Indigestion

If Health Soup doesn’t sound appealing, there are plenty of bland recipes in the invalid cookery sections of old cookbooks that should be equally soothing to an upset stomach. Mrs Tuckford’s Cookery for the Middle Classes has this recipe for fish custard:

1 oz. Farola, 1 pint milk, 1 egg, pepper and salt, 3/4 lb. filleted fish (whiting or haddock). Grease pie-dish, cut fish into neat pieces, sprinkle with seasoning, and put into pie-dish. Mix Farola with milk, and cook 5 minutes. Allow to cool, add egg and seasoning. Pour over fish and cook in a moderate oven for 30 minutes.

If you are looking for something more specifically settling to the stomach, she suggests making peptonised milk instead, according to the following recipe:

1 pint milk, 2 teaspoonfuls Benger’s liquor pancreaticus, 1 1/2 gills cold water, 1/4 teaspoonful bicarbonate of soda, a little salt. Allow milk and water to get a little more than lukewarm, add pancreaticus, soda, and salt, and stand in a warm place for 15 or 20 minutes, or until the milk tastes nutty. Boil up or place on ice to arrest the peptonising process.

If you really want to try peptonised milk today, it seems to mainly be available at scientific supply shops, who tell us that it’s “a pancreatic digest of skimmed milk”, and is used these days “primarily in culture media for the isolation and growth of lactobacilli and streptococci from dairy products”.

To prevent indigestion in the first place, consider this advice from Household Hints:

Don’t be grouchy at table; it is conducive to indigestion.