C

CABBIDGE CREAM: See C 1. Receipts for this dish of clotted cream in built-up layers to resemble cabbage leaves appears in several 17th century cookery books. It must have been quite difficult to achieve. (John Nott, 1726)

CABBIDGE-LETTUCE, 10, 116: the name by which a headed lettuce was known in the 17th and 18th centuries. (Robert May, 1660/1685)

CAG, an old spelling of keg.(Glasse, 1747)

CALAMUS AROMATICUS: Sweet flag. The roots were candied and produced a sweetmeat with a pungent flavour midway between pepper and ginger They were also used as a flavouring in liqueurs and cordials. (John Nott, 1726)

CALFSNUT. The testicle of a calf.(Glasse, 1747)

CALL: a wedge; or caul (the membranous lining of the abdominal cavity), depending on context. (Sir Kenelm Digby, 1669)

CALVER, 331. A ‘calvered’ salmon, according to the NSOED, was one which was fresh, or which had been ‘prepared in a now unknown way’ while still alive or newly dead. The term was used by many 17th and 18th century writers, usually but not always of salmon. May uses it at 346 of a flounder still alive; but at 344 he applies it to a turbot which has already been ‘drawn’ (gutted). The common factor seems to be that the fish is ‘scotch’d’, which means that gashes are cut in its side. In this respect, carver seems to mean the same as crimp, a term which came into use in the late 17th century, meaning to make gashes in a fish’s side before the onset of rigor mortis, i e before death or very soon afterwards. It is tempting to suppose that the earlier term, carver, was gradually ousted by the later one, crimp; but the agnostic stance of the NSOED counsels caution. (Robert May, 1660/1685)

CALVERED: cut in thin slices when fresh, then pickled. (Sir Kenelm Digby, 1669)

CAMFARY LEAVES, referred to on 82, an unorthodox spelling of comfrey leaves.(Glasse, 1747)

CAMPAIGN OVEN: A portable iron or copper oven, originally developed for use on military campaigns and exercises. (John Nott, 1726)

CAMPHIRE ROOTS. Probably a misspelling of comfrey roots. These were used, e.g. in a couple of the numerous ‘waters’ for which Eliza Smith (1742) gives recipes. However, there is another possibility. Camphire was the usual spelling of camphor in the 18th century and earlier, and was still given as an alternative spelling by Law’s Grocer’s Manual in the 1890s. That same book has an interesting account of the extraction of camphor from the wood of the camphor tree (an oriental relation of the laurel and bay) and comments that the roots are the most productive pare of the tree in this respect.(Glasse, 1747)

CANARY: See Sack. (John Nott, 1726)

CANARY, see SACK.(Glasse, 1747)

CANDID LIMON: candied lemons. (Sir Kenelm Digby, 1669)

CANDLEMAS: 2 February, the date of the feast of the purification of the Virgin Mary (or presentation of Christ in the Temple), celebrated with many candles. (Richard Bradley, 1736)

CANDLEMAS: February 2nd. (William Ellis, 1750)

CANICULAR DAYS: dog days. The hottest time of year (variously reckoned), associated with the rising of Sirius, the Dog-Star. (Sir Kenelm Digby, 1669)

CANTIMPLORA: the word is Italian, in Spanish it is cantinplora. In the text, and the appended footnote, is information about these, but this letter from the late Elizabeth David to the present editor throws more light on their use and characteristics. ‘I am amused,’ she wrote, ‘to hear that Evelyn was interested in these devices. A cantimplora was – still is – a glass vessel with a big belly and a long neck. Half up the body of the vessel is a deep pocket in which ice or snow is inserted, thereby indirectly cooling the wine in the vessel without diluting or in any way damaging it. (John Evelyn, Cook, C17)

‘The cantimplora in Evelyn’s drawing is lying on its side, and if one didn’t already know what it’s supposed to be it would be quite a puzzle. (I happen to own one from the days when I used to go from time to time to Malta, where these vessels were in common use.) Round about the 1660s, Tuscan nomenclature changed, and a cantimplora became the term applied to an ice bucket which was then a pretty new idea. I didn’t know that the cork ice bucket was also called a cantimplora.’(John Evelyn, Cook, C17)

CAP OF THE STILL: see under ALEMBICK. (Richard Bradley, 1736)

CAPER. ‘The Caper has been propagated with great Care in our Green-Houses to very little purpose.’ Thus Bradley in his New Improvements of Planting and Gardening (part III, 1718, p. 255). But by 1722 Bradley had been to Toulon, in France, where the caper grew profusely (Pierre Pomet remarked that “tis a certain Truth, that all the Capers eaten in Europe, except those from Majorca, come from Toulon’), had transported some seeds back to England, and had succeeded in naturalizing the plant to the English climate. Unfortunately, the plague was raging round Toulon in 1721 and Bradley was unable to obtain enough seeds to make the caper as common in England as he had planned. For further details and for Bradley’s personal recipe for pickling caper flower buds, see ~ General Treatise of Husbandry and Gardening, volume II, 1726, pp. 338, 418-19. (Richard Bradley, 1736)

CAPERONS, 158: presumably a spelling of ‘capers’. (Robert May, 1660/1685)

CAPILOTADO, 81. The name clearly has affinities with capirotada, a word found in early Spanish cookery sources (notably Ruperto de Nola, Castilian edition of 1529), to which no precise meaning can be confidently given. Barbara Santich in PPC 12 has given translations of the two de Nola recipes and has pointed out that capirotada might mean something like ‘pot-pourri’ or might refer to a sauce. She also links the word with an Italian dish of 1661 called capirattata, to which Elizabeth David had drawn attention in PPC 8 and which certainly constituted a medley of ingredients.

It has been suggested that capilotado and capirotado were terms commonly used to indicate a dish of alternating layers of meat and bread, or meat and sauce. However, the examples in May’s book, ‘Capilotado Francois’ and ‘Capilotado, or Custard, in the Hungarian fashion’, are unlayered and the latter has no meat.

The meaning of the term(s) has undergone considerable changes. A bread pudding known as capirotada features in the Mexican cookery of today. (Robert May, 1660/1685)

CAPIVI: balsam of capivi is a resinous extract from the copaiba tree of Brazil. It was used in making lacquers, and in treating urinary disorders. Its taste is not pleasant. (William Ellis, 1750)

CAPON LARDED WITH LEMONS: See C 38. This curious receipt comes from a much older work, The Compleat Cook of 1655. The dish must surely be of Arab or Moorish origin. (John Nott, 1726)

CAPON PUDDING: This is the French boudin blanc, pounded chicken meat and eggs made up like sausages. (John Nott, 1726)

CARBONADE or to CARBONADO: ‘is to cut and slash any cold joynt of Meat and Salt it and then broil it before the Fire’ (Randle Holme). (Richard Bradley, 1736)

CARBONADOE, 166-8: a method of cooking meat by broiling, for example on a grid-iron before the fire or over hot embers, with prior slashing to increase the speed with which heat penetrates the meat. In Coriolanus, Shakespeare wrote: ‘He scotcht him and notcht him like a Carbinado.’ Some but not all of May’s examples are explicit about the prior slashing. (Robert May, 1660/1685)

CARDONES, 69, Cynara cardunculus: the cardoon. This thistlelike plant, which is related to the globe artichoke, was more widely eaten in England in the past. The main stalk and leaf-stalks were ‘string’d’ end boiled. (Robert May, 1660/1685)

CARDOON: see Thistle. (John Evelyn, Cook, C17)

CARDOONS: A thistle-like plant allied to the globe artichoke. The inner leaf stalks were eaten raw, like celery, or blanched and then stewed. Cardoons were much prized by the Italians and are still popular in Italy, where they always figure among the raw vegetables to be dipped into the hot anchovy, oil and garlic sauce called bagna calda. Braised or stewed cardoons made a popular entremets or ‘intermess’. (John Nott, 1726)

CARDS SEWED ROUND: See AP 72. Cards were shallow moulds, usually of copper or tin-plate, but in this case perhaps of stiff parchment. Modern versions of cards are called sheets, e.g. bun sheets, sponge finger sheets, madeleine sheets. Instead of using one standing mould for each small cake or biscuit, sheets made of tin plate or aluminium are stamped out with say a dozen depressions in the shape required. (John Nott, 1726)

CARDUCE, CARDUS, CARDUUS, 158-9. The holy thistle, Silybum marianum, known to Evelyn (1699) as Carduus Mariae, Our Lady’s milky or dappled thistle, whose white striped and speckled leaves were used medicinally to increase the flow of milk, and also as vegetable and salad. ‘The young Stalk about May, being peel’d and soak’d in Water, to extract the Bitterness, boiled or raw, is a very wholsome Sallet.’ Not to be confused with the blessed thistle, Cnica benedicta.(Glasse, 1747)

CARDUUS, 425: probably Cnicus (formerly Carduus) benedictus, the blessed thistle, an ingredient for things like plague water and carduus posses. It was regarded as a valuable medicinal plant. (Robert May, 1660/1685)

CARDUUS BENEDICTUS: blessed thistle, a garden plant. (Sir Kenelm Digby, 1669)

CARDUUS BENEDICTUS: The blessed thistle, cultivated as a medicinal herb. It appears to have been regarded as a kind of all-heal. (John Nott, 1726)

CARDUUS is the blessed thistle, Carduus (now Cnidus) benedictus, or it was the milk thistle (Silybum maritimum) which was more generally used as a food plant and to increase the flow of mothers’ milk – its flavour was bitter, like the wormwood’s. (William Ellis, 1750)

CARRAWAY-COMFITS: sugar-coated carraway seeds. (Sir Kenelm Digby, 1669)

CARRAWAY OR CARAWAY CONFECTS: See Comfits

CARRAWAY-COMFITS, 141: carraway seeds coated many times with boiling sugar to produce small white ‘comfits’, Coriander seeds and aniseeds were similarly treated. Carraway comfits were often put into cakes or buns or used to decorate them. Hannah Glasse writes of ‘rough’ carraway-comfits, by which were meant ones which had been repeatedly coated with sugar boiled to a greater height than for smooth comfits. These were referred to by earlier authors as ‘crisp and ragged coinfits’. See Wilson (1973, 302) for details of comfit-making. Modern forms of comfit include sugar-coated almonds; and aniseed comfits are still available in, e.g., parts of France, and in the guise of aniseed balls.(Glasse, 1747)

CARROT SOOP : See C 67. A good example of a sweet dish made from carrots and dried fruit. (John Nott, 1726)

CARVI (comfits): sugar-coated caraway seeds. (Sir Kenelm Digby, 1669)

CASSEROLES: An excellent definition of a casserole as it was understood in John Nott’s day is given in C68. (John Nott, 1726)

CAST OF ROLLS, 175: the quantity of rolls made at any one baking. (Robert May, 1660/1685)

CATCHUP, see KETCHUP.(Glasse, 1747)

CAUDLE, a general term for a kind of thick drink. This was generally made from ale, sweetened and spiced, and thickened with egg yolk and often breadcrumbs or oatmeal or something similar. A caudle could also be made with water, milk, or wine (Hannah Glasse uses white wine in Brown Caudle, 120). It was used as a hot drink for invalids and was drunk out of a squat, round vessel which usually had two handles and a lid, called a caudle-cup. A hot caudle could be added to a pie, e.g. a wine caudle to a sweet meat pie.(Glasse, 1747)

CAUDLE: a warm drink of thin gruel mixed with ale or wine and sweetened, often for the sick-bed. (William Ellis, 1750)

CAUL: The inner membrane enclosing a calf foetus. In French, crepine. Cleaned, it makes an admirable natural packaging and is much used in French charcuterie to wrap mixtures of chopped pork, liver, and so on. Hence crepines and crepinettes, of which Nott’s ‘calves liver in a caul’ is a version. (John Nott, 1726)

CAVEACH, used as a noun for Pickled Mackerel, 130, was also a verb. The term is found in many languages (French escabeche, Italian scapece, Spanish and Portuguese escabeche, etc), always meaning the pickling of cooked fish. (The similar term ceviche – also cebiche, seviche, etc – in use in parts of Latin America must surely have the same derivation, but refers to the ‘cooking’ of raw fish by the simple application of lime juice or something similar, which brings about many of the changes which real cooking would produce.) The OED gives the term caveach a Spanish derivation, but confusingly says that it means to pickle mackerel in the West Indian way, which suggests that it reached England from Spain via the West Indies. In fact its use in English goes back further than the OED realised; thus Hannah Glasse took her recipe for Caveached Mackerel from Mary Kettilby (1714) and there are 17th century examples. The origin of the word caveach seems to be the Persian ‘sikbaj’ (sometimes rendered ‘sakbay’), meaning ‘vinegar stew’ (Perry, 1981). It would have entered the European vocabulary through the Arabs, via Spain.(Glasse, 1747)

CAWDLE: caudle, a warm, sweetened drink, of thin gruel, mixed with wine or ale. (Sir Kenelm Digby, 1669)

CAWL (caul): the fatty membrane surrounding the intestines. (Richard Bradley, 1736)

CEESE: Printer’s error for cheese. (John Nott, 1726)

CELANDINE: Chelidonium majus. Good for eye problems. (Sir Kenelm Digby, 1669)

CERSEVIL: chervil. (Sir Kenelm Digby, 1669)

CERVELAS: A semi-cured sausage, for cooking. (John Nott, 1726)

CHADOCK (shaddock). Bradley thought it was ‘the largest kind of Orange that is known’. This exotic fruit first excited his attention at Benjamin Whitmill’s nursery garden at Hoxton. Mr Whitmill had ‘received several Fruits of the Chadock Orange from Barbadoes’ and used the seeds to raise plants in pots. (See the chapter devoted to the chadock orange in the Appendix to New Improvements of Planting and Gardening, 1726.) The shaddock, or pompelmoose or pomelo as it is also called, is the fruit of Citrus decumana. It resembles a grapefruit rather than an orange. (Richard Bradley, 1736)

CHAFING DISH, 266: a portable brazier to hold burning coals or charcoal and designed to be set on a metal stand. Dishes of food could be finished or reheated over this, away from the fierce heat of the hearth. See Hess (1981, 22-4). (Robert May, 1660/1685)

CHAFING DISH: a portable brazier holding charcoal, set on a metal stand, that acted as a stove away from the heat of the main kitchen fire. ‘A portable grate for coals’ (Johnson’s Dictionary). (John Evelyn, Cook, C17)

CHAFING-DISH: dish to hold burning charcoal, portable grate. (Sir Kenelm Digby, 1669)

CHAFING DISH OF COLES, COALS: A portable brazier or small furnace consisting of a receptacle for the burning coals or charcoal set in or on an iron, copper or brass stand. The receptacle for the coals was called a dish. Over this, food in another dish or pan was reheated, sauces finished off, and minor cooking operations carried out. An important piece of equipment—and one handed down among family heirlooms—since at least the 1 4th century, the ‘chafing dish of cores’ ultimately became the elegant silver-plated chafing dish set over a spirit lamp and used for the table cookery of Edwardian days. (John Nott, 1726)

CHAFFING-DISH, CHAFIN DISH. The chafing dish of coals referred to at 80 and 102 was a portable brazier to hold burning coals or charcoal and designed to be set on a metal stand. Dishes could thus be finished or reheated away from the fierce heat of the hearth. See Hess (1981, 22-4); and also David (in Nott, 198 reprint), who points out that ‘the “chafing dish of coals” ultimately became the elegant silverplated chafing dish set over a spirit lamp and used for the table cookery of Edwardian dishes’. By then the ‘dish’ was the dish of food to be cooked or heated, not the dish containing the fire.(Glasse, 1747)

CHALDERON, chathern: chawdron, entrails. (John Evelyn, Cook, C17)

CHALDRON, 183, 219, 220. This term can mean either a cooking pot (cf the word cauldron) or (usually in a culinary context) the entrails of an animal. ‘Calves chaldron’ clearly uses the term in the latter sense. (Robert May, 1660/1685)

CHAMBERLYE is urine. It softened the water. Ellis suggested in his book on brewing that it was used as an additive in London pale or amber malt drinks. More generally, it was the waste water from the house reycled to economize on soap. (William Ellis, 1750)

CHARDONE (cardoon): an edible thistle (Cynara cardunculus) cultivated for the fleshy stalks of its inner leaves. It is closely allied to the artichoke. (Richard Bradley, 1736)

CHARDOONS, a vegetable, usually spelled cardoons nowadays. The plant, Cynara cardunculus, is like a thistle. The stalks and the thick leaf ribs are the parts eaten. Hannah Glasse’s two recipes for chardoons, 97, come from The Whole Duty of a Woman (1737), which copied them from Carter (1732). It is interesting that both these earlier books thought it necessary to explain that ‘Chardoons are a wild Thistle that grows in every Ditch or Hedge’; whereas Hannah Glasse omits the information, no doubt because it was superfluous for her audience, less lofty than Carter’s.’(Glasse, 1747)

CHARRS are fish of the salmon family. They belong to the same genus as the brook trout, and may be sea or freshwater fish. Various landlocked freshwater populations are known, including the famous ‘omble chevalier’ of Lake Geneva, and colonies in Scottish, Irish and Welsh lochs. One such has for long existed in Lake Windermere in England and potted char (the modern spelling) from the Lake District was a traditional delicacy, sent down to London in shallow, decorated pots until the late 19th century. Hannah Glasse’s recipe, 117, is not ascribed to the Lake District, and the recipe is common enough in the literature, but it may reflect her familiarity with the north of England.(Glasse, 1747)

CHAULDRON or chawdron is the general term for the entrails of a beast, most often a calf. (William Ellis, 1750)

CHEESE. Bradley’s seven cheese recipes are of exceptional interest. They were indeed original and unpublished receipts he collected from the best dairies in England. Anyone wishing to pursue the history of 18th-century English cheese-making should also consult Bradley’s main work on animal husbandry, The Gentleman and Farmer’s Guide, For the Increase and Improvement of Cattle (1729) which contains recipes for Angelot-cheese, Cheshire-cheese, Cheddar, Cream-cheese, Morning-milk-cheese, Two-meal-cheese, and Fleet-milk or Flet-milk- cheese. It is worth noting that Nathan Bailey lifted all of Bradley’s cheese recipes virtually verbatim for his Dictionarium Domesticum, being a new and compleat household dictionary. For the use both of city and country…, published by C. Hitch, London, in 1736. See also the entry under STILTON. (Richard Bradley, 1736)

CHEESE MOTE: cheese vat. (Richard Bradley, 1736)

CHERRIES. The recipes call for Kentish, Flemish, Cornelian, Morello, and Black cherries. Some of Bradley’s most interesting comments about cherries are to be found in his General Treatise of Husbandry and Gardening. At that time (c.1721) about ten sorts were available in the nurseries about London. Furthermore, red and white cornelian cherries were ‘often gathered green, and put in Salt and Water, to imitate pickled Olives’. (See volume II, 1726, pp. 14, 121.) (Richard Bradley, 1736)

CHERRIES, KENTISH OR MAYDUKE: the May Duke cherry was first mentioned, as the Duke, by John Rea in 1665. This variety, and its cousins, was an English hybrid of the sweet Prunus avium and the acid Prunus cerasus. In France they were called ‘Anglais’. (William Ellis, 1750)

CHERRIES. Hannah Glasse’s list of varieties of cherries, 164-5, is not very extensive. She gives Duke cherries; Red Hearts; Flemish and Carnation cherries; the Morella (‘Carnation Morella’ should probably read ‘Carnation, Morella’), Great Bearer, Morocco, Erigat and Begarreaux. The season apparently extended from April (when ‘some’ cherries were available) until July, i.e. all about a month earlier than in modem times, a discrepancy which applies to her fruits generally. Three of her varieties are still current. Duke cherries are hybrids between sour and sweet, which supposedly originated in the Medoc but received the name May Duke, later shortened to Duke, in England. Begarreaux, now Bigarreaux, constitute a main category of sweet cherries. It is noteworthy that Switzer (1724) equated ‘Biggarois’ with ‘Heart Cherries’ and included among them the ‘bleeding Heart’ and Gascoigne (probably one and the same, and possibly to be identified with Hannah Glasse’s Red Hearts, although Switzer names Red Hearts too). Switzer, incidentally, also mentions the Carnation Cherry as ‘a most delicate Fruit either for the Table or Conservatory’. The Morella (Morello) cherry, the third survivor, is well known.(Glasse, 1747)

CHERRIES, KERROON, also known as Caroon, were widely grown in Hertfordshire and Norfolk (Roach, Cultivated Fruits of Britain, 1985). (William Ellis, 1750)

CHESFAT: cheese vat, the mould in which the curds are pressed to make cheese. (John Evelyn, Cook, C17)

CHEVIN, 324: chub. (Robert May, 1660/1685)

CHEWETS, 224, 232, 339, and (with an illustration) 378. A chewet was a kind of small round pie, containing meat or fish. See also 3, where we learn that it was taller than a marrow pie. (Robert May, 1660/1685)

CHIBBOLDS, green, 126. The name comes from the French ciboule, referring to Allium fistulosum, the welsh onion (nothing to do with Wales, the adjective means foreign). The leaves as well as the bulb of this species are eaten. (Robert May, 1660/1685)

CHIBBOLS: Shallots. (John Nott, 1726)

CHICKEN: at 214 we have ‘turkey-chicken’, which may be a large chicken or alternatively a confusion, since the recipe heading is ‘Turkey, Chicken …’, and pea-chicken (presumably small ones). (Robert May, 1660/1685)

CHICKEN-PEEPERS. A pleasant expression for young chickens.(Glasse, 1747)

CHIMBOL, 53, a way of spelling chibbols, meaning shallots (cf French ciboule).(Glasse, 1747)

CHINA, 454, and CHINA-ROOT, 455: the root of Smilax china, an Asian plant which is closely related to plants of North and Central America which are the source of sarsaprilla. (Robert May, 1660/1685)

CHINA BROTH: Quinine water. (John Nott, 1726)

CHINE: ‘the whole or part of the backbone of an animal, with the adjoining flesh’ (SOED). (John Evelyn, Cook, C17)

CHINE OF MUTTON: The backbone of the animal with its attached meat. (John Nott, 1726)

CHINE OF SALMON, STURGEON: The main middle cut. (John Nott, 1726)

CHIPPINS, 457: presumably chippings, in the sense of fragments of bread chipped off a loaf. (Robert May, 1660/1685)

CHIRINGRATE, the title of a chicken dish, 39. The word seems to be connected with the French ‘chingaras’ or Italian ‘zingaras’, meaning gipsy style. The Whole Duty of a Woman (1737) has a short recipe for Chickens Chiringrate, no doubt taken from an earlier source.(Glasse, 1747)

CHITTERLANS, CHITTERLINGS. The smaller intestines of a pig, unless another animal is specified (as at 30, where there is a reference to calf’s chitterlings).(Glasse, 1747)

CHOCOLATE-MILL. The reference, 145, is not to a grinding mill, but to a whisking mill, known also as a molinette, which was used to whisk chocolate drinks. These were often ‘bound’ with egg and constant stirring was necessary to prevent curdling or separation and to produce a good froth. See Maggie Black (1983) on this and on 17th and 18th century chocolate generally.(Glasse, 1747)

CHUB: Freshwater fish of the carp tribe. Also called chevin. (John Nott, 1726)

CHURDONES, another way of spelling chardoons.(Glasse, 1747)

CHURN-MILK, 117, another name for buttermilk.(Glasse, 1747)

CICATRIZE, to: Ellis writes of ‘a wound that requires digesting, deterging, incarning or cicatrizing’. To cicatrize means to heal by forming a scar. (William Ellis, 1750)

CITRON: green-citron, Citrus medica. It has very thick peel and so was mostly used candied. (Sir Kenelm Digby, 1669)

CITRON, GREEN: Two or three varieties of the citron were cultivated in southern Europe. The thick rinds were candied much as they are today and were also used as an aromatic flavouring for cordials and creams. Oil of citron peel was also used to perfume liqueurs. (John Nott, 1726)

CITRON, CITTRON. The thick rinds of the citron, which was grown in southern Europe, were candied, as they still are, and oil of citron was an article of commerce.(Glasse, 1747)

CITTERNS, 409: presumably citrons. Rabisha (1682) uses the same spelling. (Robert May, 1660/1685)

CITTRON, citron: Citrus medica, see Davidson, Fruit, for a discussion of its virtues. It was usually employed, for instance in Receipt 140, for its peel. It is sometimes distinguished as ‘green citron’. (John Evelyn, Cook, C17)

CIV: sieve. (John Evelyn, Cook, C17)

CIVET, 274: a strongly scented substance produced by the African civet cat. Imported into England in powdered form, it was used, like musk, to give an exotic touch to food. (The ‘civet’ mentioned in the recipes for Pike, e g at 320, is a mix-spelling or misprint of ‘rivet’, the liver of the fish.) (Robert May, 1660/1685)

CIVET, a French term which means a way of preparing chicken or hare by first frying brown and then cooking in a broth. It entered the English language (in the sense here relevant – it was already present with other meanings) at the beginning of the l4th century (OED).(Glasse, 1747)

CLARRETT, clarret, claret, wine: claret. Although the usage that invariably linked claret to the wines of Bordeaux was current from about the year 1600 (OED), the earlier meaning, which distinguished wines of a claret colour (orange or light red, i.e. the French clairet) from white or fully red wines, was still found. See, for instance, the use in Receipt 129 where the maker of cherry wine is to add ‘white or clarrett wine into each bottle’. Hess has a useful discussion of this point. (John Evelyn, Cook, C17)

CLARY, 6, 172. Clary, Salvia sclarea, was used as a remedy for eye complaints (claws being the Latin word for clear), but also had culinary uses. It is slightly bitter and was used to add flavour to wine. Clary fritters, i e clary leaves fried in batter, were featured regularly in 17th century cookery books. (Robert May, 1660/1685)

CLARY, clarie: clary, Salvia sclarea. Clary leaf fritters are specified in Receipt 311. Clary was otherwise used medicinally. (John Evelyn, Cook, C17)

CLARY: Salvia Sclarea. The herb in flower was used to make a sweet wine with a muscatel flavour. Oil of clary is a perfume fixative. (John Nott, 1726)

CLARY LEAVES: the crinkled leaves of Salvia sciarea, or other plants such as celandine and species of fennel. (Richard Bradley, 1736)

CLARY; CLARYE FRITTERS, 82; CLARYE LEAVES. Clary, the herb Salvia sclarea. Apothecaries interpreted the name as a form of ‘clear-eye’ and applied it to other plants which were thought to be beneficial to the eyes. It was more common in the 18th century to find recipes for clary wine than for clary fritters. Rabisha (1682) gave a longer recipe, To Fry Clary, which would also have produced fritters of a kind, but with an egg batter.(Glasse, 1747)

CLENGED, 2, 25, etc: North England dialect for ‘cleansed’. (Robert May, 1660/1685)

CLIVERS, an old spelling, which still survives in the West of England, for cleavers, the plant Galium aparine, more commonly known as goosegrass. It had and still has medicinal uses.(Glasse, 1747)

CLIVERS or (a later spelling) cleavers, is goosegrass – which cleaves or sticks to the clothing. (William Ellis, 1750)

CLOB-WEED: Grigson records this as a Gloucestershire dialect name for knap-weed; Ellis also suggests it might be knotgrass (Polygonum aviculare). He seems to be describing batchelor’s buttons, i.e. knap-weed. (William Ellis, 1750)

CLODDES: clots, or lumps. (John Evelyn, Cook, C17)

CLOUTS, LINNING, 285: linen cloths, with various culinary uses. (Robert May, 1660/1685)

CLOVE JELLY-FLOWERS, 160. Clove gilliflowers (or guillyflowers), Dianthus caryophyllus, now commonly known as ‘pinks’, belong to the carnation family. They are credited with a flavour and scent ‘distinctly clove-like’. (Robert May, 1660/1685)

CLOVE JULY-FLOWER, julyflower: clove-gillyflower (Dianthus caryophyllus) or clove-scented pinks. (John Evelyn, Cook, C17)

CLOVE-GILLY-FLOWERS: clove-pinks or carnations. (Sir Kenelm Digby, 1669)

CLOVE JULY-FLOWERS, GILLIFLOWERS: Carnations or pinks. (John Nott, 1726)

CLOVE GILLIFLEWERS, a name for pinks or carnations. The spelling gillyflowers is more usual.(Glasse, 1747)

CLOVE-JULYFLOWER (Clove-gillyflower): a clove-scented species of Pink (Dianthas caryophylius). (Richard Bradley, 1736)

CLOVE JULY-FLOWER or clove gillyflower is the clove-scented pink, the original of the carnation. (William Ellis, 1750)

CLOWNS-ALL-HEAL: Stachys palustris, named by Gerard as a healing herb. (Sir Kenelm Digby, 1669)

COALS: in most cases where this word is used, the meaning is charcoal – as might be employed in a chafing dish. There are references to wood fires, for instance in Receipt 151, where ‘it must be very quick’. (John Evelyn, Cook, C17)

COAST of beef, lamb, etc, 122: side (cost, from French c8te) of beef, lamb, etc. (Robert May, 1660/1685)

COCHEREL, 127, CUTCHINELE, 203: cochineal, a brilliant red dye obtained from the dried and pulverised bodies of the insect Coccus cacti, a parasite of cacti in Central America. After the European colonization of America this product was adopted as a better source of red colouring than the ‘sanders’ (sandalwood) used in medieval cookery. (Robert May, 1660/1685)

COCHINEEL (cochineal): a brilliant scarlet dye-stuff made from the dried bodies of the insect Coccus cacti, so named because it is found on several species of cactus. (Richard Bradley, 1736)

COCK TREADINGS, treads: opaque speck on the yolk of a fertilised egg, usually removed by straining. (John Evelyn, Cook, C17)

COCK’S COMB (or coxcomb). The crest of a cock or cockerel, frequently used as a decorative garnish. (Richard Bradley, 1736)

COCKSCOMBS. The crest of a cock or cockerel, often used as a decorative garnish.(Glasse, 1747)

COCK’S THREAD, 294: a dark speck on the yolk of a fertilised egg. (Robert May, 1660/1685)

COD: pod. (Sir Kenelm Digby, 1669)

COD-SOUNDS, the air-bladders which run alongside the spines of cod. Still regarded as a delicacy in some places, e.g. Newfoundland. The fact that they could be thoroughly dried, and would then keep perfectly, made them more important in the era before refrigeration than they are now.(Glasse, 1747)

CODDLE: to boil gently, to simmer. (Sir Kenelm Digby, 1669)

CODDLE, 110, to boil or stew gently. The word survives in ‘coddled eggs’, but its general use (as in Sterne’s pleasant phrase ‘whilst dinner is coddling’) has ceased.(Glasse, 1747)

CODLINS LIKE MANGO: Green unripe apples pickled to resemble pickled mangoes from India. (John Nott, 1726)

COFFINS: moulds or cases of raised hot-water paste, used as containers for any number of dishes, from meat pies to cheesecakes. Where they were made of coarse pastry, it is not inevitable that they would have been eaten. They were more a way of getting food through the baking process that anything else. In Receipt 154 are instructions for blind-baking a coffin for cheesecake. The pastry is pricked all over and filled with bran, rather than our current favourite of beans or ceramic beans. Receipt 244 says that you should butter your coffins before filling them with Naples biscuit mixture. In this instance, the word is used to describe a baking tin, rather than pastry case. (John Evelyn, Cook, C17)

COFFIN: a mould of pastry for a pie. (Sir Kenelm Digby, 1669)

COFFINS: Pastry cases. (John Nott 1726)

COFFIN: a pie crust, shaped like a box or coffin. (Richard Bradley, 1736)

COFFIN is a stout pastry case. (William Ellis, 1750)

COLERAPE: a green vegetable of the Brassica (cabbage) family. It is not clear exactly which species Bradley was referring to, but it may have been Brassica rapus, which today is just called rape. (Richard Bradley, 1736)

COLIANDER: coriander. (John Evelyn, Cook, C17)

COLLAR, 353: a length of meat or fish rolled up on itself and bound tight with ‘tapes’. The flesh of a single pig could be trussed up in this way to make a very large collar, 197; or smaller pieces of the animal could be so treated. Collaring was the first stage in preparing meat or fish for pickling and sousing. (Robert May, 1660/1685)

COLLAR: a collar of beef, or any other meat, or fish, was a boned and rolled joint, bound with tapes, threads or cloths, that was usually pickled or brined before boiling. (John Evelyn, Cook, C17)

COLLAR: to roll up meat, eels, or congers and tie them with string. Randle Holme says: ‘Collar of Beef, is Beef half boiled and rowled up with Spices and sweet Herbs chopped small in it, and then baked in a Pot: Eels or Congers are so collared and souced.’ (Richard Bradley, 1736)

COLLAR, to tie up in a roll and cook thus. Hannah Glasse gives a number of recipes for collaring fish and meat: see the Index. The practice survives, although it has waned in popularity.(Glasse, 1747)

COLLAR is a boned, rolled, bound, and tied joint of meat or fish. Collaring was a universal method of controlling floppy joints, as well as allowing them to be stuffed, spiced, then boiled without dissolution. (William Ellis, 1750)

COLLIFLOWER, a spelling of cauliflower.(Glasse, 1747)

COLLOP, 39, 117: slice (of meat). (Robert May, 1660/1685)

COLLOPS: thin slices of meat. In Receipt 232[bis], the collops are ‘hacked’ which usually means cut into smaller pieces. It almost seems as if the escalopes (note the phonetic, perhaps even philological, connection between the two words) have been cut further to become scaloppini. Compare with Hess’s remarks on this word. Collops are still current usage in Scotland. (John Evelyn, Cook, C17)

COLLOP, COLLUP. This word (of obscure derivation, says the OED, perhaps connected with coal) had from early times the primary meaning of a rasher of salt bacon, to be fried, often with eggs; ‘a peculiarly British fashion of eating bacon, not known elsewhere in Europe’. The comment is from Anne Wilson (1973), who also quotes Piers Plowman on the subject and has drawn our attention to the view of Thomas Cogan (1612) that ‘collops and egges, which is a usuall dish toward Shrovetide, can in no wise be wholesome meate’. Later, the term came to have the more general meaning of a slice of meat. Hannah Glasse’s recipe for Collup and Eggs, 58, and her recipes for Scotch Collop, 13, illustrate this development in the meaning of the word. Scotch collops were a well-known dish from the 17th to the 19th centuries, although the manner of preparing them changed with the passage of time, as a comparison of Hannah Glasse’s recipes with earlier and later ones clearly shows. It is still usual to speak of venison collops; and by extension the word seems to have acquired in some places the general meaning of thick slice (Mary Hanson Moore, 1980, records that her mother, in Yorkshire, served as ‘collops’ thick slices of potato which had been fried in dripping until golden brown). There was some confusion between the nouns collup (or collop) and scollop (or scallop). Indeed there still is. It is compounded by the circumstance that the French word for a slice of meat is escalope; and by the formation of a verb ‘to scallop’ which sometimes is and sometimes isn’t connected with scallop shells. Hannah Glasse’s recipe for making Collups of Oysters, 95, seems to be an early and pure example of the flowering of this confusion. It has nothing at all to do with collops, but requires the oysters to be put into scallop shells.(Glasse, 1747)

COLLOP is a small slice. (William Ellis, 1750)

COLLUPS: slices of meat, such as bacon. Randle Holme defines Scotch or Scots collups as thin, salted slices of mutton or beef, broiled and served with vinegar and butter. (Richard Bradley, 1736)

COLLYFLOWER: cauliflower. (Richard Bradley, 1736)

COLTSFOOT: Tussilago farfara, useful against coughs. (Sir Kenelm Digby, 1669)

COLUMBINE, collombine leaves: from Aquilegia vulgaris, are used in Receipt 184, although normally restricted to medicinal receipts. (John Evelyn, Cook, C17)

COMFITT, comfit: sugar-coated grains, seeds, or small aromatic substances. Hence amber comfits in Receipt 61 were grains of ambergris coated in hard sugar. The most common were caraway comfits. Aniseed balls are their modern descendants. (John Evelyn, Cook, C17)

COMFITS, CONFECTS: Sweets, usually aniseeds, carraways or coriander seeds repeatedly coated in boiling sugar until they were smooth and white, as in sugared almonds. Carraway comfit were often put into and used for decorations of cakes or buns, e. g. the original Bath buns. (John Nott, 1726)

COMFIT: a sweetmeat made from some fruit or root preserved with sugar. (Richard Bradley, 1736)

COOM is the black stuff, comprising grease and dust, which works its way out of axles or bearings. (William Ellis, 1750)

COPPER. A large copper, to boil things in, would be built in to the brickwork of a large house. An establishment with a brewhouse would have a copper brewing vat in it. There would also be a laundry copper built into the kitchen or wash-house in smaller houses. In her recipe for Pork Hams, 13O, Hannah Glasse recommends using ‘a Copper, if you have one’, leaving open the question what sort. In Rules for Brewing, 149-50, she is referring to a brewhouse copper, which must have been a moveable one, since she says to pour the copper of water into the mashtub, not to draw it off.(Glasse, 1747)

COPPERAS is really the same as vitriol. The term embraced blue, green and white copperas, the salts of copper, iron and zinc respectively. Where it was used without qualification is usually referred to a salt of iron, ferrous sulphate, used in dyeing, tanning and making ink. (William Ellis, 1750)

CORBOLION, 301, 303: from the French court-bouillon (literally, ‘short-boil’). ‘Court’ in this instance refers to the shallow depth of the liquid in which the fish was boiled, rather than to any length of time. La Varenne, a French contemporary of Robert May, included, in his Le Cuisinier françois (of which an English translation was published in 1653), several fish recipes ‘au court-bouillon’. A typical court bouillon cited by La Varenne for use with a perch consisted of ‘wine seasoned with all sorts of spices, such as salt, pepper, clove, peel of orange or lemon, “chibbolds”, and onions’. May’s corbolion was broadly similar. (Robert May, 1660/1685)

CORDIAL: a medicine, food, or beverage which invigorates the heart and stimulates the circulation. (Richard Bradley, 1736)

CORDICITRON: An error for candicitron ? (John Nott, 1726)

CORDONS, 9: see CARDONES. (Robert May, 1660/1685)

CORINTHS: currants, also called raisins of Corinth. (John Evelyn, Cook, C17)

CORKING PIN describes the largest size of pin. The epithet derives from the word calkin: either the turned-down edge of a horse-shoe so as to raise its heel from the ground, or the pins around the edge of the heel of a clog. (William Ellis, 1750)

CORN: green corn was used in tansies as a colouring agent. (John Evelyn, Cook, C17)

CORN-SALLET, 160: corn salad or lamb’s lettuce, Valerianella locusta, a small, perennial salad plant. It was particularly valued as a source of fresh greens in winter as it continued unaffected under frost and snow. (Robert May, 1660/1685)

CORN OF SALT. Corn here means grain(s).(Glasse, 1747)

CORNER-PLATE, see SERVICE.(Glasse, 1747)

COURSE: see Service. (John Evelyn, Cook, C17)

COWAGE, 159, is an oddity. The tropical plant Macuna pruriens bears pods which have hooked, stinging hairs. These were thought to have medicinal virtues, and were taken in honey against worms, the idea being that the hooks would ‘catch’ the worms. So, as Geoffrey Grigson (private communication) has explained, cowage was the hairs-in-the-honey, to be bought ready for use. The name cowage comes from the Hindu kawanch, so the hairs may have been imported along with spices via the East India trade.(Glasse, 1747)

COWSLIP (or PEIGLE): Primula veris, a well-known plant with deliciously scented flowers, commonly found in pastures and grassy banks. (Richard Bradley, 1736)

COX (verb), 58. Obscure, possibly similar to ‘to scotch’ i.e. to cut. (Robert May, 1660/1685)

CRAB CHERRIES: An error for crab apples. (John Nott, 1726)

CRACKLING CREAM: Another receipt from Massialot. (John Nott, 1726)

CRACKLING CRUST, see under PASTE, PASTRY.(Glasse, 1747)

CRAM is a ball of compressed food for cramming. Linguistically, the verb preceded the noun. (William Ellis, 1750)

CRAWFISH, ‘the middling sort’, 54. This reference occurs in one of the French sauce recipes, and is clearly a translation of ecrevisses, meaning freshwater crayfish, Astacus spp.(Glasse, 1747)

CRAYFISH. The recipe for A Crawfish Soop, 63, refers in the text to crayfish (200 of them, so it is quite clear that we are dealing with the small freshwater crayfish, of the genus Astacus, see above) and then again to crawfish. Thus Hannah Glasse used the two spellings interchangeably. She does not seem to have had any recipe for the spiny lobster, a larger creature which lives in the sea and is also, confusingly, referred to as both crawfish and (less often) crayfish in the general run of cookery books.(Glasse, 1747)

CREAM, FRIED: As above. (John Nott, 1726)

CREAM TOASTS: A version of pain perdu. See also Poor Knights. (John Nott, 1726)

CREED: [grain] softeneed by boiling. (Sir Kenelm Digby, 1669)

CRIMP. This term, applied to cod and other fish, is not always properly understood. Its basic meaning is to contract or cause to contract. It used to be the practice to cause the flesh of cod to contract by cutting gashes in it before rigor mortis set in, i.e. shortly after or even before death. The word therefore came to mean the act of gashing rather than its consequence; and the idea that the gashing had to be carried out on live fish gained some currency among those who did not comprehend the connection with rigor mortis. Crimping fish was still a common practice in the 19th century, but is now rare.(Glasse, 1747)

CRINKLINGS are now better known as pork scratchings. (William Ellis, 1750)

CROW: the entrails or giblets of an animal. (Richard Bradley, 1736)

CROW, the mesentery of an animal, connected with the intestines. Thus the crow is given as a part of a bacon hog, 160.(Glasse, 1747)

CROW is the mesentery or giblets. (William Ellis, 1750)

CROW-GARLICK: a wild species of garlic (Allium vineale). (William Ellis, 1750)

CROWNPIECE, used as a measure of thickness, 56. Its thickness was approximately 3 mm or 1/9″.(Glasse, 1747)

CRUCIFIX PEASE, 92: unexplained by any dictionary or other reference work so far consulted. (Robert May, 1660/1685) [David Potter suggests that crucifix pease may be pickled nasturtium buds (the English version of capers) which are, of course, part of the genus named Cruciferae.]

CRUST, STANDING, BOTTOM AND TOP, 73 – 4, see under PASTE, PASTRY.(Glasse, 1747)

CUBILO: See P 135. Cubilo was a manner of writing, or perhaps pronouncing, cupola used by—among others—Celia Fiennes. (see p. 13). In the pike receipt the way of arranging the head and tail of the fish with toasts underneath was evidently supposed to resemble a cupola. (John Nott, 1726)

CUCURBITE: a gourd-shaped vessel; also a shallow vessel with a wide mouth, used for distillation. (Sir Kenelm Digby, 1669)

CUE: the use of this word in Receipt 57 is not certain. In his instructions for mustard-making in Acetaria, Evelyn advises the cook to sieve (searce) through tiffany (fine silk). It is possible that the word is used here in the manuscript to denote a vessel, perhaps an abbreviation of cucurbit, which was a gourd-shaped glass used in distillation, the lower part of an alembic. The OED records Evelyn’s recommendation in Kalendarium Hortense (1664) of the ‘new-invented cucurbit-glass’ as a trap to catch insects in the garden. (John Evelyn, Cook, C17)

CULLEDAR, CULLENDER, CULLINDER. Colander is the preferred modern spelling for this useful piece of kitchen equipment. In the 18th century it would have been made either of earthenware (cheaper) or metal. Brass ones existed, such as that illustrated in the preceding column. Verral (1759) includes a ‘pewter cullender’ in his list of kitchen equipment. Massialot (1702) has a copper or tin one listed as equipment for the confectioner.(Glasse, 1747)

CULLIS: The favourite sauces of the 18th century. John Nott gives a good selection. The word came from the French coulis. A definition is in C 235, and there are brown, white, capon and general cullises, and various others under the heading of the main ingredients. (John Nott, 1726)

CULLIS, an anglicization of the French word coulis, meaning a preparation for thickening soups and stews. The directions given for making various cullises in the sauce chapter all come originally from French sources Jennifer Stead, 1983, Part 11, 17-19). The reference to a Veal and Ham Cullis (47) is not backed up by any recipe so entitled, but the two Cullises on 53 are veal and ham ones, as is that described on the first page of To the Reader.(Glasse, 1747)

CUMFERY, an old spelling of comfrey, the herb.(Glasse, 1747)

CURIOUS: meticulous. (Sir Kenelm Digby, 1669)

CURRAN WATER: Redcurrant water for ices. (John Nott, 1726)

CURRANS, corrance: currants. (John Evelyn, Cook, C17)

CURRANS, an old spelling of currants.(Glasse, 1747)

CUTCHENELE, 203: see Cochineal. (Robert May, 1660/1685)

CYDER-PRESS, 149. Any household with several servants would have made their own beer and most would have had easy access to a cider press.(Glasse, 1747)

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