A cheap green peas soup

Wash very clean and throw into an equal quantity of boiling water salted as for peas, three quarts of the shells, and in from twenty to thirty minutes, when they will be quite tender, turn the whole into a large strainer, and press the pods strongly with a wooden spoon. Measure the liquor, put two quarts of it into a clean deep saucepan, and when it boils add to it a quart of full grown peas, two or even three large cucumbers, as many moderate sized lettuces freed from the coarser leaves and cut small, one large onion (or more if liked) sliced extremely thin and stewed for half an hour in a morsel of butter before it is added to the soup, or gently fried without being allowed to brown; a branch or two of parsley, and, when the flavour is liked, a dozen leaves of mint. Stew these softly for an hour, with the addition of a small teaspoonful, or a larger quantity if required of salt, and a good seasoning of fine white pepper or of cayenne; then work the whole of the vegetables with the soup through a hair-sieve, heat it afresh, and send it to table with a dish of small fried sippets. The colour will not be be bright as that of the more expensive soups which precede it, but it will be excellent in flavour.

Pea shells, 3 quarts; water, 3 quarts: 20 to 30 minutes. Liquor from these, 2 quarts; full sized green peas, 1 quart; large cucumbers, 2 or 3; lettuces, 3; onion, 1 (or more); little parsley; mint, 12 leaves; seasoning of salt and pepper or cayenne: stewed 1 hour.

Obs – The cucumbers should be pared, quartered, and freed from the seeds before they are added to the soup. The peas, as we have said already more than once, should not be old, but taken at their full growth, before they lose their colour: the youngest of the shells ought to be selected for the liquor.

From Modern Cookery, for Private Families: Reduced to a System of Easy Practice, in a Series of Carefully Tested Receipts, in which the Principles of Baron Liebig and Other Eminent Writers Have Been as Much as Possible Applied and Explained (1868) by Eliza Acton

[Link]

Notes: This book was the first cookbook designed for domestic use, rather than the professional kitchen. It also introduced the idea of listing ingredients, and contains the first ever published recipe for Brussels sprouts. For more on Eliza Acton see here.
• Sippets are nothing more complicated than stale bread fried in butter with fresh herbs, a rather more luxurious alternative to croutons.
• Baron Liebig was an eminent chemist who also developed a process for making beef extracts. More here.