LHSA's invalid fruit tart features in the Great British Bake Off

A recipe for invalid fruit tart from LHSA's collection was included in the BBC programme, ‘The Great British Bake Off’ on Tuesday 28 August. It had caught the eye of the production team after featuring in the Scottish Council on Archives’ 2011 archives awareness raising campaign “The Edible Archive” (http://www.scoarch.org.uk/projects/ediblearchive/therecipes).

Invalid fruit tart was one of a multitude of recipes from the 1950s designed with the health of patients in mind, and forms part of our Royal Infirmary of Edinburgh (RIE) Dietetics Department collection. The first dietician to be appointed in the UK, in 1924, was a nursing sister at the RIE - Miss Pybus. It was in the context of the growing importance of the role food could play in health (preventing illness in the first place and helping patients to recover) that the 1950s recipes we hold were created. There are 24 recipes altogether including those for making tea and coffee, soft drinks, custards, beef tea, egg dishes, fish dishes, cooking vegetables, chicken, and stewed fruit.

For more information on the Dietetics collection, please view our RIE Catalogue and scroll to collection reference LHB1/89 on pages 159 - 166.

Please click on the image to see enlarged versions of the recipes for fricassee of rabbit and apple water.

Photograph of a display promoting a balanced diet