The Green Room Pantry

What Broadway’s stars kept off the menu.

The biggest names of 1908 gave up their personal recipes — and their kitchens were as theatrical as their stages. The strangest here, each linking to its page.

1. Harry Houdini's secret was a sweet tooth. The escape artist contributed a bread-and-butter custard with a confession: *"I happen to have a weakness for sweets, and this one you will not find in any other cook book."*Read it: Harry Houdini
2. Gentleman Jim Corbett had passion fruit shipped from Australia by the steamer-load. The world heavyweight champion's recipe was a passion-fruit salad, and he added: *"This fruit grows exclusively in Australia and nearly every incoming steamer from that country has a consignment for me."*Read it: James J Corbett
3. A cookbook assembled entirely by fan mail — from the biggest stars alive. Rowland simply wrote to the celebrated players and asked; the answers came from Enrico Caruso, Lillian Russell, Mary Pickford, Douglas Fairbanks, George M. Cohan, John Philip Sousa, Harry Houdini and dozens more — a 1916 time capsule of Broadway and early-Hollywood appetites, star by star.Read it: About the Book
4. The world's greatest tenor sent in a turtle recipe. Enrico Caruso's contribution was Terrapin à la Baltimore — complete with the unglamorous instructions to *"plunge into boiling water,"* rub the skin from the feet, and *"draw out nails from feet."*Read it: Enrico Caruso
5. Mary Pickford baked her own jam tarts. America's Sweetheart offered raspberry jam tarts folded envelope-fashion, noting: *"These are so simple to make that I often do them myself."*Read it: Mary Pickford
6. John Philip Sousa was a spaghetti purist. The March King's recipe brooks no substitution: *"Use a package or a pound of spaghetti; not macaroni… Boil exactly twenty minutes,"* and grate your own cheese — *"Use the piece of cheese to grate, not bottled cheese."*Read it: John Philip Sousa
7. Douglas Fairbanks's crab dish was bound with ketchup and sherry. The swashbuckler's "A Southern Delicacy" flakes cooked crab and stirs in *"a gill of unsweetened ketchup… a wineglassful of sherry,"* served hot on garnished toast.Read it: Douglas Fairbanks
8. Anna Held's decadent chestnut coupe. The star famed for her (legendary) milk baths gave a one-person dessert layering vanilla ice cream, whole and candied French chestnuts, and Jamaica rum, topped with whipped cream and maraschino cherries.Read it: Anna Held
9. Lillian Russell liked to cook for herself. The great beauty's creamed mushrooms came with a note that it was *"a dish that I love to fuss with myself,"* finished with lemon juice to *"bring out the flavor of all the seasoning."*Read it: Lillian Russell
10. The recipes came signed. Many contributions close with the star's own signature and, throughout the book, their portraits — so a reader in 1916 got Ethel Barrymore's rabbit sauté or George M. Cohan's steamed veal over the player's autograph. — about / ethel-barrymore — B