By Rebecca Pou, Project Archivist
To celebrate National Poetry Month, we are sharing a poem from our collection each week during April. With the support of the Pine Tree Foundation of New York, we are currently cataloging our manuscript recipe collection, which is the source of our first poem. The rhyming recipe was in both English and American cookbooks through the end of the nineteenth century, but this particular version is most likely from the last quarter of the eighteenth century.
To try out a modern take on this recipe, see “Mother Eve’s Pudding Redux.”
To Make Mother Eves Pudding
To make a good Pudding pray mind what your taught
Take two penny worth of Eggs when twelve for a groat
Six ounces of bread Let Moll eat the Crust
The Crumb must be grated as small as the Dust
Take of the same Fruit that Eve once Cozen
Well pared and Chop’d at Least half Dozen
Six ounces of Currans from the Grit you must sort
Least they break out your teeth and spoil all the Sport
Six ounces of Sugar wont make it to sweet
Some Salt and a nutmeg will make Compleat
Three Hours it must boil without any Flutter
Nor is it Quite Finished without melted Butter
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What is the original source of this recipe/verse? Any additional information other that ‘it’s late 18th century.
Hi, unfortunately we do not have an exact date. The recipe comes from this manuscript: http://bit.ly/1HlmrI2 It is one of the last recipes and clearly copied from another source, most likely a printed cookbook.
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