Full Description
In 1615 the poet and writer Gervase Markham published an extraordinary handbook for housewives, containing advice on everything from planting herbs to brewing beer, feeding animals to distilling perfume, with recipes for a variety of dishes such as trifle, pancakes and salads (not to mention some amusingly tart words on how the ideal wife should behave). Aimed at middle-class women who would share in household tasks with their servants in the kitchen, this companionable and opinionated book offers a richly enjoyable glimpse of the way we lived, worked and ate 400 years ago.
Contents
12: The outward and active knowledge of the housewife including her skill in cookery with flesh, fish, sauces, pastry, banqueting and great feasts3: The distillations of waters and their virtues4: The ordering, preserving and helping of all sorts of wine5: Of the excellency of oats6: Of the brew-house and the bake-house7: Glossary
