Chip Butties and Parmentier Sandwiches.

As many of you know, I love old words - especially old regional food words. I had a sudden realization the other day that I have never shared my favourite old regional food word with you. I don’t know how it happened, but it did. Today I want to make up the deficit.

The word is butty.  As far as I can make out, in the late nineteenth century the word rsimply referred to a piece of bread and butter. Before too long – and certainly by the time I grew up in the North of England – the word was usually qualified to indicate the chosen spread or filling,  so you could have, for example, a treacle butty or a jam butty or a bacon butty. In other words, a butty was a sandwich. Not one of your unfulfilling fancy-pants sandwiches made with thinly sliced white bread cut into triangles, but a rustic, filling snack, hastily made and thickly comforting. Not cut, even, but the bread just folded over the filling.

Jam and bacon butties are pretty good, but the quintessential butty is a chip butty. A chip is known elsewhere in the non-butty-eating parts of the world as a French fry, but  ‘French Fry Butty’ does not sound right, no matter where you eat it. A cousin of the chip butty is the crisp butty, crisps being ultra-thin packetted potato snacks known in the non-buttty-eating parts of the world as chips. Confusing, isn’t it?

Anyway, if you haven’t had one, I urge you to try a genuine chip butty. You don’t need a recipe. Just put a big pile of hot chips onto a thick slice of buttered bread, salt and vinegar them (malt vinegar, if you please) fold it over and eat it while it is hot. The bread must be white. Tomato sauce (ketchup, if you will) is optional.

Less well-informed parts of the world have a quite different concept of a potato sandwich, as the following recipes show. First, from America:

A New Sandwich to Please the Palate.

For luncheon or tea try these Parmentier sandwiches. Cut thin rectangles of bread from a sandwich loaf, not too fresh, cook by steam potatoes with skins. Remove the jackets and when cool cut into thin rondelles. Arrange them carefully on one-half of the rectangles of bread.

Then make a good mayonnaise dressing, using a little mustard. Spread the other halves of the bread, and join with the others to make neat sandwiches. Put them on a plate and in a moistened linen. Place under a heavy weight for three or four hours before serving.

Rochester Evening Journal and the Post Express... February 12, 1925

And secondly, the nineteenth century celebrity chef version from the big southern city of London, England:

Potato Sandwiches.

Sauté the slices of beef as directed for bubble and squeak, cover one side of each piece with mashed potatoes a quarter of an inch in thickness, egg and bread-crumb over, then proceed the same with the other sides, fry in hot fat of a light brown colour, as you would a sole, and serve. Any kind of fresh meat may be used the same way.

The Modern Housewife (1851) by Alexis Soyer

The Great American Breakfast.

The ‘Great British Breakfast’ is a relatively new ‘tradition,’ and it seems that in the past, America had the lead in grand breakfasts - at least in hotels. From an article entitled Hotel Life in New York, from The Times of December 27, 1860, an English reporter tells it all:

How great was the contrast between the American hotel life into which we were now thrown and the quiet domestic life at home? The ladies were certainly relieved almost entirely from household cares. There was no marketing, no anxiety about providing for dinner, no troubles about servants, no “washing day.” Our meals were served to suit our own convenience. Breakfast might be obtained from half-past 6 till 11, and on a scale of which even our neighbours north of the Tweed [i.e. in Scotland] have no conception. I was totally unable to do justice to the good things which surrounded me, and my waiter consequently manifested a great deal of anxiety on my account. After I had partaken of a steak, potatoes, and fried oysters, he would gently remonstrate – “Sure you want something else? A little broiled fowl, or an omelet? Well, you will have some hot cakes?  Hot cakes are an American institution (every custom, I should remark, is termed an “institution” in America).These hot cakes resemble crumpets, and are generally served in a pyramidal form, a large cake forming the base, and the small one the apex of the pile. A little butter is placed between each cake, and syrup (refined molasses) poured over the whole. An Englishman is filled with astonishment when he beholds an American taking breakfast at an ordinary hotel. Before him is placed an array of different dishes according to the season. He will first dispatch half a melon; this is merely to prepare the appetite for what is to follow. Next he will take a little shad; then a steak, with a few “fixings” in the shape of potatoes, roast, boiled, or stewed; followed by a dish of toast immersed in milk; some oyster fritters, and lastly, by hot cakes.

And they talk about the Great British Breakfast! This American breakfast of course is far inferior to the genuine, but really not very old-traditional British Breakfast on account of it not including genuine marmalade. And as for soggy milky toast – I fail to be convinced of its deliciousness.

‘Hotcakes’ today usually refers to thick wheat-flour pancakes leavened with baking powder, served in a stack with maple syrup, but the term was used more broadly in the past to indicate a wide range bread-type items such as rolls, buckwheat cakes, and muffins. The following is an example:

Hot Cakes

Scald a quart of Indian meal with just water enough to make thick batter. Stir in a little salt, and two tablespoonfuls of butter Pour it into a buttered pan, and bake it half an hour

Mrs. Bradley's Housekeeper's Guide; Or, A New, Plain, and Economical Cook-book (1860)

Things to do with Bush Lemons.

I guess naturalized lemons, originating from the rootstock of grafted lemons, grow just about anywhere in the world where there are neglected lemon trees, but they seem to be regarded with a particular fondness in Australia. We call them “bush lemons.”  

Bush lemons are popular “wild food”, so it is not surprising that recipes which take advantage of them appeared regularly in Australian newspapers in the past – thrifty housewives being incapable of ignoring such free bounty. The fruit is not beautiful – it is knobbly and rough and thick-skinned – but very “lemony” and ideal for preserves of all sorts.

Bush Lemon Jelly.

This prize recipe for using bush lemons which are plentiful now, produces a jelly excellent in colour, flavour, and consistency. Wash the lemons, scrubbing if necessary, wipe them, and slice them roughly, putting the fruit into a preserving pan, with two cups of water allowed to each lemon. Boil till the contents of the pan are reduced by one half. Strain the juice, measure it and return to pan, adding one cup of sugar to each cup of juice. Boil for one hour or until a small quantity jellies when tested on a cool plate. Bottle, and seal when cold.

The Richmond River Herald and Northern Districts Advertiser (NSW) 1 December, 1931

Bush Lemon Jam Recipe

HERE is a recipe that will prove of special use to country readers.This bush lemon jam has quite a different flavour from the usual marmalade. The recipe was contributed by Mrs. G. Jeffs, Kingaroy, who wins to-day's prize of 2/6.Slice three bush lemons finely and put on to boil with 8 cups ofwater. Boil for 80 minutes quickly,and add 8 cups of sugar. Boil for 1 hour longer and bottle while still hot.

The Courier-Mail (Brisbane, Qld.  9 June, 1945 

Lemon Syrup.

With Bush Lemons. The following method for using bush lemons is sent by S. Kite. Strain the juice from a quantity of bush lemons and put it in a pan with three pounds of sugar to each pint of juice. Boil for 7 minutes. Bottle and use as ordinary lemon syrup.

The Courier-Mail (Brisbane, Qld) 14 Sept 1939

Penny Dinners and Butterfly Feasts.

“Penny dinners” for the poor were a charitable service offered from time to time by well-meaning individuals and organisations in Britain in the Victorian era. I came across another interpretation of the concept recently, in The Preston Guardian of Saturday, January 27, 1883. The article appeared in the Ladies’ Column, which was written by “one of themselves.” The article shows that an economical meal can also have some prettiness. The lady writes:

I have lately been invited to partake of a penny dinner for the second time – that is a dinner in which each course shall cost but a penny for guest. There were eleven people present, and eleven courses. The total cost – exclusive of service and firing – was 10s 1d. The following is the menu, which was pronounced excellent – superior I think to the last experiment of the kind at which I assisted:-

MENU

            1.Crecy soup (a puree of various kinds of vegetables, predominating flavour carrot and tomato). 2. Fried kedgeree (little balls of cod, eggs, and rice). 3.Brain patties (bread cut into the shape of patties, filled with a mince of sheep’s brains and white sauce, just like sweetbread). 4. Rabbit soufflé garmished with artichokes. 5. Pig’s fry with fried potato ribbons. 6.Fillets of beef with carrot croquettes (this is American beef braised ,with mashed carrots made into balls and fried, mashed potatoes were handed separately). 7. Sweet macaroni. 8.Orange fritters. 9. Apple mould, with whipped cream. 10.Mulberry trifle (sponge cake, mulberry syrup, and custard in little cups). 11. Egg toast (little squares of toast) with buttered egg, flavoured with cheese grated.

All the arrangements and surroundings of a dinner add very much, of course, to a pleasant recollection of it. On this occasion we had each lovely flowers, pretty menus and name cards that I always think of it as a charming gastronomical and entomological dinner. The bill of fare was written on plain white cards, of the ordinary size, with an arrangement behind so that they stood up properly on the table. Perched on the edge of each menu, with extended wings, was a pretty painted butterfly, also on the little name card, and at the bottom of the large card, sat a second little moth or small butterfly. They looked so lifelike that I was almost deceived at first, and could have fancied that the nursery tale was reversed, and instead of  “the butterfly’s ball and the grasshoppers feast” we were summoned to the “butterfly’s feast,” and the ball was to follow. There were purple emperors, red admirals, painted ladies, chalk, rich blues, “sulphurs,” and “cabbage whites,” seemingly poised over the festive board, as if they had fluttered off the flowers; and great was our admiration of this quaint and pretty device – a novelty certainly, and purchased, I believe, at Mr Southwood’s, 90 Regent Street. I fancy any skilful lady could make them for herself, though she must be a clever artist to imitate the colours and forms of living insects so well, and they are sold so cheaply, it may not be worth trying to do so. But I have by me a small collection of real butterflies’ wings, preserved and taken off on to paper, by a process shown to me years ago by a young Italian naturalist. Here they are, as bright and fresh as when the down was on the gossamer wing itself. I think I shall try and utilize some of my pretty specimens in this way.

I was quite taken with the idea of Orange Fritters, so here is a recipe for them for you to try at your next economical dinner:

Orange Fritters.

Pare five or six oranges, cut them in quarters, take out the seeds, and boil them with a little sugar; make a paste with white wine, flour, and a spoonful of fresh butter melted; mix it of a proper thickness; it should rope in pouring from the spoon. Dip the quarters of your orange into this paste, and fry them in lard till of a light brown. Serve them glazed with sugar, and a salamander.

Cookery Made Easy: Being a Complete System of Domestic Management.

by Michael Willis, (London 1831.)

A Hundred Years of Chocolate Cake.

Today, especially for the bakers amongst you, I am going to give you three recipes for chocolate cake from over a period of a hundred years.

First, from Miss Leslie's Lady's New Receipt-book (Philadelphia, 1852) a recipe involving some rather laborious work to scrape the compressed cacao and to beat the butter-sugar mixture until creamy, the egg whites until stiff, and the yolks until thick and smooth:

Chocolate Cake.

Scrape down three ounces of the best and purest chocolate, or prepared cocoa. Cut up, into a deep pan, three-quarters of a pound of fresh butter; add to it a pound of powdered loaf-sugar; and stir the butter and sugar together till very light and white. Have ready fourteen ounces (two ounces less than a pound) of sifted flour; a powdered nutmeg; and a tea-spoonful of powdered cinnamon—mixed together. Beat the whites of ten eggs till they stand alone; then the yolks till they are very thick and smooth. Then mix the yolks and whites gradually together, beating very hard when they are all mixed. Add the eggs, by degrees, to the beaten butter and sugar, in turn with the flour and the scraped chocolate,—a little at a time of each; also the spice. Stir the whole very hard. Put the mixture into a buttered tin pan with straight sides, and bake it at least four hours. If nothing is to be baked afterwards, let it remain in till the oven becomes cool. When cold, ice it.

And from almost fifty years later, a rather no-nonsense, very basic cake from an English newspaper, Lloyd's Weekly Newspaper (London, England), on Sunday, November 19, 1899

Chocolate Cake.

Half a pound of flour, quarter of a pound of sugar, quarter of a pound of butter, two eggs, three ounces of chocolate powder. Beat the butter and sugar together till the latter is dissolved, then beat in each egg separately. Mix the baking powder with the flour, and beat all together well, then add the chocolate powder and bake in a moderate oven.

And the grand finale – a “new type of chocolate cake” that won a prize in the third annual national Pillsbury baking contest in the USA for a Vassar-graduate turned housewife in 1951. The story comes from the New York Times of December 12, 1951.

A recipe that rings a new change on that old favorite, chocolate cake with chocolate frosting won $25,000 and a model General Electric kitchen yesterday for a 39-year old mother of two small boys, Mrs. S. P. Weston of La Jollie, Calif.

Starlight Double-Delight Cake, as it was called by Pillsbury Mills, which gave the top award in its third annual baking contest, calls for making a basic mixture of cream cheese, sugar, and chocolate, half of which is used in the cake batter itself, and the other half in the frosting. Even a kitchen novice will recognize that such a method represents something entirely new in home baking.

A graduate of Vassar College, class of ’34, Mrs. Weston, who wore a two-piece flaming red dress, said her main job now was “keeping house and minding my children.” Before her marriage she was a researcher at Solar Aircraft and a school teacher, and once she won an automatic washing machine in a soap contest. Asked her plans for using her award, she replied in a wide-smiling daze, that she just didn’t know.

Starlight Double-Delight Cake.

2 (3-oz.) pkg. cream cheese, softened

½ cup shortening plus one-fourth cup of [recipe says milk, but this appears to be an error - from the instructions, this is meant to be shortening]

½ teaspoon vanilla extract

½ teaspoon peppermint extract

6 cups (pound and half) sifted confectioners’ sugar

¼ cup hot water

4 oz. melted chocolate

2 cups Pillsbury Best enriched flour.

1 ½ teaspoons soda

1 teaspoon salt

3 eggs

¾ cup milk

1.      Cream together till fluffy the cream cheese, half-cup shortening, vanilla and peppermint extract. Blend half of the sugar into this mixture. Add the hot water alternately with the balance of sugar. Blend in the chocolate.

2.      Sift together the flour, soda, and salt.

3.      Combine the remaining fourth-cup shortening and half the creamed chocolate-cheese mixture (two cups.) Mix thoroughly. Blend in the eggs, one at a time. Beat for one minute.

4.      To this mixture add alternately with the milk the sifted dry ingredients (flour, soda, salt.) Begin and end with the dry ingredients. On an electric mixer, use low speed.

5.      Pour batter into two well-greased and lightly floured nine-inch round layer pans. Bake at 350 degrees F. for thirty to thirty-five minutes.

6.      Cook and frost with remaining chocolate-cream cheese mixture (two cups.) Note: all ingredients should be at room temperature.

The Hooverized Pie.

The United States Food Administrator during World War I was Herbert Hoover. His efforts to convince the American public to reduce waste resulted in the word “Hooverize” coming to mean “to economise.”  One of Hoover’s major campaigns was to advocate the voluntary adoption of wheatless days, the rationale being to allow the saving of wheat to feed the soldiers, and to divert cargo shipping for military transport.

Naturally, the ‘wheatless days’ campaign was directed primarily at the women of the country. Newspaper columnists and patriotic housewives did their bit, and the published correspondence was prolific indeed.

From New York Times of April 20, 1918:

The Hooverized Pie.

To the Editor of the New York Times.

Pie! “Can its crusts be made of something else than wheat?” asks The Times. “Yes!” They can be made of many things else than wheat. If it is a custard or pumpkin pie or a lemon pie or a cream pie, with one crust, grease the tin well with lard, compound, or other shortening, and dust it heavily with corn meal. Then pour in the stuff that makes the pie good, and bake as usual. If it is a two-crust pie, make the crust of half-wheat and half barley flour, or half wheat and half white corn flour. Either of these make the most delicious pie crust you have ever eaten. All the substitutes can be used through mixing with wheat flour. Women have simply got to try it, that’s all. We had the finest tea biscuits with honey at home the other evening, and they were made with half wheat flour and half barley flour.

Betsey Perkins.

Utica, April 18, 1918

Using other grains to reduce wheat consumption was not the only strategy. Here is a recipe for a pastry which uses potato.

Potato Crust for Meat for Vegetable Pie

Two cups mashed potato, ½ cup corn flour, 1 cup hot milk, 1 teaspoon salt, 1 teaspoon baking powder, 1 tablespoon butter substitute. Mix, beat well and spread on meat or vegetable pie and bake 20 minutes. I have used one-third cup of white cornmeal when I could not get the corn flour.

The Boston Sunday Globe, April 21, 1918

Tumble Upside-down cake, and other Canadian Novelties.

I was most intrigued to come across a ‘Canadian Novelty’ in an Australian newspaper from 1936. The recipe was called ‘Tumble Upside-down Cake’, which sounded like a lot of fun. It turns out to nothing more or less than a Pineapple Upside-down Cake of the already (by 1936) well-known style.

NOVELTIES FROM CANADA.

Unusual Dishes you will like.

We don't often' come across Canadian recipes and this makes them all the more fascinating.

Tumble-Upside-Down-Cake.

You may have heard of Tumble Upside-Down-Cake -a long name, but the "cake" is delicious. Here is the recipe for making it. It is exciting and full of surprises, which makes it all the more attractive. For one thing you make it all in a frying, pan, and for another you, start by making the "icing" first, putting the cake on top and turning the whole thing upside down before serving.

Into a frying pan put a liberal cup and a half of brown sugar and a half a cup of butter (a quarter cup will do, but the cake will not be so rich). Set over heat and stir until the mixture has melted and bubbled but not long enough to burn. After removing from heat drop rings of canned pineapple into the sugar and butter, putting a cherry in the centre of each ring. Into a separate vessel mix an ordinary cake batter (if you haven't one you like, try this – to ¼ cup of butter beaten to a cream add ¼ cup sugar and 2 eggs slightly beaten. Mix 1½ cups flour, pinch of salt, and 2 teaspoons baking powder and gradually stir into egg and sugar mixture, also adding ½ cup of milk.) Pour this batter into the frying pan, on top of the sugar and pineapple rings, and bake in a medium oven until the cake is done. It takes a fairly good-sized frying pan and you'll find the frying pan will usually fit, handle and all, cornerwise in an ordinary oven. If not, use a shallow enamel dish. Fifteen to 20 minutes will bake the cake. When done flop the whole thing upside down onto a large plate. The cake may be served hot, although the true Canadian style it to serve it cold, in slices and smothered in thick cream.

Gippsland Times (Victoria) July 27, 1936

Given that recipes for pine-apple upside-down cake appeared regularly in Australian newspaper columns in the 1930’s, I do wonder why this one was seen as a novelty. Australian recipes for this cake commonly specified, or assumed, fresh, not canned pineapple, which is hardly surprising as the fruit grows well in the tropical regions of the country, and is robust enough to travel well. So, perhaps it is the use of canned pineapple?

Here is another interesting glimpse of Canadian food as seen through Australian eyes. From the

Cairns Post (Qld.) of 12 October, 1923.

A Canadian Salad.

An entirely new salad has recently been served with great success at a luncheon party in Montreal, Canada. Ingredients are unusual, but it can be recommended as particularly piquant and delicious. It could be served as a separate course, or with roast duckling, chicken, or home-made sausage.

Fresh or canned pineapple is cut up in fairly thin slices, and surrounded with crisp lettuce. On each side of the pineapple is a thin sprinkling of fresh red pepper (the canned variety is quite satisfactory, and can be bought from any shop that sells hors d’oeuvres). Cover the surrounding lettuce leaves with a fairly stiff home-made mayonnaise dressing.

Hmmmm. Is this another significant Canadian – canned pineapple connection?

And is there a connection of interest between Cairns, in hot, tropical Far North Queensland and our Cold Commonwealth Cousin, Canada?

Canadian Boats.

Four oz. butter, 3 oz. icing sugar, 1 egg, 6 oz. flour, ¼ teaspoon baking powder. Make into a dough, and line some boat shaped tins. Beat the whites of two eggs stiffly, add four tablespoons sugar, 2 tablespoons chopped walnuts, 2 tablespoons cherries, 2 tablespoons coconut, and 2 tablespoons sultanas, and a few drops of essence; fill tins three-quarters and cook slowly to set and brown meringue mixture.

Cairns Post (Qld.) 4 February 1939

Previous posts on upside-down cake.

1945 http://theoldfoodie.blogspot.com/2007/04/aussie-war-cake.html 

1923 ‘http://www.theoldfoodie.com/2008/08/unusual-prune-dishes.html

1943 in the Kitchen, at the Shops, and in the Larder.

The British Food Ministry published hundreds of Food Facts leaflets over the course of World War II, and a number of them have featured in previous posts here. Leaflet number 130 was published in The Times on New Year’s Day in 1943, and it summarised some of the plans and suggestions for the year ahead.

The leaflet featured a ‘Poet’s Corner’ which began with an amusing cautionary tale about wasting food, and continued with two more rhymes on the same theme.

POET’S CORNER.

Aunty Threw Her Rinds Away,

To the lock-up she was taken.

There she is and there she’ll stay

Till she learns to save her bacon.

*

When in winter Nature limits what the cows hold

Your trusty grocer helps you out with ‘Household.’

*

Don’t waste fuel

On a vegetabuel;

It’s more to your credit

To shred it.

1943 IN THE KITCHEN.

1.      See that each one of the family has his own full rations, and remember this includes Dried Egg and Household Milk. Make the most of your cheese ration.

2.      Eat at least 1 lb. of potatoes every day. Don’t peel them. Cook them in your skins. They are better for you and tastier too.

3.      Eat plenty of green vegetables and salads, and when you cant get greens eat root vegetables, especially swedes and carrots.

4.      Cook your vegetables the modern way. Use very little boiling water. Shred or slice your vegetables first. Cook very quickly with the lid on. Eat as soon as cooked.

1943 IN THE SHOPS.

5.      Do your shopping in as few bits as possible. It will save the shopkeeper’s time and paper. Try and buy a week’s supply of goods at one time. This isn’t easy for you, but your shopkeeper, who is very short-handed, will be very grateful.

6.      Take paper or piece of cloth to wrap your shopping in. Especially save paper at the butcher’s whenever possible.

7.      Always return milk bottles well rinsed and don’t forget to save the milk bottle caps for the milkman.

1943 IN THE LARDER.

8.      Don’t throw away a scrap of food. Bits of leftover fish or vegetables make splendid sandwich fillings. Odds and ends of bread can be used in puddings. Use cheese rind for flavouring sauces. Shred the outside leaves of cabbages and use them in soups and stews.

9.      Don’t hoard your Dried Egg. It is meant to be used now. Keep it in a cool dry place.

10. Dont forget to ask for your Household Milk at the grocers. And read the instructions on the tin before you use it.

The recipe for the day is from another Food Facts leaflet, No. 118, in October 1942.

Savoury Loaf.

Cooking time: 1 ½ hours.

Ingredients: 1 rasher bacon, ½ steak or ¼ lb. cold meat, liver, or kidney if possible, 2 carrots, 2 oz. oatmeal, ¼ lb. mashed potato, 1 teaspoonful Worcester sauce, 1 tablespoonful vegetable stock, 1 reconstituted dried egg, salt and pepper.

Quantity: Four helpings.

Method: Mince meat, bacon, carrots. Mix in mashed potato, egg, oatmeal, Worcester sauce, salt, pepper, and stock to form a stiff mixture. Put mixture into well-greased basin. Cover, steam for 1 ½ hours. 15 mins. Before serving put green vegetable in same saucepan. Serve with the loaf. This can be served cold with salad. If you have a steamer, cook a pudding over the saucepan.

Apple Pies in Apple Pie Order.

The English idiom “in apple-pie order,” means “tidy and well-ordered” – Yes? But what is the origin of the phrase? Well, the experts disagree, or don’t know, which is interesting in itself. I don’t expect any of us to come up with a definitive explanation today, but anything with a food connection is fair game on this blog, and I am sure we can have some fun exploring the concept.

What does seem to be agreed is that the first record of the phrase is in the Private Sea Journals of British naval hero, Admiral Sir Thomas Pasley (1734-1808), published in 1780. The words appeared in his weekly plan for his ships’ crews.

Tuesdays and Fridays – exercise great guns and small arms;

Wednesdays and Saturdays – fire volleys and fumigate;

Mondays – air spare sails;

Thursdays – master the men;

And their Persons Clean and in apple-Pie order on Sundays.

The main contenders for the origin of the phrase are that it is an English language corruption of one of two French phrases: either cap-à-pie (“head to foot”) or nappe plié (“folded linen.”) Of the two, my vote would go to the second.

There are numerous other theories, some more amusing and creative than others. One that I like, which does have a sort-of food connection, indicates that apple-pie order is perfect and orderly as the alphabet by suggesting that the phrase comes from the nursery rhyme which begins:

A was an apple-pie;

B bit it,

C cut it, ..

There are of course, theories that relate the idiom to actual apple pie cookery. I think these domestic images are highly unlikely explanations for a phrase that has strong naval and military associations, but they are fun, so here they are:

-          The ‘order’ relates to the precision and skill of the housewife, systematically making and filling row upon row of apple pies.

-          The neatness and order are as the neatly cut and neatly placed overlapping slices of apple in an apple pie.

-          It refers to the old English custom of removing the top of an apple pie after it is cooked, pouring cream or custard over the apples, then cutting the top pie crust into neat shapes and arranging the pieces in a fine pattern on the top of the apple custard.

Whether or not the final explanation is the correct one (and it sounds a little unlikely to me) the practice described was in fact common. John Simpson, in his A Complete System of Cookery, on a Plan Entirely New, published in 1806 gives:

Apple Pie with Custard.

Cut off the top of the pie, and put the custard over the apples; cut the top in sippets, and put them round the pie.

The housekeeper's guide: or, A plain & practical system of domestic cookery, (1832) by Esther Copley gives more detail  – and doesn’t the recipe sound marvelous?

FRUIT PIES. - APPLE.

It is a common error to cut apples too small, by which the flavour is injured. Each apple, when peeled, should be cut in eight; that is, in four quarters, and each quarter cut across the middle; by which means the core can be easily removed. Lay them as close as possible: to a moderate sized pie, allow a quarter of a pound of good moist sugar, with or without four or five cloves, and a little grated lemon-rind. If the apples are juicy, no liquid will be required; if otherwise, a spoonful or two of cyder or beer is much better than water. A little quince marmalade is sometimes put in an apple-pie. Puff paste. Bake an hour and a half. It is usually eaten warm. Some people like to stir in a bit of butter when an apple pie is cut hot. If the pie is to be creamed, when baked cut the middle of the crust in eight equal parts, without touching the border; then return the crust, the broad end to its place, and make the points stand up towards the middle; or the lid may be removed altogether. When cold pour on the apples a rich boiled custard.

Luncheon on an Alaskan cruise, 1930.

It is time I took you out to virtual luncheon again. Today we are aboard the Alaska Steamship Company’s S.S. Northwestern and it is Saturday, October 4, 1930.

LUNCHEON

Indian Relish                        Pickled Onions

Dill Pickles                                             Sweet Mixed Pickles

SOUP

Vermicelli                                              Beef Bouillon

FISH

Broiled Alaska Chicken Halibut with Shrimp Sauce

HOT DISHES

Grilled Pork Chops with Saratoga Chips

Boiled Short Ribs of Beef Spanish Sauce

Ragout of Veal with Brown Potatoes

Baked Macaroni and Cheese

Boiled Carolina Rice

Baked Alaska Potatoes      Stewed Lima Beans Lyonnaise

COLD MEATS

Roast Sirloin of Beef                          Roast Mutton

Corned Beef                                         Blood Sausage

SALAD

Old Fashioned Potato en Mayonnaise

DESSERTS

Grape Nut Custard Pudding with Jelly

Peach Pie                                               Green Apple Pie

Lemon Jell-O

Fresh Apple Sauce               Lunch Cake          Stewed Prunes

American Cheese                                Old English Cheese

Coffee   Black or Green Tea                             Chocolate

What are you going to choose for lunch? The Chicken Halibut had me intrigued for a few moments, but it turns out that it is simply young halibut, which certainly sounds better than old halibut, but is still not sufficiently tempting today. Sometimes it is easier to decide what NOT to have, isn’t it? The Lemon Jell-O does not do it for me, and although anything labeled ‘custard’ normally gets me in, there is something not-tempting about one made with Grape-Nuts.

A dessert made from a commercial breakfast cereal seemed to me to be a strange dessert option aboard a cruise ship, but Grape-Nuts Custard Pudding had its time in the limelight in the ‘30’s and 40’s, even finding its way onto the menus of some quite acceptable hotels. Some of you may remember it with fondness. Here is a recipe for it from The Washington Observer of 13 July, 1963.

Grape-Nuts Custard Pudding.

3 tablespoons melted margarine or butter

¾ cup Grape-Nuts

3 large eggs, beaten

½ cup granulated sugar

2 cups milk

Dash salt

Dash ground nutmeg

1 teaspoon vanilla

¼ cup seedless raisins.

A perfect warm dessert that enables you to add Grape-Nuts to your diet, even if on a bland set-up. Melt margarine or butter and mix into the Grape-Nuts; seet aside. Beat eggs; stir in sugar, milk, salt, nutmeg, vanilla, and raisins. Add the grape-nuts mixture. Stir until sugar is dissolved. Turn into a 1 ½ quart casserole or baking dish. Place dish into a pan of hot water one-inch up on dish in depth. Bake in pre-heated oven 375 degrees, until brown and puffy, about 55 minutes or until knife inserted half way to center of pudding comes out clear; stir pudding every 10 minutes(3 times) during first half-hour of baking. Remove from oven when done: cool 45-60 minutes and spoon into pretty dessert dishes while slightly warm. Makes 5 to 6 servings.