A Soup for the Poor

Whenever famine raised its head, soup kitchens were soon opened. This recipe comes from the chef and campaigner Alexis Soyer’s Charitable Cookery, or, the Poor Man’s Regenerator (1848). Soyer had spent time in Ireland, working with organisations trying to provide aid for the millions of Irish left starving during the potato famine of the 1840s. In 1847 he opened a soup kitchen in Dublin, which fed up to 5,000 people a day. Class differences were acutely showcased: the rich could pay 5s. to watch the spectacle of desperate people eating with spoons that were chained to both the bowls and the tables to prevent their theft.