People in the 1800s usually ate a hearty breakfast because they worked hard physically. And they didn’t waste any food, either. Food left over from the night before was often used for breakfast.

Most recipes in cookbooks from this time were vague, only had general directions, and assumed you knew how to heat your wood stove or fireplace to the proper temperature.

INFORMATION BELOW FROM 1800s COOKBOOKS

DURING the early part of the autumn, and indeed until late in the winter, the supply of fruit is only less abundant than in the summer. Melons and peaches go first, but their place is taken by grapes, pears, apples, and, later, mandarins, tangerines, and oranges. Meat now begins to be a more necessary article in the bill of fare. By the exercise of a little ingenuity, left-overs from the dinner of the previous day may be rendered even more appetizing than they were in their first estate.

VEAL CUTLETS a la MAITRE d’HOTEL
Cut veal cutlets into neat pieces, and pound each with a mallet. Broil over a clear fire, transfer to a hot dish, and lay on each cutlet a small piece of maître d’hôtel butter. Set in a hot corner, covered, for five minutes before sending to table.

MAITRE d’HOTEL BUTTER
Into one cup of good butter, work a tablespoon of lemon juice and two tablespoons finely chopped parsley, with a little salt and white pepper. Pack into a small jar, cover, and keep in a cool place. It is useful to put on chops, steaks, or cutlets, or to mix with potatoes.

POTATOES HASHED WITH CREAM
Chop cold boiled potatoes fine, and stir them into a cup of hot milk in which has been melted two tablespoons of butter. Pepper and salt to taste. Let the potatoes become heated through before you serve them. If you have cream, use this and half as much butter.

QUICK SALLY-LUNN
Stir one-half cup butter, melted, into the beaten yolks of three eggs. Add one cup milk, three cups flour (into which two teaspoons baking-powder has been sifted), one-half teaspoon salt, and the egg whites last. Bake in one loaf, in a moderate oven*.

*moderate oven – about 350-400 degrees Fahrenheit.

MINCED MUTTON WITH POACHED EGGS
Chop cold boiled or roast mutton quite fine. Put two cups of this into the frying-pan with half an onion minced, and a half-cup of good gravy. If you have none, use instead a gill* of hot water and a lump of butter the size of an egg. Just before taking the mince from the fire, stir into it a tablespoon of Worcestershire sauce or two tablespoons of tomato catsup. Heap the mince on small squares of buttered toast laid on a hot platter, and place a poached egg on top of each mound. Serve very hot.

*gill – a liquid measurement; four ounces in the U.S. and five ounces in the U.K.

POTATO BALLS
To two cups cold mashed potato, add an egg, a teaspoon of butter, and salt and pepper to taste. Form with floured hands into small round or long balls, and fry in deep fat.

QUICK WAFFLES
Beat two eggs light, add two cups milk, one tablespoon butter, and a little salt. Mix two teaspoons baking-powder with three cups flour, then add to mixture. Grease your waffle-irons well with a piece of fat pork.

BROILED STEAK WITH MUSHROOMS
Broil your steak over a clear fire. Before you put it on, open a can of mushrooms, take out half of them, and cut each mushroom in two. Sauté them in a frying-pan with a little butter, unless you have a cup of bouillon, clear beef soup, or gravy at hand. If you have, let them simmer in this for ten minutes, and when you dish your steak, pour gravy and mushrooms over it. Leave it covered in the oven five minutes before sending to the table.

UNLEAVENED BREAD
Take two cups flour, one tablespoon butter, a pinch salt, and enough water to make a dough. Knead this well, roll out very thin, cut in rounds with a biscuit cutter. Prick with a fork, and bake in a hot oven.*

*hot oven – about 400-450 degrees Fahrenheit

DROPPED FISH-CAKES
Take one cup of salt cod picked very fine, one-half cup milk, one tablespoon butter, two teaspoons flour, one egg, and pepper to taste. Make a white sauce of the flour, butter, and milk, stir the fish into this, and add the egg, beaten light. Season, and drop by the spoonful into boiling lard, as is done with fritters.

BROILED SAUSAGES
Make sausage-meat into quite thin cakes with the hands, lay them on a gridiron, and broil them over a hot fire.

CLAM FRITTERS
Chop two dozen clams fine, and stir them into the batter made of one cup milk, the clam liquor, one beaten egg, and two cups flour, or enough for a thin batter. Season to taste, and fry by the spoonfuls in very hot lard.

ENGLISH MUFFINS
Make a stiff batter with two cups milk, one tablespoon butter, one teaspoon sugar, one saltspoon* salt, half of a yeast-cake, and about four cups flour. Set to rise for about three hours, or until the batter is like a honeycomb. Bake on a soapstone griddle in very large muffin-rings. Make them the day before they are wanted, and when ready to use them, split, toast lightly, butter, and eat hot.

*saltspoon – a miniature spoon used with an open salt cellar for individual use before table salt was free-flowing.

MOLDED POTATO
Press cold mashed potato into small teacups, turn them out, brush over with the yolk of egg, put a bit of butter on top of each, and brown in the oven.

HASTY MUFFINS
Into two eggs, beaten very light, stir one tablespoon each butter and lard, mixed, two teaspoons white sugar, one cup milk, and two cups flour, well mixed with one saltspoon salt and one teaspoon baking-powder. Stir well, and bake in thoroughly greased tins.

EGG TIMBALES WITH CHEESE
Beat six eggs well without separating the yolks and whites, add one gill milk and salt and pepper to taste. Stir in two tablespoons grated cheese, and pour into well-greased little tin pans with straight sides. Set these in a pan of hot water, and bake in the oven. When the egg is firm, turn out on a flat dish, and pour a white sauce over them.

LYONNAISE POTATOES
Slice cold boiled potatoes into neat rounds. Cut a medium-sized onion into thin slices, and put it with a good tablespoon of butter or bacon dripping into the frying-pan. When the onion is colored, add the potatoes, about two cupfuls, and stir them about until they are a light brown. Strew* with chopped parsley, and serve.

*strew – to scatter or spread untidily over (a surface or area).

Image from Deposit Photos

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