My husband and I hosted a Regency dinner party for friends on March 28th. Earlier this month I described the menu or Bill of Fare, as cookbook author John Mollard would call it, and posted photos of the final dishes. In this post I list the five things I learned about cooking a Regency meal using recipes from Mollard’s 1802 cookbook, The Art of Cookery Made Easy and Refined, Comprising Ample Directions for Preparing Every Article Requisite for Furnishing the Tables of the Nobleman, Gentleman, and Tradesman.1
Aristocratic families in 1807 enjoyed their meals and likely gave little thought to the cook’s hard work below-stairs (Source: Wikimedia Commons)
1. Regency cooks had many skills
Regency cooks needed good cooking skills. Not only did they need to know how to roast, fry, steam and bake over a fire, they needed to know how to select high-quality fruits and vegetables; how long to let meats and poultry hang before dressing; how to prepare a proper stock, sauce, glaze and cullis, which is a thick gravy made from veal and ham; and how to prepare forcemeats and sweetbreads.
This chef might be the very image of John Mollard, even though it’s a 17th-century painting by an unknown Spanish Master (Source: Wikimedia Commons)
In addition to these basic preparation skills, Regency cooks made dishes using recipes with the barest instructions. For example, Mollard’s recipe for preparing a benshamelle (or béchamel) sauce advised sweating white veal, lean ham, turnips, celery, onions cut in pieces, a blade of mace and a little whole white pepper until three parts tender, after which the concoction was discharged with beef stock. Other than the mace, no specific volumes or weights were given. For “Pea Soup another Way,” Mollard wrote: “Let the soup be of a proper thickness.” Presumably a seasoned cook knew what he meant.
In some cases, the amounts given were relative. For preparing “Baked Beef,” the recipe called for chopping plenty of parsley; a middling quantity of thyme, marjoram, savory and eschallots; and a little basil. In a few cases, specific measures were stated: for Soup a la Reine, use a gill of cream; for a Robert sauce, such as the one we made for our Regency dinner party, use a gill of rhenish wine. When making real turtle soup, add 3 pints of madeira wine if the turtle weighs 70 pounds; if less than 70 pounds . . . guess.
2. Regency cooks were master planners
This painting of a 17th-century kitchen by Frans Snyders hints at the work required of cooks (Source: Wikimedia Commons)
After reading nearly every recipe in Mollard’s cookbook, I came to appreciate the enormous task facing the Regency cook: getting food on the table at the proper time and temperature. Of course, today’s cook has the same goal, but today’s cook takes advantage of many time-saving conveniences: precut and packaged meats, sausage, poultry and fish; pre-made sauces, stocks and soups; ready-to-cook pasta and rolls; desserts and sliced breads; muffin, bread and stuffing mixes; frozen foods and condiments galore. We have bottled and clean tap water; we don’t start with pump water. We also enjoy the convenience of microwave ovens, refrigerators and freezers. Today’s North American cook doesn’t start from scratch with every single ingredient in every recipe.
The Regency cook always had veal or chicken or beef stocks simmering for the purpose of making sauces and soups. She also had a storehouse of pickled vegetables and cucumbers, since these often accompanied main dishes served at the table. In short, a good Regency cook had to be a master planner—gathering and processing foods now for use weeks or months later—and she must command her staff well, what with half-a-dozen vegetables to go on the dinner table, along with several meat dishes and desserts, all served in three courses. I take my hat off to the Regency cook!
3. Regency cooks wasted nothing
The Regency cook aimed to make the best use of everything in her kitchen (Source: Wikimedia Commons)
Almost nothing was wasted in the Regency kitchen. For example, when making an olio, which is a heavily spiced stew of meat and vegetables, the pigs feet and ears were cleaned; the hare cut into joints and daubed with bacon; the best end of neck of mutton cut into steaks; the poultry trussed; the tongues scalded and cleaned; the rabbits cut into pieces—all the bits and bobs got used. Other recipes called for using ox cheek, beef tails, marrow bones, a hashed calf’s head with throat sweetbreads and hashed brains, a minced lamb’s head and a pig’s head (for making a “currie”). The prized Regency cook wasted as little as possible.
4. Regency cooks used spices frequently
A cup of homemade white caudle (© 2015 Diane H. Morris) (Source of recipe: Foods of England)
Spices were common ingredients in many recipes. Cayenne, for example, was used in recipes for cullis, real turtle soup, stewed fish and mackerel fixed the German way. Mace was added to a cullis, the glaze for hams, fish sauce, mutton cutlets and a peloe of rice. Other commonly used spices included grated nutmeg, cardamon, cinnamon, cloves and cumin.
The caudle I fixed for our Regency dinner party was made by adding four spoonfuls of oatmeal, two blades of mace and a piece of lemon peel to two quarts of boiling water. The concoction was boiled for 15 minutes and then strained. When it was ready to serve I added a pinch of nutmeg and a cup of white wine. From my survey of guests I came to the following conclusion: I was the only person who liked a white caudle.
Those might be pippins in this 1768 still life painted by Peter Jakob Horemans! Note, too, the fly sitting on the bird’s breast—a realistic touch. (Source: Wikimedia Commons)
5. Regency cooks used ‘writing paper’
Who would have thought the Regency cook used writing paper? The “Pippins and Rice” dessert we prepared for our dinner party had specific instructions. Pippins are a type of red and yellow apple. The recipe called for paring, coring, and stuffing the applies with a mixture of rice, cinnamon and cloves. For baking the apples were to be put on “writing paper” placed on a tin-plate. The recipe for broiled salmon called for dipping the fillets in sweet oil, sweetening them with salt and pepper, and then placing them in folded pieces of writing paper for broiling over a clear fire. Today we use parchment paper designed for ovens, but I like to picture Jane Austen arguing firmly with her family’s cook over precious writing paper.
Every Plate and Spoon
We all left the dinner table well-fed and sated and full of admiration for the Regency cook’s hard work. After our guests left, my husband and I laughed at the chaos in our kitchen. We had used nearly every pot, pan, Corning Ware dish, tea towel and serving spoon we owned! And then there were the soup bowls, salad plates, bread plates, dinner plates, dessert plates, silverware and glassware for six people. Still, we had a merry time and our dinner was well worth the fuss.
Despite the promise of his cookbook’s title, I did not find John Mollard’s recipes all that easy or refined. I did agree, however, with his description of the qualities needed by the “thorough cook”: “an acute taste, a fertile invention, and a rigid attention to cleanliness.” It was true then; it’s true now.
Source:
1Mollard, John. The Art of Cookery Made Easy and Refined, Comprising Ample Directions for Preparing Every Article Requisite for Furnishing the Tables of the Nobleman, Gentleman, and Tradesman (London, 1802).