Modern Cookery for Private Families (Southover Historic Cookery & H) [Hardcover]

Eliza Acton (Author)

Book Description

Series: Southover Historic Cookery & H | Publication Date: August 1, 2002

(first published in 1845) Reprint of the extended edition of 1855 as edited by Eliza Acton. The most widely used of all the Victorian cookery books, much admired for its limpid style and incomparable recipes, and for the classic English style it represents. Eliza Acton's receipts show English cookery at its very best, before the over-elaboration of late Victorianism overtook it. She was writing for small families, so quantities in the recipes hardly need to be altered. Her personality shows strongly all through her book: she was precise, orderly, very observant, and mistress of an estimable prose style. With an introduction by Elizabeth Ray, who unearths some previously unknown facts about Eliza's life.

Product Details

• Hardcover: 544 pages
• Publisher: Southover Press (August 1, 2002)
• Language: English
• ISBN-10: 1870962087
• ISBN-13: 978-1870962087
• Product Dimensions: 10.6 x 5.3 x 1.9 inches
• Shipping Weight: 2.1 pounds
• Average Customer Review: 5.0 out of 5 stars  See all reviews (1 customer review)
• Amazon Best Sellers Rank: #2,685,785 in Books (See Top 100 in Books)

Customer Reviews

Most Helpful Customer Reviews

10 of 10 people found the following review helpful:

5.0 out of 5 stars One of the best cookbooks EVER written., December 8, 2006

By 

I. Seligman - See all my reviews

This review is from: Modern Cookery for Private Families (Southover Historic Cookery & H) (Hardcover)

This 1845 cookbook has been perhaps the most influential cookbook in the last 150 years. It is now obvious to me why great British writers such as Delia Smith rave about this seminal cookbook.

It's actual title is "Modern Cookery, in All its Branches: Reduced to a System of Easy Practice, for the Use of Private Familiies".

Reading Acton's beautifully written recipes, and later learning how much she was plagiarized by Elizabeth Beeton (1861) and others (barely changing the amount of an ingredient or two) it's clear to see how her cookbook's codification of many French and typically British recipes has been the tremendous ground on which nearly all great British and American cookbooks have directly or indirectly arisen. Yes, pretty strong words!

I have often, when reading other writer's referencing one of Acton's recipes, wondered what Acton's entire book was like. Now that I have an 1845 copy of the 683 page masterpiece, I realize that nearly none of those quoting recipes had ever read one from her book, and just copied what others said were her recipes!! Yes, the delightfully clear and instructive recipes, beautifully in her own words, put to shame the hollow words others incorrectly ascribed to her. Whether it's her Mullagatawny soup (she's often given credit for first writing a recipe of it or another recipe, you will enjoy reading her own poetic descriptions and instructions. This is not a Rachael Ray type 30 miute quickie, but a book to be savored by cooks and non cooks alike, to give a view of bith proper cookery and of a time long past.