Early 19th century handwritten American recipe book: cakes, medicine, veterinary, polishes, perfume, drinks, fine arts, cordials

Hardcover. 6.25 x 4 inches, vellum-covered boards, good with wear, soil and stains to vellum, contents very good, about 70 pages filled in with recipes in a variety of hands, probably representing two or three generations in a single family. The book itself probably dates from the 1820s; we found only one date in the book (1850) and only two references that might provide a key to where this came from, a mention of the Camden Daily Post (19th century Camden NJ paper) and of a couple named Ray & Gisele, 283 Main St., Buffalo. This came to us from an antique store so tracing its roots is going to be hard. We think the recipes probably date from the 1820s to 1880s. Begins with alphabetically tabbed index pages, which include a few recipes as well, and then to the recipes themselves, which include breakfast cake, Irish stew, various cakes, vanilla cream, cure for rheumatism, making a poultice, curing hams, making "bottle wax" and black sealing wax, a glue that will "hold against fire or water," blacking, "meat pickle," cold cream, cures for coughs, "an excellent receipt to make the hair grow," camphor cake, a mixture to prevent rust, "to hasten the blooming flowers," pomade, portable glue, to size paints for coloring, "to burnish prints that are colored," to brown gun barrels, another recipe for camphor cake, to make crayons to write on glass, for violet perfume, another cough mixture, a cordial (made of rum, citric acid and soda water), cure for sea sickness, something called a Rum Shrub, waterproof cement, imitation rosewood, red stain for wood, artificial French polish, cure for tooth ache, French polish, arsenated soap, gum paste, to prepare syrup for preserving fluids & fruit, preserving lemons, preserving "green fruit almost without sugar," ginger beer powders, lemonade, key to apothecary marks, coral vermillion wax for basket work, white coral, apothecary weight chart (20 grains is 1 scruple, for example), raspberry vinegar, cream for icing, custard, jelly cake, other cakes, "to make cloth or outer clothing of any description waterproof," "to make an oilskin coat or wrapper," artificial anchovies, to pickle capsicums, artificial milk, rice jelly, pickles, cookies, fruit cake, jelly cake, wedding cake, sponge cake, ice cream, icing, German paste, copying paper for manyfold writers, waterproof cement for wood or iron, to stop severe bleeding from a cut, gun cotton, Painuatic crystals [??], pastilles, preston salts, cold cream, to restore the hair, plus some pages devoted to listing letters received and sent and some other miscellaneous notes, clippings, etc. A charm ing book covering the gamut of domestic economy chemistry. Good. Item #H33372

Price: $300.00