Mrs. Gardiner's Receipts from 1763

This work brings into the mainstream another welcome addition to the body of historical culinary literature. It is based on a version prepared and privately printed by the Gardiner family in 1938, but Weesner indicates that the collection borrows from other 18th century cookbooks and suggests that the original handwritten volume may have been assembled by a daughter or daughter-in-law of Anne Gardiner. As the wife of a prosperous and outspoken British loyalist, she could set a table in an elegant English style. Her dishes include browned-onion soup, lemon sauce for boiled fowl, marrow pasties and walnut ``catchup.'' Living in a port city, Gardiner gathered seafood recipes, including a fish sauce made with lobster, mussel sauce and scalloped oysters. Unfortunately, Weesner does not specify which recipes come from other sources, but brief notes on the Gardiners, on the book's evolution and publishing history and on pre-Revolutionary American cookery enhance the volume's appeal. (September)