Ye olde hot stuff...Britain had taste for curry in 1793

RECIPES from 1793 that were found in a monastery and contain the oldest mention in England of curry have been turned into a cook book.

Monks used the recipe book to make various dishes including “calves head turtle fashion” and “fricassee of pigs feet and ears”.

Ingredients included curry powder, sugar and other spices not widely available in Britain but which passed through Bristol when it was part of the slave trade “triangle” between England, Africa and the Caribbean.

The curry recipe is three spoonfuls of curry powder, a teaspoonful of salt, two large onions, chicken, lemon rind, veal gravy and butter.

Veal

It was served with rice and the author suggested swapping chicken for lobster, veal or rabbit.

The recipe book came from a stately home near Bristol and was donated by the family in the 19th Century to Downside Abbey, Stratton-on-theFosse, Somerset.

But it had remained in the archives until a project began in 2015 to document what was there.

Frances Bircher, heritage officer at the abbey, said: “We have made food from a huge amount of recipes and tasted them. At the time, Bristol would have had ships that would have been part of the ‘triangle’.

“There is a range of ingredients – there are things you can still pick up in supermarkets today and there is a lot of veal which seems less acceptable. There is calf head and pigs’ ears and feet. The chicken curry recipe is chicken breast and curry powder.”

She said some recipes are “a bit more extreme” as the whole animal was used and added: “All the recipes need a bit of attention as there are no standardised cooking temperatures.

“A lot of the houses would have had their own cook books and if a member of the family went to visit another house and enjoyed a meal, they might bring it back in the book.”

The monks were fascinated by the recipe book and got chefs at the nearby Michelin-starred Pony And Trap inn to cook some of the dishes.

Ms Bircher said: “I think a lot of the chefs enjoyed how simple the recipes were to make.”

The £15 book, titled Downside Abbey Presents: Bristol Georgian Cookbook, is available from the abbey website at www.downside.co.uk The chicken curry recipe from 1793, found at monastery

THE monks’ recipe: “Take an ounce of butter and make it hot in your stew pan, put to it about two spoonfuls of rice pounded fine, a teaspoonful of salt and three of curry powder. With a little veal gravy, boil it up and cut them fricassee fashion and...