In
memory of my grandaunt Kathleen Deutrom, the best storyteller I know.
(17th
May 1919 – 07th September 2015)
This was first published in the The Sunday Times, 19th June 2016.
Most Sri Lankan households even today would have a
copy of the Daily News Cookery Book, first published in 1929. Here Deborah
Philip writes about the author Hilda Deutrom and her extended family who
contributed to it.
 |
| Kathleen, May and their Aunt Hilda Deutrom © Deborah Philip Please do not use without permission of the author |
Now Ready!The Daily News Cookery Book,
followed by a drawing of a demure
saree-clad lady stirring a mysterious (but obviously delicious) something in a
pan on the fire. Under the image the advertisement stated that ‘cookery is a
pleasure to the Ceylon Housewife now that she has the ideal cookery book for
which she has waited so long’.
Thus with 700 selected Dutch, English, Portuguese, Indian and Ceylon
recipes and useful hints for the Ceylonese housewife, the Ceylon Daily News
Cookery Book was born. This slim volume (7½”x5”) was the first locally produced
cookery book in Colonial Ceylon and was sold at Rs.3. A number of
advertisements in a similar vein were to follow in the next few days but only
on the 6th of July 1929 did the Ceylon Daily News carry the name of the editor
of the book, Miss H. Deutrom, who for many years would remain a largely obscure
figure. Her book on Ceylon cooking however went on to become a household name.
The Daily News Cookery Book hit the shelves in 1929 followed by four
subsequent editions and numerous reprints. A Sinhala edition known as the
Dinamina Cookery Book first appeared in 1930 and like the English version has
been revised and published a number of times. In modern parlance Hilda’s name
is used to validate the ‘authenticity’ of lamprais in online battles on YAMU
and she has made brief appearances in the fiction of Yasmine Gooneratne’s ‘Change
of Skies’ and Romesh Gunasekera’s Reef.
Anita Mannur in ‘Culinary Fictions: Food in South Asian Diasporic
Culture’ writes that Hilda Deutrom’s cookbook is a ‘script to
articulate diasporic Sri Lankan identity’. For the rest of her life Hilda’s
name and the Daily News Cookery Book went hand in hand, but as the success of
her book grew, Hilda receded further into the background with memories of her
limited to close family and friends. This article is written in memory of
Hilda’s niece and god daughter, Kathleen Deutrom (May 17, 1919 – September 7,
2015), who in March 2015 sat down to discuss Hilda, her life and her reasons
for writing a cookery book.
Hilda Gladys Deutrom was born on the 17th of March 1884 to Abigail Maria
Anthonisz and James Vincent Deutrom. She was a premature baby, born at eight
months and as a result was termed delicate or semi-invalid for the rest of her
life. Hilda had four brothers, George, Percival (Percy), Hugh and Bertram and
one sister Vivienne. The family grew up at Seaspray, a house located close to
the Mount Lavinia Railway Station. After Percy married his cousin Edith
Anthonisz, Hilda first became an aunt to May (1917) and then to Kathleen
(1919). The Deutroms were closely associated with Lake House and the Daily News
because of Percy’s friendship with the founder D.R Wijewardene. He was Percy’s
employer and the family fortunes of Hilda’s brother rested to a great extent on
Wijewardene’s affection and generosity.
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| Poffertje Pan
Place the poffertje pan over a fire and put a
a little butter or dripping into each receptacle,
When very hot put into each a spoonful or
more of the batter ... and sprinkle a few sultanas.
When cooked on one side turns over with a fork
and keep on turning the poffertjes until of a nice
golden brown colour. They must be perfectly
round. Serve hot with sugar syrup.
Image and Recipe Courtesy of Ceylon Daily
News Cookery Book.
|
In 1929, when the first edition of the book was published, Hilda wrote
that “a certain number of the recipes included in this volume have already been
published in the columns of the ‘Daily News’”
[1].
Perhaps the best kept secret about the compilation of the Daily News
Cookery Book is the fact that Hilda Deutrom was not the cook. According to
family lore Hilda wrote and compiled the recipes while her sister, Vivienne
Woutersz, sharpened her culinary skills by testing out the recipes before they
were included in the cookery book. In Hilda’s own words ‘Every one of these is
a tried recipe and if the directions are followed carefully there should be no
failure’. Kathleen believes that the Dutch Recipes came out of her
grandmother’s (Hilda’s mother’s) kitchen. Her memory of her grandmother making
Poffertjes (light dough fritters/little puffy pancakes) in her special
Poffertje pan reinforces this. The Poffertjes were eaten at tea-time with sugar
syrup or maple syrup and Kathleen voted them ‘delicious’.
 |
| Vivienne Woutersz (nee Deutrom) © Deborah Philip Please do not use without permission of the author |
In the past, cookbooks were not tied to one particular celebrity author
but instead were the result of either un-named compilers or collective
authorship. In the West a cookbook originated from home kitchens and
represented a community’s favourite recipes with publication providing a method
by which to refine ‘the community’s repertoire of dishes’[2]. It seems that through the Daily News Cookery Book, Hilda was invoking
the same principles found in the community cookbooks of the West. Old
single-rule exercise books, dating from the 1940s, 1950s and 1960s, were found
in Hilda’s last home, ‘Middelburg’, located down Circular Road, Mount Lavinia.
Words, dates and numbers spill out of their pages as they list numerous
recipes, ingredients and the cost as Hilda and Vivienne seemed to have taken
orders for catering as well. In 1943 Mrs. Ohlums placed an order for 4 dozen
fuggettis which cost her Rs. 4.80. The Deutrom sisters sold 90 lamprais to
‘Doreen A’ at the rate of Rs.1 per lamprais in 1949 but by 1962 the price of a
lamprais had increased to Rs. 1.25. However what is most significant about
these exercise books is that some of the recipes are accompanied by bracketed
names of friends and family members, suggesting the possible source for the
recipes. There was Enid’s Love Cake, Sylvie’s Passion Fruit Syrup, Lou
Deutrom’s Pork Pies, Cecile Anthonisz’s Cream Buns and Sardine Rolls, Elva
Poulier’s Chinese Rice and Hilda Deutrom’s very own Date Cake.
 |
A Second Edition (1934) Daily News Cookery Book signed
by Hilda and gifted to her sister-in-law Sylvie Deutrom
(nee Herft)
Courtesy of Paul Beling
|
Described as a careful and wise spender, Hilda contributed to the
building of Middelburg, which was the house that her brother-in-law Claire
Woutersz constructed for her sister Vivienne, who was his wife. For when the
house was about to be completed Claire ran short of money and Hilda stepped in
with the little money she had saved in the bank -accumulated from the sale of
the Daily News Cookery Book – to help finish building the house. Hilda was to
live out the rest of her adult life at Middelburg where she had her own
quarters.
When Hilda was older and a confirmed invalid, her grand-nephew Paul
Beling was taken to sing to her and cheer her up. Both grand-aunt and
grand-nephew derived much joy from these visits. Hilda enjoyed the singing
while Paul enjoyed eating her soft milk toffee which was made especially as a
treat for him.
 |
| Different Editions of the Daily News Cookery Book from 1934 - 2010 © Deborah Philip Please do not use without permission of the author |
[2]
Elizabeth Driver, “Cookbooks as Primary Sources for Writing History”, Food, Culture & Society, 2009, vol. 12,
no.3, pp.257-274
[3] Igor Cusack, “African Cuisines: Recipes for
Nation-Building?”, Journal
of African Cultural Studies, Vol. 13, No. 2 2000, pp. 207-225
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