Libraries and leisure

Tasty History - Recipes from the Archives, April 2007

In 1700 the English still lived and ate in a way which would have been familiar to their medieval ancestors. The historical view that British cooking was (or is) dull can be partly blamed on Puritans, who banned rich food and spices, taking back to bland Middle Ages fare. By the 1800s, the country was prosperous and a consumer society was born. The landed and gentry classes wanted good food.

Move over Mr Oliver…

Cookery books became enormously popular and in the 18th century, over 300 books were published, making it possible for every middle class house to own one. Most books were aimed at servants rather than the Mistress. Whilst the poor depended on bread and cake, the wealthy were enjoying flavours from abroad. While the aristocracy employed fashionable French chefs to create fancy dishes, the majority of people preferred simple and affordable plain food: roasted and boiled meat, with lots of puddings and pies.

Pickle mad

Butter, nutmeg and anchovies were the condiments of choice. Raw green sauces were replaced by pickles and ketchups and at the end of the 18th century, bottled sauces. Fresh food that was kept in cellars and larders would only last a week so lots of preserving took place. Most things could be pickled, smoked, salted and cured.

Feeling queasy

Spirits such as gin and brandy were cheap. Coupled with a heavy diet of protein, animal fats, lack of fibre and high salt content, this indulgence soon took its toll on the nations’ health. Gout, diabetes, heart and liver disease was common. Bad meat, stale fish, rancid butter and rotten vegetables lay in wait for the unwary shopper...

Poisonous pickles

Some recipes told you how to “rescue bad meat” with vinegar and spices. Many foods were unwittingly made with poisonous ingredients: pickles were made green, sweets multicoloured, cheese rind red, all with the use of copper and lead. Alum (a toxic salt mineral) made bread whiter. Even copper and brass pans were dangerous, when mixed with acidic food as a poisonous layer of verdigris was produced.

Nicer pies, please

In the early 19th century, people were limited by what food they could get locally or what they had preserved at home. By the 1850s as the new railways spread, food was fresher and easier to distribute.

Recipes from the archives

The recipes, both culinary and medicinal were found among private papers; in diaries and pocket books, on account slips and on odd scraps of paper. How about "dressed codd's head", or a cure for "giddiness in the head"to delight your senses? Some may have been copied from recipe books or simply passed between friends. Try them if you dare!