“Mary Whitcher's Shaker house-keeper” is a cookbook by famous American Shaker trustee, school teacher, and author. It promoted Shaker medicines, cooking, and philosophy and it also gives a short history of the Shakers. Whitcher designed a cookbook that had a basic economical meal for each day of the week that was different. This was a novelty for most of the New England homes of the nineteenth century. Many of the recipes she obtained from her friends. She hoped that the readers would use the daily recipes as a basis for more elaborate meals. The first meal was on Sunday and the last on Saturday. After this she gave many miscellaneous recipes including several deserts and credited many to whom she obtained the recipe or desert from. Whitcher brings up some pointers of etiquette for the dinner table at the very end of her cookbook.
