Lucia Alden Bradford (1807-1893).

Carolyn Ravenscroft, Archivist

I have mentioned the19th century cookbook (c. 1860-1890) created by Lucia Alden Bradford and her sisters in this blog before, but I couldn’t resist bringing it out once again.[1]  It is such a wonderful piece of history – a compilation of popular recipes copied from a variety of sources, including neighbors and the Ladies Almanac. The book is meticulously laid out, with chapters for Cakes and Puddings, Meats, Vegetables and “other useful Receipts of various kinds.” There is even an index.  I can only imagine the creation of this little book was a labor of love – gathering and organizing the many snippets of paper and magazine clippings that had accumulated over a lifetime.  When a recipe originated with a friend, her name is properly given.  The writing is mostly in Lucia’s neat and recognizable penmanship. Some recipes were obviously added later and these are written in the loose scrawl of a hand that had seen almost ninety years of use.

I could not tell you my favorite recipe. I am not a great cook and many of the ingredients are foreign to my modern eyes (and taste buds). In many instances there are no cooking directions as we’d expect to find today – no oven settings or baking times. Of course, 19^th century hearths and later wood stoves didn’t come with temperature gauges or timers so cooks had to know their own equipment. Other recipes are incredibly explicit, e.g. I feel confident I could cure a ham if I had a freshly slaughtered pig, a smokehouse and about two months.

There is one recipe that stood out from all the others on this rainy day – Coffee. Americans today require their coffee to come at them quickly, waiting for a cup of Joe is a thing of the past. Who under the age of forty even remembers coffee percolating on the stove or could now suffer the more than ten minutes it took for it to boil and brew?  Imagine then, if creating Lucia Bradford’s perfect cup was part of your morning routine:

Coffee recipe from Bradford Cookbook

“For Making Coffee”

Beat an egg – 2 for a large pot & mix it well with the coffee till you have formed a ball – fill the pot with cold water allowing room enough for the ingredients – let it simmer very gently for an hour – do not stir it on any account – just before it is required put the pot on the fire & warm it well, but take care that it does not boil – pour it off gently & you will have a pure & strong extract of the coffee – use white sugar & cream if attainable, if not, boiled milk.

Enjoy!

[1] Lucia Alden Bradford (1807-1893) was the daughter of Capt. Gershom Bradford and Sarah Hickling Bradford. She, along with her three sisters – Maria (1803-1864), Elizabeth (1809-1890) and Charlotte (1813-1893) – was raised and learned to cook in the Bradford House on Tremont Street in Duxbury. Today the house is a museum owned by the Duxbury Rural & Historical Society.