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Gilded Age Recipes

Gilded Age recipes, 1868 to 1898: Dickens at Delmonico’s, the Waldorf’s breakfast, chafing-dish suppers, the Klondike trail and the army’s beef.

The Gilded Age takes its name from Mark Twain and Charles Dudley Warner’s novel of 1873, and these recipes run from 1868 to the war with Spain in 1898. At Delmonico’s in New York on April 18, 1868, the press gave Charles Dickens a dinner of oysters, asparagus cream à la Dumas and a fish named for Queen Victoria. The guest who wrote about it and the chef who printed the menu years later do not agree on that fish, as What Was Served When Dickens Dined at Delmonico’s in 1868? shows.

In New York the Waldorf’s breakfast card of April 22, 1896, priced fruit, cereal with cream, eggs, chops, hot breads and coffee line by line, and much of it was plain home food. What Did People Eat for Breakfast in the 1890s? reads the card. At home, one hot dish cooked at the table beside a cold salad made ahead was a chafing-dish supper. And in an 1889 novel written for a real New York charity, schoolgirls swore off bought candy to pay for a poor boy’s keep, which is the story of the Total Abstinence Candy Society.

Further west, Vicenta Labadie de Chaves of New Mexico sent her tamales, in Spanish, to the Chicago World’s Fair cookbook of 1893, where half the method landed 118 pages from the rest (What Did the Southwest’s Tamales Look Like in Print?). In 1897 a trail meal of beans and bacon cost 75 cents on the way to the Klondike and $3.50 in Dawson: What Did Klondike Stampeders Eat on the Trail? The period ends with a general’s charge that the army’s beef was embalmed, which the Dodge Commission answered in February 1899: What Was the ‘Embalmed Beef’ Scandal of 1898?

What Was Served When Dickens Dined at Delmonico’s in 1868?

  • A white soup plate with a gilt rim holding smooth, pale green cream of asparagus soup with five green asparagus tips laid on the surface, on a white damask cloth beside a silver soup spoon.
    Crème d’asperges à la Dumas

    Soups & Broths · 1 hr 10 min total

    Cream of Asparagus Soup (1894) 

    Delmonico’s cream of asparagus from Ranhofer’s Epicurean (1894): asparagus fried in butter, sieved with broth and velouté, finished with egg yolks and cream.

  • Four poached salmon steaks of different shapes with pale coral flesh in the middle of a long white platter, ringed by thick round slices of lobster tail with red shells, each with a thin brown wine sauce spooned over it, and a white sauce boat of the same sauce beside the platter, on a pale linen cloth.
    Saumon à la Victoria

    Fish & Seafood · 1 hr 30 min total

    Salmon à la Victoria (1894) 

    Salmon slices cooked in a ham and vegetable stock with red wine, the stock reduced to a buttered sauce, served with lobster: Ranhofer’s Epicurean, 1894.

What Did a Total Abstinence Candy Society Eat Instead?

  • Rows of small pale caramel-colored squares of maple cream candy on white parchment on a marble slab, one square broken in two to show its fine, grainy inside, beside a long steel kitchen knife.
    Maple Cream

    Desserts & Sweets · 1 hr 50 min total

    Maple Cream Candy (1884) 

    Maple cream candy after the one a Chicago candy maker sold over the counter in 1884: maple syrup boiled to a soft ball, cooled and stirred until pale and creamy, then set in a pan and cut into squares.

  • Twelve round chocolate-coated creams in rows on waxed paper in an old tin baking sheet, one cut in half to show a smooth white fondant center, with a dinner fork on a dark wooden table.
    Chocolate Cream Drops

    Desserts & Sweets · 14 hr 10 min total

    Chocolate Cream Drops (1884) 

    Balls of soft white fondant dipped in sweet chocolate melted with a little ground cinnamon, after the chocolate cream drops in an 1884 Chicago candy maker’s trade manual.

  • Two scoops of pale pink strawberry ice cream in a footed pressed-glass dish on a linen cloth, with two fresh strawberries and a silver teaspoon beside it.
    Strawberry Ice Cream

    Desserts & Sweets · 6 hr total

    Strawberry Ice Cream (1896) 

    Fannie Merritt Farmer’s strawberry ice cream, from her Boston Cooking-School Cook Book of 1896: fresh berries sugared, mashed and sieved, folded into a light cream base thickened with a little arrowroot.

  • One tall scoop of very pale green ice cream, smooth and without nuts, softening at the base on a blue-and-white transferware plate, with an empty white teacup behind it on a pale pine table.
    Pistachio Ice Cream

    Desserts & Sweets · 6 hr total

    Pistachio Ice Cream (1896) 

    Pistachio ice cream with no pistachios in it: a pale green custard ice cream flavored with vanilla and almond, after Fannie Merritt Farmer’s Boston Cooking-School Cook Book of 1896.

What Did the Southwest’s Tamales Look Like in Print?

  • Two sweet tamales tied in pale corn husks and a third unwrapped and cut in half on its husk, showing ivory corn dough with dark raisins and a streak of cinnamon, on a cream plate beside a heap of raisins on a pale wooden table.
    Tamales de Dulce

    Desserts & Sweets · 2 hr 30 min total

    Tamales de Dulce (1893) 

    Tamales de dulce, sweet corn tamales from New Mexico: masa beaten until it floats, enriched with lard and sugar, filled with ground cinnamon and raisins, tied in husks and steamed, from Vicenta Labadie de Chaves’s recipe of 1893.

  • Three tamales tied in corn husks on a red-brown earthenware plate, a fourth opened on its husk and split to show ivory dough around shredded pork in dark red chile sauce, with a small bowl of the chile pork on a weathered wooden table.
    Tamales de Chile

    Meat & Poultry · 4 hr 25 min total

    Tamales de Chile (1893) 

    Tamales de chile from Vicenta Labadie de Chaves’s New Mexican recipes of 1893: pork cooked in red chile and salt, on the same beaten masa as the sweet tamales they refer back to.

  • A brown-glazed earthenware dish of pale golden, separate-grained rice with pieces of pale chicken and a few whole black peppercorns, a wooden spoon resting in it, on a worn light wooden table.
    Pollo con Arroz

    Meat & Poultry · 1 hr 45 min total

    Pollo con Arroz (1893) 

    Pollo con arroz from Vicenta Labadie de Chaves’s New Mexican recipe of 1893: chicken boiled until tender, folded into rice fried with onion in lard and cooked in the strained broth with whole peppercorns.

  • A cream-glazed earthenware bowl of chopped pale green squash, yellow corn kernels, green chile and small golden cubes of fried salt pork, glossy with a little cream, with a metal spoon.
    Calabacitos con Chile Verde

    Vegetables & Sides · 1 hr total

    Calabacitos con Chile Verde (1903) 

    Calabacitos con chile verde from the Spanish-American chapter of the 1903 Landmarks Club Cook Book: summer squash, corn and fresh green chile fried with salt pork and onion, cooked down dry and finished with a little cream.

What Did a Chafing-Dish Supper Serve?

  • Ten browned mushroom caps, stems removed and hollow side up, on two slices of golden bread glossy with paprika-red oil, on a white plate beside a small silver dish with its lid ajar.
    Mushrooms for “Jim”

    Vegetables & Sides · 20 min total

    Mushrooms on Toast (1896) 

    Mushrooms on toast, the bachelor’s chafing-dish supper from Deshler Welch, 1896: caps browned under a lid in olive oil with paprika, on bread warmed in the same pan.

  • Plump oysters with curled edges, dusted with paprika, in a pale butter broth with bits of celery over slices of toast in a shallow white bowl, with a lemon half beside it.
    Oysters (in any way)

    Fish & Seafood · 20 min total

    Chafing-Dish Oysters (1896) 

    Chafing-dish oysters à la George Trimble Davidson, 1896: oysters warmed in butter and their liquor with celery, paprika, Tabasco, lemon and sherry, poured over hot toast.

  • Small pink shrimps in a thick, pale coral cream sauce heaped on four buttered square crackers on a gold-rimmed white plate, with a cut-glass dish of celery sticks beside it.
    Cosmos Club shrimps

    Fish & Seafood · 17 min total

    Cosmos Club Shrimps (1914) 

    Cosmos Club shrimps, a Midnight Feasts spread of 1914: cooked shrimps heated in a cream sauce tinted pink with tomato and sharpened with cayenne and lemon, on hot buttered crackers.

  • Six golden-browned skinless sardine fillets, each laid along a narrow strip of toast and dusted with cayenne, on a white oval platter with two lemon wedges.
    Grilled sardines

    Fish & Seafood · 15 min total

    Grilled Sardines on Toast (1914) 

    Grilled sardines on toast, a Midnight Feasts chafing-dish spread of 1914: boneless sardines turned once in hot olive oil, seasoned with salt, cayenne and lemon, on narrow strips of toast.

What Did People Eat for Breakfast in the 1890s?

  • A dark square metal pan of golden cornbread cut into squares, seven left in the pan and two on a plate beside it showing a fine, even yellow crumb, with a small bowl of butter and a butter knife on a butcher-block counter.
    Corn Bread

    Breads & Cakes · 30 min total

    Golden Corn Cake (1896) 

    Golden corn cake, Fannie Farmer’s sweetened cornbread of 1896: yellow cornmeal, wheat flour, milk and one egg, baked in a shallow pan in twenty minutes.

  • Two slices of golden-brown toast, softened and lying flat in a shallow white scalloped dish of thin, pale milk sauce with a sheen of melted butter, beside a spoon and a blue-and-white check napkin.
    Dipped or Milk toast

    Breads & Cakes · 40 min total

    Milk Toast (1896) 

    Milk toast as Fannie Farmer made it in 1896: dry toast dipped slice by slice in a milk sauce cooked for twenty minutes, then covered with the rest of the sauce.

What Did Klondike Stampeders Eat on the Trail?

  • A deep brown earthenware baking dish of baked navy beans, browned and fairly dry on top, with thin slices of salt pork showing between the beans and a serving spoon resting in the dish.
    Beans and bacon

    Meat & Poultry · 19 hr 15 min total

    Baked Pork and Beans (1896) 

    Baked pork and beans after the War Department’s Manual for Army Cooks, 1896: navy beans soaked overnight, boiled, layered with parboiled salt pork and baked slowly until nearly dry.

  • Nine plain, pale golden biscuits baked touching each other in a dark square metal pan, a tenth split beside it to show a fine white crumb, with a dish of butter and a butter knife.
    Bread and butter

    Breads & Cakes · 29 min total

    Baking-Powder Biscuits (1896) 

    Plain baking-powder biscuits of flour, salt and a little lard, rolled thick and baked close together, from the War Department’s Manual for Army Cooks, 1896.

  • Soft, whole stewed peach halves in a thin amber syrup in a white enamel bowl with a dark blue rim, with a tin spoon beside the bowl.
    Dried peaches

    Desserts & Sweets · 15 hr 10 min total

    Stewed Dried Peaches (1896) 

    Stewed dried peaches from the War Department’s Manual for Army Cooks, 1896: soaked overnight, simmered under a lid, sweetened at the end and served cold.

What Was the ‘Embalmed Beef’ Scandal of 1898?

  • A dented enamel camp kettle of stew with thick slices of soft potato and onion in a thin pale broth, chunks of pale shredding canned beef through it, beside a tin plate with a serving.
    Stew, with canned meats

    Meat & Poultry · 45 min total

    Stew with Canned Meat (1896) 

    A stew with canned meat from the 1896 Manual for Army Cooks: sliced potatoes and onions stewed soft in a covered pot, then canned beef cut up and simmered in for ten minutes.

  • A thick beef stew of large tender cubes of simmered beef with small pieces of potato, carrot and soft tomato in a thick red-brown gravy, in a wide brown stoneware dish with a pewter spoon.
    To stew fresh beef

    Meat & Poultry · 3 hr 30 min total

    Fresh Beef Stew (1896) 

    A fresh beef stew from the 1896 Manual for Army Cooks: stewing beef simmered two hours with bay, then an hour more with potatoes, tomatoes, onions and carrots, kept thick.

  • A white enamel saucepan of soft stewed tomatoes in a thick red sauce flecked with cracker crumbs, beside a few square crackers on a pale linen cloth.
    Stewed tomatoes

    Vegetables & Sides · 1 hr 5 min total

    Stewed Tomatoes (1896) 

    Stewed tomatoes from the army’s 1896 Manual for Army Cooks: peeled ripe tomatoes stewed gently with butter, salt, pepper and a little onion, then thickened with rolled cracker.

  • A round cake of finely minced beef and potato with a deep brown crisp underside, turned out whole onto a warm white ironstone plate, one wedge cut away to show the soft minced inside.
    Beef hash

    Meat & Poultry · 45 min total

    Dry Beef Hash (1896) 

    Dry beef hash from the 1896 Manual for Army Cooks: cold cooked beef, potato and parboiled onion minced, moistened with stock and fried in dripping until brown underneath.