‘Foreign’ Recipes.

Part of the fun of exploring this week’s cookery book choice (Adam's Luxury and Eve's Cookery, or, the Kitchen-Garden display’d, published in 1744) has been considering old recipes as a source of new inspiration. I am sure I have gone on about this before, but I am constantly surprised, and more than a little disappointed, that modern cooks rarely seem to use history for inspiration. We are very comfortable with cultural inspiration however, and think nothing of incorporating ingredients and ideas from other countries in our recipes, even if we revert to familiar dishes for their comfort value.

It seems that ‘foreign’ food ideas were also appealing to cooks and diners in 1744. Here are a couple of recipes for peas with an international flavour, from Adam's Luxury and Eve's Cookery.

Peas the Portuguese Way.
Wash your Peas, cut in some Lettuce with a Lump of Sugar, some fine Oil, a few Mint Leaves, cut small, with Parsley, Onions, Shallots, Garlick, Winter Savory, Nutmeg, Salt, Pepper, and a little Broth; put some over the Fire, and when ‘tis almost ready, poach some new Eggs in it, making a Place for each Egg to lie in; then cover your Stew pan again, and boil your eggs with a little Fire upon the Cover; then slide them into your dish, and serve them.
Fine beans may be dress’d in the same manner, but you must blanch them, and put them in as they are, without putting them in Butter.


Peas the French Way.
Shell your Peas, and pass a quarter of a Pound of Butter, gold colour, with a Spoonful of Flower; then put in a Quart of Peas, four Onions cut small, and two Cabbages cut as small as the Onions; then put in half a Pint of Gravy, seasoned with Pepper, Salt, and Cloves. Stove this well an Hour, then put in half a Spoonful of fine Sugar, and fry some Artichokes to lay round the Side of the Dish; serve it with a forced Lettuce in the Middle.

Quotation for the Day.

LAUREL, n. The laurus a vegetable dedicated to Apollo, and formerly defoliated to wreathe the brows of victors and such poets as had influence at court.
Ambrose Bierce, Devil’s Dictionary.

A Different Spin on Salad.

Our source for the week, Adam's Luxury and Eve's Cookery, or, the Kitchen-Garden display’d, (1744), has, I think, singlehandedly put to rest the myths that vegetables were essentially neglected by our ancestors, and if they were served at all, the recipes were uninspiring.


One of the other things the book demonstrates is that at the time, many of the plant foods that we consider as salad vegetables were much more likely to be cooked before serving. As a sweeping generalisation, raw vegetables and fruits were considered with some suspicion in the past as being unhealthy. Remember the story of Samuel Pepys, who believed his neighbour died from eating ‘cowcumbers’? This was the topic of my very first blog post over five years ago.


One of the other things that stands out in cookery books of the seventeenth and eighteenth centuries is the number of recipes for cooking the vegetables that we now mostly eat raw in salads. When was the last time you had a dish of celery or cucumber cooked, as a side dish? I I am not talking about a couple of sticks of celery added to a stew, or cucumber to a stir-fry here, I am talking about these vegetables performing solo.

From our cookery book of the week, I give you a couple of ideas worth reviving.

Cellery with Cream.
Tie up your Branches and boil them tender; then cut them into Bits three Inches long, and put to them half a Pint of Cream, four Yolks of Eggs, a little Butter, and season it with Salt. Shake it together and serve it.

A Regalia of Cucumbers.
Slice twelve Cucumbers, put them in a Cloth, beat and squeeze them dry, flower and fry them brown; then add half a Gill of Claret, a little Gravy [broth], and some Salt, Pepper, Cloves, Mace, Nutmeg, and Butter work’d in Flower; toss them together, and serve them.


Quotation for the Day.

We can get fuel from fruit, from that shrub by the roadside, or from apples, weeds, saw-dust - almost anything! There is fuel in every bit of vegetable matter that can be fermented. There is enough alcohol in one year's yield of a hectare of potatoes to drive the machinery necessary to cultivate the field for a hundred years. And it remains for someone to find out how this fuel can be produced commercially - better fuel at a cheaper price than we know now.
Henry Ford.

Take Some Wild Thistles ….

I have never eaten cardoons. I know a little about them, of course, but it is all theoretical. Now that I have realised this, deficit in my life, eating cardoons is on my A list, which I prefer to call my TTT-list (Things To Try list). I don’t remember ever seeing cardoons at any of the Brisbane farmers’ markets, but perhaps this will change now that they are on my curiosity radar.

I did consider the cardoon in a post a long time ago (here), but this week I am seeking vegetable inspiration from Adam's Luxury and Eve's Cookery, or, the Kitchen-Garden display’d, published in 1744. What does this lovely book have to give us on cardoons (which it calls chardoons) ? Four recipes, as it turns out – which is four more than any of the high profile celebrity chef cookery books that have ended up on my bookshelves over the last few years. How come we keep losing vegetable recipes from our cookery portfolios?

A couple of the recipes are quite substantial – chardoons with cheese, and one with bacon and marrow and more cheese, and one is for buttered chardoons. I am going to give you the first one in the book, which shows that if you prepare them right, they can substitute for asparagus, or even peas.

Chardoons Fried and Butter’d.
They are a wild Thistle that grows in every Ditch or Hedge. You must cut them about ten Inches, string them, tie them up twenty in a Bundle, and boil them like Asparagus: Or you may cut them in small Bits, and boil them as Pease, and toss them up with Pepper, Salt, and melted Butter.


Quotation for the Day.
I am better off with vegetables at the bottom of my garden than with all the fairies of the Midsummer Night's Dream.
Dorothy L. Sayers (1893-1957) 'Lord, I Thank Thee'

Red is Good.

The Cabbage has been a staple vegetable for humans for millenia. We probably domesticated the wild form well over two thousand years ago, which has given us plenty of time to develop the different varieties from which we can now choose. The one I want to focus on today red cabbage.

As you well know, red cabbage is the litmus vegetable of the garden and kitchen – turning bluish if it is grown or cooked at the alkaline end of the pH spectrum, and red if it senses an acidic environment. This ability is due to the presence of one of the flavinoid pigments called anthocyanins – the same pigments that give the red colour to blood oranges, red apples, and autumn foliage, and which may well act as powerful anti-oxidants when we eat red foods.

Blue food on the other hand is not ‘natural’ to humans, probably because there are no really, truly blue foods in nature – only a few at the purplish (reddish) or blackish end of the spectrum such as blueberries and blackberries. Truly blue food is therefore quite repellent to humans – a fact exploited by the famous film-maker and practical joker Alfred Hitchcock when he held his legendary ‘Blue Dinner’ for some selected industry guests. And it is the reason why recipes for red cabbage almost always include a little vinegar or other acid, as this ensures the desirable red does not become disgusting blue in the cooking process.

As promised yesterday, my recipe inspiration this week is coming from Adam's Luxury and Eve's Cookery, or, the Kitchen-Garden display’d, published in 1744. Amongst its cabbage offering, this book has three methods for stuffing the vegetable – I don’t know of any modern or celebrity cook books that include that number for stuffed cabbage - but I digress. The red cabbage recipe is my focus today, and a fine one-pot dish this book recommends too, and ideal for a winter night or your slow-cooker. The ‘gravy’ referred to probably means meat broth, not the thickened ‘sauce’ that the word usually refers to today. The touch I like is that not just any vinegar is added at the end to preserve the colour and give the dish an edge, but elder-flower vinegar is specified.

To Stew Red Cabbage.
Cut your cabbage very fine, and stew it with Gravy, Sausages, and Ham, and season it with Pepper and Salt. Before you serve it, put in a little Elder-Vinegar, and mix it well together.

Quotation for the Day.

Botany, n. The science of vegetables - those that are not good to eat, as well as those that are. It deals largely with their flowers, which are commonly badly designed, inartistic in color, and ill-smelling.
Ambrose Bierce (1842-1914) 'The Devil's Dictionary' (1911)

Beetroot à la 1744.

In the year of 1744, France declared war on one old enemy (England), and made peace with another (Prussia), James Bradley, the English Astronomer Royal, discovered that earth periodically wobbles on its axis, Abigail Adams (wife of President John Adams) was born, and William Byrd of Westover (Virginia) died.

But what really important things were happening? What was going on in the kitchens around the country? Some pretty good things with vegetables, it seems.

There is a common assumption that in the past vegetables played an insignificant role on the dinner table. The assumption has been fuelled, I think, by the study of menus and meal descriptions of the time. Menus (or Bills of Fare, if you like) were kept or recorded only for important events, so no inference can be drawn from them as to the daily meals of most ordinary folk. Meat was the star at important meals and in wealthy households, because protein food was more valuable and more expensive (and not easy to preserve), so is presence was emphasised – leaving us to assume that vegetables were the poor relations.

Vegetables were grown and used extensively of course in the eighteenth century. There was a great flourishing of the herb and vegetable garden at this time, and great interest in horticulture and the development of new and useful food plants. One of my favourite food books was published in 1744, the chosen year for this post. It is Adam's Luxury and Eve's Cookery, or, the Kitchen-Garden display’d , and I like it in part because of its title, and in part because of the range and variety of recipes included at the end of the book.

I have given a couple of recipes from this book in previous posts: To butter Onions, and an interesting sweet Bean Tart made with green beans. There are more delights within it, and this week I want to feature the book, and see if it gives us inspiration several centuries later.

One of my favourite themes is the re-discovery of old recipes that would seem interesting and innovative on a modern restaurant menu. The recipe I have chosen today fits this bill, I think. I am not sure whether or not beetroot is still trendy, but if it is, it is no doubt the small roasted beet, served with goats cheese or similar. I have never seen anything on a modern menu like today’s recipe for what is essentially fritters of beetroot – especially fritters in the shape of fish.

To Fry the Roots of Red Beets.
Wash your Beet-roots, and lay them in an Earthen glaz’d Pan, bake them in an Oven, and then peel the Skin off them: After this is done, slit them from the Top to the Tail, and cut them in the Shape of a Fish call’d Soal, about the Thickness of the third Part of an Inch. Dip these in a thick Batter, made of White Wine, [fine] Flower, sweet Cream, Eggs, Pepper, Salt, and [?] beaten, and all well mix’d. As you dip each Beet-root in this Batter, strew them over thick with fine Flower mix’d with grated Bread and Parsley shred small, and then fry them in lard. When they are enough, let them dry, and serve them with a Garnish of Lemon. These likewise may be put about Carps, Tench, and roasted Jacks, by way of Garnish.

Quotation for the Day.

A vegetable garden in the beginning looks so promising and then after all little by little it grows nothing but vegetables, nothing, nothing but vegetables.
Gertrude Stein.

Things to do with Radishes.

It must soon be the turn of the radish to be trendy again, must it not? I haven’t thought about radishes for – Oh! Ages and Ages, and I don’t remember the last time I was served them in a restaurant salad. My radish thoughts were stimulated by finding that, in the cooler parts of the Northern hemisphere, this month used to be the time for putting by the products of the radish crop so that they could furnish the table during the fresh vegetable dearth-time of winter. Thankfully, we have cool-rooms and refrigerators instead of cellars full of sand barrels nowadays, but the following idea is worth remembering:

A Guide to the Orchard and Kitchen Garden (1831) describes 15 varieties of radish, six of which “will supply the table in succession through the autumn and winter. Those which are intended for winter use should be taken up in dry weather in November, divested of their leaves and fibres, and preserved in sand until they are wanted.”

The radish (Raphanus sativus) belongs to the family Brassicaceae – the mustard and cabbage family that has been an important source of human nutrition for millennia. As with other members of the family, the radish is so ancient and so widespread that its wild origins are lost in the mists of time, but it appears to have been cultivated since the pre-Roman era. The whole plant is edible, although the root is the most familiar and is the main reason for its cultivation. The plant grows and matures very rapidly (‘raphanus’ refers to this characteristic), and there are now many different varieties with slightly different growing requirements so that nowadays they are available most of the year round.

John Gerard in his Herball or General Historie of Plantes, published in 1597, indicated their culinary use (and the always associated health implications) thus:

“Radish are eaten raw with bread instead of other food. .. for the most part, they are used in sauce with meates to procure appetite, and in that sort they ingender blood lesse faulty, than eaten alone or with bread onely...”

By the early nineteenth century, the uses of the radish were summed up in The Practical Gardener, and Modern Horticulturalist (1828)

“The roots are much esteemed as salad, and are the only part of the plant generally used in a raw state. The pods are pickled, and considered a substitute for capers. Sometimes the tender tops are used along with other small salads; and they were anciently boiled, when full grown, and used as greens.”

The oil from radish seeds has been used medicinally since ancient times for a variety of conditions. More recently it has been proposed as a useful bio-fuel. If you add these applications to the culinary uses, you end up with a very useful plant indeed.

Methinks that when we do prepare the radish for our table, we use it in a fairly uninspiring way these days. We don’t make it a feature, do we? We certainly don’t feature the leaves as often as we should – perhaps because to do that we have to grow our own?

The American Salad Book (1899) gives a recipe for radish leaf salad, plus four using the root - including one variation on the classic Waldorf. Sadly, the proof-reader of the cookbook missed the missing radish from the ingredient list - presumably it should be mixed with the apples before adding the mayonnaise. I could not omit the recipe however, as I have previously featured Waldorf salad history and variations (here, and here), and I hate to miss an opportunity to expand a theme.

Radish Leaf Salad.
When the rows of young radishes are being thinned a very good salad can be made from the leaves of those taken out. Serve with French dressing made with a little onion juice, or sprinkled with mixed chives. Excellent in potato salad.


Radish Salad No. 4 Waldorf.
This is served with meat pies or hot meats. Four large tart apples are pared, cut into small pieces and mixed immediately with [the quantity of radishes] a teaspoonful of salt, one of paprika, and two tablespoonfuls of tarragon vinegar. Pour over the whole a large cupful of mayonnaise dressing. Serve on leaves of lettuce.


Quotation for the Day.

The radish is "a vulgar article of the diet" that has a "...remarkable power of causing flatulence and eructation."
Pliny

Knowing your Onions.

Onions have been human food for millennia, and perhaps familiarity has bred, if not contempt, then disinterest. Food fashions come and go – beetroot and parsnips and celeriac and a host of other vegetables keep on getting rediscovered and are briefly novel and interesting again, but I don’t remember the same honour ever being given to the onion.

The onion has a long history of medicinal use, as a food for the poor, and as a flavouring ingredient – but seems to have only rarely been prepared and celebrated in its own right as culinary treat. Why is this? How could a mid-eighteenth century wife or nurse prepare ‘a cataplasm of roasted onions and bruised mustard seed’ as an ‘excellent external application for the piles’ (or the chilblains), and not be tempted by the aroma to pile the leftover cataplasm on the dinner plate? On the other hand, maybe a haemorrhoid medication could never be appealing for dinner.

Even by the mid-nineteenth century the onion was hardly a culinary delicacy, if we are to judge from the following opinion:

Great use is made of the onion in the United States; but I do not regard it as a very valuable esculent, except for medicinal purposes. It is somewhat stimulant and heating, as well as diuretic. Dr. Paris says it certainly contains a considerable portion of nourishment; but his manner of expressing his opinion appears to me, to imply doubts of the truth of his own statements. He relates, moreover, from Sir John Sinclair, that a Scotch Highlander, with a few raw onions in his pocket, and a crust of bread or some oatcake, can travel to an almost incredible extent, for two or three days in succession, without any other food. This is not very strange, however. Who could not travel, with crusts of good bread in his pocket, if in sufficient quantity? There is no better food in the world for a person who is to travel violently a few days, than this; but I have yet to learn that the raw onions would add much to the amount of real sustenance. They might serve as a condiment.

Since, however, the onion is much in fashion, it may be well to say that the best method of cooking it is either by boiling or roasting; and the worst by frying. The fried onion, either alone, or with apples, potatoes, or meat, is exceedingly indigestible and unwholesome; and to any but a perverted taste, highly offensive and disgusting. As a medicine, it is sometimes properly used raw.

[The young house-keeper: or, thoughts on food and cookery (Boston, 1839) by W.A. Alcott.]

I admit it. My taste is perverted. I love fried onions.

I do wonder what future readers will think of our current theories of food and disease (“How ridiculous! Back then, they actually thought BUTTER was BAD!”)

As for the ‘exceedingly indigestible and unwholesome’ combination of onions and apples, we have previously come across the very thrifty idea of onion-apple pies – for rough farm-workers of course.

What about this repeated connection of the Scots with onions? It is mentioned again in that very Scottish cookery book by ‘Mistress Margaret Dods’ (aka Christian Isobel Johnstone) - Cook and Housewife’s Manual (1826). The book does actually contain a recipe for roasted onions – to be eaten, not applied.


To Stew And Roast Onions
Scald and peel a dozen middle sized, or two or three Spanish onions. If old and acrid, parboil them, and stew very slowly for nearly an hour in good veal or broth, with white pepper and salt; thicken the sauce with a little white roux or butter kneaded in flour, and dishing the onions in a small hash-dish, pour it over them. A little mushroom catsup may be added or they may be browned. Onions are roasted before the fire in their skins, and served with cold butter and salt. They are in Scotland served with roasted goose or pork, and eaten alone or with roasted potatoes or red or pickled herrings. In the latter case we would recommend mustard as well as butter. Obs. Stewed and roasted onions used to be a favourite supper dish in Scotland, and were reckoned medicinal .The onions were stewed (after parboiling) in a butter sauce to which cream was put, i.e. the Sauce blanche of France.

Quotation for the Day

The onion being eaten, yea though it be boyled, causeth head-ache, hurteth the eyes, and maketh a man dimme sighted, dulleth the senses, ingendreth windinesse, and provoketh overmuch sleepe, especially being eaten raw.
John Gerard (1545-1611)

Cabbage anyone?

When I am onto an interesting source, I do find it hard to move on, as regular readers probably realise (and to be truthful, in busy weeks it helps maintain the commitment to a story a day!) We have had some interesting snippets this last week from the mid-nineteenth century English monthly magazine, The Family Economist. I don’t want to bore you, but I must give you one more recipe from it before I put it (temporarily) aside.

A recipe for Cabbage Jelly caught my eye, while falling well short of tempting my tastebuds, – until I read the recipe properly. I was expecting some awful coagulated construction, such as the jellified coleslaw I gave the recipe for some time ago. But actually, I quite like the idea of this dish – and surely it would be excellent done with red cabbage cooked initially according to ‘the usual method’?

Cabbage-Jelly.
A tasty little dish, and by some persons esteemed more wholesome than cabbage simply boiled. Boil cabbage in the usual way, and squeeze in a colander until perfectly dry. Then chop small; add a little butter, pepper, and salt. Press the whole very closely into an earthenware mould, and bake one hour, either in a side oven or in front of the fire; when done, turn it out.

In another publication of similar vintage, the Working Man’s Friend, and Family Instructor, (London, 1850), I found the following recipe. Perhaps moulded vegetables are the next new/old idea?

Potato Medley.
Boil some potatoes, and mash them. Boil, also separately from the potatoes, any greens you may choose – savoys, turnip-tops, or spinach are the best. Press the water well out of them. Then chop them well up, mix with the mashed potatoes, and season with salt, pepper, and butter. Grease a pudding-mould, or shape, press your mixture well into it, and put it into a hot oven for about ten minutes. If you are careful to preserve the green colour of your spinach or turnip tops – which you may do by putting a small quantity of soda into the water – this will make a very pretty dish. If you have not a pudding-mould, a basin will answer the purpose.
N.B. Cold vegetables may be made into a dish in the same way.


Quotation for the Day.

"If you lived on cabbage, you would not be obliged to flatter the powerful." To which the courtier replied, "If you flattered the powerful, you would not be obliged to live upon cabbage."
Diogenes, ancient Greek philosopher’s advice to a young courtier

Harvest Supper.

There is a lot of discussion these days in the ethical-eating press about our distance from the source of our food – not just the geographical distance (food miles, carbon footprint etc), but also the emotional distance. A huge percentage of folk (maybe most?) have never actually seen an apple still on a tree, or a potato still damply dirty from the ground - never mind a pig being slaughtered to make the breakfast sausages. We pay a huge price for this distance, not the least of which is a lack of reverence and appreciation for the earth’s bounty. It is this which makes us waste at least one fifth of all the food that we purchase.

There is a great loss that we have suffered too, which I have not heard discussed. We no longer participate in, or even know about, the wonderful celebrations and feastings that used to mark many of the important milestones in the food-production year. To lose an opportunity for a community party of thanksgiving is not progress, my friends.

A week or two ago we discussed ‘missing meals’, and now I want to remind you of some of the annual feasts that are missing completely from our civilized calendar. In previous blog posts I have talked about Martinmas (or ‘Split Stomach Day’), St. Thomas’ Day, and Midsummer’s Day.

Today it is the turn of the Harvest Supper (or the Churn or Kern Supper, Mell Supper, Feast of Ingathering, Harvest Home etc) There are regional differences in the use of the names, in some places the feast followed the reaping rather than the ‘ingathering’, and in other places there was a celebration at the end of the sheep-shearing season, but no matter – the idea is the same.

There are many common themes to the harvest supper. It was the time of the year when Master and servant sat down together to feast ‘on terms of perfect equality’. Corn dolls (‘corn’ referring to wheat in early English usage) were made and dressed, and games of ‘guising’ were played. Young men were the usual participants in the ‘guising’. They would dress up in clothes of ‘the gayest motley imaginable’, with masks or blackened faces, and would then ‘force entry’ into the supper hall, claiming ‘the privilege of conquerors’ (which no doubt they hoped included the favours of the young women present.) Any votes to bring back the Harvest Supper?


The man we go to for advice on the harvesting business in the eighteenth century is William Ellis, who wrote The Country Housewife’s Family Companion, in 1750. We have previously heard his thoughts on ‘Victualling Harvest-men in Hertfordshire’, and on the importance of apple pies and pasties as part of that process. There is no doubt that the housewife spent a large part of the year putting by supplies to feed the huge increase in the number of labourers she would have to feed at this time. Ellis discusses in his book the importance of a good housewife furnishing herself with ‘a due Quantity of Suet against Harvest-time’ – the suet being an indispensible ingredient for the puddings expected in great quantity by the harvest workers. He reminds us of the importance of supplying ‘culinary vegetables’ at this time too.

The Benefits of getting Roots, Herbs and other culinary Vegetables against Harvest-Time.
In our Chiltern country of Hertfordshire, several of our prudent housewives foresee the great conveniency of having broad beans, pease, carrots, turnips, potatoes, cabbages, onions, parsley, and other kitchen ware, ready for use against a want of them in harvest-time; for that some of these not only prove a sauce, but also help meat to go the further. And here I think it necessary to inform our country housewife, that she ought to have a bed of grass-onions ready all the summer time for her pot uses, even 'till Allholland-Tide. Now what I mean by grass-onions, are Welch onions; whose green large flaggy stalks will endure cutting many times in a year, and will last ten or twenty or more years, provided the bed is dressed once in three years with soot, ashes, or malt-dust, and not suffer'd to run to seed. This I yearly prove to my great conveniency, as being thus furnish'd with early and late onion-stalks, when roots and stalks of others are not easily had; and for having these onions, its seed may be had at any of the London seed-shops, by asking for a pennyworth or two of Welch onion seed: But I have further to inform my reader, that this is the seed which produces the forward sort of young onions, which are drawn by May-Day to be eat with sallads; therefore this Welch onion seed may be sown for an early drawing of them, as well as for a durable crop to cut in flags. And as for broad beans, they serve, in some measure, as a second sort of meat as well as sauce, and are so necessary to a family in harvest-time, that that gentleman, yeoman, or farmer, who does not provide a sufficient crop of them against such an occasion, is very much wanting to his own interest; for it is this most cheap and serviceable vegetable which allays thirst, and so relishes fat bacon, or salt pork, that the men often eat it with a good stomach, to the saving of much expence in the consumption of beef and other meat; it is easy of carriage to the field, will keep hot some time, and prove a very wholesome nourishing eatable. Pease also are valuable, as a change of satiating diet, and are cooling and pleasant to the taste. In the harvest of 1748, as well as in former harvests, I fed my harvest men almost every other day with bacon and beans, or pickled pork and beans. Carrots, turnips, cabbage, and potatoes, are also good kitchen provision to be eaten with salt or fresh meat. Onions, sallary, leeks, parsley, thyme, and savory, are also necessary in harvest-time, because with these our country housewife cooks up her lean orts of beef, her pieces of bacon or pork, her offald cold turnips, carrots, cabbage, or potatoes. And if the meat is a little tainted, yet by her skillful management in the use of some of these roots and herbs, she may recover such meat, by causing it to be hashed or minced according to the art of good housewifery.


How to make Hertfordshire Cakes, Nuts, and Pincushions.
These are much used in Hertfordshire, for giving farmers servants a changeable dinner now and then to their satisfaction; for if they are made as they should be, the men are generally fond of them. To do which, our housewife puts skim milk and hogs-lard over the fire, and warms them only for mixing. Then she takes some flour, sugar, yeast, and an egg or two, with the powder of Jamaica spice, and makes a paste of these and the milk and fat, as if for pye-crust; and when it is work'd and rolled enough, to the thinness of about a quarter of an inch, she cuts it out in two-inch square pieces, and boils them in hogs-lard in a little kettle, or in a stew-pan or frying-pan. Others roll up this paste in the shape of walnuts, and dress them in the same manner the square pieces are.--N. B. No fat is so good for this as hogs-lard, because the lard hollows the cushions or nuts, and makes them look whiter than any other fat does; though some for want of this make them with dripping, &c.


Quotation for the Day.

Care less for your harvest than how it is shared and your life will have meaning and your heart will have peace.
Kent Nerburn.

Queer Vegetables.

I almost gave this post the header ‘Queer Gear’, as in the title of one of today’s sources – Queer Gear: How to Buy and Cook Exotic Fruit and Vegetables, (1986) by Carolyn Heal and Michael Allsop, but I thought perhaps it might attract some disappointed readers. It is a strange title, I think, considering that the word ‘queer’ was already well and truly hijacked by, or applied to, the gay community by the 1980’s. Actually it was applied in the early part of the nineteenth century, in a derogatory sense – by the 1980’s it had all but lost its negative implications and in some circles was an adjective of pride.

The authors of the book clearly meant ‘queer’ as in one of its sixteenth century definitions as referring to something strange or exotic. I am not sure how they selected the vegetables and fruits for inclusion. ‘Exotic’ clearly depends on location: I guess mangoes and custard apples might have been ‘exotic’ in England in the 1980’s, but figs and horseradish and garlic – I don’t think so.

I do like discovering previously unknown foods, and re-discovering forgotten ones. Previous stories have covered crosnes, salsify and scorzonera, and mangelwurzels, but there must surely be many more delights skulking in the culinary history wings.

There was nothing particularly tempting to be found in Queer Gear, but it set me on the trail of looking for other sources on forgotten vegetables. I found (in the wonderful Internet Archive) The Book of Rarer Vegetables (1906) – which is surely a far less provocative title. Aubergine and artichokes may have been rare-ish in Edwardian England, but why include dandelion and horseradish? I was temporarily waylaid by Couve Tronchuda, but it turns out to be sea-kale. Eventually I selected for your delectation Scolymus and Sweet Cicely.

Scolymus

“I have seen this plant grown in this country under the name of GoldenThistle — doubtless that appellation applied to its golden coloured flower heads. These are large, and the growths attain a height of 3 feet. The genus is a small one. There are three species, and the variety, Hispanicus, or the Spanish, is the form grown as a vegetable; it is often known as the vegetable Oyster plant, as the flavour of the roots is supposed, somewhat to resemble oysters. On the continent, especially in Spain, the roots are cultivated in the same way as the Scorzonera, and are considered to be quite as good. The leaves and stalks of the plants are also eaten as Cardoons by the people of Salamanca, but they should be well grown to be equal to the Cardoon. The flowers also are used for various purposes, one being for the adulteration of Saffron.”

The author then goes on to give planting and cultivation advice for scolymus, which is way beyond the scope of this blog. The cookery advice is a little weak, the author merely suggesting that it cooks like salsify – then referring the reader to a book on asparagus.

Sweet Cicely

Sweet Cicely (Scandix odorata) is a plant rarely seen in gardens at the present day, but well worth culture. It is valuable in all preparations in which the flavour of Aniseed is required. By many persons the smell is objected to; as both the leaves and other portions of the plant smell so strongly of the above herb, it is disliked. It is much more cultivated in France and other portions of the continent than in this country, and, of course, from the market point of view it cannot be termed a profitable vegetable. The leaves are mostly used mixed with salads, and the roots also are edible, these being used in soups and with cooked meats.

Again, the author follows with good gardening advice, and minimalist cooking advice – it being merely suggested that sweet cicely roots be prepared exactly as chervil.

Thankfully, he does have some more definitive advice on the cooking of chervil.


To Boil Chervil

Wash and brush the roots, but do not cut them. Place them in a pan, pour over them sufficient boiling water to cover them, and let them simmer for about an hour and a half.

To Fry Chervil

Cook the roots as above for about an hour, then cut into long shreds and fry in butter.

Quotation for the Day.

A vegetable garden in the beginning looks so promising and then after all little by little it grows nothing but vegetables, nothing but vegetables.
Gertrude Stein.

Vouching for Lunch.

On this day in 1955, luncheon vouchers were introduced to Britain on a new, enlarged scale. The concept of employers providing lunch for their workers was not new in Britain, and many companies did provide their employees with vouchers, but the individual systems were an administrative nightmare for individual firms to manage.

A man called John Hack saw this inefficient system in operation, and realised an opportunity. He set up a company to provide vouchers and manage the system for employers, with clients and caterers paying a fee for the service. The British government backed the system by exempting the vouchers from National Insurance Contributions and tax concessions – and the rest, as they say, is culinary history.

Here is a nice 1950’s luncheon dish, from The Times of August 13, 1956.

Spinach Cream with Mushrooms.
(The Constance Spry Cookery Book)
Boil two pounds of spinach, drain and press well. Sieve. Have ready half a pint of béchamel sauce made from one ounce each of flour and butter and half a pint of seasoned milk. Add the spinach purée, mixing thoroughly. Stir in two beaten eggs and a tablespoonful of cream, season with salt and pepper and a grating of nutmeg. Turn into a well-buttered ring mould. Stand in a roasting-tin on a doubled piece of paper, surround with boiling water, lay a piece of buttered paper over the top and cook in a moderately slow oven until firm to the touch, 30-40 minutes. Turn out onto a hot dish and fill the centre with a salpicon of mushrooms.


Salpicon of Mushrooms.
Cook a dessertspoonful of finely chopped onion in three-quarters of an ounce of butter for a minute or two, add 6-8 ounces of mushrooms, peeled and quartered, and cook briskly for 4-5 minutes, shaking the pan frequently and adding a squeeze of lemon juice. Draw aside, mix in a dessertspoonful of flour, three-quarters of a gill of vegetable stock, and half a gill of sherry. Bring to the boil, season well and boil rapidly until creamy; use at once.
Be sure that the spinach purée is thick. If it is watery the ring will flop and run when it is turned out. The spinach will sieve more easily if the stalks and any coarse leaves are torn off the central rib before cooking.


Quotation for the Day.

Time is an illusion, lunchtime doubly so.
Douglas Adams.

Queues in the Kitchen.

Yesterday’s story on the bespoke mutton and pudding which came complete with micro-livestock and a few hairs - courtesy of the lice-ridden kitchen boy - reminded me of an interesting example of entrepreneurial activity from the past. The article is from Popular Mechanics, in February 1921, and in this case, hair is a positive benefit in the kitchen.

Buy Chinese Queues to Make Hair Filters for Soup.

Because long-strand human hair makes an almost ideal filter for straining soup, and other liquid foods, in preparation for canning, a certain manufacturer is reported to have bought recently some $800,000 worth of Chinese queues. These will be used in place of the goat-hair filters formerly employed because of their comparative cheapness. Human hair for various purposes has long been an article of Chinese export, but when the wearing of “pigtails” went out of fashion in the celestial land several years ago, an enormous supply of the material was created. The enterprising buyer was able to obtain for his money a total of 2,450,000 of the long plaits, comprising a load for about 28 freight cars.

I cannot imagine the work involved in making a sieve from hair!

One of the other old methods of making a very clear broth or fine puree in the old days was to strain it through a bolt of fabric – another laborious job, which must have created an enormous pile of difficult laundry. Thank heavens for blenders and food processors, I say!

Here is a recipe for celery soup which specifies a hair sieve. It is from The Cook’s Own Book, by Mrs. N.K.M.Lee (‘A Boston Housekeeper’).


CELERY SOUP.
Split half a dozen heads of celery into slips about two inches long; wash them well; lay them on a hair sieve to drain, and put them into three quarts of clear gravy soup in a gallon soup-pot; set it by the side of the fire to stew very gently till the celery is tender; this will take about an hour. If any scum rises take it off; season with a little salt.
Obs.- When celery cannot be procured, half a drachm of the seed, pounded fine, which may be considered as the essence of celery, put in a quarter of an hour before the soup is done, and a little sugar will give as much flavor to half a gallon of soup as two heads of celery weighing seven ounces or add a little essence of celery.

Quotation for the Day.

Do not arouse disdainful mind when you prepare a broth of wild grasses; do not arouse joyful mind when you prepare a fine cream soup.
Dogen (Japanese 13th C Buddhist monk and philosopher)

Thanksgiving Food: Sweet Potato.

I love sweet potatoes. Although I have no objection to gilding the occasional lily, I do not, however, love the idea of mixing them with marshmallows. I have heard rumour that this is what happens in some households at Thanksgiving. I will try to reserve final judgement until I actually face this dish across a Thanksgiving table one day.

How did this idea of sweetening the sweet potato come about? And when? I have come across a 1913 reference to topping pumpkin pie with marshmallows and briefly returning it to the oven – a not particularly shocking idea. The first mention of sweet potatoes with marshmallows (in a side dish) that I have found so far is from 1917, in the Lowell Sun. Here it is:

Scalloped Sweet Potatoes.
Slice boiled sweet potatoes and place in buttered baking dish with layers of brown sugar dotted with butter between layers of potatoes. Cover the top with 2 tablespoonfuls of cream, dots of butter, and bake until brown. A few minutes before serving cover the top with a layer of marshmallows and return to the oven to brown.

Was the precedent for the sweetening-the-sweet potato idea this ‘candy’, mentioned in The Cedar Rapid Times, of February, 1889?

"The candied sweet potato is a Philadelphia confectionery. It is nothing but sweet potatoes carefully boiled and quartered, then candied in boiling syrup, but it is said to be dainty and tender and of a delicious flavor".

Here, to assist you to digest the idea, I give you a random selection of recipes for sweetening the sweet potatoes at your Thanksgiving dinner.

From the New York Times of November 24, 1895:

Glazed Sweet Potato.
Boil the potatoes for fifty or sixty minutes, then peel and cut in two lengthwise; season them with salt, spread a little butter over them, dust lightly with sugar, and bake in a hot oven fifteen or twenty minutes.

From the New Oxford Item (New Oxford, Pennyslvania) of October 22, 1908, an elegant version with maple syrup (maple syrup: a difficult addiction for me to maintain, at this distance of half the world’s girth, but I try.)

Candied Sweet Potato Balls.
With a French cutter, scoop balls from raw sweet potatoes; the potatoes should first be neatly pared. For a pint of balls melt one-fourth a cup of butter in a casserole, add one fourth a cup of maple syrup or sugar, and when very hot put in the balls and shake them over the fire until quite hot, then cover and let cook in the oven till tender. Baste frequently with the liquid in the dish; add salt before the cooking is complete.

The bacon drippings notwithstanding, the following recipe is intended to be a dessert, is it not? From the Cumberland Evening Times, September 26, 1919:

Marshmallow Sweets.
1 pint of boiled and mashed sweet potatoes, 1 tablespoonful sugar, ½ cupful chopped nuts, 1 tablespoonful bacon drippings, ½ [?] teaspoonful ground cinnamon,1 dozen fresh marshmallows.
Beat the mashed sweet potatoes and fat until very light, adding the spice and sugar slowly. Put one layer of the potatoes into a buttered baking dish. Beat the nuts into the remaining potato, and top with marshmallows, and cover the baking dish.Bake for ten minutes. Remove cover and brown. Serve very hot.

The following two recipes, are, to me, extreme variations on the theme.

From a 1940’s advertisement for Parkay Margarine

Candied Sweet Potato Casserole.
1 20 oz can pineapple chunks
3 17 oz cans whole sweet potatoes, drained
¾ cup packed brown sugar
½ cup PARKAY margarine
¾ teaspoon cinnamon
¼ teaspoon ground cloves

Drain pineapple, reserving ¼ cup liquid. Cut potatoes in half lengthwise. Combine potatoes and pineapple. Spoon into 12 x 8-inch baking dish. Combine reserved liquid, sugar, margarine and spices in saucepan. Bring to boil over medium heat, stirring frequently. Reduce heat, simmer 5 minutes, stirring frequently. Pour over potato mixture. Bake at 350 deg. 25 minutes.
10-12 servings.

From Ebony magazine, December 1971.

Baked Sweet Potatoes & Bananas.
Boil 6 medium sweet potatoes, peel, slice in ¾ in. thick slices. Slice 3 banans, crumb 15 to 20 gingersnaps. Butter casserole, fill with alternate layers potatoes, bananas, gingersnap crumbs. Heat ½ c. butter, add ½ tsp. slat, 2 tbls. lemon juice, 1 c. boiling water. Pour over casserole. Bake covered 20 min. in 400 deg. oven. Uncover, brown about 15 mins.

Quotation for the Day.

Heap high the board with plenteous cheer and gather to the feast,
And toast the sturdy Pilgrim band whose courage never ceased.
Alice W. Brotherton

Thanksgiving Food: Succotash.

I decided a little while ago to focus this week on some traditional Thanksgiving foods. This is probably presumptuous of me. I reside in the opposite half of the world, and have never attended a Thanksgiving dinner. It is however, impossible not to be aware – even at a distance of half the world’s girth – that the Big Cooking Day approacheth.
Presumptuous or not, I am going to do it. It will blend nicely with previously presumptuous posts on Thanksgiving menus and Thanksgiving pies – for which you will find links below.

Many of the historic menus for Thanksgiving dinners that are in my collection (vicarious Thanksgiving-dinnering is what I do), include succotash. This dish is a mystery outside of the USA – understandably because the name derives from an Algonquin (Naragansett) word msíckquatash. Originally this referred to boiled corn, although as we will see, the name now generally applies to a dish containing a mixture of corn and beans. It is said that the earliest settlers were shown how to make this by the Indians, which is why, I assume, it has a place at the traditional Thanksgiving table.

I give you a selection of recipes from across a century and a half, to show how very varied this dish can be in spite of its apparently simple basic ingredients. Or perhaps it will show how the recipe has evolved, improved, or degenerated over time. You be the judge.

First, a recipe from The Republican Compiler (Gettyburg, Pennsylvania), of September 12, 1853.

To Make Succotash.
Take one dozen ears of sweet corn, cut off the kernels, boil the cobs in three pints of water: wash one quart of Lima, or other fresh-shelled beans; and put them in the water with the cobs; scald one pound of salt pork, and add it to the beans and cobs, let the whole boil together three quarters of an hour, then take out the cobs, add the kernels of corn previously cut from them, and let the kernels, the beans, and the pork boil together fifteen minutes; when done, there should remain water only sufficient to keep them from burning, in the pot; serve the pork on a flat, and the succotash in a deep dish.
Succotash is a favorite dish in New England; some prefer it without the salt pork, in that case, butter and salt must be added when the succotash is dished.

Here is a pork-less recipe from the New York Times of August 3, 1879.

Rhode Island Succotash.
Good succotash wants tender young corn. Have a dozen ears, and remove with a sharp knife the kernels. If your corn is tough, do not cut too close to the cob. String a quart of young beans, and cut them in three. Boil the beans with the corn, in half a pint of water. Boil for quite three-quarters of an hour. When cooked, cover closely, add a piece of butter, a teaspoonful of salt, and some pepper. If cream is obtainable, add half a pint at the conclusion.

The well-known cookery book writer Juliet Corson’s Miss Corson's Practical American Cookery and Household Management (New York, 1886) gives three versions of succotash. Here is her version using dried corn and beans.

Succotash of Dried Corn and Beans
Pick over a pint each of dried sweet corn and small white dried beans, and soak them over night in separate bowls of water, putting the water upon the vegetables while it is warm; the next morning wash a pound of salt pork in cold water, put it over the fire in two quarts of cold water, with the beans, and boil it slowly for an hour; then add the corn, and continue the boiling until both vegetables are tender; when the vegetables are tender, take out the pork to serve with the succotash, and put it on a separate dish; drain off nearly all the water from the vegetables; add a tablespoonful each of butter and sugar, milk enough to cover them, and a palatable seasoning of salt and pepper; heat the succotash, and then serve it with the pork.

Canned corn and beans were easier, of course:

From the New York Times of November 24, 1895:

Succotash: Mix equal quantities of canned corn and Lima beans; heat carefully, adding cream, butter, sugar, and salt to taste: although by no means the same dish as made by our Plymouth “foremothers”, it will be found an excellent substitute.

And finally, a ‘recipe’ which is perhaps closer to its roots:

Succotash.
The delicacy of the year was the far-famed succotash, made by scraping the milky kernels from the ears, mingling them with little round beans, which had now come to be domesticated, and with bits of fresh meat, the whole being seasoned with salt, thickened with sunflower-seeds, suthl'-to-k'ia, or piñon-nut meal, and boiled until reduced to an almost homogeneous stew.
Zuni Breadstuff . Frank Hamilton Cushing. 1920

Postscript:
Last year the blog focus was on Thanksgiving pies – five varieties in all. You can find them here, here, here, here, and here.

Quotation for the Day.

An optimist is a person who starts a new diet on Thanksgiving Day.
Irv Kupcinet

Corn Bread to Help the Allies.

Breakfast has been the subject of the last two posts, and as it is an intriguing (and inexhaustible) topic, I am of a mind to continue with it for perhaps a few more days.

In both World Wars, wheat conservation was a huge issue. There were several reasons, not the least of which was that every available ship was required to transport troops, not agricultural products. There was also a strong belief that what wheat was available should be fairly distributed amongst the Allies.

In the USA, the obvious substitute was corn. A large part of the responsibility of saving wheat and using corn or other substitutes obviously fell to the housewives of the times, and large amounts of newspaper space were given over to exhortations to acts of housewifely patriotism in this regard.

The New York Produce Exchange ran a "Corn Bread for Breakfast Until the End of the War” campaign during WW I “as a practical method of increasing the supply of wheat available for the Allies.”A New York Times article in June 1917 reported on the official statement from the Exchange under the header “Corn Bread to Help Allies”. In part it read:

“Eating corn bread for breakfast may not - on the face of it – appear to be either an act of sacrifice or service contributory to winning the war. It is, however, a very definite and effective form of service to that end, and if the propaganda can be spread far enough to enlist the co-operation of a great mass of the people, it will help mightily to solve the crushing problem which is now facing the Food Administrator of the United States.
If there could be a complete substitution of corn and other cereal products for wheat bread on the breakfast table of the nation, it would increase our exportable surplus of wheat by 150,000,000 bushels. This sould solve the immediate problem of wheat for our Allies.
We suggest that special efforts be made to enlist the patriotic women of the country for the idea, and its house to house promulgation.”
… We urge that each one adopt the habit in his own household, and that he begin today.”

Now, we have had stories before on the “wheatless” days of WW I, and we have certainly had several recipes for cornbread and muffins, corn puffs, and other corn concoctions such as Johnny Cakes. Here is an alternative corn dish that would be perfect as a bread substitute at breakfast, from Meatless and Wheatless Days(New York, 1918)

Belgian Corn Fritters.
1 ½ cups flour
1 tablespoon baking powder
1 teaspoon salt
¼ cup sugar
¾ cup milk
2 egg yolks
Corn scraped from 2 ears cooked green corn.
1 teaspoon melted fat
2 stiffly beaten egg whites.
Mix and sift the flour, baking powder, salt, and sugar; add the corn, milk, egg yolks, and melted fat slowly, stirring constantly. Fold in the stiffly beaten egg whites. Cook like pancakes on a hot greased griddle, turning until a golden brown on both sides. A piece of bacon or pork rind may be used for greasing the griddle.


Quotation for the Day.

We breakfast at seven on beef, potatoes, tea, coffee, new bread, and butter.
Isabella L. Bird, A Lady’s Life in the Rocky Mountains.

Keeping the Toaster Shiny.

When did being “time-poor” in the kitchen become an issue (or an explanation, or an excuse, or a justification ….) ? We are used to exhortations to domestic economy. Cookbooks from every era and every culture have preached the doctrine of saving expense – or at the very least, the avoidance of waste. Waste, even in good times in wealthy households, has generally been viewed – at least in theory – as a sinful thing. Somehow in very modern times we have moved well away from this idea: there is plenty of evidence that in developed countries, up to a fifth of purchased food is thrown away – a situation that would have been unthinkeable until …. when?

But to return to my first question – when did saving time in the kitchen become an issue, and why? We feel - and are regularly told - that we have hectic lives and too much to do, and are too busy and too stressed. But we have – at least in theory – a legislated 8 hour working day only five days a week (an unbelievably lazy working life, historically); we have labour-saving devices in our homes; we can get to work in a blink of an eye, relatively speaking. Most of us would certainly feel that we did not have time for the following little domestic chore, described in a 1930’s American newspaper.

“Every toaster should have its little long-handled brush with which to sweep out the crumbs that accumulate after each use. It is a sign of good housekeeping to find the toaster always as shiny as a new dime, with no burnt-on crumbs, butter stains or finger marks.”

Oddly, this same newspaper page also had a column of ideas and recipes for “Half Hour Meals”. Perhaps the time saved was intended to be used to polish the toaster in time for breakfast. The newspaper was the Middletown Times Herald (of Middletown, NY) of May 28, 1936, and the helpful section called Modern Home News was “Conducted for this newspaper in the interest of its women readers by recognized authorities on all phases of home making.”

Here is one of the suggested menus for “a substantial though quick dinner”:

… starting off with a tomato juice cocktail; then broiled beef patties, fried potatoes (which have been cooked in the morning); asparagus, butter sauce, fruited gelatin (also prepared in the morning). Asparagus should be cleaned in the morning, folded in a wet cloth, and put into the ice-box. When preparing the dinner, start the water for boiliing asparagus first; then slice or dice the potatoes and broil the patties.

This is a bit of a cheat, I think, as the half-hour does not include the morning preparation.

I must return to this time-poor in the kitchen approach sometime soon. In the meanwhile, from the same page of the newspaper, from an article headed Vegetables In Spring Attire, we have the following recipe to encourage Dad and Junior to enjoy their vegetables.


Scalloped Cabbage.
Wash and cut into sections a young cabbage. Boil in salted water until tender. Chop very fine (leftover cabbage may be used to advantage.) Add one egg, well beaten; three fourth cup milk; one tablespoon finely chopped broiled bacon. Season to taste with salt and pepper. Put a layer of cabbage in the baking dish; sprinkle grated sharp cheese over the mixture, then another layer of cabbage. Continue until baking dish is filled. Cover top with buttered bread crumbs, sprinkle with cheese and bake for thirty minutes in a moderate oven of 350 degrees F.


Quotation for the Day.
Cabbage as a food has problems. It is easy to grow, a useful source of greenery for much of the year. Yet as a vegetable it has original sin, and needs improvement. It can smell foul in the pot, linger through the house with pertinacity, and ruin a meal with its wet flab. Cabbage also has a nasty history of being good for you.”
Jane Grigson (1928-1990)

"To make meat of parsley."

I have mixed feelings about parsley. It has a very long and extensive history as both a culinary and medicinal herb – for which I admire it enormously. Its reputation has, however, been sullied, I believe, by its modern use as the lazy cook’s generic green sprinkle over anything and everything – a ploy which leaves me saddened and disappointed.

I happen to like parsley, myself, although don’t use it much in cooking as I am married to a parsley-hater. The parsley-hater hates the green leafy bits – but I don’t believe either he or I have ever eaten parsley root - so methinks, if I can source some, I will try it out on both of us.

The whole of the parsley plant is edible, but at least one cultivar is grown specifically for its thicker root. This type is used enthusiastically in many parts of Central and Eastern Europe, which accounts for some of its common names of Hamburg parsley, Dutch parsley, Rock Parsley, Rock Selinen, Turnip-rooted parsley, Parsnip-rooted parsley, Padrushka, and Heimischer. I understand that parsley root looks similar to parsnip (to which it is related), but tastes quite different. It is used in the same way as parsnip and other root vegetables, which means it comes into its own in stews and soups, and would presumably be sweetly delicious when roasted.

I give you a recipe for parsley root taken from Epulario, or, The Italian Banquet (the English translation of 1598). Note that ‘meat’ does not imply a vegetarian recipe, but the word is used in the old sense of ‘meat’ simply meaning ‘food’.


To make meat of parsley
Take Parsely rootes, and pull out the string or pith which is within them, and make them very clean, and boile them very well in flesh broth with Pepper and saffaron, this may likewise be done with oile.

Quotation for the Day.

Parsley is gharsley.
Ogden Nash (1902-71)

Peasecods, How to Use.

We are back for a final visit to Gawthorpe House in the Elizabethan era, and today we are going to sample peasecods.

Peasecods (peas-in-pods, or pea-shucks, or pea-pods) are mentioned several times in the household manual of the Shuttleworth family. The idea of eating pea-pods seems to have been found, lost, and found again over the centuries. Certainly when I was growing up in the North of England in the 1950’s I have no recollection at all of anything resembling “snow peas”, although I do seem to remember hearing references to “pea pod wine”.

There are recipes for “pescoddes” in several medieval cookbookd, but they are actually for small marrow-filled pastries that resemble peas in a pod. The small hard field peas that provide us with the dried peas (or pease) that we use for pea soup would hardly have been appetising to eat whole and fresh. When “garden peas” were developed by clever horticulturalists in the seventeenth century, the well-to-do went wild for them, as we have seen in a previous story. The French seemed to have maintained an early monopoly on the idea of eating them whole, if we are to believe the fine scholar and author Peter Lund Simmonds, who wrote in 1862


“We do not cook our peas in the pod, or eat the pods as they do in France … supplied to milch-cows in the metropolis during the season … the pea-shells have been recommended as a paper material and they have been used for distilling from in France.”

And perhaps the French were even first to use them to make alcohol. The English Farmer’s Magazine of 1858 says:

“The French are even utilizing their pea-shucks: they have discovered, so it is said, that pea-pods yield alcohol as abundantly as the beet-root, or pumpkin.”

Meanwhile, as the wealthy nibbled at peas in the pod, the peasants continued to use the hard dry pease in a number of ways:

Oatmeal and Pease Bread.
To a peck of pease flour, and a like quantity of oatmeal, previously well mixed, by passing the two flours through a sieve, add three or four ounces of salt; knead into a stiff mass with warm water ; roll out into thin cakes ; and bake in an oven. In some parts of Lancashire and Scotland, this kind of bread is made into flattened rolls, and they are usually baked in an iron pot.
The complete confectioner, pastry-cook, and baker, by Eleanor Parkinson, 1844

And Pea soup is still a winner: if you want to value-add to your pea soup, add pea soup flavouring.

Pea Powder
Pound together in a marble mortar half an ounce each of dried mint and sage, a dram of celery seed, and a quarter of a dram of cayenne, and rub them through a fine sieve. This gives a very savoury relish to pea soup and to water gruel. A dram of allspice, or black pepper, may be pounded with the above, as an addition, or instead of the cayenne.
The cook and housekeeper's complete and universal dictionary, by Mary Eaton, 1822

Quotation for the Day.

"To eat, to love, to sing, and to digest; in truth, these are the four acts in this opéra bouffe that we call life, and which vanishes like the bubbles in a bottle of champagne."
Gioacchino Rossini (1792-1868)

In Praise of Pumpkins, Part 2.

As promised last week, in honour of History Week in Queensland, today I give you a few more ideas for pumpkins.

As you know, the humble pumpkin has one very important function above and beyond the purely culinary – it is essential for the proper manufacture of Halloween lanterns. You may not be aware of another role in another scary situation. The pumpkin is, according to an article in the Brisbane Courier of April 17, 1891, useful for distracting sharks away from happy picnickers.

“Here is a hint for Inspector Fison and his white shark pets in Moreton Bay. One day last week there was a picnic down Sydney harbour (says the Evening News). One of the guests, M. Bonifacio Zurbano, of George-street, seeing a number of sharks about a boat, in which were a number of the picnickers, conceived a very happy idea, and one, we venture to say, unequalled in the annals of shark stories. Mr. Zurbano roasted a large pumpkin until it was thoroughly done. He then threw is near to a large shark, who took it down at one full gulp. Things were quiet for a minute or two when the shark commenced jumping out of the water to a height of 6 ft. or 7 ft., now rushing this way, now that, and lashing the sea into foam. What ultimately became of the fish is not known, but one can guess that in future, if it has survived the vegetable pill, it will, however hungry, draw the line at baked pumpkin.”

To settle your nerves after that idea, and at the particular request of reader Alf, I now give you Pumpkin Scones which are very popular here in Queensland. They are the default scones, actually, in spite of their association with one of our previous Premiers (or rather, his wife … This is not the place for political commentary, so I wont give any.)

The recipe is from a little book intended to assist the teaching of “plain cookery to school girls”, called Simple Cookery. It was published by The Department of Public Instruction in Queensland, in (I think) the 1940’s.


Pumpkin Scones.
Materials: 1 ½ cups flour; ½ cup mashed pumpkin; 1 teaspoon cream of tartar; ½ teaspoon soda; ½ teaspoon salt; 1 dessertspoon sugar; 1 egg; 1 tablespoon butter; ½ cup milk.
Utensils: Bowl, wooden spoon, cutter, baking dish, knife.
Method:
1. Cream butter and sugar; add mashed pumpkin, egg, and milk.
2. Sift in flour mixed with cream of tartar, soda, and salt.
3. Turn onto a floured board; knead lightly; press out flat, and cut into scones.
4. Bake in quick oven 15 to 20 minutes.

And because I want to extend your opinion of the culinary potential of this vegetable that is botanically a fruit, I give you this interesting idea from the Canberra Times, in 1931


Pumpkin Pickle.
This pickle is ready to eat 24 hours after it is made. Peel and seed about 5 lb pumpkin. Cut the pulp in pieces about 3 in. long and 1 in. wide. Steam till tender. In the meantime, put one quart vinegar into a saucepan with one pint water, 2 lb. sugar, one tablespoonful salt, and four sticks cinnamon, broken in small pieces. Bring to the boil. Drain the pumpkin, put into small jars and fill up with boiling vinegar.


Quotation for the Day.

It will be a great day when our schools have all the money they need, and our air force has to have a bake-sale to buy a bomber.
Robert Fulghum.

Take one thousand beans ....

I had numerous (admittedly vague) ideas for the one-thousandth post at The Old Foodie but the event has been eclipsed by the even more momentous birth of my grandson five weeks early. I am no longer certain what those ideas were, but I seem to remember they involved a lot of recipes inspired by the word “thousand”, to be enjoyed in a giant cyber-celebration with all my loyal readers, and the requisite number of bottles of champagne.

My time being somewhat fragmented right now (and perhaps for the next couple of weeks), the party will be cut short – although hopefully the champagne will flow freely – and you must do what you will yourselves with the following ideas.

First, the vegetables:

Here is an interesting idea: I had never heard of this plant until I came across the following recipe, from A Shilling Cookery for the People, by Alexis Soyer, 1855

Plant Called The Thousand Heads.

On seeing this plant growing in great abundance in Yorkshire, I inquired of the farmer on whose land they were—if they were a vegetable for the table, and their name ? when he informed me that they were intended for spring feeding for sheep, during the lambing season; that he never used them as human food. I asked him to let me have some to try and see how they eat. He did, and I cooked them like greens; and an exceeding nice vegetable they are. They are also good stewed, and cooked with a piece of bacon. As they grow at a time of the year when other green vegetables are scarce, I consider them a valuable article of food. They are sown about April, the small plant put out about October, and planted about three feet apart, and by March or April the whole field will be one luxuriant crop of greens.
Farmers in the vicinity of large towns would do well to undertake their cultivation, as they would find a ready sale in all such places. At that time of year they are in full bloom, and are called by the above singular name in consequence of the thousands of heads continually sprouting from their root. The plant covers nearly one yard in circumference, and bears no resemblance to any other green I recollect seeing, not even to Brussels sprouts.

Now, I don’t know about you, but I am disinclined to count the number of individual beans required for a dish:

The Dutch Method of preserving French Beans.

Take a thousand French beans, when in full season, cut them slanting, and as thin as possible ; then procure a stone jar sufficient to contain them ; in which deposit alternately a layer of beans, and then of common table salt, observing that the proportion of salt must be, for every thousand of beans, about four pounds. When the jar is full, let it stand to the following day, and then press them down well till the water overflows, and the harder they are pressed the better. Cover them with a cloth within the jar, tight down upon the beans, over which place a trencher the size of the inside of the jar, and then a heavy weight on the top. It will be proper now and then to take off the cloth and wash it clean, when it must be put on again, as before-mentioned. By these means the beans may be preserved for a considerable time. When dressed, let the quantity chosen be steeped the night before in cold water. In the morning they must be well washed in two or three fresh waters, and put into boiling water, letting them boil hard till they become tender, for which half an houf will be sufficient. Take them off the fire, and stew them with a little butter, when they will be fit for the table.
The London art of cookery and domestic housekeeper's complete assistant, by John Farley, 1811

But a thousand beans is nothing compared to a thousand-weight of pork (although I have no idea what this really means – this is your homework for the week.)

To Cure Bacon.

To one thousand weight of pork, put one bushel of fine salt, one pound and a half of saltpetre rolled fine and mixed with the salt; rub this on the meat and pack it away in a tight hogshead; let it lay for six weeks, then hang it up and smoke it with hickory wood, every day for two weeks, and afterwards two or three times a week for a month; then take it down and rub it all over, with hicko.ry ashes, which is an effectual remedy against the fly or skipper. When the weather is unusually warm at the time of salting your pork, more care is requisite to preserve it from taint. When it is cut up, if it seems warm, lay it on boards, or on the bare ground, till it is sufficiently cool for salting; examine the meat tubs or casks frequently, and if there is an appearance of mould, strew salt over; if the weather has been very warm after packing, and on examining, you should find evidence of its spoiling, lose no time in unpacking the meat; for a hogshead of hams and shoulders that are in this state, have six pounds of brown sugar, three pounds of salaeratus, mixed with half a bushel of salt; rub each piece with this, and as you pack it in the hogshead, (which should be well washed and cleaned,) sprinkle a little coarse salt over each layer of pork, and also' on the bottom of the hogshead. I have known this plan to save a large quantity of pork, that would have been unfit for use, if it had not been discovered and attended to in time. Some persons use crushed charcoal to purify their meat. Shoulders are more easily affected than hams, and if the weather is warm the ribs should be cut out of the shoulders. Jowls also require particular care; black pepper, about a pound to a hogshead, sprinkled on the meat before it is hung up to smoke, is valuable as a preventive where flies are troublesome; have a large pepper-box kept for the purpose, and dust every part that is exposed; pepper is also good to put on beef before it is hung up to dry; wash it off before cooking, and it does not injure the flavor.
Domestic cookery, useful receipts, and hints to young housekeepers by Elizabeth E. Lea, 1859

And of course no celebration is complete without dessert. I give you millefeuille (“thousand leaves”)

A Pyramid Of Paste, Or Mille Feuilles.

For this purpose a set of tin paste cutters is required, oval, octagon, diamond, scalloped, or any other form; the largest nine or ten inches, and from that size down to an inch or less. Roll out puff paste half an inch thick and cut out with as many sizes as you want, beginning with the smallest. Bake them on a tin or sheet of paper* laid on a haking plate; the top may he done over with yolk of egg heibre baking, or iced when nearly done; bake them of a light brown colour. Have a dish to fit the largest, and when cold spread on it a layer of one kind of jam, then another sheet of paste, then another kind of jam, and surmount the top with a caramel or ornament, see Chap. xiii. The order of the jam should be so as to display a variety of colours; either by contrast, the darkest and lightest next to each other, or in shades from the darkest to the lightest, as damson, gooseberry, raspberry, or red currant, strawberry, apricot, greengage, or white egg plum.
The housekeeper's guide, by Esther Copley, 1838

Looking forward to being with you all for the next one thousand!