Tea caddies

18th century tea caddy — Tea caddy, c1780s, copper with enamel surface decoration, pink peonies in famille rose colours, made in China for Western buyers. Photo by VeronikaB

Tea first arrived in Europe in 1610, when Dutch traders brought some back from Asia to the Netherlands. It reached England in the 1640s and soon became a fashionable drink in London, but it was not something you made at home. If you wanted to drink it in private you had to order a cup from one of the smart coffee-houses where all the new beverages – coffee, chocolate, and tea – were served.

To begin with tea was kept in porcelain jars that had travelled with it from China. Storage for tea became more and more varied once people were able to buy the leaves to brew at home. They had to be wealthy. Tea was so expensive that it was protected from pilfering. One pound (450g) could cost more than a skilled workman’s weekly wage. By 1700 well-to-do households had lockable wooden tea chests holding canisters full of the precious leaves. The lady of the house kept the key, and servants had no access.

A few tea canisters – not yet called caddies – travelled across the Atlantic with early Dutch and British migrants to North America. Matching pairs of canisters were popular for keeping a choice of teas to hand – usually green tea and black tea. Later tea chests sometimes had a third canister and/or a mixing bowl for creating your own blend.

wooden caddy with 2 canisters and bowl — Varnished caddy box with two wooden caddies and glass mixing bowl inside, 19th century. Photo by Leeds Museums

Silver, fruitwood, and other caddies

English silversmiths soon started to make very fine caddies along with beautiful teapots, trays, caddy spoons, and other silver teaware reflecting the owners’ wealth and status. Antique silver and silver-gilt tea caddies attract high bids at auction today, with prices in tens of thousands of dollars for the best of them.

The earliest silver caddies in America were made in the first part of the 18th century – not long before a historic interruption to the growth of tea-drinking in that part of the world. Tea taxes imposed by the British government led to the Boston Tea Party, and, not surprisingly, all this discouraged American craftsmen from making caddies and other tea paraphernalia.

Today’s tea caddies belong in the kitchen, but earlier ones were for public display. A tea table was brought to the drawing room and set beside the lady of the house. A fine tea service with caddy was laid out for her, and she would take charge of preparing the luxurious beverage. In the 19th century she might have a special three-legged teapoy table or pedestal chest with her caddies stored under a flip-up lid.

pear shaped tea caddy — Lockable pear tea caddy, Georgian. The grain shows it was turned from one piece of wood, except for the stem. Photo by HomeThingsPast

Caddy designs proliferated, and most had a well-crafted lock and key. Some were chinoiserie influenced by Asian decorative arts. Furniture designers like Chippendale contributed chests and caddies in Georgian cabinet-maker style. As well as ceramic and silver caddies there were containers made from tortoiseshell, copper, painted papier-maché, glass, and exotic woods lined with foil. Ornamentation might include ivory, mother-of-pearl, enamel, or Regency penwork. Caddies covered in rolled paper filigree work were popular from about 1770 to 1815, some of them professionally finished and some bought ready for ladies to decorate at home.

One enduringly popular type of wooden caddy is carved in the shape of a fruit – often an apple or pear – and these are very sought-after today, fetching high prices, especially the earlier ones. They may be made of the fruitwood appropriate for their shape – like a pear caddy made of pearwood. They were inspired by Chinese containers in the shape of an egg plant or aubergine: a good luck fruit.

The tea caddy got its current name around 1800, from a Chinese and Malay measure of weight (cati) that was slightly more than a pound.

Photos

Photographers credited in captions. Links to originals here:
enamelled floral caddy, wooden caddy box. More picture info here

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Hanging salt boxes

Hanging salt box, wood, Victorian — Sloping lid of this elm wood salt box is hinged with a leather strip. English, Victorian, about 7 inches across. Photo by Leeds Museums.

Hanging salt boxes used to be taken for granted in kitchens throughout northern Europe and colonial America. There they were, on the wall next to where you cooked.

The pictures on this page are all European, but salt boxes were an essential part of life for settlers in North America too. They pounded salt lumps with a mortar and pestle to make it ready for culinary use. Salt was important for preserving food as well as cooking it.

In colonial homes, free-flowing grains [of salt] began with placing the salt box near the fire for drying out lumps or removing a brick to make a salt niche.
Mary Ellen Snodgrass, Encyclopedia of Kitchen History

Polish salt box, hanging, wooden — Wooden salt box hanging near cooking hearth in 18th century mansion in Gdansk, Poland. Photo by Piotrus.

In damp, cool weather salt absorbs moisture from the air. Cooks in colder places used to help it stay dry by keeping it:

near the fire or stove – most important
in an airy place – hanging on the wall kept it away from damp
covered – though not all salt boxes had a lid

The practical Pennsylvania Dutch housewife suspended a patterned and decorated covered salt box on the wall to contain enough crystals for preserving meat or as a granular extinguisher for dousing a kitchen fire.
Snodgrass, Encyclopedia, as above

Wooden salt boxes could be covered with decorative carving, sometimes as an engagement gift, painted, veneered, or left plain. Antique boxes that look simple may be very well crafted. Look at the quality of wood and joints, the hinging of the lid, the hanger, and the overall finish.

A salt box and a welcoming home

Enamelled salt box Germany — German 1920s kitchen has an enamelled metal salt box and a matching flour container near the stove. Photo by Ziko-C

The salt box was full of meaning, over and above its practical importance. It was a symbol of hospitality in Germany, and suggested a well-run and comfortable home in Britain and Ireland too. Like salt itself the box might not be noticeable, and yet it was essential for cooking.

…her kitchen was…large, comfortable, and warm. …to the right hung a well-scoured salt-box…Over the door…were nailed, “for luck”, two horse-shoes that had been found by accident. In a little ” hole” in the wall, beneath the salt-box, lay a great bottle of holy water to keep the place purified…
Lianhan Shee, an Irish story collected by William Carleton, 1833

But if the salt box was unavailable the house was miserable and unwelcoming.

It was a very dark miserable place, very low, and very damp…The grate…was…screwed up tight, so as to hold no more than a little thin sandwich of fire. Everything was locked up; the coal-cellar, the candle-box, the salt-box, the meat-safe, were all padlocked…The pinched and meagre aspect of the place would have killed a chameleon.
Charles Dickens, Master Humphrey’s Clock, 1840-41

Salt box variations

Hanging wooden salt box, Scottish — This simple wooden salt box by the fireplace in a Scottish longhouse has no lid. Photo by Donald Strachan.

Not all hanging boxes were wooden. You may see relatively modern ones in enamelware or earthenware with a wooden hanger and lid. Also see this highly decorative pewter salt box from before 1600.

Silver miniature or toy salt boxes: familiar domestic objects made in precious metal for fun.

Ceramic salt holders to sit in a niche or on a shelf were an alternative to boxes for some people. They often had a round opening in the side like this characteristically Scottish “saut bucket”.

Photos

Photographers credited in captions. Links to originals here: Victorian salt box, Polish salt box, German salt box, Scottish salt box. More picture info here

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Caddy spoons

Sterling silver caddy spoon — Solid silver caddy spoon with typical wide, round bowl and short handle. Elaborate decoration is not unusual. Made by Birmingham silversmith in reign of George IV, c1829. Photo by Clark Mills

If you have a nice tea caddy, you may also want a caddy spoon. In the early years of tea drinking in Europe and America, either the lid of the caddy was used for measuring out tea leaves, or a long-handled strainer spoon, but in the 1760s people started to use special silver spoons instead, with short handles so they would fit easily inside the caddy, on top of the tea leaves.

Silversmiths created a wide variety of spoons, and yet certain shapes were particularly popular: shells, especially, and a variety of leaf shapes. Shell-shaped spoons may have echoed the shells packed in tea consignments for merchants to sample the leaves. Fluted shells were a good way of strengthening thin silver spoon bowls along the lines of the fluting. Shovels and ladles are styles of spoon that may sound purely functional, but they too can be very decorative, with handles made of ivoory or mother-of-pearl, and highly collectible.

Spoons from the Georgian era, made by 1830, are very desirable now. A good silver spoon may well fetch several hundred dollars at auction, and a four figure price is not impossible. Silversmiths in Birmingham, England produced a high proportion of these early caddy spoons.

If you come across a pierced caddy spoon, it was probably intended to serve as a “mote spoon”. It could help pick out any mote or stray tea-leaf floating in the tea-cup, as well as being used in the ordinary way for measuring tea into the pot.

Caddy spoon in brass with Lincoln Imp handle - a design associated with Lincoln Cathedral. Photo by Terry Whalebone

Once tea was no longer a luxury, tea-drinking became widespread, more affordable caddies appeared, and caddy spoons became available cheaper versions. By the early 20th century, die-stamped alloy caddy spoons were a popular souvenir gift for people with modest incomes, and were on sale in every seaside town in Britain. They could be decorated with local motifs or scenes, enamelled crests, embossed placenames etc.

At the other end of the scale, one of the most valuable caddy spoons sold at auction in the last few years was designed by the 20th century craftsman Omar Ramsden. His 1931 art nouveau silver caddy spoon with semi-precious stones in a knotwork handle fetched over £2000.

Photos

Photographers credited in captions. Links to originals here:
silver caddy spoon, imp caddy spoon. More picture info here

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Toby jugs – comic or commonplace, English or not?

toby, jug full of ale — A Toby with a foaming jug, plenty of painted decoration on jacket, hat and red-nosed face. Photograph by scrappy annie

Toby jugs portray a character whose story is rather unclear. He reminds some people of Shakespeare’s jovial, disreputable Toby Belch, and he very likely has something to do with an old song about Toby Fillpot.

Dear Tom, this brown jug that now foams with mild ale,
(In which I will drink to sweet Nan of the vale),
Was once Toby Fillpot, a thirsty old soul,
As e’er drank a bottle, or fathomed a bowl….
(1761, by Francis Fawkes, a clergyman)

This ceramic character was born in the English Staffordshire potteries region in the 18th century, fully clothed in breeches, coat, and a tricorn hat, seated, and clutching his own jug of ale. Sometimes Toby holds a pipe, takes snuff, or has a barrel between his feet.

Although Tobies are real glazed jugs with a handle behind and a spout in front, usually formed by the front point of the three-cornered hat, they have probably never held much liquid, and were originally intended to be decorative pieces of pottery.

Toby inspired many other character jugs, and they have been made more or less continuously over the last 250 years. Some are fictional personalities, and some are based on real people. They generally have humorous, earthy faces. Character is drawn in their wrinkles, and there may be an element of caricature. Themed sets are also possible.

Were any early Toby jugs made outside England?

toby jug from Brittany — This jug is very Toby-like, well-supplied with drink and a clay pipe resting between his legs, but he was made in Brittany, not England, probably before 1800, and he has a bicorne, 2-pointed hat. Is he drinking wine? Photo by Pymouss

Everyone knows Toby is an Englishman, and that’s why I was surprised to find that a French museum (Musée de Bretagne) has a Tobyish jug made in Rennes, probably 18th century. (See photo) His jug says Boy-Tout or Drink-All. In France of the 1700s this was a slangy, joky word to do with finishing your drink in one swig:* rather like the Toby Fillpot character, that “thirsty old soul”. As far as I can discover, Toby’s French cousin is called Jacquot, but please comment if you know more.

Victorian and Edwardian attitudes to Toby jugs

In 1904 the writer Gertrude Jekyll thought of a Toby jug as an ornament to sit above the fireplace on a cottage or farmhouse mantelpiece along with other “coloured glazed pottery and low-class porcelain”.

She was not the only person of that period who was unimpressed by earthenware Tobies, whether recently-designed Victorian ones or earlier jugs from the Georgian period. Edward Downman, who wrote English Pottery and Porcelain in 1896, doesn’t sound too enthusiastic, even when he admits that the older antique jugs were made by expert craftsmen.

…the most eminent potters of a bygone age may be associated with this grotesque and commonplace ware…

Now Toby jugs are admired by many and collected by enthusiasts. Genuine antiques may cost several hundred pounds in their home country. Collectors can specialise in particular types – pearlware or Wemyss ware, sailor or farmer Tobies, for example – and they expect the best jugs to be sold by upmarket auction houses and antique dealers.

toby jug handle — This Toby jug's handle is reflected in the mirror behind him. Photo by HomeThingsPast.

Photos

Photographers credited in captions. Links to originals here: First jug picture, Breton Toby jug
More picture info here

Notes

*Various old French dictionaries on Google Books explain boy-tout aka boi-tout: like this one.

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Historic kitchens – visiting with eyes wide open

16th century kitchen fireplace - Tudor England — Open fireplace 10ft across in the 16th century kitchen at Cotehele House, Cornwall, England. See how many things you recognise before reading lower down the page. Photo by Lee Morgan.

Whenever I travel I look out for historic houses, especially if they have kitchens worth visiting, and enjoy picking out bits and pieces for a closer look.

And yet the room often isn’t the way it would have looked at any time in its life. The picture above is of a 16th century English manor house kitchen, amazingly unchanged in its basic structure. The Tudor open hearth with old iron pots and logs in a smoke-blackened fireplace is wonderful, but when did that protective fireguard appear? The things on the shelves come from various different periods in the life of the house. When and where did each pot, plate, or tool start its useful life? Does knowing matter? For myself, I enjoy seeing a kaleidoscope of things that have belonged to the house over the generations – but it’s still good to know what’s what.*

What can you identify in the picture?

Ironware

In the fireplace the classic iron kettle hanging on a chimney crane is centuries-old way of heating water. The crane may have arrived in the kitchen in the 17th or 18th century to replace a simpler kind of hanger. There’s also an “idleback” kettle tilter to help with pouring, probably not there originally. The urn to the left has a brass tap that may be relatively modern. The assorted spoons, ladles, and skimmers look timeless; you’d have to examine them hands-on to try guessing their dates. A trivet sits under the red cloth. Out of sight above the mantel-shelf are racks for roasting spits, and a cradle-spit for roasting small birds or joints of meat is hanging down into the upper left of the picture. Many big kitchens acquired fancier mechanised roasting equipment and cooking ranges or stoves well before 1900, but I understand this room was in use, unmodernised, until 1946. (There’s an old oven in one of the walls you can’t see.)

Kitchen utensils 1900s — Selected utensils have been numbered to help with the discussion. Some are probably 19th century like the mug, and others could be much earlier, e.g. the pewter plates.

Smaller iron things on the shelves and nearby include two pairs of sugar cutters (3), a rushlight holder (7), lemon squeezer (1), and vegetable cutter (2) – suitable for hacking up root vegetables and big cabbages.

Woodware

A wooden salt box (4) hanging to the left of the fireplace has a traditional sloping lid and carved hanging loop. On the shelf below is a nice turned bowl. The two flat moulds with decorative carving (10) have left me wondering. Are they unusually long, flat butter moulds, or an uncommon kind of gingerbread mould with sides, or something else?

Biscuit pricker

The small wooden stamp with a round handle (8) is a biscuit pricker. With lots of little needles on the base, it was used before baking to perforate the dough for thin crackers, to help them stay flat in the oven. Think of it when you see the holes in British water biscuits or American graham crackers. The metal stamp (9) is probably a cookie cutter or biscuit docker: for cutting out small baked goods and possibly adding a pattern.

Water Biscuits: Into one pound of flour rub three ounces of butter, add a sufficient quantity of water to make it a stiff dough; well knead it, and roll it as thin as wafers; prick with a biscuit-pricker, and bake a very pale brown. (1870s UK recipe)

Other things

On the shelves are pewter plates and a metal cloche or dish-cover (5) that looks factory-made. The earthenware mug (6) is mocha ware, almost certainly for beer. This design with coloured bands and black-brown “trees” first appeared in the very late 18th century and was often seen in 19th century pubs where it might be government-certified as a pint or half-pint measure. Similar earthenware mugs were also used for the servants’ ale in big houses.†

On the floor, next to the big unglazed ceramic storage pot with lid, is a stone mortar without its pestle. It has those familiar triangular bits round the upper edge, but what are they for? The hole in the wall is the kind that might be used as a candle and rushlight store: handily near the fire for lighting.

More

If you like to ID old kitchen items, try the things in a 1920s ranch kitchen or a German kitchen around 1930.

Notes

*Please note these are general remarks about all sorts of places, and are not in any way a criticism.

†See Pamela Sambrook’s Country House Brewing in England.

You may be interested in this list of links to sites that help you research kitchen antiques and historic culinary utensils.

Also see this piece about where a butter worker belongs. Was it always in the kitchen?

Photos

Photographers credited in captions. This is the original kitchen photo, or see more picture info here.

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Cornishware: what did people like about it?

Cornish ware jar jugs — Classic blue and white Cornishware jugs and storage jar. Photo by Mary-Kay G.

Why did Cornishware appeal to people in its early days? Now we think of it as a British “design classic”, collected above all for its distinctive broad blue and white stripes, the core pattern of the original TG Green Cornish Kitchen Ware range. Some collectors also like less common variations: black stripes, or a storage jar lettered with the name of a retro cooking ingredient.

The blue and white banding has always been the most popular design. Did it really suggest white-crested waves under a blue sky to its early customers, as the company now believes? Cornish seascapes inspired the brand name, but people often associated it more with cottage and farm kitchens than with the wide open sea.

Cornish blue storage jars in ad — 1941 UK ad for banded Cornish Blue and White kitchen jars. Different sizes, different prices.

The term Cornish was a marketing strategy used to evoke farmhouse and country associations, while the use of blue reinforced the fresh feel of the dairy.
Catherine McDermott, Design Museum Book of Twentieth Century Design, 1999

In 1932 the Manchester Guardian wrote about “Cornish farmhouse-ware, with its bold blue lines and white background”. A few years later one of its writers said you might get some at a “cottage sale” or “the village store”.

Cornishware was available in Canada in its early years, and there too it seemed like homey kind of stuff. When a new batch arrived in British Columbia after the second world war, an ad in the Vancouver Sun called it “lovely wholesome famous blue and white ware”.

In 1957 a New York store offered “peasant-type Cornishware earthenware, cherished for its rugged good looks.” It still had a pleasantly down-to-earth image for a New Yorker writer twenty years later:

… nice English Cornishware whose wide blue and off-white horizontal stripes have such an air of cheerful comfortableness …

Cornish blue plates covered dish — Cornishware covered butter dish and plates. Photo by Robin Kearney.

Was it always intended to have a folksy appeal, for people wanting to make their kitchen or breakfast table look cosy and rural? Maybe not. The colour was originally called electric blue, or “e blue”, which sounds more contemporary than rustic. And Catherine McDermott, professor of design, links the style to Modernism as well as to farmhouses and dairies:

Cornishware’s distinctive blue and white bands owe something to the Continental development of well- designed, mass-produced Modernist tableware at this time.

Cornishware storage jars — Sago and tapioca look good in Cornishware lidded jars, but does anyone cook sago or tapioca pudding today? Photo by Katy Frankel.

So how do you react? Does Cornishware make you think of ocean waves, wholesome farm kitchens, or modernist electric blue?

Note

I haven’t tried to distinguish between genuine TG Green Cornishware and imitations here, with the main focus on discussing the way people feel about the Cornish Blue style.

One 1930 ad offered a Cornish Ware tangerine-and-white version which I haven’t come across elsewhere. Orange was available at some point, but was it made by TG Green in 1930?

Cornish Ware
…It’s available now in green-and-white or tangerine-and-white, as well as in the blue-and-white that everybody likes. The whole range is reduced for this event – plates, basins, store-jars, everything, as an example, you can have a sturdy two-pint milk jug for 2/9
Ad for Lewis’s Household Bargains Event, Feb 1930, Manchester Guardian

Photos

Photographers credited in captions. Links to originals and/or licenses: Jugs and jar, plates and butter dish, storage jars, or see more picture info here.

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The White Frost Refrigerator: unique 100-year-old icebox

white frost refrigerator icebox — A White Frost Refrigerator from 1906. It had 2 revolving shelves and an internal water cooler.

Most iceboxes looked like plain wooden cabinets in the early 1900s. Without electric refrigeration, they were fitted inside with a space for ice, which had to be topped up regularly to keep food cool and fresh.

Keeping the butter hard, the milk and cream sweet, and the meat from spoiling, is a part of the housewife’s trouble in the summer time.
White Frost ad from Carter’s Hardware, Sonora CA, 1913

The White Frost Refrigerator was the only cylinder-shaped icebox. A block of ice sat in a compartment under the lid and chilled air was vented into the food storage space below. The makers said their distinctive model was:

More hygienic – easy-clean curved enamelled steel, food always in perfect condition
More scientific – better design, better insulated, economical with ice, revolving shelves
Desirable yet affordable – stylish, special, above-average price payable in installments

Advertising

white frost refrigerator crystal water cooler — The "Crystal" water cooler looked good on the side of White Frost Refrigerators in the 1920s. It left room inside for 3 shelves.

Excerpts from their ads show what White Frost Refrigerator Co. and their dealers thought buyers wanted. (To read about the manufacturer, designer, patent etc. please scroll down the page.)

…rolled steel, galvanized and beautifully enameled…nothing to swell, warp or shrink…no corners to dig out, no shelter for germs…absolutely wholesome…circulation of air so scientifically directed…there can be no moisture from the ice in the food chamber
Weis & Fisher ad, Rochester NY, 1905

…only sanitary refrigerator on the market, not a splinter of wood, no waste of ice, clean and odorless
Cahn’s ad, Youngstown OH, 1908

…sparkling, cleanly white…harmonizes so well with the modern white kitchens
Trice-O’Neal Furniture Store ad, Florida, 1925

white frost refrigerator 1914 — In 1914 this ad targeted the man of the house. An icebox with US government approval, and a loving wife into the bargain. (Red lines added.)

Of course the advertisers wanted to appeal to women, but they also needed to persuade men. An ad in Popular Mechanics showed “Bob” and his wife in icebox-inspired closeness.

Features

47in high
27in diameter
Holding up to 110lb. ice
Double walls insulated with asbestos or aerofelt, and maltha (asphalt) with “dead air space”, later models with granulated cork
3 coats of white enamel inside
Exterior white with nickel or brass trim, or golden oak finish
Easy to move, on wheels
White Frost Sanitary Refrigerator an alternative name
“Crystal” water cooler attachment allowing for an extra shelf – from 1919

Manufacturers and inventor

The first White Frosts were made in Jackson, Michigan even before a full patent was granted in 1906. The president of the company making them was Hugh L. Smith, a hardware entrepreneur and director of at least 2 other businesses. He also bought the Boeck Stove Company.

Charles H. Boeck patented various stove designs and other inventions too. His 1906 refrigerator patent describes him as assignor to the Jackson Metal Stamping Co. In the next few years he patented some improvements to the icebox. His 1919 patent for the water cooler attachment used a different company name: White Frost Refrigerator Co. White Frosts were sold through dealers in many different states, and were also available by mail order from Mechanic Street in Jackson. The price in its first few years was about $30, with a $20 end-of-summer bargain in Paterson NJ. By 1924 a store in Painesville OH was selling one at $74, reduced from over $90.

white frost refrigerator patent drawings — Boeck submitted 5 pages of drawings for the original 1906 patent.

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Marrow scoops, spoons & table manners

marrow spoons or scoops from 1700s and 1800s — Silver marrow scoops from 1720s to 1850s (left to right). Photo by miladus

A silver marrow scoop is an elegant solution to a problem most of us don’t have today. How can you get the tasty marrow out of meat bones without abandoning your table manners?

Upper class diners adopted new rules of etiquette during the 1600s. Forks appeared on posh tables to help people eat with a less hands-on approach to cooked food. But forks didn’t help take the savoury jelly out of the marrowbones. You can get an idea of how this was done once upon a time by reading a mid-17th century etiquette book. The author thought it best for people to stop handling and “mouthing” bones altogether, but he would allow you to use one hand for meat bones as long as there was no gnawing, sucking, slurping etc. And definitely no banging, cracking, or biting. Get the marrow out neatly and decently – with a knife.

Suck no bones…Take them not with two hands…Gnaw them not…Knock no bones upon thy bread, or trencher, to get out the marrow of them, but get out the marrow with a knife…To speake better…it is not fit to handle bones, and much lesse to mouth them.
Make not use of a knife to breake bones…also breake them not with thy teeth, or other thing, but let them alone.
(Youths [sic] behaviour, trans. from French by Francis Hawkins, 1646)

marrowbone served with toast or bread — Cooked marrowbone served with bread. Photo by Sifu Renka

Before the end of the century marrow spoons had arrived, starting in the 1680s. These new implements for eating marrow had a rounded spoon at one end with a narrow scoop at the other. In 1710 one was described as “a marrow spoon with a scoop at the other end”.* Soon the spoon evolved into an elongated scoop, usually with a narrower version at the other end. Many more were made during the 18th century: an era when an impressive variety of new culinary paraphernalia was developed for the prosperous classes – from gravy warmers to caddy spoons.

I wish I could find a written description of someone taking marrow jelly out of a bone in the early days of the new scoops. Did no-one write about it at all? Later there are recipes for dainty dishes of prepared marrowbone that could be eaten quite easily; by this time the bones were being cut and served in a special way. Diners could still enjoy the traditional delicacy, but without handling the bones at all, not even excavating with a knife as a polite alternative to sucking. Probably the late 19th century marrow scoop in the last picture on this page was intended for this kind of dish. It doesn’t look suitable for fiddly excavation of bones cut from a big joint of meat, or from a whole animal roast on a spit.

Marrowbones from Mrs. Beeton's recipe

Ingredients.—Bones, a small piece of common paste [pastry], a floured cloth. Mode.— Have the bones neatly sawed into convenient sizes, and cover the ends with a small piece of common crust, made with flour and water. Over this tie a floured cloth, and place them upright in a saucepan of boiling water, taking care there is sufficient to cover the bones. Boil the bones for 2 hours, remove the cloth and paste, and serve them upright on a napkin with dry toast. Many persons clear the marrow from the bones after they are cooked, spread it over a slice of toast, and add a seasoning of pepper; when served in this manner, it must be very expeditiously sent to table, as it so soon gets cold. … Marrow-bones may be baked after preparing them as in the preceding recipe; they should be laid in a deep dish, and baked for 2 hours.
(Isabella Beeton’s recipe from 1861)

marrow scoop by spoon maker George Smith — Marrow scoop by George Smith - London 1780-1781. Photo by HomeThingsPast

The marrow scoop by George Smith III (picture left) comes from an important company of English spoon makers and silversmiths started by Thomas Chawner. They were active in London from the mid-18th to early 19th centuries.

marrow scoop late 19th C — Late Victorian marrow scoop - silver plate, mother of pearl handle. Photo by Leeds Museums and Galleries

Photos

Photographers credited in captions. Links to originals here: 5 marrow spoons – n.b. dates and details on original photo, cooked marrowbone, Gge Smith scoop by HomeThingsPast, Victorian marrow scoop. More picture info here

Notes

* From The Lucubrations of Isaac Bickerstaffe in Joseph Steele’s Tatler: “a marrow spoon with a scoop at the other end”.

Household expenses for a “middling” 18th century family

Mary Johnson's household costs — Weekly expenses for a middling family laid out in Madam Johnson's Present: Or, Every Young Woman's Companion in Useful and Universal Knowledge (1770 edition)

What could you afford if you were of “middling station” in England in the 1760s and 1770s? You would have plenty of beer, ale, meat, and soap, but no wine, according to a detailed budget in Madam (Mary) Johnson’s book on household management. She suggests the mistress of her middle class home will spend £16 a year on her own clothes, and acknowledges this does not allow for “very fine laces”.

Mother and children have pocket money for fruit and toys, and may occasionally go to a “country-lodging” for “health and recreation”. Yet this hypothetical family of two parents and four children have only one live-in maid.* This surely means Mother will have to work hard in the house, on top of the “lying-in” (childbirth) which is budgeted for every other year.

The largest sums go for savings, rent and taxes, clothing for four children, and money set aside to cover bad debts. The bad debts give us a clue that this 18th century “middling” family is a tradesman’s family. Other costs confirm this, like the “expenses of trade with customers”.

Some of the smallest items are the most unfamiliar to us. Who puts sand, fullers earth, whiting, smallcoal, and brickdust on their shopping list today? All these were for cleaning jobs except the smallcoal, or charcoal.

The haberdashery (sewing bits and pieces) expenses were essential then, but more like hobby accessories now. By the way, when she says worsted I think she means worsted wool thread for darning socks etc., not worsted woollen cloth.

Buying two and a half pounds of candles a week seems a lot to most of us. In England day lengths vary hugely between winter and summer so the candle budget would fluctuate accordingly. When she says candles cost 1s 3d “per week the year round” she means on average.

Mary Johnson's household budget 1750 — Annual budget for the same middling family, as suggested by Madam Johnson.

A chaldron of coal was 36 bushels. Five chaldrons might have filled between 60 and 80 sacks, all delivered to the house, of course. A ferkin or firkin of small beer would have been about 8 or 9 gallons. Small beer was fairly weak, for everyday drinking, and considered inferior to ale.

The soap for “family occasions” was not for special occasions or events! Occasions here just means needs.

Money abbreviations:

l … pound
s … shilling (20 in a pound)
d … penny (12 in a shilling)
f … farthing (4 in a penny)

*The mistress of the house had other help as well as the live-in maid: a washerwoman would have needed the soap bought for use “abroad” (away from home), and a wet-nurse would be employed for “nursing a Child abroad”. And it looks as if repair costs covered work that would have been done by live-in servants in much bigger houses.

There’s no perfect way to adjust the prices to today’s values. This website suggests multiplying by somewhere between 75 and 100. That would mean the family’s annual expenditure was equivalent to £30,000+ in today’s world – maybe $50,000. All very rough estimates.

The first edition of Mary Johnson’s book (1753) says she was “for many Years a Superintendent of a Lady of Quality’s Family in the City of York”.

Want to compare prices, incomes etc. over the years?

This page on “changes in the value of money over time” has links to many useful resources.

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Mrs. Beeton’s pastry essentials

Victorian pastry making tools — Victorian pastry-making equipment suggested by Isabella Beeton in 1861.

Mrs. Beeton knew it took time to learn how to make good pastry, which she called paste.

…the art of paste requires much practice, dexterity and skill…
Isabella Beeton, 1861

Her main tips are:

Pastry-making utensils must be kept scrupulously clean and not used for anything else.
Use a light touch with cool hands and work in a cool place.
Water and/or butter must be mixed in gradually.
Tins, dishes etc. must be well buttered.
Rich pastry must be put in the oven promptly, as soon as it’s made.

Cooking temperature

Her other tips are all about oven heat and are not relevant to owners of electronically controlled ovens. Just as well, because she uses terms that mean little to us. A raised pie needs a “soaking heat”. Puff pastry won’t rise in an oven that’s too “slack”.

Equipment

After rolling the pastry, ideally on a cool marble slab, you could use corner cutters for a neat finish on a square pie. There were plenty of shaped ornamental cutters available in the 1860s or the wheel on the end of the paste-pincers was good for cutting pastry shapes freehand. The flutings on the wheel would make a patterned edge like pinking shears do on fabric.

The paste-pincers are for pressing together the edges of the top and bottom of a pie to stick them as firmly as possible. These are new to me and I imagine they could be quite useful. Please do comment if you’ve ever used such a thing.

The picture of the jagger isn’t very clear but it looks like an interesting way of making a decorative edge on pies and tarts: an alternative to pressing edges with the prongs of a fork. The raised pie mould is magnificent but how easy would it be to get the pastry out in good condition? Victorian cooks did work a lot with moulds, including the gorgeous copper jelly and pudding moulds that look so splendid hanging on the walls of historic kitchens, so perhaps they wouldn’t have had any trouble turning out a fine raised pie.

A jagger wasn’t just for pastry. It could also mean a toothed chisel, and other similar tools. We don’t use the word now, though jagged edges are still with us. Jagged suggests something undesirable to me, not really a decorative feature

Mix the eggs with flour…cut them the shape of a long narrow leaf…cut them with a jagger so they will be notched.

from the New York Voice, 1892

She didn’t mention pie funnels.

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