On display in The Cromwell Museum in Huntingdon is a small, unassuming looking volume; a leather bound book, the title of which proclaims it to be  “The Court and Kitchen of Elizabeth, Commonly called Joan Cromwell, the Wife of the Late Usurper.” The appearance of the book belies its significance as one of the strangest cookery books ever published.; it claims to contain 102 of the personal recipes collected by Oliver Cromwell’s wife Elizabeth, together with an extended introduction composed of essays condemning the Cromwellian Regime.

This new reprint from the original text and recipes contains a new introduction by the Cromwell Museum’s Curator, and a glossary of the terms used in the text. It provides a fascinating window into the food and dining of the 17th century, and tantalisingly one of how Cromwell family might have lived.