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Kitchen alchemy in the 16th century
Since late antiquity, alchemical texts have had a reputation for being difficult to read. Besides often being written in Latin, which automatically limited the readership, these treatises employed a hermetic language, following the tradition of the secrecy of esoteric knowledge.… Continue reading
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Censorship of medieval English recipes
A late medieval manuscript in the Wellcome Library contains intriguing marks of censorship. MS. 406 is a collection of Middle English texts and recipes produced in the 15th and early 16th centuries. The recipes are from the ‘Practica phisicalia’ composed… Continue reading
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Midwinter warmers
As the nights draw in, what better way to banish winter chills than with a warming drink. In the last of her Christmas blog posts, Mary-Anne Boermanns offers something from our historical recipe manuscripts that will see you through the… Continue reading
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Last minute plum pudding
Looking to bring something a little out of the ordinary to the Christmas table this year? Mary-Anne Boermans sought inspiration from our historical recipe manuscripts. Here’s her adaptation of a traditional plum pudding recipe: When we think of sweet, festive… Continue reading
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Savoury mince pies
Looking to bring something a little out of the ordinary to the Christmas table this year? Mary-Anne Boermans sought inspiration from some traditional recipes in our historical recipe manuscripts. Here’s her take on the original mince pies: Mince Pies have… Continue reading
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How to survive the dog-days of summer
Are you wilting under the heliacal rising of Sirius, Orion’s best friend, otherwise known as the ‘dog-days of summer‘? Whether or not you have modern air conditioning (or servants to fan your heated brow), history provides us with a number of examples… Continue reading
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Hoarse remedies
If you’ve been inspired by the This Is A Voice exhibition at Wellcome Collection to exercise your voice more than usual, you may be in need of something for a sore throat. Here are some herbal remedies from the past.… Continue reading
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Barberries, saffron and almond milk: the flavours of 2015 … and 1662
Holly Story from the Library’s media team has been delving in to one of our many historical recipe books. Here’s what she discovered from the point of view of a curious cook rather than an historian or archivist. In the… Continue reading
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A high class book of reference
Here is an entertaining guide to Our Daily Fare and How to Provide It, for World Book Day. This book is aimed at the average housewife stuck at home in 1893 and limited to a “small weekly household allowance” of… Continue reading
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Researching medicine in recipe books
Researcher Katherine Allen is using recipe manuscripts to study domestic medicine in the 18th century. I first came upon the topic of recipe books as sources for the history of medicine during my master’s degree at the University of Saskatchewan.… Continue reading