Colonial Cookbook: The Art of Cookery Made Plain and Easy

Meet Mrs. Hannah Glasse. By day, she is a plain English housewife, struggling to scrape by in the mid-1700s. By night, however, she works on her revolutionary new idea: a cookbook designed for the masses of untrained servants working in fine English homes.

source: Wikipedia

By 1746, when Glasse began to write The Art of Cookery Made Plain and Easy, a growing middle class was settling into the cities of England. Hoping to set themselves up comfortably, they hired servants, but very few of those servants actually knew how to cook. Glasse aimed to fill that void with her cookbook, offering a collection of original recipes and those rewritten from other sources. She was clear about her motives: "I do not pretend to teach professed Cooks, my design being to instruct the ignorant and unlearned...and that in so full and plain a manner, that the most ignorant Person, who can but read, will know how to do Cookery well," she stated in her introduction.

And instruct she did. According to food historian Karen Hess, Glasse's book sold well in England and her colonies in North America following its publication in 1747. Many noted Americans owned copies (including Thomas Jefferson and George Washington), despite their growing discontent with Mother England. In the mid-18th century, many Americans still relied on English foods, as they still saw themselves as British subjects. Yet ingredients found only in North America crept into their English recipes, as Glasse's special "American Mode of Cooking" section proves.

And we see "American" ingredients and recipes in this book because I'm using the 1805 edition. By this point, foods in America began to take on a more distinctly "American" flavor, just as the newly-minted nation began to form its unique identity. This edition comes at a major turning point in American history, and the recipes and ingredients reflect that, harking back to the colonists' European origins while looking ahead to New World foods.

I'll try to highlight that cross-section with the recipes I choose from Glasse's book, but of course you can expect some recipes just for fun, too. How could I have resisted those stewed pears?


Works cited: "Hannah Glasse: The original domestic goddess" (Independent). British Library. Karen Hess introduction.

Historical links, lately

Happy Friday! I'm planning to enjoy some unexpectedly warm November weather with plenty of walks outside and reconnecting with friends. And of course, some kind of extravagant baking/cooking project will be involved. Fall chestnuts, I have my eye on you.

Hope your weekend is relaxing and fun. In the meantime, here are some fun historical links from around the web...

Houseplants throughout history. Make your own Hanging Gardens of Babylon!

The wonder of the mechanical apple peeler-slicer-corer, fresh from the 1880s. Also, that pie sounds amazing.

Wednesday, November 13 was National Indian Pudding Day. And last year I made Indian pudding! It's as good as NPR makes it sound.

Dry your fruits and veggies colonial-style.

These colorized old photos are stunning.

Happy weekending!

Spiced, stewed pears

Thank you for all your wonderful comments on our news! It can be scary to put big announcements out into this void of the internet, so it meant a lot to read your good wishes.

We're knee-deep in fall over here in New England. Leaves turning color, crisp and clear afternoons, days growing shorter. Sometimes I think that New England is my favorite place to be come fall. Though the leaves turn brilliant orange and red in Ohio, the days are never as consistently clear and blue, thanks to our moody Lake Erie. Plus, as a history teacher, fall and colonial history seem to go hand-in-hand for me, and there's so much history to be mined here in Rhode Island. Walking by a low stone wall puts me in mind of a colonial homestead, the stones demarcating property lines from faraway neighbors. And teaching colonial history come fall, as I'm doing this year, just feels right. (Maybe it's the Thanksgiving/Pilgrim connection, which is basically ingrained by this point.)

At any rate, I'm going to pursue some colonial studies of my own on this little blog for a while. We've looked at 18th-century Williamsburg before, thanks to the Williamsburg Art of Cookery, but now we're going to get serious. We're hauling out the real, original recipes. Even if the results are less than savory.

Luckily, one of the first recipes I tried turned out beautifully.

Pears are delicious on their own, and oh-so-fall and wintry. Since I was little, some relatives have been sending us a big box of pears and grapefruit for Christmas every year, which my dad would store in the cold cellar of our house. When he felt like topping off a meal with fresh, crisp fruit, he'd trek down to the basement and return with a perfectly-chilled pear, and he'd slice it up for all of us to sample. It's still one of my favorite holiday (and post-holiday) traditions.

But Mrs. Hannah Glasse, writer of one of colonial America's most popular cookbook The Art of Cookery Made Plain and Easy, takes those pears and raises me one. You peel and quarter the pears, then bathe them in a delicious mixture of red wine, cloves, sugar, and lemon peel. Bake until the pears are soft and blushing, and they taste like November straight out of the oven. There's nothing better.


Spiced, Stewed Pears
(adapted from The Art of Cookery Made Plain and Easy)

3 pears, peeled and quartered
1/4 cup sugar
1/2 cup red wine
1 tbsp lemon peel
4-6 cloves (varies depending on how much spice you want)

Preheat the oven to 350 F.

In a small bowl, mix the sugar and wine together until sugar dissolves.

Place the pears in a ceramic or glass baking dish and pour the wine mixture over them. Scatter the lemon peel and cloves (more if you like intense spice, less for a milder flavor) over the mixture. Bake for 40 minutes, stirring the pears once halfway through.

Dining at Downton: Champagne julep

There's something I've been keeping under my hat for a while, and it's time you knew: Josh and I are engaged!

We're thrilled, and despite all the chaos of starting a new school year, we couldn't be happier. We're also trying to get used to calling each other "fiance," which feels pretty weird. (Did anyone else find that?)

As we've been telling our families and friends, they have been very kindly responding with good wishes and congratulations...and Champagne. Lots of Champagne. It's pretty funny, actually, and we've been enjoying it quite a bit, when we can open the bottle. (Josh struggled greatly to open the bottle of Prosecco we used to make the following cocktail. In the end, the cork shot through two rooms and landed behind the couch. It boggles the mind!)

that dastardly cork

I can't help but think that the Crawley family would have toasted with Champagne when Matthew and Mary announced their long-awaited engagement on Downton Abbey. We never saw the family's response (because, let's face it, Matthew and Mary smooching in the falling snow is all you really needed by that point), but Champagne would have been an appropriate toast. So let's extend our little celebration to the internet via a 1920s Champagne julep, straight from The Savoy Cocktail Book.

Personally, I find this to be kind of a silly cocktail, as it's basically Champagne with sugar. Nevertheless, it's an easy and refreshing drink to make, especially if you're distracted by exciting news. Simply add Champagne (or Prosecco, as I did) to a glass with a teaspoonful of sugar, stir, and garnish with fruit or mint. And toast to your favorite celebratory news.

Champagne Julep
(slightly adapted from The Savoy Cocktail Book, via Savoy Stomp)

1 bottle of Champagne or Prosecco
2 tsp of sugar, divided
mint, to garnish
ice

Pour 1 tsp of sugar each into 2 long tumblers. Pour enough Champagne into each glass to fill, and stir to dissolve the sugar. Add ice and bruised mint. Enjoy, and top off with Champagne as needed.

Research comes from the unlikeliest of places

As evidenced by my various afternoon adventures, I love visiting historic sites. I will drag Josh to living history museums just to pretend I'm living in colonial New England (more on that soon). When my parents called to say they were planning a weekend in upstate New York, and that they hoped to visit some painters' houses and one of the Roosevelt sites, I dropped everything to join them. Nothing says vacation to me like poking around perfectly preserved homes from another era.

But why? Yes, I'm a huge history nerd, but what exactly do I love about it? (As Josh keeps asking me.)

First, I love feeling like I'm stepping into another era. There's no better way than to actually stand in the house where the Vanderbilts entertained, or to look out at the views the servants at The Elms saw. Sure, reading historical fiction transports me to another era, as does obsessively watching Downton Abbey, but there's no replacement for seeing a 1920s refrigerator in person. And that kind of visual only fuels my imagination when I'm reading.

That brings me to the main reason why I love historic houses: each visit is a treasure trove of research. Maybe the information won't be useful for my current projects, but I can always file it away in the back of my mind, or jot down an idea in my notebook, to call up later. Guides are often bursting with strange factoids--our guide at the Vanderbilt Mansion, for example, reminded us that the Vanderbilts could build what they did because they didn't have to pay income tax. (It hadn't been invented yet.) These bits of information can spark a new idea or flesh out a current one.

During that weekend in New York, my parents and I visited the homes and studios of the Hudson River School landscape painters Frederic Church and Thomas Cole. I was finishing a draft of a historical YA novel about a young woman who longs to be a painter, and I was struggling to add enough specific details that would make her world come to life. Turns out that visiting these two homes was exactly what I needed. I got to look at Thomas Cole's paintbox, which he took with him on his regular 12-mile hikes across the mountains. Cole punched studs into his personal trunk to decorate it, and Frederic Church, himself a student of Cole, filled his home with paintings he collected during his world travels. I even learned when paints began to be sold in tubes rather than as powders.

These kinds of details are gold to writers of historical fiction, and they're tough to find in regular research routes. Plus there's no replacement for soaking in the feel of an artist's home; the very atmosphere of a place can inform your work.

If you like to visit historic homes, what do you love about it? Any places to recommend?


Top two photos of Thomas Cole house; bottom three of Frederic Church house.

Afternoon Adventure: Vanderbilt Mansion, Hyde Park

About a month ago I met up with my parents in Hyde Park, New York, for a weekend of sight-seeing and poking around historic places (this is the order of the day with my family). After touring two painters' homes on the first day, we headed to the Vanderbilt Mansion bright and early on Saturday. Now, I have seen my share of Vanderbilt mansions, and those of their friends. Living so close to Newport, it's basically a law that I have to make a yearly pilgrimage to the Breakers or Marble House. But I'd never seen the mansion in Hyde Park.

the entrance hall

Friends, it was worth it. It was the American version of Downton Abbey.

The Vanderbilts were one of the wealthiest families in the 19th century. Patriarch Cornelius Vanderbilt created a shipping and railroad empire in the early 19th century, and his children and grandchildren used that money to build magnificent mansions during the Gilded Age, following the Civil War. Only a few of his descendants used their inheritances wisely--most of the family, including those who lived at Newport, became famous for throwing money around and trying to marry their children off to British royalty. However, grandson Frederick William actually grew his inheritance, and he got to build a bunch of beautiful residences to boot. So we made our way to his "country palace" in Hyde Park.

Frederick and his wife Louise purchased the estate as a country home, and while they often entertained friends there, for the most part it was just the two of them. Well, and loads of servants.

Louise's bedroom, because we all need a gated bed

The mansion is a gorgeous example of late-Gilded Age architecture and decoration, complete with servants' quarters that mimic the design of the public rooms. The first floor, designed for entertaining, is laid out in an oval, with dining and sitting rooms fanning off to the sides. The second floor is no different, with a gallery in the center to let light filter down to the first floor. From there you can peek into bedrooms, ranging from "simple" quarters for guests to the his-and-hers bedrooms designed to look like the palace at Versailles. A few rooms were even set up as though the Vanderbilts had left for the season; white cloths covered all the furniture and only a single lamp lit the interiors.

What fascinated me about this house was the sharp contrast between upstairs and downstairs. This is Downton Abbey-speak for the employers (who lived "upstairs") and employees (who lived "downstairs") of the Gilded Age in America. Though the basement servants' floor was laid out in the same manner as the first and second floors, the decoration was completely different: dark wood free of ornamentation, small windows that didn't let in much light, simple furniture. The servants' staircase was painted silver to mark the shift from the gold in the public rooms.

A staff of over 60 kept the house running during the entertaining season, while the Vanderbilts only ever entertained, at maximum, 16 guests. It was easy to picture a Downton-like lifestyle at Hyde Park, and in a way that's what the Vanderbilts were going for.

Wealthy Americans in the 19th century longed for the class and distinction they felt came with a European background. They traveled to Europe and purchased all the old art and sculpture and furniture they could find, because they felt American art and furniture wasn't refined enough. By building such a palace and staffing it to the nines, the Vanderbilts, like many wealthy families, were trying to become European. No wonder the place felt so English!

Shortbread fans (and a bit about ovens)

It's the last gasp of summer, friends. The air is getting cool at night (sometimes). Stores offer apple cider in big displays. And this week I go back to school.

To mark the occasion, let's look at one more recipe from this summer's Canadian vacation. It's a pretty basic shortbread recipe, one that calls for three ingredients and a modicum of decoration. But things get interesting with the instructions.

First, the original recipe calls for "washed butter." Why would you need to give your butter a bath? According to the many homesteading blogs that encourage you to make your own butter, you have to wash fresh butter well in order to drain away all traces of milk. Otherwise it goes rancid. The only other reason I can think of for using "washed butter" here is to make sure your butter is, well, buttery. Shortbread depends on a specific blend of butter, flour, and sugar, and there's no room for anything else.

Once you've mixed all the ingredients and prepared the cookies, you're instructed to "bake in a slow oven (325 F)." What?

cooking range, c. 1910

The phrase "slow oven" comes from a time before ovens had regulated temperatures. You'll find it in early American cookbooks when food was baked in Dutch ovens and in later ones when women used monstrous ranges, the predecessor to today's stove-oven combination. Until the 1920s, when most families had made the transition to gas ovens, women had to rely on their understanding of heat to put on enough wood or coals to bake bread, or to let the coals burn out to bake something more delicate, like cookies. Even into the 1920s and 1930s, some families didn't have "heat regulators," as the editors of The Boston Cooking-School Cook Book called them. And if that was the case, "judgment and experience must be the guides."

The Boston Cooking-School Cook Book, from where this recipe originates, used both points of reference ("slow oven" and a specific temperature) because many Americans were in the middle of switching over when it was published in 1930. Some readers had heat regulators, while others didn't. It's fascinating to see how the smallest details can illuminate a turning point in American domestic history.

I am hopelessly reliant on temperatures, just as I am pretty dependent on recipes. But I was pleased to see that when reading colonial recipes, my interpretation of "slow oven" as 300 to 325 F was right on the mark.

Shortbread Fans
(slightly adapted from The Boston Cooking-School Cook Book)

2 cups all-purpose flour
1/2 cup brown sugar
3/4 cup butter, softened

Preheat the oven to 325 F (yes, we use temperatures around these parts). In a medium bowl, whisk flour and sugar together. Work in butter with your fingertips until well blended.

Roll out the dough on a floured surface to about 1/4-inch thickness and cut out rounds with a measuring cup. Slice each round in half and press each half-moon four times with the tip of a knife, creating a fan-like decoration. Bake for 10 minutes at 325 F, or until browned on the bottom.


Works cited: Cooking range photo from Family Lineages and History.