American Cookery

[1][2] It was the first cookbook to include New England specialties such as Indian pudding, johnnycake, and what is now called pumpkin pie.

The cookbook was the first to suggest serving cranberry with turkey, and the first to use the Hudson River Valley Dutch word cookey (now usually spelled "cookie").

[1][2] The cookbook also introduced the use of pearlash, a precursor of baking soda, as a chemical leavener, starting a revolution in the making of American cakes.

[2] The preface reads: The candor of the American Ladies is solicitously intreated by the Authoress, as she is circumscribed in her knowledge, this being original work in this country.

"[citation needed] This assumption is bolstered by the inclusion of southern New England specialties such as Indian pudding and johnnycakes.

However, many of the later editions were published from a cluster around the Hudson River Valley (e.g., Albany, Salem, Troy, Poughkeepsie, New York).

[9][10] Karen Hess also referred to Miss Simmons as a "good plain cook", noting the generous use and variety of herbs and the use of wine in her recipes.

In 1808, Lucy Emerson plagiarized Simmons's book (from the Troy, NY 1808 edition) by renaming part of the title and copying verbatim most of the rest of it.

It reveals the rich variety of food Colonial Americans enjoyed, their tastes, cooking and eating habits, even their colorful language.

Author Amelia Simmons worked as a domestic in Colonial America and gathered her cookery expertize from first-hand experience."

And no later work, however completely it may reflect the mores of this country, has quite the freshness of this first glimpse caught in the small mirror held up by an American Orphan.

... Not one of them included specifically American recipes, although by that time a few native American products had become adopted in English cookery, beginning with turkey and so called French beans, but gradually also both sweet and white potatoes, even chocolate, vanilla, and tomatoes, and so came to be called for in English cookbooks well before the end of the eighteenth century.

[3] Jan Longone continues by saying "Perhaps the most far-reaching innovation was the introduction of pearlash, a well-known staple in the colonial American household, as a chemical leavening in doughs.