Image: Fernando Dessaur · Public domain
The Hygeian Home Cook-Book
- Year
- 1874
- Era
- 19th century
- Origin
- USA · Americas
- Language
- English
- Category
- Vegetarian/Reform
The Hygeian Home Cook-Book sets out cookery for adherents of the Hygienic System, the health-reform regimen advanced by Russell Thacher Trall through his New York medical institute and lecture circuit. Recipes exclude flesh, stimulants, and elaborate seasonings, favouring grains, fruits, and vegetables prepared with minimal salt or fat. The work stands as a key practical handbook of nineteenth-century American vegetarian and water-cure reform, linking domestic cookery to a broader programme of physiological doctrine.
Cooking from this book
Unfired Graham Bread
Signature dishA dense loaf of coarse wholemeal flour, water and little else, this bread became the emblem of Trall's Hygeian kitchen. Stripped of salt, yeast, sugar and shortening, it embodied the principles of the Hygienic system that Trall championed: plain fare, minimal cookery, and trust in the unaltered grain. Served at his water-cure establishments, it stood as a daily reminder that nourishment, in this reformist vision, lay in simplicity rather than in seasoning or skill.
An editorial note on a dish associated with this book, written for The Coquinist. It is not a reproduction of the book's recipe.
