Cipe and earliest cookbook, and a departure

This week's reading involves books I've been waiting for, for quite a while, Cipe Pineles'  Leave me Alone with the Recipes, and Amelia Simmons' American Cookery,  the earliest published cookbook known from Colonial times.  

They actually have quite a bit in common, both insisting that ingredient quality is vital, no matter how good the cook, and taking great pride in selecting and preparing great meals as an important part of life.

Cipe's book was found, in an antique book show, her own handwritten and painted recipes not seen outside her own family, despite her stellar career as a groundbreaking woman in the graphic art industry, and it's a treat to leaf through.  There are lengthy preambles from the women who discovered her, and as a team brought the manuscript to the stage of being a published book, and the best part is her own work.

The paintings are full of life and color, and food that looks like food without being tediously literal.  It's not so much about getting recipes from her, since they're largely traditional, so much as learning more about this interesting and wildly talented woman who made time for great attention to people as well as her cooking. You wonder how she managed to fit all she did into her days, and end up just admiring. She made her way in a very male environment, in the graphic arts and magazine industries, without losing her composure, or her adherence to her principles. 

Her last unfinished recipes had the graphics written, without the text, an interesting insight into an artist who fitted the handwritten text in after the graphics, rather than writing out and then illustrating a recipe.

And the other is the cookbook written by the earliest known published cook of the early part of the republic, Amelia Simmons.  I found a reference to it in the Card Catalog book which noted a modern reissue of this priceless work.

She's full of great advice, and it's interesting to see the gigantic quantities she deals in, with perfect aplomb.  Pounds of butter, and flour, and masses of raisins, to make cake, probably for a crowd.  She wasn't a caterer, but was familiar with cooking for large numbers.  And she assumes that you are growing a lot of your own food.  As in: select your plums before they develop a pit, which you establish by pushing in a pin.  So this means your own fruit trees.

Her advice on picking good meat and fish are still up to date, though few people now have access to a real butcher.  She's really fun to read.  The illustrations came later, woodcuts largely.  And she's very modern in her insistence that a woman, particularly a single one without a family to support her, as she was, should develop her skills regardless of whether she might marry, so as to maintain her independence.

Then, as a complete change, comes the Year of Less, which is advertised as a minimal approach to life, sorting and disposing of possessions, and cutting back on bringing items into the house, so as not to be stuck decluttering later. 

It turns out to be an intense journey of a year in her life, full of great emotional struggles and resolve, and it also turns out that living with less is only a very small part of what that year was about.  Not a quick and easy read.  But worth getting the insight into the life of a very talented person whose demons are always in conflict with her achievements. 

Interesting that all three arrived at about the same time, three very different lives, but with similar threads. They all have an intentional approach to life, designing their own way through work and living, and not looking to depend on other people for their sense of value.

And they're all well worth meeting.