Call Number:

Item 0146

Repository:

University of Delaware Library Special Collections

Extent:

1 volume (60 pages)

Language:

English and German

Preferred Citation:

MSS 0097, Item 0146, German-American manuscript recipe book, Special Collections, University of Delaware Library, Newark, Delaware.

Date:

approximately 1885-1888 (inclusive)

Creator:

Creator unknown

Form:

Cookbooks, Recipes, Manuals (instructional materials), and Clippings (information artifacts)

Abstract:

This nineteenth-century German-American manuscript recipe book is written in both languages and contains a variety of food recipes, particularly desserts, as well as several laid-in items like clippings and additional handwritten recipes.

The author of this nineteenth-century German-American manuscript recipe book is unknown, but the dual language of the volume itself suggests use by a recent immigrant and a possible network of German- and English-speaking families.

Biographical information derived from the collection.

This small, partly disbound manuscript recipe book dating from the late 1880s contains sixty pages of handwritten food recipes written in German and English. This recipe book contains entries for a variety of foods, mostly desserts like cookies, puddings, cakes, and pies. While German-language entries dominate the first half of the volume and English is more common in the second half, the two languages are interspersed throughout the book.

The handwriting in the volume is in ink and pen. There are inserts present throughout the second half of the book, with a large fold-out page for "Puddings." Notable condition issues include the wear and staining of the paper and the volume's missing front cover. The back cover features a fragment of an illustration with a caption in German, as well as the birth dates for three children born between 1885 and 1888: Clarence W. Seymour (14 March 1886); Emily Helen Seymour (19 December 1886); and Edgar Harrold (7 April 1888).