OP: The New Art of Cookery

W. Spotswood, Boston, 1798. Hardcover. Good. Second American edition, improved.

Here is a late 18th century work by London tavern cook Richard Briggs, originally printed in England in 1788 with the title The English Art of Cookery and first appearing in the US in 1792 with its altered title, The New Art of Cookery.

The author offers a brief resume in earlier editions, which includes the Globe Tavern, White Hart Tavern, and Temple Coffee House (the only one listed in this second American edition), but it is the robust chapters which really speak to his experience in the craft. At over 400 pages, he covers marketing and trussing, soups and sauces, dishes by technique (boiling, roasting, baking, broiling, frying), stews and hashes, desserts, preservation, and so much more. 

There are dishes for the sick and instructions for “seafaring men,” beginning with a ketchup that will keep twenty years (ingredients include strong, stale beer, pickled anchovies, shallots, mace, cloves, pepper, ginger, mushrooms).

Briggs is a cook’s cook with direct and practical instruction: “nor can the Reader reasonably expect any superfluous Embellishments of Style from one whose Habits of Life have been active, and not studious.”

Ours is a Good and handsome copy.; Soiling, toning, and closed tears throughout, but all text intact and legible. One tear previously repaired with tape. Twelve leaves with monthly bills of fare. Bound in full sheepskin with gilt ruler on the spine and a green title label. Liquid damage to the spine. This copy was acquired from famed music journalist June Barsalona (née Harris) who, in turn, acquired it from her friends and antiquarian book dealers Betsy and Timothy Trace.