Historical reenactors assemble outside Hyde Park Barracks. Photo © Fiona Morris for Sydney Living Museums
According to Francois-Maurice Lepailleur, a convict living at the Hyde Park barracks in 1840, “You don’t starve but you’re always hungry.” So what did convicts eat at Hyde Park barracks in the when it was home to over 600 male convict workers at any one time?
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Rouse Hill House built in lego. Photo (c) Sydney Living Museums
Looking for something for the kids to do these school holidays? How about making Rouse Hill House in Lego! Continue reading
A Victorian family dinner. Image source: Free Vintage Digi (digital) stamps. freevintagedigistamps.com
I was recently invited to give a talk for the New South Wales Dickens Society. I had no hesitation accepting, not as an aficionado of Dickens literary works, but because Charles Dickens’s wife Catherine (nee Hogarth), published a book of menus in the 1850s. Continue reading
Supper table from Mrs Beeton's Book of household management, 1895. Caroline Simpson Library and Research collection © Sydney Living Museums
Unappetising as it might seem today, tongue was regarded a delicacy in the 19th and early 20th centuries. Tongue was on the menu at formal dinners, sociable breakfasts and wedding banquets, and at the gala ball held at Government House for the Prince of Wales, Continue reading
Detail of cover of menu from Shepheard's Grill Cairo for Christmas Eve 1929. Caroline Simpson Library & Research Collection, Sydney Living Museums
Far away from the harbour of Sydney, a new book from Sydney living Museums has us dining in the shadow of the pyramids! Continue reading