Pastry-Making & Confectionery

Hêrisse, Emile & Senn, C Herman. Pastry-Making & Confectionery: including the art of icing & piping. Ward, Lock & Co: London, [1946-1952]. 8vo (190x125mm) tan cloth bds, 192pp. VG-/- lacks dj; evenly foxed throughout; sm signs of kitchen use

HÊRISSE, Emile & SENN, C Herman. [Charles (1864-1934)]

Pastry-Making & Confectionery: including the art of icing and piping also cakes, buns, fancy biscuits, sweetmeats, etc. With over 60 illustrations.

London and Melbourne : Ward, Lock & Co, circa 1946-1952¹. First published in 1912². Printed by The Whitefriars Press Ltd., London and Tonbridge.

Octavo (190x125mm) tan cloth boards, heavy cream paper, 192pp. Colour frontispiece, 8 out-of-text leaves of monochrome photographic illustrations, advertisements to endpapers.  Lacks dust jacket; spine head and tail lightly worn; text lightly foxed throughout; small signs of kitchen use; bookseller ticket "W C Coddington Bookseller Woollongong" to front pastedown.


Hêrisse was a French pastry chef who worked in Paris and London during the late nineteenth century.  Senn was the most prolific British cookery writer of his time.  Classically trained, Senn worked under Francatelli at the Reform Club in London.   He became involved in various culinary and catering trade associations, editing various magazines and year books.   In 1892 he was appointed the consulting chef to the National Training School for Cookery.   He also oversaw the annual Universal Cookery & Food Association Cookery Exhibitions in London for over thirty-three years.  Over his long career, he published well over one hundred titles; also editing (and significantly contributing to) the 1906 edition of Mrs Beeton's The Book of Household Management and the 1911 edition of Francatelli's The Modern Cook as well as numerous other books.

There are eleven chapters: Pastry-making; Tarts, Tartlets, small French pastry, choux, bouchées, éclairs etc; Cakes; Buns and Scones; Biscuits, Macaroons, Wafers etc; Meringues and Soufflage Cakes; Sweetmeats and Bon-bons; Icing and Piping; Sugar, to clarify and boil; Aromatic and coloured sugars; Icings and fillings.  The chapters contain about 520 recipes and include French pastry and baking, English baking and confectionery  as well as a section on cake decoration contributed by an unnamed expert.  The biscuits are mostly French.  There is little viennoisserie.

A practical and economical book on basic pastry-making and confectionery suitable for students and home cooks.

§  OCLC records only 5 holdings: Leeds, MSU, SLV, Deakin and RMIT
§  cf Driver 491, earlier editions.
¹  Ward Lock & Co moved to temporary premises in Chancery Lane in 1946; King George VI mentioned in several advertisements died in 1952.
 ²  Hêrisse first published his book on pastry-making in French Manuel pratique du Pâtissier-Confiseur décorateur, à l'usage des chocolatiers, confiseurs, etc. Paris, c1890and then translated it into English for it to be published by Ward Lock & Co (then Ward Lock Bowden & Co) in 1893.  A second edition was published and in 1912 a new and revised edition was published with many new recipes contributed by Senn.  This new edition was reissued, usually undated, a number of times up to the 1950s.