Image: Hannah Glasse · Public domain
The Servants Directory
- Year
- 1760
- Era
- 18th century
- Origin
- England · Europe
- Language
- English
- Category
- Household/Etiquette
The Servants Directory, issued in 1760, extends Hannah Glasse's domestic publishing beyond cookery into the broader management of the genteel English household. Organised as a manual for servants and the mistresses who directed them, it sets out duties, cleaning methods, and orderly routines for each post below stairs. As a companion to her celebrated cookery works, it documents mid-Georgian service hierarchies and the practical economy of the household.
Cooking from this book
Roast Beef of Old England
Signature dishAlthough The Servants Directory is a manual of household management rather than a conventional cookbook, it is forever linked in the public imagination with the great roast beef joint that Hannah Glasse championed throughout her writing career. The dish stands as a national emblem of the eighteenth century English table, and Glasse's guidance to cooks, spit-turners and kitchen maids helped enshrine it as the centrepiece of the well run Georgian household.
An editorial note on a dish associated with this book, written for The Coquinist. It is not a reproduction of the book's recipe.
