Stephenson Family Recipe Book

NO ACCESS - POOR CONDITION - SEE NRM ARCHIVIST - Volume, paper with card covers and leather spine and string gathering; Stephenson Family Recipe Book, 1820s-1840s. Contains hand-written culinary, medicinal and household recipes in various hands, fixed in. Some are signed, initialled or attributed in the title, including 'Mr. Stephenson', Margaret Warren (cook), E. Stephenson (Elizabeth Stephenson), Mrs. Bidder, Miss May, Charlotte Sanderson, Mrs. Gisborn, Mr. Dixon, Robert Stephenson, Ann Porteus etc. A few are dated. There are also a few printed circulars for household medicines fixed in, When first sold in 1906, the book was described as having been "purchased at the Sale of the Effects of the Second Wife of George Stephenson, at Shrewsbury." It seems to have been bought by one John Cheese. The book was probably assembled by the Stephenson family cook or housekeeper in the mid-1840s.

It's notable that the dated recipes cease in 1845 when George’s second wife Betty died. Betty was the Mrs Stephenson to whom some recipes are attributed. George married his third wife Ellen Gregory in January 1848 but he died in August that year. Ellen had previously been George’s housekeeper, and she likely contributed to the recipe book.

The recipes in the book are a fascinating insight into the daily life of the Stephenson household. They paint a vivid picture of a wealthy household. There are relatively few recipes for whole meals, although jugged hare is a notable exception. Most of the recipes and instructions fall into the following categories:

Baking and desserts including bread, cheese patties, a variety of cakes, tea cakes, jelly, mince pies, blancmange, Bakewell pudding, lemon cheesecake, lemon ice, lemon pudding and others.

Sauces, jams, and instructions for preserving meats and vegetables including vinegars (gooseberry, garlic, shallot, chilli and others), fish sauce, horseradish sauce, cream cheese, Indian pickle, orange marmalade (made from the Stephensons’ own Seville oranges), damson cheese (possibly like lemon curd), brandied cherries, spiced beef, curing spices, pickled cucumbers and preserving lettuce stalks.

Drinks including wines (orange, gooseberry, ginger, colts’ foot, shallot, cowslip, birch, “English Champagne” [made with currants] and elderberry), lemonade, beer, ginger beer, and punches, including pine punch (which included pineapples and rum), and champagne punch, as well as instructions for making yeast and barm (for both baking and brewing).

A variety of medicinal recipes and instructions including cough syrups, eye water, instructions for making pills and remedies for colds, gout, rheumatism pain, cholera, toothache, “decline or asthmatic”, stomach cramps and stomach complaints, feet and ankles, and dropsy, as well as veterinary treatments for mange, fowl of beast and sheep’s feet, and medicine for a dog by purge or vomit.

Household instructions including recipes for numerous colours of dyes, pomatum (a hair styling wax), shoe blacking, French polish, and instructions for washing clothes as well as several sets of knitting instructions and how to make “day flowers” which involves taking moulds of leaves and stalks.

A couple sets of instructions for growing produce, including how to mix soil and animal dung for spawning mushrooms and how to replant the first harvest of new potatoes and replant them for a late crop of potatoes at the start of winter (this being the oldest date in the book from 1835).

There are many potential insights that can be learnt about daily life in the household. The medicinal recipes give insight into the types of health conditions that the family may have been coping with and how they treated them. Many are consistent with the types of medications supplied by pharmacists in this era, including the use of laudanum (a mixture of alcohol and opium), and other remedies frequently involving tinctures or poisons.

Some of the ingredients are indicative of a wealthy household, including the many recipes that makes use of lemons and oranges, as well as the use of pineapples which were still a high status fruit in this era due to the difficulty of growing them in Britain. The large quantities of alcohol being brewed or mixed in punches (often by the gallon) suggests a household that may have entertained large guests. The recipe for lemon ice also suggests that the family had access to ice for chilling drinks and desserts.