Blue plaque tribute to a ‘domestic goddess’
A‘DOMESTIC goddess’ who was the 1700s’ answer to Delia Smith, Karen Brady and Margaret Thatcher all rolled into one has been commemorated with a Blue Plaque.
Elizabeth Raffald, who married into the wellknown Stockport family, will have the plaque at the Arden Arms, a pub built by her nephew George, in the town centre.
Born in 1733, she was an educator, entrepreneur and innovator who wrote a cook book with 800 of her own recipes - and still found time to raise a family, having nine children.
Among her other major achievements was writing the first trade directory for Manchester, running a pub and shops, introducing the first servants employment office - and inventing the recipe for piccalilli.
Despite her success, very few people know about Elizabeth, something author Suze Appleton was keen to change so campaigned to get her the plaque.
She said: “In those days women had no legal rights so for her to achieve anything was miraculous. She did what she could to make things better for people.
“She was a superwoman and the original domestic goddess, but she has been forgotten. In a way she was like Margaret Thatcher, she must have survived on little sleep but got things done, a firm woman but perhaps difficult to live with.
“She was like the Karen Brady and Delia Smith of her time, but she did so much it is hard to pin her down.”
Elizabeth died in 1781 aged 48 and is buried in the Raffald grave at nearby St Mary’s Church.
Only three of her nine children survived and descendants of one still live in Stockport, including David Jackson, from Reddish. He is among those thanked for donating to the £550 needed for the Blue Plaque.
Others include Olga Shipperbottom, the widow of a man who researched Elizabeth, the Heatons WI and Robinson’s Brewery.
Suze, 63, from Heaton Mersey, has reproduced the cook book, the Experienced English Housekeeper.
She said: “No other women were making cook books at that time in Manchester, it was all men. Plus these were all her own recipes.
“Some of them were a bit insane and gruesome, for example cooking turtle, but she tested all of them and some of them are very similar to what we see today.”
The Blue Plaque will be officially unveiled on March 3.