[Sca-cooks] Anna Wecker and sauteed potatoes

[Terry Decker]

I decided to waste a little time chasing the elusive "Rosti" recipe of Anna 
Wecker as presented by Esther B. Aresty in The Delectible Past.  So I went 
to Aresty to examine the evidence.

Aresty states, "...and in 1598 one Swiss cook--Anna Weckerin--completed the 
first cookbook ever written by a woman.  A recipe in it bore a close 
resemblence to Rosti..."

This says to me that Aresty is prone to overstatement and error.  Anna 
Wecker did not complete the first cookbook written by a woman, although she 
is probably the first to have a cookbook published and distributed by a 
commercial printer.  The original publication was in 1597.  And "a close 
resemblence" is an unscholarly excuse to segue to a modern recipe.  Of 
interest to me, was the fact that Wecker does not appear in the list of 
Aresty's collection as presented in The Delectible Past, therefore, we have 
no idea which edition was being quoted.

According to Henry Notaker, the original Wecker, Ein kostlich new Kochbuch, 
was first published by Forster in Amberg, Germany in 1597.  Forster also 
released editions in 1598, 1600, and 1607.  A 1609 edition was released by 
Ludwig Konig of Basel.  An expanded and revised 1620 edition by Konig was 
renamed, New kostlich and nutzliches Kochbuch.  In Notaker's opinion, the 
expanded recipes were taken from Johann Deckhardt's New Kunstreich und 
Nutzliches Kochbuch published in Leipzig in 1611.  Konig's editions of 1652, 
1667, and 1679 appear to be copies of the 1620 edition.

If Notaker's publication history of Wecker is accurate, and I have no reason 
to believe it is not, it is possible that the recipe for potatoes referenced 
by Aresty is actually an early 17th Century artifact from Deckhardt rather 
than Wecker.

Bear