Perhaps no-one else thinks so but I find that Domácí kuchařka (1826) and Science in the Kitchen and the Art of Eating Well (1891) have at least one thing in common: they are surprisingly modern. Pellegrino Artusi is a legend and his cookbook still used by Italian food-lovers all over the world. Magdalena Dobromila Rettigová is thought a little old-fashioned but most Czech families today have a copy of her work. 19th
century recipes are generally easy to follow and the dishes similar to ours but English & American best-sellers were often
repeating themselves or each other. By contrast, Rettigová
was inspired by several European cuisines because she lived at the
junction of many different cultures. Pellegrino Artusi's cosmpolitan
attitude was much more intentional: though most of the friends who gave
him recipes were Italian, he often developed
recipes that he labelled as 'foreign'.
Pellegrino Artusi wrote Science in the Kitchen and the Art of Eating Well not only because he loved food but also to establish an Italian cuisine. This idea was probably born during the Risorgimento but national identities in Europe had emerged long before the 1860s when the Italian state was founded. Rettigová's work, composed in her mother tongue instead of the official language (German), was inspired by the national awakening of the Czech lands in the first two decades of the nineteenth century. Around the year she published Domácí kuchařka, the historian, politician and writer František Palacký published the Journal of the Bohemian Museum in both Czech and German. Cultural revolutions either preceded or followed and often co-existed with political revolutions in most of Europe after 1848. Rettigová had been active within the national movement through her spouse -keeping a literary salon and corresponding with Czech patriots such as Palacký.
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| Front page of Domácí kuchařka (1826) |
In Czech:
"Koláč se třešněmi. K tomuto koláči přichystej si půl druhého žejdlíka mouky, žejdlík syrové smetany, šest žloutků, čtyry loty přepouštěného másla, čtyry loty tlučeného cukru a ze šesti bílků sníh. Nejprve utři máslo na misce, a mezi třením přidávej k němu žloutky, pak přimíchej střídavě vždy trochu smetany a zase trochu mouky, až je všechno smícháno; potom vymaž máslem dlouhý plech, který je opatřen nízkým okolkem, posyp ho strouhanou žemličkou, vlej na něj těsto všude stejně na prst tlustě, toto poklad třešněmi jednou vedle druhé, a nech koláč pěkně upéct, pak ho posyp hojně cukrem."
In English:
"Cake with cherries. For this cake you will need 1/2 žejdlík of flour, 1 žejdlík of sweet cream, 6 egg yolks, 4 loty of clarified butter, 4 loty of powedered sugar, 6 egg whites beaten into stiff peaks, [cherries]. Combine the butter with the yolks, gradually adding the cream and the flour, until thoroughly mixed. [Fold in the meringue with a spoon]. Butter a shallow rectangular dish, cover with breadcrumbs, and pour in the batter. Spread evenly into a thin layer, arrange the cherries in rows, and bake until golden. Finally, dust with powdered sugar."
Note that žejdlík weighed 358g, lot was a spoonful, a thin layer was finger-high. The goal was for the cherries to not sink in the batter, resulting in a dot pattern that was visible after baking. Finger-high layers of cake batter were also recommended by Pellegrino Artusi, mainly because 19th century ovens did not have a bottom heat element.
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