I wasn’t planning on posting another entry this week but I got the same question several times, so I threw this together because I want to nip something in the bud, really quickly. When I mentioned beef tea in the previous post on fever, I was not talking about the bone broth invented by a certain covid denying author and spread around the internet by the WP whackadoos.
Restoratives were a class of remedies written about by various physicians. You will also see them writing about analeptics or restorative jellies which here in the US we would call gelatin. This is the history behind jello as a popular hospital food. That deserves it’s own post though.
Restorative broths were used to nourish convalescents or people who were chronically ill. You will see them recommended for people with a consumption or “of a melting away” as William Salmon called it in Synopsis Medicinae. German physician, David Sennert wrote in his treatise on fevers that “greatest hope of cure consisteth in Diet” and recommended restorative broths made of meat with good juice,.[i] which you now know meets a feverish person’s increased need for protein.
So I am going to share the following receipts, to show you what I am talking about. These are pretty typical and you will note most of the receipts discard the bones before cooking. That is not to say that no one ever made broth from bones, however. The poor were often dependent on the leftover food that was distributed from the kitchens of the wealthy. I am sure they made broth with whatever they could get their hands on. It would be a poor substitute in terms of nutrient quality though.
These are all fairly meat heavy, so I am going to attach my vegetarian alternative to this post and redirect you to my post on mushroom beverages.
The Receipts
This is an interesting receipt from a historian’s viewpoint because it explains how to dress the capon in more detail than a lot of receipts do. Note the use of wine to clean the insides of the chicken. It also appears as though butchering and dressing the fowl was a job for whoever oversaw keeping the barn door stocked and not the household help.
A Restorative
Take a well flesht Capon from the barn-door, and pluck out his Intrals, then wash it within with a little white-wine, then flea of all the skin, and take out his bones, and take the flesh, onely cut it in little peeces, and put it into a little stone bottle, and put to it an ounce of white Sugar Candie, six Dates slit, with the stones and piths taken out, one large Mace, then stop the bottle up fast, and set it in a Chafer of water, and let it boil three houres, then take it out, and pour the juice from the meat, and put to it one spoonful of red Rose water, and take the better part for your breakfast four hours before dinner, and the other part at three a clock in the afternoon, being bloud-warm.
Elizabeth Kent 1653
Ingredients
Meat obtained from boning and skinning a capon or small chicken
31.1 g (1-ounce) white sugar
6 dates-pitted (raisins or figs would work here too)
One large mace avril
1 tbsp rosewater
Directions
- Mince the meat and put it in a mason jar along with sugar, sliced dates, and the mace avril. Put a lid on the jar.
- Let it cook in a water bath water bath bain-marie style for three hours.
- Strain the juice from the meat and add the rose water,
Another Restorative
Take a young leg of Mutton, cut off the skin, and the fat, take the flesh being cut into small peeces, and put it into a stone bottle, then put to it two ounces of raisins of the Sun stoned, large Mace, an ounce and half of Sugar Candie, and stop the bottle very close, and let it boil in a Chafer three hours, and so put the juice from the meat, and keep it in a clean glasse, it will serve for three breakfasts, or if he will, he may take some at three a clock in the afternoon being made warm.
Elizabeth Kent 1653
Ingredients
1 leg of lamb
32.2 g (2 ounces) of sun-dried raisins
A large mace avril
46.6 g (1 ½ ounce) white sugar
Directions
- Remove the skin from the leg of lamb and debone it.
- Chop the meat into very small pieces.
- Mince the meat together with the raisins, mace, and sugar and put them in a wide-mouth mason jar with a lid.
- Place the jar in a crockpot and cook for at least three hours. Strain the broth into a jar with an airtight lid.
This receipt is quite fancy and fit for a queen with the addition of red wine, rosewater and pot herbs.
A Restorative Broth
Take a young Cock or Capon, flea it, and cut it in four quarters, take out the bones and chop the flesh somewhat small, put it into an earthen pot of three quarts with a close cover, and pour on it a quart of good red wine, and a pint of red Rose-water, and put to one handful of Currans, ten Dates stoned and cut small, of Rosemary flowers or leaves, and Borage, of each half a handful, then close on the cover of the pot very fast, and set the said pot in a big brass pot of water, and let it boil five or six hours, taking heed that the water in the brass pot get not into the other pot: when it is well boiled, let it cool leasurely in the brass pot, and then bruise all with a ladle, and strain out the liquor, whereof take morning and evening four or five spoonful’s blood warm.
Queen Henrietta Marie 1659
Ingredients
1 small chicken skinned, deboned
1-liter red wine
500 mL red rosewater
50 g (½ cup) currants
10 dates pitted and chopped
30 g (½ cup) fresh rosemary
30 g (½ cup) fresh borage
Directions
- Chop the meat into small pieces.
- Place all the ingredients including the juice from the cutting board in a crock pot with a cover and cook it for five hours.
- Strain the liquid into a jar, pressing the liquid from the chicken into the jar.
- Serve in the morning and evening, warming four or five tablespoons until it’s about 100 degrees.
Other restorative broths were very close to a pottage receipt like May’s that I shared some time ago. I am going to modernize it using the herbs recommended in the receipt but would say you could substitute here pretty freely. This is the receipt I have kind of adapted to make my vegetarian nutritive broth, which I will attach to this post.
A restorative Broth for weak and consuming bodies
Take of the best Chinaroot thin-sliced half an ounce, infuse it 24 hours in a Pottle of Spring water, in a Vessel close stopp’d and set it in hot water; Then put theirein a small Chicken or a little piece of Neck of Veal, boyl it gently, and put into it a Succory-root scraped and pithed, leaves of Agrimony, Buglos, Ceterach and Endive, of each a one handful; Hartshorn two drams, with a crust of white Bread, boyl it to the consumption of half the liquor; then strain it, and being sweetened to your taste with fine Sugar or Sugarcandy, drink off warm early in the Morning, and about four in the Afternoon about a third of a pint; continue for the space of the three weeks taking it every day.
George Hartman 1683
Ingredients
½ ounce sliced fresh ginger root
1 small chicken quartered or neck of veal
1 succory root peeled and pithed
1/2 cup agrimony leaves
1/2 cup bugloss leaves
1/2 cup ceterach (Asplenium fern) leaves
1/2 cup endive leaves
1 package of gelatin
1/2 cup bread crumbs (oats or barley would work here too)
Sugar to taste
Directions
- Put the sliced ginger root in a gallon jar that has a lid.
- Pour one-half gallon of hot water over it and then put the lid on the jar and let it infuse for 24 hours bain-marie style.
- Put this liquid in a soup pot and add the meat, roots and herbs, gelatin, and bread/barley/oats if you are going to use them.
- Simmer this until the liquid is reduced by half and then take the pan off the heat and allow it to cool enough that you don’t burn yourself straining it.
- Strain the liquid into a pint jar and I suppose you could sweeten it if you like. I usually use one of my savory seasoning blends.
- This needs to be served warm or it is going to be very thick. You could spread it cold on toast but the child in me who was given such things to eat wants me to tell you not to.
As time went on these restoratives began to call for beef. If anyone has seen the movie Effie Gray this is what Emma Thompson’s character is referring to when she says Effie needs beef tea because she is ill. My guess is that this was a trend amongst the wealthy when beef became a status symbol and other folks still used whatever meat they could get their hands on.
John Letty wrote that in Dublin in 1772 the sea crab was “much esteemed as a restorative in Consumptions.” He wrote to bruise four or five crabs that have had the heads/guts removed and then simmer them in chicken broth until the broth takes on a red color. Then strain the broth off for drinking and mix the flesh with butter, mace, and salt.
These receipts remind me very much of my great grandmother’s beef tea and so I am going to close this post by sharing that and a little about the way my mother, who was far too busy with work to do this every time one of the four children got sick, would put it up in bulk.
It calls for brisket but any other fatty cut with ample connective tissue would work here. I use corned beef sometimes. You could even try a pork butt for economy.
Beef Tea
Adapted from Sadie Mae Hayworth’s Recipe
Ingredients
½ pound beef brisket
1/3 cup marrow from marrow bones
1-quart water
Directions
- Mince the beef. Put it in a wide-mouth quart jar with one pint of water to soak for two hours.
- Scrape the marrow into the jar. Fill the jar the rest of the way with boiling water.
- Put a lid on the jar and cook it a crockpot bain marie style for eight hours.
- Strain this and then add salt and pepper to your taste.
When I was growing up my mother made this in large batches with her pressure canner, with both chicken and beef on butchering days. She would repeat the first two steps of the process for 7-quart jars and instead of cooking it bain-marie style, she would process accordingly Note: If you are going to give this a try, it is not safe to can bones. I don’t care what you have read.
When one of us was sick, she would pop it open and strain the broth off to warm for us to drink and then make something with the meat. Meat cooked when making these restoratives makes excellent potted meats which is also something you can feed someone recovering from an illness.
[i] Sennert, Daniel. Nine Books of Physick and Chirurgery. Written by … Dr. Sennertus. The First Five Being His Institutions of the Whole Body of Physick: The Other Four of Fevers and Agues, Etc. (Made English by N. D. B. P.). J. M. for Lodowick Lloyd, 1658.
Domestic Medicine 
You must be logged in to post a comment.