Although Mrs Beeton died in 1865, the book continued to be a best-seller. The first editions after her death contained an obituary notice, but later editions did not, allowing readers to imagine that every word was written by an experienced Mrs Beeton personally. The personal significance of a "Mrs Beeton" found expression in one of Arthur Conan Doyle's novels of 1899, where a character declares: "Mrs Beeton must have been the finest housekeeper in the world, therefore Mr. Beeton must have been the happiest and most comfortable man".
Many of the recipes were copied from the most successful cookery books of the day, including Eliza Acton's Modern Cookery for Private Families (first published in 1845), Elizabeth Raffald's The Experienced English Housekeeper (originally published in 1769), Marie-Antoine Carême's Le Pâtissier royal parisien (1815), Hannah Glasse's The Art of Cookery Made Plain and Easy (1747), Maria Eliza Rundell's A New System of Domestic Cookery (1806), and the works of Charles Elmé Francatelli (1805-1876). This practice of Mrs Beeton's has in modern times repeatedly been described as plagiarism.
By : Mrs. Isabella Beeton (1836 - 1865)
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Contents
The following description refers to the 1907 edition; the book was greatly extended in the decades since Mrs. Beeton's death (in 1865) to 74 chapters and over 2000 pages; the first edition had 44 chapters.
The book begins with general chapters on the duties of the "mistress", the housekeeper, and the cook. There follow chapters on the kitchen itself, "marketing" (choosing good-quality produce at the market), and an introduction to cookery (Chapter 6). Together, these take up over 100 pages. Chapters 7 to 38 (roughly 1000 pages) cover English cooking, with recipes for soups, gravies, fish, meat (principally veal, beef, mutton and lamb, and pork), poultry, game, preserves, vegetables, pastries, puddings, sweets, jams, pickles, and savouries. Chapter 39 describes the "art of carving at table", supported by 11 illustrations. Chapters 40 to 50 (some 200 pages) give instructions for dairy products, vegetarian and invalid (sick person) cookery, making bread, biscuits and cakes, and beverages. Chapters 51 to 59 describe cooking in various international styles including French, German, Spanish, Jewish, Australian, South African, Indian, American and Canadian cookery. Chapters 60 to 68 provide guidance on matters from trussing poultry to the definitions of culinary terms, arranging meals, decorating the table, making menus and the duties of domestic servants. Chapters 69 to 73 describe "household recipes" and medical preparations. The final chapter, 74, offers "legal memoranda".
There is a detailed index. The edition includes advertisements for products such as "Lemco" beef extract and "Cadbury's Cocoa".
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