From the British Library: Books for Cooks.
This unique collection of cookery books will transport you back in time. It will take you to medieval banqueting tables laden with peacocks and pastry ships; to the medicine cabinets of noblewomen; and to royal picnics in the jungle. It will show you how the poor were encouraged to re-use coffee grounds in Victorian London, and how a rationed population attempted to stay healthy during World War 2. You will find recipes for puddings and roasts, for beauty treatments and bed bug repellents, for pies made with live birds and frogs, and for dishes spiced with ingredients as valuable as jewels. (…)
The project includes extracts from 17 texts, beginning with The Forme of Cury, written by Richard II’s master-cook (one of the oldest known English cookery manuscripts), and ending in 1940 with some down-to-earth advice and instruction for wartime cooking from the Association of Teachers of Domestic Subjects.
By exploring these pages you will get [continue]
Speaking of WWII and rationing, I owe my strong bones and good teeth to my mother and grandmother, both of whom gave me the milk gained via their coupon books and did without for themselves. My mother, like many women of her generation, did not nurse me. I’ve often wondered why nursing went out of fashion. Because they, like her, were working in wartime production factories? She tested airplane engines for Pratt & Whitney. I should have asked her while she was still alive.
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