Norfolk +dumplings as ere thou laydst thy lips to;" and in another passage of +the same drama, where Swash's shirt has been stolen, while he is in +bed, he describes himself "as naked as your Norfolk dumplin." In +the play just quoted, Old Strowd, a Norfolk yeoman, speaks of his +contentment with good beef, Norfolk bread, and country home-brewed +drink; and in the "City Madam," 1658, Holdfast tells us that before +his master got an estate, "his family fed on roots and livers, and +necks of beef on Sundays." I cite these as traits of the kind of +table kept by the lower grades of English society in the seventeenth +century. + + + + +MEATS AND DRINKS. + + + Slender: You are afraid, if you see the bear loose, are you not? + + Anne: Aye, indeed, Sir + + Slender: That's meat and drink to me, now. + + MERRY WIVES OF WINDSOR, i, 1. + + +The manufacture of wine and of fruit preserves, and many of the +processes of cookery, could have scarcely been accomplished without a +large and constant supply of sugar. + +The exact date of the first introduction of the latter into England +continues to be a matter of uncertainty. It was clearly very scarce, +and doubtless equally dear, when, in 1226, Henry III. asked the Mayor +of Winchester to procure him three pounds of Alexandria sugar, if so +much could be got, and also some rose and violet-coloured sugar; +nor had it apparently grown much more plentiful when the same prince +ordered the sheriffs of London to send him four loaves of sugar to +Woodstock. But it soon made its way into the English homes, and before +the end of the thirteenth century it could be procured even in remote +provincial towns. It was sold either by the loaf or the pound. It was +still exorbitantly high in price, varying from eighteen pence to +three shillings a pound of coeval currency; and it was retailed by the +spice-dealers. + +In Russell's "Book of Nurture," composed about 1450, it occurs as an +ingredient in hippocras; and one collects from a letter sent by Sir +Edward Wotton to Lord Cobham from Calais in 1546, that at that time +the quantities imported were larger, and the price reduced; for Wotton +advises his correspondent of a consignment of five-and-twenty loaves +at six shillings the loaf. One loaf was equal to ten pounds; this +brought the commodity down to eight pence a pound of fifteenth century +money. + +The sugar of Cyprus was also highly esteemed; that of Bezi, in the +Straits of Sunda, was the most plentiful; but the West Indian +produce, as well as that of Mauritius, Madeira, and other cane-growing +countries, was unknown. + +Of bread, the fifteenth century had several descriptions in use: +pain-main or bread of very fine flour, wheat-bread, barley-meal +bread, bran-bread, bean-bread, pease-bread, oat-bread or oat-cakes, +hard-bread, and unleavened bread. The poor often used a mixture +of rye, lentils, and oatmeal, varied according to the season and +district. + +The author of "The Serving-man's Comfort," 1598, however, seems to say +that it was counted by the poorer sort at that time a hardship only to +be tolerated in a dear year to mix beans and peas with their corn, +and he adds: "So must I yield you a loaf of coarse cockle, having no +acquaintance with coin to buy corn." + +In a _Nominale_ of this period mention is made of "oblys," or small +round loaves, perhaps like the old-fashioned "turnover"; and we come +across the explicit phrase, _a loaf of bread_, for the first time, +a pictorial vocabulary of the period even furnishing us with a +representation of its usual form. + +Nor were the good folks of those days without their simnels, +cracknels, and other sorts of cakes for the table, among which in the +_wastel_ we recognise the equivalent of the modern French _gâteau_. + +Besides march-pain or pain-main, and pain-puff, two sorts baked +on special occasions, and rather entering into the class of +confectionery, our better-to-do ancestors usually employed three +descriptions of bread: manchete for the master's table, made of fine +boulted flour; chete, of unboulted flour, but not mixed with any +coarser ingredient; and brown-bread, composed of flour and rye meal, +and known as _maslin_ (mystelon). + +A bushel of wheat, in a romance of the thirteenth century, is +estimated to produce twenty loaves; but the statement is obviously +to be taken with allowance. The manchet was sometimes thought to be +sufficient without butter, as we now eat a scone. In the "Conceits of +Old Hobson," 1607, the worthy haberdasher of the Poultry gives some +friends what is facetiously described as a "light" banquet--a cup +of wine and a manchet of bread on a trencher for each guest, in an +apartment illuminated with five hundred candles. + +There is no pictorial record of the mode in which the early baker +worked here, analogous to that which Lacroix supplies of his sixteenth +century _confrère_. The latter is brought vividly enough before us in +a copy of one of Jost Amman's engravings, and we perceive the bakery +and its tenants: one (apparently a female) kneading the dough in a +trough at the farther end, a second by a roasting fire, with a long +ladle or peel in his hand, putting the loaf on the oven, and a third, +who is a woman, leaving the place with two baskets of bread, one on +her head and one on her arm; the baker himself is almost naked, like +the operatives in a modern iron furnace. The artist has skilfully +realised the oppressive and enervating atmosphere; and it was till +lately quite usual to see in the side streets of Paris in the early +morning the _boulanger_ at work precisely in the same informal +costume. So tenacious is usage, and so unchanging many of the +conditions of life. + +The Anglo-Norman used butter where his Italian contemporary used oil. +But it is doubtful whether before the Conquest our ancestors were +commonly acquainted with butter. + +The early cook understood the art of glazing with yolk of egg, and +termed it endoring, and not less well that of presenting dishes under +names calculated to mislead the intended partaker, as where we find +a receipt given for _pome de oringe_, which turns out to be a +preparation of liver of pork with herbs and condiments, served up in +the form of glazed force-meat balls. + +Venison was salted in troughs. In the tale of "The King and the +Hermit," the latter exhibits to his unknown visitor his stock of +preserved venison from the deer, which he had shot in the forest. + +The mushroom, of which so many varieties are at present recognised +by botanists, seems, from the testimony of an Italian, Giacomo +Castelvetri, who was in London in 1614, and to whom I have already +referred, to have been scarcely known here at that time. I cannot +say, of course, how far Castelvetri may have prosecuted his inquiries, +though he certainly leaves the impression of having been intelligently +observant; or whether he includes in this observation the edible +toadstools; but even now much unreasonable prejudice exists as to the +latter, and very limited use is made of any but two or three familiar +sorts of the mushroom itself. It is a pity that this misconception +should not be dissipated. + +Caviary had been brought into England, probably from Russia, at the +commencement of the seventeenth century, perhaps sooner. In 1618, "The +Court and Country," by Breton, seems to represent it as an article of +diet which was little known, and not much relished; for a great lady +had sent the writer's father a little barrel of it, and it was no +sooner opened than it was fastened down again, to be returned to the +donor with a respectful message that her servant had black soap enough +already. + +In the time of James I. the ancient bill of fare had been shorn of +many of its coarser features, so far as fish was concerned; and +the author of "The Court and Country" tells a story to shew that +porpoise-pie was a dish which not even a dog would eat. + +The times had indeed changed, since a King and a Cardinal-archbishop +judged this warm-blooded sea-dweller a fit dish for the most select +company. + +It is not a despicable or very ascetic regimen which Stevenson lays +before us under April in his reproduction of Breton's "Fantasticks," +1626, under the title of the "Twelve Months," 1661:--"The wholesome +dyet that breeds good sanguine juyce, such as pullets, capons, sucking +veal, beef not above three years Old, a draught of morning milk +fasting from the cow; grapes, raysons, and figs be good before meat; +Rice with Almond Milk, birds of the Field, Peasants and Partridges, +and fishes of stony rivers, Hen eggs potcht, and such like." + +Under May he furnishes us with a second and not less appetising +_menu_:-- + +"Butter and sage are now the wholesome Breakfast, but fresh cheese and +cream are meat for a dainty mouth; the early Peascods and Strawberries +want no price with great Bellies; but the Chicken and the Duck are +fatted for the Market; the sucking Rabbet is frequently taken in the +Nest, and many a Gosling never lives to be a Goose." + +Even so late as the succeeding reign, Breton speaks of the good cheer +at Christmas, and of the cook, if he lacks not wit, sweetly licking +his fingers. + +The storage of liquids became a difficult problem where, as among our +ancestors, glazed pottery was long unknown; and more especially with +regard to the supply of water in dry seasons. But so far as milk was +concerned, the daily yield probably seldom exceeded the consumption; +and among the inhabitants further north and east, who, as Caesar says, +partook also of flesh, and did not sow grain--in other words, were +less vegetarian in their habits from the more exhausting nature of the +climate--the consideration might be less urgent. It is open to doubt +if, even in those primitive times, the supply of a national want +lagged far behind the demand. + +The list of wines which the King of Hungary proposed to have at the +wedding of his daughter, in "The Squire of Low Degree," is worth +consulting. Harrison, in his "Description of England," 1586, speaks of +thirty different kinds of superior vintages and fifty-six of commoner +or weaker kinds. But the same wine was perhaps known under more than +one name. + +Romney or Rumney, a Hungarian growth, Malmsey from the Peloponnesus, +and Hippocras were favourites, and the last-named was kept as late as +the last century in the buttery of St. John's College, Cambridge, +for use during the Christmas festivities. But France, Spain, Greece, +almost all countries, contributed to furnish the ancient wine-cellar, +and gratify the variety of taste among connoisseurs; and for such as +had not the means to purchase foreign productions, the juice of the +English grape, either alone or mingled with honey and spice, furnished +a not unpalatable and not very potent stimulant. As claret and hock +with us, so anciently Bastard and Piment were understood in a generic +sense, the former for any mixed wine, the latter for one seasoned with +spice. + +In "Colin Blobol's Testament," a whimsical production of the fifteenth +century, Tent and Valencia wines are mentioned, with wine of Languedoc +and Orleans. But perhaps it will be best to cite the passage:-- + +"I trow there shall be an honest fellowship, save first shall they of +ale have new backbones. With strong ale brewed in vats and in tuns; +Ping, Drangollie, and the Draget fine, Mead, Mattebru, and the +Metheling. Red wine, the claret and the white, with Tent and Alicant, +in whom I delight. Wine of Languedoc and of Orleans thereto: Single +beer, and other that is double: Spruce beer, and the beer of Hamburgh: +Malmsey, Tires, and Romany." + +But some of the varieties are hidden under obscure names. We recognise +Muscadel, Rhine wine, Bastard, Hippocras, however. On the 10th of +December, 1497, Piers Barber received six shillings and eight pence, +according to the "Privy Purse Expences of Henry VII.," "for spice for +ypocras." + +Metheglin and beer of some kind appear to be the most ancient liquors +of which there are any vestiges among the Britons. Ferguson, in his +Essay "On the Formation of the Palate," states that they are described +by a Greek traveller, who visited the south of Britain in the fourth +century B.C. This informant describes metheglin as composed of wheat +and honey (of course mixed with water), and the beer as being of +sufficient strength to injure the nerves and cause head-ache. + +Worlidge, in his "Vinetum Britannicum," 1676, gives us receipts for +metheglin and birch wine. Breton, in his "Fantasticks," 1626, under +January, recommends a draught of ale and wormwood wine mixed in +a morning to comfort the heart, scour the maw, and fulfil other +beneficial offices. + +The English beer of by-gone times underwent many vicissitudes, and it +was long before our ancestors conquered their dislike to the bitter +hop, after having been accustomed to a thick, sweet liquor of which +the modern Kentish ale is in some measure a survival. Beer was made +from a variety of grain; oats were most commonly employed. In France, +they resorted even to vetches, lentils, rye, and darnel. But as a rule +it was a poor, thin drink which resulted from the operation, and the +monks of Glastonbury deemed themselves fortunate in being allowed by +their abbot to put a load of oats into the vat to improve the quality +of the beverage; which may account for Peter of Blois characterising +the ale in use at Court in his day (he died about the end of the +twelfth century) as potent--it was by contrast so. The first assize of +ale seems not to have been enacted till the reign of Henry III. + +From a glossary of the fourteenth century, inserted in "Reliquse +Antique," 1841, it appears that whey was then used as a drink; it +occurs there as "cerum, i, quidam liquor, whey." + + + + +THE KITCHEN. + + +In direct connection with cookery as with horticulture, are the +utensils and appliances which were at the command of those who had to +do with these matters in days of yore; and in both cases an inquirer +finds that he has to turn from the vain search for actual specimens +belonging to remoter antiquity to casual representations or +descriptions in MSS. and printed books. Our own museums appear to be +very weakly furnished with examples of the vessels and implements in +common use for culinary purposes in ancient times, and, judging from +the comparatively limited information which we get upon this subject +from the pages of Lacroix, the paucity of material is not confined to +ourselves. The destruction and disappearance of such humble monuments +of the civilisation of the past are easily explained; and the survival +of a slender salvage is to be treated as a circumstance not less +remarkable than fortunate. + +It seems that the practice was to cut up, if not to slaughter, +the animals used for food in the kitchen, and to prepare the whole +carcase, some parts in one way and some in another. We incidentally +collect from an ancient tale that the hearts of swine were much prized +as dainties. + +Besides a general notion of the appointments of the cooking +department, we are enabled to form some conception of the aspect +of the early kitchen itself from extant representations in the +"Archaeological Album," the "Penny Magazine" for 1836, and Lacroix +[Footnote: "Moeurs, Usages et Costumes au Moyen Age," 1872, pp 166, +170, 177]. The last-named authority furnishes us with two interesting +sixteenth century interiors from Jost Amman, and (from the same +source) a portraiture of the cook of that period. + +The costume of the subject is not only exhibited, doubtless with the +fidelity characteristic of the artist, but is quite equally applicable +to France, if not to our own country, and likewise to a much earlier +date. The evidences of the same class supplied by the "Archaeological +Album," 1845, are drawn from the MS. in the British Museum, +formerly belonging to the Abbey of St. Albans. They consist of two +illustrations--one of Master Robert, cook to the abbey, as elsewhere +noticed, accompanied by his wife--unique relic of its kind; the other +a view of a small apartment with dressers and shelves, and with plates +and accessories hung round, in which a cook, perhaps the identical +Master Robert aforesaid, is plucking a bird. The fireplace is in +the background, and the iron vessel which is to receive the fowl, +or whatever it may really be, is suspended over the flame by a long +chain. The perspective is rather faulty, and the details are not very +copious; but for so early a period as the thirteenth or early part of +the following century its value is undeniable. + +The "Penny Magazine" presents us with a remarkable exterior, that of +the venerable kitchen of Stanton-Harcourt, near Oxford, twenty-nine +feet square and sixty feet in height. There are two large fireplaces, +facing each other, but no chimney, the smoke issuing atthe holes, each +about seven inches in diameter, which run round the roof. As Lamb +said of his Essays, that they were all Preface, so this kitchen is +all chimney. It is stated that the kitchen at Glastonbury Abbey was +constructed on the same model; and both are probably older than the +reign of Henry IV. The one to which I am more immediately referring, +though, at the time (1835) the drawing was taken, in an excellent +state of preservation, had evidently undergone repairs and structural +changes. + +It was at Stanton-Harcourt that Pope wrote a portion of his +translation of Homer, about 1718. + +A manufactory of brass cooking utensils was established at Wandsworth +in or before Aubrey's time by Dutchmen, who kept the art secret. +Lysons states that the place where the industry was carried on bore +the name of the "Frying Pan Houses" [Footnote: A "Environs of London," +1st ed., Surrey, pp. 502-3]. + +In the North of England, the _bake-stone_, originally of the material +to which it owed its name, but at a very early date constructed of +iron, with the old appellations retained as usual, was the universal +machinery for baking, and was placed on the _Branderi_, an iron frame +which was fixed on the top of the fireplace, and consisted of +iron bars, with a sliding or slott bar, to shift according to the +circumstances. + +The tripod which held the cooking-vessel over the wood flame, among +the former inhabitants of Britain, has not been entirely effaced. It +is yet to be seen here and there in out-of-the-way corners and +places; and in India they use one constructed of clay, and differently +contrived. The most primitive pots for setting over the fire on the +tripod were probably of bronze. + +The tripod seems to be substantially identical with what was known in +Nidderdale as the kail-pot. "This was formerly in common use," says +Mr. Lucas; "a round iron pan, about ten inches deep and eighteen +inches across, with a tight-fitting, convex lid. It was provided with +three legs. The kail-pot, as it was called, was used for cooking +pies, and was buried bodily in burning peat. As the lower peats became +red-hot, they drew them from underneath, and placed them on the top. +The kail-pot may still be seen on a few farms." This was about 1870. + +The writer is doubtless correct in supposing that this utensil was +originally employed for cooking kail or cabbage and other green stuff. + +Three rods of iron or hard wood lashed together, with a hook for +taking the handle of the kettle, formed, no doubt, the original +tripod. But among some of the tribes of the North of Europe, and +in certain Tartar, Indian, and other communities, we see no such +rudimentary substitute for a grate, but merely two uprights and a +horizontal rest, supporting a chain; and in the illustration to +the thirteenth or fourteenth century MS., once part of the abbatial +library at St. Albans, a nearer approach to the modern jack is +apparent in the suspension of the vessel over the flame by a chain +attached to the centre of a fireplace. + +Not the tripod, therefore, but the other type must be thought to have +been the germ of the later-day apparatus, which yielded in its turn to +the Range. + +The fireplace with a ring in the middle, from which is suspended the +pot, is represented in a French sculpture of the end of the fourteenth +century, where two women are seated on either side, engaged in +conversation. One holds a ladle, and the other an implement which may +be meant for a pair of bellows. + +In his treatise on Kitchen Utensils, Neckam commences with naming a +table, on which the cook may cut up green stuff of various sorts, as +onions, peas, beans, lentils, and pulse; and he proceeds to enumerate +the tools and implements which are required to carry on the work: +pots, tripods for the kettle, trenchers, pestles, mortars, hatchets, +hooks, saucepans, cauldrons, pails, gridirons, knives, and so on. +The head-cook was to have a little apartment, where he could prepare +condiments and dressings; and a sink was to be provided for the +viscera and other offal of poultry. Fish was cooked in salt water or +diluted wine. + +Pepper and salt were freely used, and the former must have been ground +as it was wanted, for a pepper-mill is named as a requisite. Mustard +we do not encounter till the time of Johannes de Garlandia (early +thirteenth century), who states that it grew in his own garden at +Paris. Garlic, or gar-leac (in the same way as the onion is called +_yn-leac_), had established itself as a flavouring medium. The +nasturtium was also taken into service in the tenth or eleventh +century for the same purpose, and is classed with herbs. + +When the dish was ready, it was served up with green sauce, in which +the chief ingredients were sage, parsley, pepper, and oil, with a +little salt. Green geese were eaten with raisin or crab-apple sauce. +Poultry was to be well larded or basted while it was before the fire. + +I may be allowed to refer the reader, for some interesting jottings +respecting the first introduction of coal into London, to "Our English +Home," 1861. "The middle classes," says the anonymous writer, "were +the first to appreciate its value; but the nobility, whose mansions +were in the pleasant suburbs of Holborn and the Strand, regarded it as +a nuisance." This was about the middle of the thirteenth century. It +may be a mite contributed to our knowledge of early household economy +to mention, by the way, that in the supernatural tale of the "Smith +and his Dame" (sixteenth century) "a quarter of coal" occurs. The +smith lays it on the fire all at once; but then it was for his forge. +He also poured water on the flames, to make them, by means of his +bellows, blaze more fiercely. But the proportion of coal to wood +was long probably very small. One of the tenants of the Abbey of +Peterborough, in 852, was obliged to furnish forty loads of wood, but +of coal two only. + +In the time of Charles I., however, coals seem to have been usual +in the kitchen, for Breton, in this "Fantasticks," 1626, says, under +January:--"The Maid is stirring betimes, and slipping on her Shooes +and her Petticoat, groaps for the tinder box, where after a conflict +between the steele and the stone, she begets a spark, at last the +Candle lights on his Match; then upon an old rotten foundation of +broaken boards she erects an artificiall fabrick of the black Bowels +of New-Castle soyle, to which she sets fire with as much confidence as +the Romans to their Funerall Pyles." + +Under July, in the same work, we hear of "a chafing dish of coals;" +and under September, wood and coals are mentioned together. But +doubtless the employment of the latter was far less general. + +In a paper read before the Royal Society, June 9, 1796, there is an +account of a saucepan discovered in the bed of the river Withain, near +Tattersall Ferry, in Lincolnshire, in 1788. It was of base metal, and +was grooved at the bottom, to allow the contents more readily to +come within reach of the fire. The writer of this narrative, which +is printed in the "Philosophical Transactions," considered that the +vessel might be of Roman workman-ship; as he states that on the handle +was stamped a name, C. ARAT., which he interprets _Caius Aratus_. "It +appears," he adds, "to have been tinned; but almost all the coating +had been worn off.... The art of tinning copper was understood and +practised by the Romans, although it is commonly supposed to be a +modern invention." + +Neckam mentions the roasting-spit, elsewhere called the roasting-iron; +but I fail to detect skewers, though they can hardly have been +wanting. Ladles for basting and stirring were familiar. As to the spit +itself, it became a showy article of plate, when the fashion arose +of serving up the meat upon it in the hall; and the tenure by which +Finchingfield in Essex was held _in capite_ in the reign of Edward +III.--that of turning the spit at the coronation--demonstrates that +the instrument was of sufficient standing to be taken into service as +a memorial formality. + +The fifteenth century vocabulary notices the salt-cellar, the spoon, +the trencher, and the table-cloth. The catalogue comprises _morsus, +a bit_, which shows that _bit_ and _bite_ are synonymous, or rather, +that the latter is the true word as still used in Scotland, Yorkshire, +and Lincolnshire, from the last of which the Pilgrims carried it +across the Atlantic, where it is a current Americanism, not for +one bite, but as many as you please, which is, in fact, the modern +provincial interpretation of the phrase, but not the antique English +one. The word _towel_ was indifferently applied, perhaps, for a +cloth for use at the table or in the lavatory. Yet there was also the +_manuturgium_, or hand-cloth, a speciality rendered imperative by the +mediaeval fashion of eating. + +In the inventory of the linen at Gilling, in Yorkshire, one of the +seats of the Fairfax family, made in 1590, occur:--"Item, napkins vj. +dozen. Item, new napkins vj. dozen." This entry may or may not warrant +a conclusion that the family bought that quantity at a time--not a +very excessive store, considering the untidy habits of eating and the +difficulty of making new purchases at short notice. + +Another mark of refinement is the resort to the _napron_, corruptly +_apron_, to protect the dress during the performance of kitchen work. +But the fifteenth century was evidently growing wealthier in its +articles of use and luxury; the garden and the kitchen only kept pace +with the bed-chamber and the dining-hall, the dairy and the laundry, +the stable and the out-buildings. An extensive nomenclature was +steadily growing up, and the Latin, old French, and Saxon terms were +giving way on all sides to the English. It has been now for some time +an allowed and understood thing that in these domestic backgrounds the +growth of our country and the minuter traits of private life are to be +studied with most clear and usurious profit. + +The trencher, at first of bread, then of wood, after a while of +pewter, and eventually of pottery, porcelain or china-earth, as it was +called, and the precious metals, afforded abundant scope for the fancy +of the artist, even in the remote days when the material for it came +from the timber-dealer, and sets of twelve were sometimes decorated +on the face with subjects taken from real life, and on the back with +emblems of the purpose to which they were destined. + +Puttenham, whose "Art of English Poetry" lay in MS. some years before +it was published in 1589, speaks of the posies on trenchers and +banqueting dishes. The author of "Our English Home" alludes to a very +curious set, painted in subjects and belonging to the reign of James +I., which was exhibited at the Society of Antiquaries' rooms by +Colonel Sykes. + +It is to be augured that, with the progress of refinement, the meats +were served upon the table on dishes instead of trenchers, and that +the latter were reserved for use by the guests of the family. For +in the "Serving-man's Comfort," 1598, one reads:--"Even so the +gentlemanly serving-man, whose life and manners doth equal his birth +and bringing up, scorneth the society of these sots, or to place +a dish where they give a trencher"; and speaking of the passion of +people for raising themselves above their extraction, the writer, a +little farther on, observes: "For the yeoman's son, as I said before, +leaving _gee haigh!_ for, _Butler, some more fair trenchers to the +table!_ bringeth these ensuing ulcers amongst the members of the +common body." + +The employment of trenchers, which originated in the manner which I +have shown, introduced the custom of the distribution at table of +the two sexes, and the fashion of placing a lady and gentleman +alternately. In former days it was frequently usual for a couple thus +seated together to eat from one trencher, more particularly if the +relations between them were of an intimate nature, or, again, if it +were the master and mistress of the establishment. Walpole relates +that so late as the middle of the last century the old Duke and +Duchess of Hamilton occupied the dais at the head of the room, and +preserved the traditional manner by sharing the same plate. It was a +token of attachment and a tender recollection of unreturnable youth. + +The prejudice against the fork in England remained very steadfast +actual centuries after its first introduction; forks are +particularised among the treasures of kings, as if they had been crown +jewels, in the same manner as the _iron_ spits, pots, and frying-pans +of his Majesty Edward III.; and even so late as the seventeeth +century, Coryat, who employed one after his visit to Italy, was +nicknamed "Furcifer." The two-pronged implement long outlived Coryat; +and it is to be seen in cutlers' signs even down to our day. The old +dessert set, curiously enough, instead of consisting of knives and +forks in equal proportions, contained eleven knives and one fork for +_ginger_. Both the fork and spoon were frequently made with handles of +glass or crystal, like those of mother-of-pearl at present in vogue. + +In a tract coeval with Coryat the Fork-bearer, Breton's "Court and +Country," 1618, there is a passage very relevant to this part of the +theme:--"For us in the country," says he, "when we have washed our +hands after no foul work, nor handling any unwholesome thing, we need +no little forks to make hay with our mouths, to throw our meat into +them." + +Forks, though not employed by the community, became part of the +effects of royal and great personages, and in the inventory of Charles +V. of France appear the spoon, knife, and fork. In another of the Duke +of Burgundy, sixty years later (1420), knives and other implements +occur, but no fork. The cutlery is described here as of German make. +Brathwaite, in his "Rules for the Government of the House of an Earl," +probably written about 1617, mentions knives and spoons, but not +forks. + +As the fork grew out of the chopstick, the spoon was probably +suggested by the ladle, a form of implement employed alike by the +baker and the cook; for the early tool which we see in the hands of +the operative in the oven more nearly resembles in the bowl a spoon +than a shovel. In India nowadays they have ladles, but not spoons. +The universality of broths and semi-liquid substances, as well as the +commencement of a taste for learned gravies, prompted a recourse to +new expedients for communicating between the platter and the mouth; +and some person of genius saw how the difficulty might be solved by +adapting the ladle to individual service. But every religion has its +quota of dissent, and there were, nay, are still, many who professed +adherence to the sturdy simplicity of their progenitors, and saw +in this daring reform and the fallow blade of the knife a certain +effeminate prodigality. + +It is significant of the drift of recent years toward the monograph, +that, in 1846, Mr. Westman published "The Spoon: Primitive, Egyptian, +Roman, Mediaeval and Modern," with one hundred illustrations, in an +octavo volume. + +The luxury of carving-knives was, even in the closing years of the +fifteenth century, reserved for royalty and nobility; for in the +"Privy Purse Expenses of Henry VII.," under 1497, a pair is said to +have cost £1 6s. 8d. of money of that day. Nothing is said of forks. +But in the same account, under February 1st, 1500-1, one Mistress +Brent receives 12s. (and a book, which cost the king 5s. more) for a +silver fork weighing three ounces. In Newbery's "Dives Pragmaticus," +1563, a unique poetical volume in the library at Althorpe, there is a +catalogue of cooking utensils which, considering its completeness, is +worth quotation; the author speaks in the character of a chapman--one +forestalling Autolycus:-- + + "I have basins, ewers, of tin, pewter and glass. + Great vessels of copper, fine latten and brass: + Both pots, pans and kettles, such as never was. + I have platters, dishes, saucers and candle-sticks, + Chafers, lavers, towels and fine tricks: + Posnets, frying-pans, and fine puddingpricks ... + Fine pans for milk, and trim tubs for sowse. + I have ladles, scummers, andirons and spits, + Dripping-pans, pot-hooks.... + I have fire-pans, fire-forks, tongs, trivets, and trammels, + Roast-irons, trays, flaskets, mortars and pestles...." + +And among other items he adds rollers for paste, moulds for cooks, +fine cutting knives, fine wine glasses, soap, fine salt, and candles. +The list is the next best thing to an auctioneer's inventory of an +Elizabethan kitchen, to the fittings of Shakespeare's, or rather +of his father's. A good idea of the character and resources of a +nobleman's or wealthy gentleman's kitchen at the end of the sixteenth +and commencement of the seventeenth century may be formed from the +Fairfax inventories (1594-1624), lately edited by Mr. Peacock. I +propose to annex a catalogue of the utensils which there present +themselves:-- + + The furnace pan for beef. + The beef kettle. + Great and small kettles. + Brass kettles, holding from sixteen to twenty gallons each. + Little kettles with bowed or carved handles. + Copper pans with ears. + Great brass pots. + Dripping-pans. + An iron peel or baking shovel. + A brazen mortar and a pestle. + Gridirons. + Iron ladles. + A laten scummer. + A grater. + A pepper mill. + A mustard-quern. + Boards. + A salt-box. + An iron range. + Iron racks. + A tin pot. + Pot hooks. + A galley bawk to suspend the kettle or pot over the fire. + Spits, square and round, and various sizes. + Bearers. + Crooks. + +In the larders (wet and dry) and pastry were:-- + + Moulding boards for pastry. + A boulting tub for meal. + A little table. + A spice cupboard. + A chest for oatmeal. + A trough. + Hanging and other shelves. + +Here follows the return of pewter, brass, and other vessels belonging +to the kitchen:-- + + Pewter dishes of nine sizes (from Newcastle). + Long dishes for rabbits. } + Saucers. } + Chargers. } Silver fashioned. + Pie plates. } + Voider. } + A beef-prick. + Fire shoves and tongs. + A brig (a sort of brandreth). + A cullender. + A pewter baking-pan. + Kettles of brass. + A skillet. + A brandeth. + A shredding knife. + A chopping knife. + An apple cradle. + A pair of irons to make wafers with. + A brass pot-lid. + Beef-axes and knives. } + Slaughter ropes. } For Slaughtering. + Beef stangs. } + +In the beef-house was an assortment of tubs, casks, and hogsheads. +Table knives, forks, spoons, and drinking-vessels presumably belonged +to another department. + +The dripping-pan is noticed in Breton's "Fantasticks," 1626: "Dishes +and trenchers are necessary servants, and they that have no meat +may go scrape; a Spit and a Dripping-pan would do well, if well +furnished." Flecknoe, again, in his character of a "Miserable old +Gentlewoman," inserted among his "Enigmatical Characters," 1658, +speaks of her letting her prayer-book fall into the dripping-pan, and +the dog and the cat quarrelling over it, and at last agreeing to pray +on it! + +But this is a branch of the subject I cannot afford further to +penetrate. Yet I must say a word about the polished maple-wood bowl, +or _maser_, with its mottoes and quaint devices, which figured on the +side-board of the yeoman and the franklin, and which Chaucer must have +often seen in their homes. Like everything else which becomes popular, +it was copied in the precious metals, with costly and elaborate +goldsmith's work; but its interest for us is local, and does not lend +itself to change of material and neighbourhood. The habits of the poor +and middle classes are apt to awaken a keener curiosity in our minds +from the comparatively slender information which has come to us upon +them; and as in the case of the maser, the laver which was employed in +humble circles for washing the hands before and after a meal was, not +of gold or silver, as in the houses of the nobility, but of brass +or laten, nor was it in either instance a ceremonious form, but a +necessary process. The modern finger-glass and rose-water dish, which +are an incidence of every entertainment of pretension, and in higher +society as much a parcel of the dinner-table as knives and forks, are, +from a mediaeval standpoint, luxurious anachronisms. + +In Archbishop Alfric's "Colloquy," originally written in the tenth +century, and subsequently augmented and enriched with a Saxon gloss +by one of his pupils, the cook is one of the persons introduced +and interrogated. He is asked what his profession is worth to the +community; and he replies that without him people would have to eat +their greens and flesh raw; whereupon it is rejoined that they might +readily dress them themselves; to which the cook can only answer, that +in such case all men would be reduced to the position of servants. + +The kitchen had its _chef_ or master-cook (archimacherus), +under-cooks, a waferer or maker of sweets, a scullion or swiller +(who is otherwise described as a _quistron_), and knaves, or boys +for preparing the meat; and all these had their special functions and +implements. + +Even in the fifteenth century the appliances for cookery were +evidently far more numerous than they had been. An illustrated +vocabulary portrays, among other items, the dressing-board, the +dressing-knife, the roasting-iron, the frying-pan, the spit-turner (in +lieu of the old turn-broach), the andiron, the ladle, the slice, the +skummer; and the _assitabulum_, or saucer, first presents itself. +It seems as if the butler and the pantler had their own separate +quarters; and the different species of wine, and the vessels for +holding it, are not forgotten. The archaic pantry was dedicated, not +to its later objects, but to that which the name strictly signifies; +but at the same time the writer warrants us in concluding, that the +pantry accommodated certain miscellaneous utensils, as he comprises +in its contents a candlestick, a table or board-cloth, a hand-cloth or +napkin, a drinking bowl, a saucer, and a spoon. The kitchen, in short, +comprised within its boundaries a far larger variety of domestic +requisites of all kinds than its modern representative, which deals +with an external machinery so totally changed. The ancient Court of +England was so differently constituted from the present, and so +many offices which sprang out of the feudal system have fallen +into desuetude, that it requires a considerable effort to imagine a +condition of things, where the master-cook of our lord the king was +a personage of high rank and extended possessions. How early the +functions of cook and the property attached to the position were +separated, and the tenure of the land made dependent on a nominal +ceremony, is not quite clear. Warner thinks that it was in the +Conqueror's time; but at any rate, in that of Henry II. the husband +of the heiress of Bartholomew de Cheney held his land in Addington, +Surrey, by the serjeantry of finding a cook to dress the victuals at +the coronation; the custom was kept up at least so late as the reign +of George III., to whom at his coronation the lord of the manor of +Addington presented a dish of pottage. The tenure was varied in its +details from time to time. But for my purpose it is sufficient that +manorial rights were acquired by the _magnus coquus_ or _magister +coquorum_ in the same way as by the grand butler and other officers of +state; and when so large a share of the splendour of royalty +continued for centuries to emanate from the kitchen, it was scarcely +inappropriate or unfair to confer on that department of state some +titular distinction, and endow the holder with substantial honours. To +the Grand Chamberlain and the Grand Butler the Grand Cook was a meet +appendage. + +The primary object of these feudal endowments was the establishment +of a cordon round the throne of powerful subjects under conditions +and titles which to ourselves may appear incongruous and obscure, +but which were in tolerable keeping with the financial and commercial +organisation of the period, with a restricted currency, a revenue +chiefly payable in kind, scanty facilities for transit, and an absence +of trading centres. These steward-ships, butler-ships, and cook-ships, +in the hands of the most trusted vassals of the Crown, constituted a +rudimentary vehicle for in-gathering the dues of all kinds renderable +by the king's tenants; and as an administrative scheme gradually +unfolded itself, they became titular and honorary, like our own +reduced menagerie of nondescripts. But while they lasted in their +substance and reality, they answered the wants and notions of a +primitive people; nor is it for this practical age to lift up its +hands or its voice too high; for mediaeval England is still legible +without much excavation in our Court, our Church, nay, in our Laws. +There lurk our cunning spoilers! + +Mr. Fairholt, in the "Archaeological Album," 1845, has depicted for +our benefit the _chef_ of the Abbey of St. Albans in the fourteenth +century, and his wife Helena The representations of these two notable +personages occur in a MS. in the British Museum, which formerly +belonged to the Abbey, and contains a list of its benefactors, with +their gifts. It does not appear that Master Robert, cook to Abbot +Thomas, was the donor of any land or money; but, in consideration of +his long and faithful services, his soul was to be prayed for with +that of his widow, who bestowed 3s. 4d. _ad opus hujus libri_, which +Fairholt supposes to refer to the insertion of her portrait and that +of her spouse among the graphic decorations of the volume. They are +perhaps in their way unique. Behold them opposite! + +Another point in reference to the early economy of the table, which +should not be overlooked, is the character of the ancient buttery, and +the quick transition which its functionary, the butler, experienced +from the performance of special to that of general duties. + +He at a very remote period acted not merely as the curator of the +wine-cellar, but as the domestic steward and storekeeper; and it was +his business to provide for the requirements of the kitchen and the +pantry, and to see that no opportunity was neglected of supplying, +from the nearest port, or market town, or fair, if his employer +resided in the country, all the necessaries for the departments under +his control. We are apt to regard the modern bearer of the same title +as more catholic in his employments than the appellation suggests; +but he in fact wields, on the contrary, a very circumscribed authority +compared to that of his feudal prototype. + +One of the menial offices in the kitchen, when the spit came into +use, was the broach-turner, lately referred to. He was by no means +invariably maintained on the staff, but was hired for the occasion, +which may augur the general preference for boiled and fried meats. +Sometimes it appears that any lad passing by, or in want of temporary +employment, was admitted for this purpose, and had a trifling +gratuity, or perhaps only his dinner and the privilege of dipping his +fingers in the dripping, for his pains. + +Warner cites an entry in some accounts of the Hospital of St. +Bartholomew at Sandwich, under 1569:--"For tournynge the spytte, +iiijd." and this was when the mayor of the borough dined with the +prior. A royal personage gave, of course, more. The play of "Gammer +Gurton's Needle," written about 1560, opens with a speech of Diccon +the Bedlam, or poor Tom, where he says:-- + + "Many a gossip's cup in my time have I tasted, + And many a broach and spit have I both turned and basted." + +The spit, again, was supplanted by the jack. + +The "History of Friar Rush," 1620, opens with a scene in which +the hero introduces himself to a monastery, and is sent by the +unsuspecting prior to the master-cook, who finds him subordinate +employment. + + + + +MEALS. + + +It has been noted that for a great length of time two meals were made +to suffice the requirements of all classes. Our own experience shows +how immaterial the names are which people from age to age choose to +bestow on their feeding intervals. Some call supper _dinner_, and +others call dinner _luncheon._ First comes the prevailing mode +instituted by fashionable society, and then a foolish subscription to +it by a section of the community who are too poor to follow it, and +too proud not to seem to do so. Formerly it was usual for the Great +to dine and sup earlier than the Little; but now the rule is reversed, +and the later a man dines the more distinguished he argues himself. +We have multiplied our daily seasons of refreshment, and eat and drink +far oftener than our ancestors; but the truly genteel Briton never +sups; the word is scarcely in his vocabulary,--like Beau Brummel and +the farthing--"Fellow, I do not know the coin!" + +In a glossary of the tenth-eleventh century only two meals are quoted: +undermeat = _prandium_, and even-meat = _coena_. That is to say, our +Saxon precursors were satisfied as a rule with two repasts daily, but +to this in more luxurious times were added the supper and even the +rear-supper, the latter being, so far as we know, a second course or +dessert and the bipartite collation corresponding to the modern late +dinner. But it is one of those strange survivals of ancient manners +which people practise without any consciousness of the fact, which +is at the root of the fashion, which still occasionally prevails, +of dividing the chief meal of the day by an interval of repose, and +taking the wine and dessert an hour or two after the other courses; +and the usage in our colleges and inns of court of retiring to another +apartment to "wine" may claim the same origin. It is obvious that the +rear-supper was susceptible of becoming the most important and costly +part of an entertainment; and that it frequently assumed extravagant +proportions, many passages from our early poets might be adduced to +prove. + +In the "Book of Cookery," 1500, we have the _menu_ at the installation +of Archbishop Nevill in York in 1467; but the bill of fare of a +feast given by him in 1452 at Oxford, where he is mentioned as Master +Nevill, son of the Earl of Salisbury, is inserted from the Cotton MS. +Titus, in "Reliquiae Antiquae," 1841. It consisted of three courses, +which seem to have been the customary limit. Of course, however, the +usage varied, as in the "Song of the Boar's Head," of which there are +two or three versions, two courses only are specified in what has the +air of having been a rather sumptuous entertainment. + +The old low-Latin term for the noonday meal was _merenda_, which +suggests the idea of food to be earned before it was enjoyed. So in +"Friar Bacon's Prophesie," 1604, a poem, it is declared that, in the +good old days, he that wrought not, till he sweated, was held +unworthy of his meat. This reminds one of Abernethy's maxim for the +preservation of health,--to live on sixpence a day, _and earn it_. + +The "Song of the Boar's Head," just cited, and printed from the +Porkington MS. in "Reliquiae Antiquae" (ii, 30), refers to larks for +ladies to pick as part of the second course in a banquet. On special +occasions, in the middle ages, after the dessert, hippocras was +served, as they have liqueurs to this day on the Continent both after +dinner and after the mid-day breakfast. + +The writer of "Piers of Fulham" lived to see this fashion of +introducing a third meal, and that again split into two for +luxury's sake; for his metrical biographer tells us, that he refused +rear-suppers, from a fear of surfeiting. + +I collect that in the time of Henry VIII. the supper was a +well-established institution, and that the abuse of postponing it to +a too advanced hour had crept in; for the writer of a poem of this +period especially counsels his readers _not to sup late_. + +Rear-suppers were not only held in private establishments, but in +taverns; and in the early interlude of the "Four Elements," given in +my edition of Dodsley, and originally published about 1519, a very +graphic and edifying scene occurs of a party of roisterers ordering +and enjoying an entertainment of this kind. About seventy years later, +Robert Greene, the playwright, fell a victim to a surfeit of pickled +herrings and Rhenish wine, at some merry gathering of his intimates +falling under this denomination. Who will venture to deny that the +first person who kept unreasonable hours was an author and a poet? +Even Shakespeare is not exempt from the suspicion of having hastened +his end by indulgence with one or two friends in a gay carouse of this +kind. + +The author of the "Description of England" enlightens us somewhat on +the sort of kitchen which the middle class and yeomanry of his time +deemed fit and sufficient. The merchant or private gentleman had +usually from one to three dishes on the table when there were no +visitors, and from four to six when there was company. What the +yeoman's every-day diet was Harrison does not express; but at +Christmas he had brawn, pudding and souse, with mustard; beef, mutton, +and pork; shred pies, goose, pig, capon, turkey, veal, cheese, apples, +etc., with good drink, and a blazing fire in the hall. The farmer's +bill of fare varied according to the season: in Lent, red herrings and +salt fish; at Easter, veal and bacon; at Martinmas, salted beef; at +Midsummer, fresh beef, peas, and salad; at Michaelmas, fresh herrings +and fat mutton; at All Saints', pork and peas and fish; and at +Christmas, the same dainties as our yeoman, with good cheer and +pastime. + +The modern luncheon or nuncheon was the archaic _prandium_, or +under-meat, displaced by the breakfast, and modified in its character +by the different distribution of the daily repasts, so that, instead +of being the earliest regular meal, like the _grand déjeuner_ of the +French, or coming, like our luncheon, between breakfast and dinner, it +interposed itself between the noontide dinner and the evening supper. +Now, with an increasing proportion of the community, the universal +luncheon, postponed to a later hour, is the actual dinner; and our +under-meal is the afternoon tea. + +In those not-wholly-to-be-discommended days, the residue of the meal +was consumed in the servants' hall, and the scraps bestowed on the +poor at the gate; and the last part of the business was carried out, +not as a matter of chance or caprice, but on as methodical a principle +as the payment of a poor-rate. At the servants' table, besides the +waiters and other attendants on the principal board, mentioned by +Harrison, sat the master-cook, the pantler, the steward or major-domo, +the butler, the cellarman, the waferer, and others. It was not till +comparatively recent times that the _wafery_, a special department of +the royal kitchen, where the confectionery and pastry were prepared, +was discontinued. + +There was necessarily a very large section of the community in all +the large towns, especially in London, which was destitute of culinary +appliances, and at the same time of any charitable or eleemosynary +privileges. A multitude of persons, of both sexes and all ages, +gradually developed itself, having no feudal ties, but attached to an +endless variety of more or less humble employments. + +How did all these men, women, boys, girls, get their daily food? The +answer is, in the public eating-houses. Fitzstephen tells us that +in the reign of Henry II. (1154-89), besides the wine-vaults and the +shops which sold liquors, there was on the banks of the river a public +eating-house or cook's-shop, where, according to the time of year, you +could get every kind of victuals, roasted, boiled, baked, or fried; +and even, says he, if a friend should arrive at a citizen's house, and +not care to wait, they go to the shop, where there were viands always +kept ready to suit every purse and palate, even including venison, +sturgeon, and Guinea-fowls. For all classes frequented the City; and +before Bardolph's day noblemen and gentlemen came to Smithfield to buy +their horses, as they did to the waterside near the Tower to embark +for a voyage. + +One of the characters in the "Canterbury Tales"--the Cook of +London--was, in fact the keeper of a cook's-shop; and in the Prologue +to the Tale, with which his name is associated, the charming story of +"Gamelin," the poet makes the Reeve charge his companion with not very +creditable behaviour towards his customers. So our host trusts that +his relation will be entertaining and good:-- + + "For many a pasty hast thou let blood, + And many a Jack of Dover[1] hast thou sold, + That hath been twice hot and twice cold. + Of many a pilgrim hast thou Christ's curse-- + For thy parsley fare they yet the worse: + That they have eaten with the stubble goose, + For in thy shop is many a fly loose." + + [Footnote 1: A sole] + +But these restaurants were not long confined to one locality. From a +very early date, owing perhaps to its proximity to the Tower and the +Thames, East Cheap was famed for its houses of entertainment. The +Dagger in Cheap is mentioned in "A Hundred Merry Tales," 1526. The +Boar is historical. It was naturally at the East-end, in London +proper, that the flood-tide, as it were, of tavern life set in, among +the seafarers, in the heart of industrial activity; and the anecdotes +and glimpses which we enjoy show, just what might have been guessed, +that these houses often became scenes of riotous excess and debauch. +Lydgate's ballad of "London Lickpenny" helps one to imagine what such +resorts must have been in the first part of the fifteenth century. It +is almost permissible to infer that the street contained, in addition +to the regular inns, an assortment of open counters, where the +commodities on sale were cried aloud for the benefit of the passer-by; +for he says:-- + + "When I hied me into East Cheap: + One cries ribs of beef, and many a pie: + Pewter pots they clattered on a heap; + There was harp, fife, and sautry." + +The mention of pewter is noteworthy, because the Earl of +Northumberland ate his dinner off wood in 1572. Pewter plates had not +long been given up when I joined the Inner Temple in 1861. + +There is a still more interesting allusion in the interlude of the +"World and the Child," 1522, where Folly is made to say:-- + + "Yea, and we shall be right welcome, I dare well say, + In East Cheap for to dine; + And then we will with Lombards at passage play, + And at the Pope's Head sweet wine assay." + +The places of resort in this rollicking locality could furnish, long +before The Boar made the acquaintance of Falstaff, every species of +delicacy and _bonne bouche_ to their constituents, and the revelry +was apt sometimes to extend to an unseasonable hour. In an early naval +song we meet with the lines: + + "He that will in East Cheap eat a goose so fat, + With harp, pipe, and song, + Must lie in Newgate on a mat, + Be the night never so long." + +And these establishments infallibly contributed their quota or more to +the prisons in the vicinity. + +Houses of refreshment seem, however, to have extended themselves +westward, and to have become tolerably numerous, in the earlier +society of the sixteenth century, for Sir Thomas More, in a letter to +his friend Dean Colet, speaking of a late walk in Westminster and +of the various temptations to expenditure and dissipation which the +neighbourhood then afforded, remarks: "Whithersoever we cast our eyes, +what do we see but victualling-houses, fishmongers, butchers, cooks, +pudding-makers, fishers, and fowlers, who minister matter to our +bellies?" This was prior to 1519, the date of Colet's decease. + +There were of course periods of scarcity and high prices then as now. +It was only a few years later (1524), that Robert Whittinton, in +one of his grammatical tracts (the "Vulgaria"), includes among his +examples:-- + +"Befe and motton is so dere, that a peny worth of meet wyll scant +suffyse a boy at a meale." + +The term "cook's-shop" occurs in the Orders and Ordinances devised +by the Steward, Dean, and Burgesses of Westminster in 1585, for the +better municipal government of that borough. + +The tenth article runs thus:--"Item, that no person or persons that +keepeth or that hereafter shall keep any cook's-shop, shall also +keep a common ale-house (except every such person shall be lawfully +licensed thereunto), upon pain to have and receive such punishment, +and pay such fine, as by the statute in that case is made and +provided." + +But while the keepers of restaurants were, as a rule, precluded by +law from selling ale, the publicans on their side were not supposed to +purvey refreshment other than their own special commodities. For the +fifteenth proviso of these orders is:-- + +"Item, that no tavern-keeper or inn-keeper shall keep any cook shop +upon pain to forfeit and pay for every time offending therein 4d." + +The London cooks became famous, and were not only in demand in the +City and its immediate outskirts, but were put into requisition when +any grand entertainment was given in the country. In the list of +expenses incurred at the reception of Queen Elizabeth in 1577 by Lord +Keeper Bacon at Gorhambury, is an item of £12 as wages to the cooks +of London. An accredited anecdote makes Bacon's father inimical to too +lavish an outlay in the kitchen; but a far more profuse housekeeper +might have been puzzled to dispense with special help, where the +consumption of viands and the consequent culinary labour and skill +required, were so unusually great. + +In the Prologue to the "Canterbury Tales," the Cook of London and his +qualifications are thus emblazoned:-- + + "A Cook thei hadde with hem for the nones, + To boylle chyknes, with the mary bones, + And poudre marchaunt tart, and galyngale; + Wel cowde he knowe a draugte of London ale. + He cowde roste, and sethe, and broille, and frie + Maken mortreux, and wel bake a pie. + But gret harm was it, as it thoughte me, + That on his schyne a mormal had he: + For blankmanger that made he with the beste." + +This description would be hardly worth quoting, if it were not for the +source whence it comes, and the names which it presents in common +with the "Form of Cury" and other ancient relics. Chaucer's Cook was a +personage of unusually wide experience, having, in his capacity as the +keeper of an eating-house, to cater for so many customers of varying +tastes and resources. + +In the time of Elizabeth, the price at an ordinary for a dinner seems +to have been sixpence. It subsequently rose to eightpence; and in the +time of George I. the "Vade Mecum for Malt Worms (1720)" speaks of the +landlord of The Bell, in Carter Lane, raising his tariff to tenpence. +In comparison with the cost of a similar meal at present, all these +quotations strike one as high, when the different value of money is +considered. But in 1720, at all events, the customer ate at his own +discretion. + +Their vicinity to East Cheap, the great centre of early taverns and +cook's-shops, obtained for Pudding Lane and Pie Corner those savoury +designations. + +Paris, like London, had its cook's-shops, where you might eat your +dinner on the premises, or have it brought to your lodging in a +covered dish by a _porte-chape._ In the old prints of French kitchen +interiors, the cook's inseparable companion is his ladle, which +he used for stirring and serving, and occasionally for dealing a +refractory _garçon de cuisine_ a rap on the head. + +The Dictionary of Johannes de Garlandia (early thirteenth century) +represents the cooks at Paris as imposing on the ignorant and +inexperienced badly cooked or even tainted meat, which injured their +health. These "coquinarii" stood, perhaps, in the same relation to +those times as our keepers of restaurants. + +He mentions in another place that the cooks washed their utensils in +hot water, as well as the plates and dishes on which the victuals were +served. + +Mr. Wright has cited an instance from the romance of "Doon de +Mayence," where the guards of a castle, on a warm summer evening, +partook of their meal in a field. Refreshment in the open air was +also usual in the hunting season, when a party were at a distance from +home; and the garden arbour was occasionally converted to this kind of +purpose, when it had assumed its more modern phase. But our picnic was +unknown. + + + + +ETIQUETTE OF THE TABLE. + + +Paul Hentzner, who was in England at the end of the reign of +Elizabeth, remarks of the people whom he saw that "they are more +polite in eating than the French, devouring less bread, but more meat, +which they roast in perfection. They put a good deal of sugar in their +drink." + +In his "Court and Country," 1618, Nicholas Breton gives an instructive +account of the strict rules which were drawn up for observance +in great households at that time, and says that the gentlemen who +attended on great lords and ladies had enough to do to carry these +orders out. Not a trencher must be laid or a napkin folded awry; not a +dish misplaced; not a capon carved or a rabbit unlaced contrary to +the usual practice; not a glass filled or a cup uncovered save at the +appointed moment: everybody must stand, speak, and look according to +regulation. + +The books of demeanour which have been collected by Mr. Furnivall +for the Early English Text Society have their incidental value as +illustrating the immediate theme, and are curious, from the growth in +consecutive compilations of the code of instructions for behaviour at +table, as evidences of an increasing cultivation both in manners and +the variety of appliances for domestic use, including relays of knives +for the successive courses. Distinctions were gradually drawn between +genteel and vulgar or coarse ways of eating, and facilities were +provided for keeping the food from direct contact with the fingers, +and other primitive offences against decorum. Many of the precepts in +the late fifteenth century "Babies' Book," while they demonstrate the +necessity for admonition, speak also to an advance in politeness +and delicacy at table. There must be a beginning somewhere; and the +authors of these guides to deportment had imbibed the feeling for +something higher and better, before they undertook to communicate +their views to the young generation. + +There is no doubt that the "Babies' Book" and its existing congeners +are the successors of anterior and still more imperfect attempts to +introduce at table some degree of cleanliness and decency. When the +"Babies' Book" made its appearance, the progress in this direction +must have been immense. But the observance of such niceties was of +course at first exceptional; and the ideas which we see here embodied +were very sparingly carried into practice outside the verge of the +Court itself and the homes of a few of the aristocracy. + +There may be an inclination to revolt against the barbarous doggerel +in which the instruction is, as a rule, conveyed, and against the +tedious process of perusing a series of productions which follow +mainly the same lines. But it is to be recollected that these manuals +were necessarily renewed in the manuscript form from age to age, with +variations and additions, and that the writers resorted to metre as +a means of impressing the rules of conduct more forcibly on their +pupils. + +Of all the works devoted to the management of the table and kitchen, +the "Book of Nurture," by John Russell, usher of the chamber and +marshal of the ball to Humphrey, Duke of Gloucester, is perhaps, on +the whole, the most elaborate, most trustworthy, and most important. +It leaves little connected with the _cuisine_ of a noble establishment +of the fifteenth century untouched and unexplained; and although +it assumes the metrical form, and in a literary respect is a dreary +performance, its value as a guide to almost every branch of the +subject is indubitable. It lays bare to our eyes the entire machinery +of the household, and we gain a clearer insight from it than from the +rest of the group of treatises, not merely into what a great man of +those days and his family and retainers ate and drank, and how they +used to behave themselves at table, but into the process of making +various drinks, the mystery of carving, and the division of duties +among the members of the staff. It is, in fact, the earliest +comprehensive book in our literature. + +The functions of the squire at the table of a prince are, to a certain +extent, shown in the "Squire of Low Degree," where the hero, having +arrayed himself in scarlet, with a chaplet on his head and a belt +round his waist, cast a horn about his neck, and went to perform his +duty in the hall. He approaches the king, dish in hand, and kneels. +When he has served his sovereign, he hands the meats to the others. +We see a handsome assortment of victuals on this occasion, chiefly +venison and birds, and some of the latter were baked in bread, +probably a sort of paste. The majority of the names on the list are +familiar, but a few--the teal, the curlew, the crane, the stork, +and the snipe--appear to be new. It is, in all these cases, almost +impossible to be sure how much we owe to the poet's imagination and +how much to his rhythmical poverty. From another passage it is to be +inferred that baked venison was a favourite mode of dressing the deer. + +The precaution of coming to table with clean hands was inculcated +perhaps first as a necessity, when neither forks nor knives were used, +and subsequently as a mark of breeding. The knife preceded the spoon, +and the fork, which had been introduced into Italy in the eleventh +century, and which strikes one as a fortuitous development of the +Oriental chopstick, came last. It was not in general use even in +the seventeenth century here. Coryat the traveller saw it among the +Italians, and deemed it a luxury and a notable fact. + +The precepts delivered by Lydgate and others for demeanour at table +were in advance of the age, and were probably as much honoured in the +breach as otherwise. But the common folk did then much as many of +them do now, and granted themselves a dispensation both from knife and +fork, and soap and water. The country boor still eats his bacon or his +herring with his fingers, just as Charles XII. of Sweden buttered his +bread with his royal thumb. + +A certain cleanliness of person, which, at the outset, was not +considerably regarded, became customary, as manners softened and +female influence asserted itself; and even Lydgate, in his "Stans +Puer ad Mensam (an adaptation from Sulpitius)," enjoins on his page or +serving-boy a resort to the lavatory before he proceeds to discharge +his functions at the board-- + + "Pare clean thy nails; thy hands wash also + Before meat; and when thou dost arise." + +Other precepts follow. He was not to speak with his mouth full. He +was to wipe his lips after eating, and his spoon when he had finished, +taking care not to leave it in his dish. He was to keep his napkin as +clean and neat as possible, and he was not to pick his teeth with his +knife. He was not to put too much on his trencher at once. He was not +to drop his sauce or soup over his clothes, or to fill his spoon +too full, or to bring dirty knives to the table. All these points of +conduct are graphic enough; and their trite character is their virtue. + +Boiled, and perhaps fried meats were served on silver; but roasts +might be brought to table on the spit, which, after a while, was often +of silver, and handed round for each person to cut what he pleased; +and this was done not only with ordinary meat, but with game, and even +with a delicacy like a roast peacock. Of smaller birds, several were +broached on one spit. There is a mediaeval story of a husband being +asked by his wife to help her to the several parts of a fowl in +succession, till nothing was left but the implement on which it had +come in, whereupon the man determined she should have that too, and +belaboured her soundly with it. At more ceremonious banquets the +servants were preceded by music, or their approach from the kitchen +to the hall was proclaimed by sound of trumpets. Costly plate was +gradually introduced, as well as linen and utensils, for the table; +but the plate may be conjectured to have been an outcome from the +primitive _trencher_, a large slice of bread on which meat was laid +for the occupants of the high table, and which was cast aside after +use. + +Bread served at table was not to be bitten or broken off the loaf, +but to be cut; and the loaf was sometimes divided before the meal, and +skilfully pieced together again, so as to be ready for use. + + + + +INDEX. + + +Acton, Eliza, 171 +Addington, Surrey, 232 +Aigredouce, 57 +Albans, St., Abbey of, 208, 233-4 +Ale, 183, 205 + --Cock, 152 + --Elder, 152 + --Kentish, 205 +Alfred and the cakes, 54 +Al-fresco meals, 253-4 +Alfric, Colloquy of, 57 +Amber puddings, 29, 83 +Angelica, 135 +Anglo-Danish barbarism, 3 +Anglo-Celtic influence, 52 +Anglo-Saxon names of meats, 181 +Animal food, 8-9, 34 +Anthropophagy, 5-7 +Apicius, C., 12 +Apuleius, 65 +Arms and crests on dishes, 42 +Arnold's Chronicle, 61 +Arthur, 56, 182, 184-5 +Ashen-keys, pickled, 143 +Asparagus, 84 +Assize of ale, 205 +Australian meat, 172 + +Babies' Book, 257 +Bacon, Lord Keeper, 251 +Bag pudding, 184-5-6 +Baker, 28, 197-8 + --Parisian, 197-8 +Bakestone, 35, 211 +Banbury cake, 29, 83 +Bannock, 33 +Banquet, order of a fourteenth century, 43 +Barba, M., 15 +Bardolf, a dish, 57 +Bardolph, 245 +Bartholomew de Cheney, 232 + --St., Hospital of, at Sandwich, 236 +Battalia pie, 109 +Beef, powdered, 187 + --Martlemas, 183 +Beer, 26-7, 204-5 + --composition of the ancient, 205 +Bees, wild, 8 +Bellows 213, 215 +Birch wine, 204 +Bit and bite, 218 +Blackcaps, 85-6 +Bolton, Charles, Duke of, 82 +Book of St. Albans, 61 +Books of demeanour, 256 +Branderi, 211 +Brass cooking vessels, 211 +Brawn, 187 +Bread, 8, 25-6, 195-7, 262 +Britons, diet of the, 8 + -- Northern and Southern, 16 +Brittany, 3 +Broach or spit turner, 236-7 +Broom-buds, pickled, 144 +Broth, 3, 23 +Bun, 28 +Butler, ancient duties of the, 234 +Butter, 198 + +Caerleon, 183 +Caesar, evidence of, 9-11, 16, 17 +Cakes, 35, 127-32 +Calais, 194 +Calves, newly-born + --removal of, from the mother, while in milk, 8 +Cannibalism, 5-6 +Carps' tongues, 13 +Carving, terms of, 12 +Castelvetri, 199 +Caudles and possets, 132-4 +Caviary, 199-200 +Charlet, 23 +Chaucer, G. 246, 251 +Chaworth's (Lady) pudding, 29 +Cheesecakes, Mrs. Leed's, etc., 29, 127, 191 +Cheeses, 125-7 +Chimney, kitchen, 210 +China broth, 84 +China earth, 220 +Christmas, 27 +Clare Market, 14 +Cleikirai Club, 168 +Clermont, B., 159-61 +Coals, 215-16 +Cobham, Lord, 194 +Cockle, 195 +Colet, Dean, 249 +College wine, 240 +Colonial cattle, 172 +Condiments, 29-31, 198, 214 +Confectioner, 28 + --master, 37 +Confectionery, 28 +Conserves, 134-42 +Cook, 201, 229-30 + --master, 231-3 +Cookery-books, lists of, 67-9, 79-81 + --with the names of old owners, 71 +Cook's-shops. 245-9 +Cooking utensils, great value of, 222 + --lists of, 223-7 +Cooper, Joseph, 72-3 +Copley, Esther, 164 +Copper, art of tinning, 217 +Cornish pasty, 185 +Coryat, Thomas, 222 +Court, the ancient, 231 +Cows, 8-9 +Crab-apple sauce, 215 +Creams, 123-4 +Cromwell, Oliver, 73-5 + --his favourite dishes, _ibid._ +Cuisine bourgeoise of ancient Rome, 7 + --English, affected by fusions of race, 10 + --Old French, 18-19 +Cuisinier Royal, Le, 14-15 +Curds and cream, 191 + +Danish settlers, 9 +Danish settlers, their influence on our diet, 9 +Deer-suet, clarified, 44 +DelaHay Street, 37 +Deportment at table, gradual improvement in the, 261 +Dishes, lists of, 23-4, 200-1 + --substituted for trenchers, 219 + --different sizes and materials of, 227 + --mode of serving up, 261-2 +Dods, Margaret, 167 +Dripping-pans, 225, 228 +Dumplings, Norfolk, 192 + +Earl, Rules and Orders for the House of an, 39-42 +East-Cheap, 246-48 +Eating-houses, public, 245-50 +Ebulum, 151 +Edward III., 222 +Eggs, 23 + --buttered, 13 +Elizabeth, Queen, 190 +Endoring, 198 +English establishment, staff of an, 39 +Ennius, Phagetica of, 6 +Epulario, 66 +Etiquette of the table, 255-63 + +Fairfax inventories, 7, 218 +Falstaff, 248 +Farm-servants' diet, 191 +Feasts, marriage and coronation, 47-9 +Finchmgfield, 217 +Fireplace, 211, 213 +Fish, cheaper, demanded, 33 + --on fast-days, 48 + --considered indigestible, 64 + --lists of, 19-21, 23 + --musical lament of the dying, 23 +Fishing, Saxon mode of, 19 +Florendine, 103 +Flowers, conserve of, 136 +Forced meat, 191 +Forks, 222-4 +Foreign cookery, 28-30 + --Warner's strictures on 29-30 +Form of Cury, 55 +Forster, John, of Hanlop, 65 +Fox, Sir Stephen, 34 +Francatelli, 162 +French establishment, staff of a, 36 +French Gardener, the, 69-70 +Fricasee, 23 +Fruit-tart, 186 +Fruits, dried or preserved, 134-42 +Frying-pan, 222 +Frying Pan Houses at Wandsworth, 211 +Furmety, 64 + +Galantine, 58 +Galingale, 251 +Game, 17, 43-4 +Garlic, 214 +Gilling in Yorkshire, 218 +Gingerbread, 131 +Ginger-fork, 222 +Glass and crystal handles to knives and forks, 222 +Glasse, Mrs., 154-6 +Glastonbury Abbey, 205 +Glazing, or endoring, 48, 198 +Gomme, G.L., 16 +Goose, 100 + --giblets, 190 +Grampus, 21 +Grape, English, used for wine, 203 +Greece, Ancient, 5 +Greek anthropophagy, 6-7 +Greene, Robert, 242 + +Hamilton, Duke and Duchess of, 221 +Hare, 17 +Harington family, 42 +Hen, threshing the fat, 62-3 +Henry II., 245 + --III., 194, 205 + --IV., 47 + --IV. and V., 47 + --VII., 21, 204 + --VIII., 241 +Hill, Dr., 156-8 +Hippocras, 204, 241 +Holborn and the Strand, suburbs of, 215 +Home-brewed drink, 192 +Hommes de Bouche, 15 +Hops 27 +Hospitality, decay of, 189-90 + +Inns, want of, in early Scotland, 32-3 + --and taverns in Westminster, rules for, 250 +Italian cookery, 28, 198 + --pudding, 85 +Italy, the fork brought from, 222 + +Jack, the, 237 +Jacks, black, 190-1 +Jigget of mutton, 34 +Joe Miller quoted, 13 +Johannes de Garlandia, 214 +Johnson, Dr., 156-9 +Johnstone, Mrs., 167-8 +Jumbals, 128 +Junket, 64 +Jussel, a dish, 23 + +Kail-pot, 212 +Kettle, 182 +Kitchens, 206 + --furniture of, 213-14 + --staff of the, 230 +Kitchener, Dr., 165-6 +Knives, 224, 226 + +Ladies and gentlemen at table, 221 +Landlord and lawyer, exactions of, 189-90 +Land o' Cakes, 33 +Laver, 229 +Leveret, 17 +Liber Cure Cocorum, 59-60 +Liqueurs, 241 +Liquids, storage of, 201 +Loaf of bread, 196 + --sugar, 194 +Lombards, 248 +London cooks famous, 250 +Lord Mayor of London, 20 +Lord Mayor's Pageant for 1590, 33 +Lucas, Joseph, his Studies in Nidderdale, 11 +Lumber pie, 110 +Luncheon, 243 +Luxury, growth of, 41-2, 187 +Lydgate's Story of Thebes, 24 + --"London Lickpenny," 247 + +Malory's King Arthur, 183 +Manuturgium, 218 +Maple-wood bowls, 228-9 +Marinade, 102 +Marketing, old, 40 +Marlborough cake, 129 +Marmalade, 139 +Maser, 228-9 +Massinger quoted, 13 +Master-cook, 41, 214, 231-3 + --ancient privileges of the, 231-3 +Meals, 191, 238-54 + --in the Percy establishment, 35 +Meats and drinks, 193, 205 +Menagier de Paris quoted, 18 +Merenda, a meal, 241-2 +Metheglin or hydromel, 64, 204 +Middleton, John, chef, 82, 84-6 +Milk, 8, 201 +Modern terms for dishes first introduced, 24 +More, Sir Thomas, 249 +Morsus, 218 +Morton, Cardinal, 23 +Moryson, Fynes, quoted, 31-2 +Mulberries, 137-8 +Mushrooms, 199 +Music to announce the banquet, 262 +Mustard, 214 + +Nasturtium-buds, pickled, 142 +Neckam, Alexander, 17, 18, 51, 53 +Nevill, Archbishop, 48, 240 +Newcastle coal, 216 +New College pudding, 113 +Nidderdale, 11, 212 +Noble Book of Cookery, 60-1 +Norfolk dumplings, 192 + --yeoman, 192 +Norman cuisine, 3, 44-6 + --influence on cookery, 45 +Normandy, 3 +Nott, John, chef, 82 + +Oatmeal, 187 +Oblys, 196 +Odysseus, 6 +Odyssey, 6 +Olio, 85 + --pie, 109 +Omelettes, 24 +Orders and Ordinances of Lord Burleigh as steward of Westminster, 250 +Ordinaries, London, 252 + --Parisian, 253 +Oriental sources of cooking, 7 +Oxford, 240 +Oxford cake, 83 + +Parisian cook's-shops, 253 +Partridges not recommended to the poor, 64 + --187 +Passage, a game, 248 +Pastry, 23 +Peacocks. 13, 48 +Pelops, 6 +Pepper, 214 +Peter of Blois, 205 +Peterborough Abbey, 216 +Pewter, utensils of, 247-8 +Phagetica of Ennius, 6 +Pheasants, 13 +Pickles, 143 _et seq._ +Piers of Fulham, 22, 187, 241 +Pies, 23, 109-10, 191 +Pig's pettitoes, 191 +Ploughman (husbandman), 188 +Plovers, 187 +Pockets, 102 +Poloe, 107 +Polyphemus, 6 +Pome de oringe, 198 +Poor, diet of the, 181_et seq._ + --relief of the, 244 +"Poor Knights," a dish, 29 +Pope, Alex., 210 +Porcelain, 219 +Pork, 18, 54 +Porpoise, 20-1, 200 +Porte-chape, 253 +Potato, 65 +Pot-au-feu, 53 +Pot-hook, 225 +Pot-luck, 53 +Poudre-marchaunt tart, 251 +Poultry, 17, 44 +Powdered beef, 187 + --horse, 30 +Puddings, 23, 113 _et seq._ +Pulpatoon, 108 + +Quinces, 138-9, 141 + +Rabbit, 17 +Radish-pods, pickled, 144 +Raisin-sauce, 215 +Rasher, 23 +Rear-supper, 239, 242 +Receipts of eminent persons, 85, + --Early, 98-153 +Religious scruples against certain food, 9 +Rents, excessive, 189-90 +Roasting-spit or iron, 217 +Robert, Master, and his wife Helena, 208, 234-5 +Romans, culinary economy of, 7 + --obligation to Greece, 7 +Roses, conserve of, 65 +Rundell, Mrs., 161 +Rush, Friar, 237 +Russell's Book of Nurture, 258 + +Salt, 214 + --, fine, 228 + --cellar, 218 +Sandwich, Kent, 236 +Saracen sauce, 58 +Saucepan, 216 +Sauces, 29-31, 214-15 +Sausage, 23 +Saxon influence on diet, 9 +Scotland, want of Inns in, 32-3 +Scots, the, 11, 33, 168 + --their early food, 11 + --their poverty, 33 +Scott, Sir Walter, 167-8 +Scottish cookery, early, 30-2 +Secret house, keeping, 26, 49,190 +Shakespeare, W., 242 +Shrewsbury cakes, 85 +"Sing a song of sixpence," 66 +Smith and his Dame, a tale, 215 +Smith, E., Preface to her Cookery Book, 1736, 89-97 + --select extracts from the work, 98-153 +Soap, 226 +Song of the Boar's Head, 241 +Soups, 23 +Soyer, Alexis, 169-72 +Spanish influence on cookery, 66 + --Armada, 190 +Spice with wine, 204 +Spinach, 84 +Spit-turner, 236 +Spit, turning the, a tenure, 217 +Spoons, 218, 222-4 +Spread-eagle pudding, 114 +Spruce-beer, 203 +Squire, functions of the, at table 259 +"Squire of Low Degree," 259 +St. Albans Abbey, 208 +St. John's College, Cambridge, 202 +Stanton-Harcourt, 210 +"Store of house," 187 +Subtleties, 47-8 +Sugar, 193-5 +Swan, 106 +Swinfield, Bishop, 4 +Sykes, Colonel, 220 +Syrups from flowers, 112 + +Table-cloth, 218 +Table-furniture, 231 +Tansies, 122 +Tart, fruit, 186 +Tea caudle, 134 +Temse, 35 +Tiffany cakes, 35 +Tillinghast, Mary, 77 +Tinder-box, 216 +Tom Thumb, 54, 182, 186 +Touchwood, Peregrine, Esquire 168 +Towel, 218 +Trencher, 197, 218, 219-21 + --Posies on the, 220 +Tripe, double, 106 +Tripod, 181, 211-13 +Trivet, 225 +Trumpet, dishes brought into the hall to the sound of, 262 +Tureiner, 103 +Tusser, Thomas, 62-3 + +Ude, Louis Eustache, 167 +Utensils, 12, 17, 206, 208 _et seq._, 225-8 + --treatise on, by Alex. Neckam, 17, 51 + +Vegetable diet, 183 +Venison, 43-4, 198 +Venner, Tobias, 63-6 +Viard et Fouret, MM., 14-15 +Village life, early, 36 +Vocabularies, primary object of, 51-2 + +Wafery, 244 +Wandsworth, 211 +Warham, Archbishop, 48 +Westminister, 249-50 +Westphalia hams, 104 +Whale, 20 +Whetstone cakes, 127 +Whey, 205 +White grease, 58 +Whittinton, Robert, 249 +Wigs, 121 +William I., 3, 27 + --III., his posset, 132 +William of Malmesbury, 16 +Wines, 145-53. 202-4 + --lists of, 203-4 +Wolsey, Cardinal, 21 +Wood-Street cake, 85 +Wormwood cakes, 130 + --wine, 204 +Wotton, Sir Edward, 194 + +Yeoman, diet of the, 182 _et seg._,_243 + --bad state of the, 189-90 +Yorkshire, 12 +Young Cook's Monitor, the, by M.H., 75-7 + + + +***END OF THE PROJECT GUTENBERG EBOOK OLD COOKERY BOOKS AND ANCIENT +CUISINE*** + + +******* This file should be named 12293-8.txt or 12293-8.zip ******* + + +This and all associated files of various formats will be found in: +https://www.gutenberg.org/1/2/2/9/12293 + + +Updated editions will replace the previous one--the old editions +will be renamed. + +Creating the works from public domain print editions means that no +one owns a United States copyright in these works, so the Foundation +(and you!) can copy and distribute it in the United States without +permission and without paying copyright royalties. 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