The cookbook The Virginia House-Wife was first published in 1824. Written by Mary Randolph, the book was formally titled The Virginia House-Wife; or, Methodical Cook and became one of the most influential American cookbooks of the nineteenth century.
Randolph’s work was more than a recipe collection. Its roughly 225 pages contained nearly 500 recipes, along with practical instructions for making household products such as soap, starch, blacking, and cologne. The book reflected the foodways of Virginia while also incorporating influences from other parts of the United States and Europe.
The Virginia House-Wife is often described as the first regional American cookbook. It was republished at least nineteen times before the Civil War, showing how widely it circulated. The book is also associated with early American recipes for fried chicken and ice cream, although claims about “first” recipes can depend on how surviving publications are compared. The publication year itself, however, is firmly established as 1824.