Virginia Woolf once said:

"One cannot think well, love well, sleep well, if one has not dined well."

With this in mind, several staff in the Henry W. and Albert A. Berg Collection of English and American Literature have collaborated to compile some of our favorite authors' recipes for you this holiday season. Drawing on some of the Berg's foremost authors' archives as well as some of the earliest additions to the the collection, this list has something for everyone; whether you're an experienced chef or are still getting your bearings in the kitchen, we hope you enjoy perusing this literary potluck—a holiday gift from us to you!

How To Roast a Chicken

Can’t cook, but starting to plan your holiday meal from scratch?
Look no further than poet Bernadette Mayer’s recipe book.

Renowned American poet Bernadette Mayer has long focused her work on creating minute records of daily life, detailed snapshots of time enlivened through clear, expressive language. In 1971, she exposed a roll of 35mm film and kept a daily journal for the project Memory and in 1978 she wrote Midwinter Day, an epic poem charting a single winter solstice, which gives “a plain introduction to modes of love and reason.” Mayer’s precision is also evident in private documents, like this recipe book she prepared for someone who didn’t know how to cook. So if this is you, and you need a nice main dish, try her recipe for “How to Roast a Chicken,” which includes helpful basics, such as reminders to preheat the oven and to leave the chicken alone once it is in there. You might even cover the dish and bring it to one of the annual readings of Midwinter Day, taking place this year online and in-person. And if the poet herself is coming to dine, remember to cook the liver for her.

—Carolyn Vega, Curator
 

Eggs a la Nabocoque

Looking to embellish a classic dish? Consider adding Vladimir Nabokov's “Eggs a la Nabocoque” to your menu.

Amongst Vladimir Nabokov’s distinct works is not only his novel Lolita (1955), but his extensive and illustrative studies on butterflies. Such meticulousness displayed in his entomological work can also be seen in this manuscript recipe for boiled eggs. In Nabokov’s own stylistic fashion, he disregards simplicity and provides us with a new way to approach the cooking of an egg. "[If] it [the egg] starts to disgorge a cloud of white stuff like a medium at an old-fashioned seance, fish it out and throw it away." In this recipe, Nabokov practically brings the eggs to life. "Have some salt and buttered bread (white) ready," he concludes, reminding us, "Eat." This recipe is best for any season and any day!

—Angelina Coronado, Library Page

Winter Salad

In need of a vegetarian option? Sydney Smith’s recipe-poem for a winter salad may be just the thing!

This recipe should serve five or six people, but if you wish to scale it up to feed a crowd please be sure to observe Sydney Smith’s handwritten instructions: "the ingredients of course must be increased with the size of the Salad, carefully observing the proportions." If you’re hoping to make an easy adjustment for your vegan guests, however, perhaps you should look elsewhere. The recipe calls for the yolks of two boiled eggs and a "magic" teaspoon of anchovy essence, and insists that "as this Salad is the result of great experience and reflection, it is hoped young Salad makers will not attempt to make any improvements upon it," although whether or not this should be taken entirely seriously is another matter, since Smith was a notable humorist (as well as an Anglican priest and long-standing contributor to the influential literary and political magazine The Edinburgh Review).

Either way, you can be sure that you’re putting out a dish which was a hit on both sides of the Atlantic, thanks to its publication in two best-selling recipe books of its day. Not only was this included by Eliza Acton in Modern Cookery for private families (1845), it was later reproduced in Marion Harland’s Common Sense in The Household: A Manual of Practical Housewifery (1871), which sold more than 10 million copies by the end of the 19th century. This particular copy was mailed by Smith to his friend Richard Harris Barham, another humorist-priest and writer who may be better known by his pseudonym Thomas Ingoldsby. We can only speculate as to whether Barham tried out the recipe for himself, but if he did I hope he appreciated it as much as Smith appears to.

—Emma Davidson, Librarian II 
 

Wild Idea Bison Bourguignon

In search of a new main course? Try Annie Proulx’s recipe for "Wild Idea Bison Bourguignon."

Before her Pulitzer prize-winning novel The Shipping News (1993) and her 1997 short story "Brokeback Mountain" made her a household name, Annie Proulx was a journalist who wrote about gardening, cooking, and wildlife. These topics are as significant in her private life as they are to her writings; they can be found throughout her collection of papers, one of the Berg's most recently acquired author archives, which includes both her professional and personal papers. This recipe is a born-digital manuscript from that collection, meaning  Proulx first "penned" the text as a typed document on her computer. In it, she offers instructions for "something extraordinary yet not demanding in time or labor" after a meal she prepared in February 2002 for a BBC film crew, "a raft of local writers," and a game biologist after a recipe from Larousse gastronomique. Depending on your location, finding bison meat may be a bit of a challenge, but it will certainly be worth the effort. Proulx describes the dish, which was served along with walnut and escarole salad, glazed carrots, mashed potato, and brothy beans, as "a grand success" albeit "perhaps too much so as the game biologist had five helpings and had to go lie down." 

—Julie Carlsen, Coordinator
 

Boeuf en Daube

Looking for inspiration without too much instruction? Virginia Woolf's recipe for boeuf en daube may be just what you need. Virginia Woolf is perhaps best known for her modernist novel Mrs. Dalloway (1925), but she was also an avid diarist who wrote drafts for many of her books in notebook form. This manuscript description of boeuf en daube (beef stew) comes from the second volume of Woolf's notebook for her stream-of-consciousness novel To the Lighthouse (1927) in the Berg's Virginia Woolf collection of papers. The stew features in one of the novel's seminal dinner party scenes, and what it lacks in culinary instruction, it makes up for in the type of descriptive detail that hallmarks Woolf's writing: the stew had an "exquisite scent of olives and oil and juice" that was exuded by its "confusion of savoury brown and yellow." Boeuf en daube was a success in bringing the characters in To the Lighthouse closer together, and, should you choose to recreate the dish this holiday season, we hope it will do the same for your guests!

—Julie Carlsen, Coordinator

Banana Orange Pudding

In search of a delicious dessert?  Consider making Jack Kerouac’s recipe for banana orange pudding. While Jack Kerouac's On the Road (1957) reels off a series of scenes revolving around a series of  diner hamburgers, ice cream and pie, tucked away inside one of his personal notebooks is a recipe for "Banana Orange Pudding." Neatly scribed amidst Kerouac's poems and fleeting phrases, he corrects his own instructions numerous times to ensure the recipe is just right: "KEEP STIRRING" seems to be very important for the consistency of the pudding. This 29 cent notebook is just one of several in which Kerouac kept his daily thoughts that now reside within the Berg's collection of his papers.

—Shannon Resser, Library Page

Coffee for Three Persons

Not looking to cook a whole meal? Elizabeth Barrett Browning’s "coffee for three persons" is just for you.

Elizabeth Barrett Browning’s coffee recipe calls for "3 ounces of fine powder" with a pint of boiling water "added by degree." Not for the lactose intolerant, this recipe also calls for "boiling milk from one + a half pint to 1 quart." If you’re in need of a snack to go with your coffee, Barrett Browning’s galette recipe serves six to eight (go ahead, have seconds!).

It’s no surprise that Barrett Browning’s coffee and galette recipe was jotted down in a hasty scrawl—she was occupied by plenty more than baking pastries. The Victorian era English poet was an admirer of the early feminist Mary Wollstonecraft’s The Vindication of the Rights of Women (1792), as well as a supporter of the abolitionist movement and a fierce critic of child labor practices. Her epic poem Aurora Leigh (1856) tells of a woman who rejects traditional domestic roles of the time and becomes a poet.

When she was forty, she married the writer Robert Browning and was inspired to write some of her best known poems. Sonnets from the Portuguese (1850) includes Barrett Browning’s famous sonnet beginning, "How do I love thee? Let me count the ways." The Brownings had a wide circle of friends. Among the famous names who may have shared in this cozy coffee break are William Makepeace Thackeray, Harriet Beecher Stowe, George Sand, and Margaret Fuller.

—Simi Best, Research Associate  
 

These items are held by The Henry W. and Albert A. Berg Collection of English and American Literature, The New York Public Library, Astor, Lenox and Tilden Foundations. Please see our about page and access page for more information about the Berg Collection, it’s history, and our policies for research appointments. For any questions about the items shown here, the Berg Collection, and/or to schedule a research appointment, please write to berg@nypl.org 

"Banana Orange Pudding" by Jack Kerouac. Copyright © 1920 Jack Kerouac, used by permission of the Wylie Agency LLC

Eggs a la Nabocoque recipe by Vladimir Nabokov. Copyright © Vladimir Nabokov, used by permission of The Wylie Agency LLC

To the Lighthouse manuscript by Virginia Woolf. Copyright © Estate of Virginia Woolf, courtesy of Estate of Virginia Woolf / Society of Authors