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    The Housekeeper's Manual: Or, Complete Housewife
    The Housekeeper's Manual: Or, Complete Housewife
    The Housekeeper's Manual: Or, Complete Housewife
    Ebook113 pages1 hour

    The Housekeeper's Manual: Or, Complete Housewife

    By American Antiquarian Cookbook Collection

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    About this ebook

    An important and fascinating document of American social history, The Housekeeper’s Manual, or Complete Housewife is believed to be an adapted version of the British best seller The Cook’s Oracle; and Housekeeper’s Manual by Dr. William Kitchiner. Intended as “a Guide for Families,” the cookbook provides recipes for “the most simple and most highly finished” dishes, all tested personally by the author, which was uncommon in the early 19th century. Furthermore, each household tip or skill was also performed by Dr. Kitchiner to test each method before writing the entry. The contents include helpful and quaint information such as “large pears should be tied up by the stalk” or “to preserve blankets from moths [it is best] to fold them and lay them under the feather beds that are in use” as well as recipes for stewing oysters, dressing halibut, preparing beef broth, and boiling ground rice milk.  Combined with the charming household information and the treasured recipes, The Housekeeper’s Manual, or Complete Housewife also calls for wives to be involved in the financial concerns of the household and serve as active members of the family, making this tome a particularly significant historical collection. This edition of The Housekeeper’s Manual, or Complete Housewife was reproduced by permission from the volume in the collection of the American Antiquarian Society, Worcester, Massachusetts. Founded in 1812 by Isaiah Thomas, a Revolutionary War patriot and successful printer and publisher, the Society is a research library documenting the life of Americans from the colonial era through 1876. The Society collects, preserves, and makes available as complete a record as possible of the printed materials from the early American experience. The cookbook collection includes approximately 1,100 volumes. 
    LanguageEnglish
    PublisherAndrews McMeel Publishing
    Release dateApr 16, 2013
    ISBN9781449428662
    The Housekeeper's Manual: Or, Complete Housewife

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      Book preview

      The Housekeeper's Manual - American Antiquarian Cookbook Collection

      OBSERVATIONS

      FOR THE

      THE MISTRESS OF A FAMILY

      IN the variety of female acquirements, though domestic occupations stand not so high in esteem as they formerly did, yet when neglected they produce much human misery. There was a time when ladies knew nothing ‘beyond’ their own family concerns; but in the present day there are many who know nothing ‘about’ them.—Each of these extremes should be avoided, but is there no way to unite in the female character, cultivation of talents and habits of usefulness? Happily there are still great numbers in every situation, whose example proves that this is possible. Instances may be found of ladies in the higher walks of life, who condescend to examine the accounts of their house-steward; and, by overlooking and wisely directing the expenditure of that part of their husband’s income winch falls under their own inspection, avoid the inconveniences of embarrassed circumstances.

      The direction of a table is no inconsiderable branch of a lady’s concern, as it involves judgment in expenditure, respectability of appearance, and the comfort of her husband and those who partake their hospitality.

      If a lady has never been accustomed, while single, to think of family management, let her not upon that account fear that she cannot attain it; she may consult others who are more experienced, and acquaint herself with the necessary quantities of the several articles of family expenditure, in proportion to the number it consists of, the proper prices to pay, &c.

      A minute account of the annual income, and the times of payment, should be taken in writing: likewise an estimate of the supposed amount of each article of expense: and those who are early accustomed to calculations on domestic articles will acquire so accurate a knowledge of what their establishment requires, as will give them the happy medium between prodigality and parsimony, without acquiring the character of meanness.

      Many families have owed their prosperity full as much to the propriety of female management, as to the knowledge and activity of the father.

      The following hints may be useful as well as economical:

      Every article should be kept in the place best suited to it, as much waste may be thereby avoided.

      Vegetables will keep best on a stone floor, if the air be excluded.—Meat in a cold dry place.—Sugar and sweetmeats require a dry place: so does salt.—Candles, cold, but not damp.—Dried meats, hams, &c. the same. All sorts of seeds for puddings, rice, &c. should be close covered, to preserve from insects: but that will not prevent it, if long kept.

      Straw to lay apples on should be dry, to prevent a musty taste.

      Large pears should be tied up by the stalk.

      The best means to preserve blankets from moths is to fold them and lay them under the feather beds that are in use; and they should be shaken occasionally. When soiled, they should be washed not scoured.

      Soda, by softening the water, saves a great deal of soap. It should be melted in a large jug of water, some of which pour into the tubs and boiler: and when the lather becomes weak, add more. The new improvement in soft soap is, if properly used, a saving of nearly one half in quantity.

      Many good laundresses advise soaping linen in Warm water the night previous to washing, as facilitating the operation with less friction.

      Soap should be out with a wire or twine, in pieces that will make a long square when first brought in, and kept out of the air two or three weeks: for if it dry quick it will crack, and when wet, break. Put it on a shelf, leaving a space between, and let it grow hard gradually. Thus, it will save a full third in the consumption.

      Some of the lemons and oranges used for juice, should be pared first to preserve the peel dry.

      When whites of eggs are used for jelly, or other purposes, contrive to have pudding, custard, &c to employ the yolks also. Should you not want them for several hours, beat them up with a little water and put them in a cool place, or they will be hardened and useless. It is a mistake of old, to think that the whites made cakes and puddings heavy: on the contrary, if beaten long and separately, they contribute greatly to give lightness, are an advantage to paste, and make a pretty dish beaten with fruit to set in cream, &c.

      If copper utensils be used in the kitchen the cook should be charged to be very careful not to let the tin be rubbed off, and to have them fresh done when the least defect appears, and never to put by any soup gravy or the like, in them, or any metallic u-ensil; stone and earthen vessels should be provided for those purposes, as likewise plenty of common dishes, that the table set may not be used to put by cold meat.

      Tin vessels, if kept damp, soon rust, which causes holes. Fenders, and tin linings of flower pots, should be painted every year or two.

      Vegetables soon sour, and corrode metals and glazed red ware, by which a strong poison is produced. Some years ago the death of several gentlemen was occasioned at Salt Hill, by the cook sending a ragout to the table, which she had kept from the preceding day in a copper vessel badly tinned.

      Vinegar, by its acidity, does the same, the glazing being of lead or arsenic.

      The best way of scalding fruits, or boiling vinegar, is in a stone jar on a hot iron hearth, or by putting the vessel into a pan of water, called a water bath.

      If chocolate, coffee, jelly, gruel, bark, and the like, be suffered to boil over, the strength is lost.

      In the following, and indeed all other receipts, though the quantities may be as accurately directed as possible, yet much must be left to the discretion of the person who uses them. The different tastes of people requires more or less of the flavour of the spices, salt, garlic, butter, &c. which can never be ordered by general rules; and if the cook has not a good taste, and attention to that of her employers, not all the ingredients which nature and art can furnish, will give exquisite flavor to her dishes. The proper articles should be at hand, and she must proportion them until the true zest be obtained, and a variety of flavor be given to the different dishes at the same time.

      Those who require maigre dishes will find abundance in this little work: and where they are not strictly so, by suet or bacon being directed into the stuffings, the cook must use butter instead; and where meat gravies (or stock, as they are called) are ordered, those made of fish must be adopted.

      DIRECTIONS FOR CARVING.

      THE carving-knife for a lady should be light, and of a middling size and a fine edge. Strength is less required than address, in the manner of using it: and to facilitate this the cook should give orders to the butcher to divide the joints of the bones of all earcass-joints of mutton, lamb, and veal, (such as neck, breast, and loin;) which may then be easily cut into thin slices attached to the adjoining bones. If the whole of the meat belonging to each bone should really be too thick, a small slice may be taken off between every two bones.

      The more fleshy joints, (as fillet of veal, leg or saddle of mutton, and beef,) are to be helped in thin slices, neatly cut and smooth; observing to let the knife pass down to the bone in the mutton and beef joints.

      The dish should not be too far off the carver, as it gives an awkward appearance and makes the task more difficult. Attention is to be paid to help every one to such articles as are considered the best.

      In helping fish take care not to break the flakes, which in cod and very fresh salmon are large and contribute much to the beauty of its appearance. A fish knife, not being sharp, divides it best on this account. Help a part of the roe, milt, or liver, to each person. The heads of carp, part of those

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