Experimental research with consequences for your weight.

Recipes from the cookbook of the Ambras Lady Philippine Welser from the sixteenth century are cooked, tasted, commented, and refined by cultural-historical, culinary highlights. 

Who was Philippine Welser?

Philippine Welser was one of the most extraordinary women in Tyrolean history, not least because of the legends around her love affair and her secret, socially unacceptable marriage to Archduke Ferdinand II, her reputation as a helpful healer, and her legendary cookbook. She probably met Ferdinand, then governor of Bohemia, when she was staying with her aunt, Katharina of Loxan, at Schloss Bresnitz for the first time in 1556. Philippine and Ferdinand II married in secrecy in January 1557. The father of the groom, Ferdinand I, emperor as of 1558, demanded they keep their relationship secret. After his father’s death, Ferdinand II became the Landesfürst (Count) of Tyrol and had Ambras Castle adapted to a residential castle in 1564. They moved from Bohemia to Ambras three years later. After 1570 the reports of Philippine’s private doctor, Georg Handsch, on her deteriorating health increased; she died on 24 April 1580.      

Cookbook of Philippine Welser

Author anonymous, Augsburg, c.1543/44,
paper, cover: leather, 137 fols.; 195 x 150 mm,
Innsbruck, Ambras Castle

It is a lucky coincidence that Philippine Welser’s cookbook remained preserved in the collections of Ambras Castle. It was written in 1545, with a few additions in the 1560–80s. It is most probably a collection of recipes that Philippine’s mother, Anna, commissioned for her daughter. Only very few of the recipes added later are in Philippine’s handwriting. In other words, the book hardly reflects the dietary habits of Tyrolean rulers but rather those of a patrician family from Augsburg. 

The recipes are organized according to the style of preparation: cakes, pâtés, baked dishes, mashes and purees, fish, aspics, soups, boiled and preserved meats, and marzipan. There are hardly any instructions on amounts or cooking times; also the herbs and spices to use are sometimes left to the chef with a simple ‘gewirtz wol’ (to your liking). If spices are mentioned, they are usually precious, exotic ones, such as pepper, ‘rerla’ (cinnamon), ‘jmber’ (ginger), ‘negala’ (cloves), ‘safren’ (saffron), or ‘musgatblye’ (mace).