Countdown to Thanksgiving, Day 4: Breads, Rolls, and Biscuits

Today we discuss one of my late Mother's favorite bits of Thanksgiving dinner, the breads.

Breads, rolls, and biscuits are the place where family traditions carry on through the years. The smells remembered fondly. The burnt bemoaned for generations to come. Whether your tradition is yeast rolls, cornbread, loaf bread, rich buttermilk biscuits, or Pillsbury Crescents; chances are good you have a Thanksgiving memory of breads.

Breads in the 19th century went almost without comment in the Bills of Fare, but were a large portion of every recipe compilation.

Today, I will share three breads. First a twist for the 19th century palate, the French Twist. Then a nod to the cornbread that may have inspired the stuffing traditions of my friends on the Civil War Kitchen. Finally, yes, they really did make pumpkin bread and apple bread in the 19th century.

French Rolls by Martha Stewart 

From: Directions for Cookery by Eliza Leslie, 1840
French Rolls.
--Sift a pound of flour into a pan, and rub into it two ounces of butter; mix in the whites only of three eggs, beaten to a stiff froth, and a table-spoonful of strong yeast; add sufficient milk to make a stiff dough, and a salt-spoonful of salt. Cover it and set it before the fire to rise. It should be light in an hour. Then put it on a paste-board, divide it into rolls, or round cakes; lay them in a floured square pan, and bake them about ten minutes in a quick oven.

From: Miss Beecher's Domestic Receipt Book by Catharine Esther Beecher, 1846 pub. 1850
French Rolls, or Twists.
One quart of lukewarm milk.
One teaspoonful of salt.
A large tea-cup of home-brewed yeast, or half as much distillery yeast.
Flour enough to make a stiff batter.
Set it to rise, and when very light, work in one egg and two spoonfuls of butter, and knead in flour till stiff enough to roll.
Let it rise again, and when very light, roll out, cut in strips, and braid it. Bake thirty minutes on buttered tins.

Buttermilk Cornbread by Southern Living

From: Hotel Keepers, Head Waiters, and Housekeepers' Guide by Tunis Gulic Campbell, 1848
To Make Corn Bread.-- Four eggs to a quart of milk, a pound of butter to six pounds of meal. Stir well until it is about the thickness of good molasses. A tea-cupful of molasses to six pounds of meal--to which add a tea-spoonful of salaratus. Grease your pans well with butter. Put it in a good hot oven; bake three quarters of an hour.


From: The Virginia Housewife by Mary Randolph, 1838
Corn Meal Bread.
Rub a piece of butter the size of an egg, into a pint of corn meal--make it a batter with two eggs, and some new milk--add a spoonful of yeast, set it by the fire an hour to rise, butter little pans, and bake it.

Awesome Apple Bread by Kathy Wetzel of Food Geeks

From: The Great Western Cookbook by Angelina Maria Collins, 1851 pub. 1857
PUMPKIN BREAD.
Take two quarts of sweet pumpkin, stewed dry; two quarts of fine Indian meal, two tea-spoonsful of salt, a table-spoon heaping full of lard, and mix them up with sufficient hot water to make it of the consistence of common corn-meal dough. Set it in a warm place, two hours, to rise, and bake it in a pan, in a moderate oven. It will take an hour and a half to bake.

From: Miss Beecher's Domestic Receipt Book by Catharine Esther Beecher, 1846 pub. 1850
Apple Bread.
Mix stewed and strained apple, or grated apple uncooked, with an equal quantity of wheat flour; add yeast enough to raise it, and mix sugar with the apple, enough to make it quite sweet. Make it in loaves, and bake it an hour and a half, like other bread.

Countdown to Thanksgiving, Day 5: Greens, Glorious Greens!

I will readily admit that the thought of vegetables at Thanksgiving left me cold when I was young. Green beans and brussels sprouts boiled to inedible mush, mushy broccoli and cauliflower with a salt lick of processed cheese food. Wilted salad greens with the dread White Dressing that reeked of fresh paint already applied liberally.
But then I grew up. I had vegetables prepared by gourmands, salad bars where I could use dressings I liked, and new and exciting preparations from foodies like me.
Now when the selections of Thanksgiving sides turns to vegetables, I'm inspired to try a few myself.

Many 19th century preparations for vegetables are very simplistic with a dressing of butter, salt, and pepper. We do see a few preparations that are more complex.

First we'll start with a dressing of green beans with a rich gravy and a savory topping that hints of the green bean casserole. A ragout is generally a gravy treatment meant to improve and impress.

Best Ever Green Bean Casserole
by Alton Brown of Good Eats

From: The Virginia Housewife by Mary Randolph, 1838
Ragout Of French Beans, Snaps, String Beans.
Let them be young and fresh gathered, string them, and cut them in long thin slices; throw them in boiling water for fifteen minutes; have ready some well seasoned brown gravy, drain the water from the beans, put them in the gravy, stew them a few minutes, and serve them garnished with forcemeat balls; there must not be gravy enough to float the beans.



Next we'll tackle the brussels sprouts, with a preparation with bacon and vinegar, a modern sounding recipe indeed.

Roasted Pictsweet Brussels Sprouts by Serious Eats

From: The Kentucky Housewife by Lettice Bryan, 1839
Sprouts, And Other Young Greens,
Should be boiled in every respect like turnip sallad, served warm with bacon, and seasoned at table with salt, pepper, and vinegar. All kinds of sallad should be thouroughly washed in two waters, otherwise it will be gritty.



Finally we reach the promised Cauliflower Macaroni. Many modern cooks are looking for alternatives to pasta. Imagine my surprise to find a 19th century recipe that does too.

Cauliflower "Mac" and Cheese by George Stella,  Food Network

From: The Lady's Receipt Book by Eliza Leslie, 1848
Cauliflower Maccaroni
--Having removed the outside leaves, and cut off the stalk, wash the cauliflower, and examine it thoroughly to see if there are any insects about it. Next lay it for an hour in a pan of cold water. Then put it into a pot of boiling milk and water that has had a little fresh butter melted in it. Whatever scum may float on the top of the water must be removed before the cauliflower goes in. Boil it, steadily, half an hour, or till it is quite tender. Then take it out, drain it, and cut it into short sprigs. Have ready three ounces of rich, but not strong cheese, grated fine. Put into a stew-pan a quarter of a pound of fresh butter; nearly half of the grated cheese; two large table-spoonfuls of cream or rich milk; and a very little salt and cayenne. Toss or shake it over the fire, till it is well mixed, and has come to a boil. Then add the tufts of cauliflower; and let the whole stew together about five minutes. When done, put it into a deep dish; strew over the top the remaining half of the grated cheese, and brown it with a salamander or a red hot shovel held above the surface.
This will be found very superior to real maccaroni.

So no need to skip the veggies at Thanksgiving this year. Spice, sauce, and cooking times mean the mush is a thing of the past. Dig in! Delicious!

Countdown to Thanksgiving, Day 6: Spuds- the Mighty Meal Maker

The 19th century dinner was incomplete without potatoes. They enjoyed their rice heartily and every housewife and chef had a noodle recipe, but a meal without potatoes was just... well, it just isn't done, Dear!

Miss Leslie advises, in her 1848 work The Lady's Receipt Book,
*There is no necessity for repeating the mention of potatoes. It will of course be understood that potatoes should constitute a portion of every dinner.

 A look at the options for potatoes include so many of our classic preparations: baked, roasted, sliced and fried, grated and fried (recommended for breakfast), and mashed with butter and cream. The usual spices include butter, salt, and pepper.
They also include a few preparations that take the modern reader by surprise.

From: The Presbyterian Cookbook by First Presbyterian Church of Dayton Ohio, 1877
Potato Pie.
Mrs. Lucy Green.
Scald one quart of milk; grate in four large potatoes, and four ounces of butter, while the milk is hot. When cold, add four eggs well beaten; spice and sweeten to your taste; bake with under crust.

Chantilly Potatoes with Parmesan Crust by Maria Guarnaschelli 

If you prefer a savory pudding...
From: The Housekeeper's Assistant by Ann Allen, 1845
Baked Potato Pudding.
12 oz. of boiled potato skinned and mashed,
1 oz. of suet,
1 oz. of cheese grated fine,
1 gill of milk.
Mix the potatoes, suet, milk, cheese, and all together; if not of a proper consistence, add a little water. Bake it in an earthen pan.

...or if you prefer a sweet pudding...

From: Directions for Cookery by Eliza Leslie, 1840
Potato Pudding.
 --Boil a pound of fine potatoes, peel them, mash them, and rub them through a cullender. Stir together to a cream, three quarters of a pound of sugar and the same quantity of butter. Add to them gradually, a wine glass of rose water, a glass of wine, and a glass of brandy; a tea-spoonful of powdered mace and cinnamon, a grated nutmeg, and the juice and grated peel of a large lemon. Then beat six eggs very light, and add them by degrees to the mixture, alternately with the potato. Bake it three quarters of an hour in a buttered dish.

In one of the earliest cookbooks featuring uniquely American foods, the recipe for Potato Pudding will work equally well for Yams, Sweet Potatoes, Pumpkin, Crookneck Squash, and Winter Squash.

From: American Cookery by Amelia Simmons, 1798
A Crookneck, or Winter Squash Pudding.
Core, boil and skin a good squash, and bruize it well; take 6 large apples, pared, cored, and stewed tender, mix together; add 6 or 7 spoonsful of dry bread or biscuit, rendered fine as meal, half pint milk or cream, 2 spoons of rose-water, 2 do. wine, 5 or 6 eggs, beaten and strained, nutmeg, salt and sugar to your taste, one spoon flour, beat all smartly together, bake.
The above is a good receipt for Pompkins, Potatoes or Yams, adding more moistening or milk and rose water, and to the two latter a few black or Lisbon currants, or dry whortleberries scattered in, will make it better.

*********************************
Potato's sweeter cousin, sweet potatoes and yams are returning to the historic preparations in the modern search for lighter preparations. Sweet Potatoes truly embody the "everything old is new again."

From: Miss Beecher's Domestic Receipt Book by Catherine Esther Beecher, 1850
Sweet Potatoes.
The best way to cook sweet potatoes is to bake them with their skins on. When boiled, the largest should be put in first, so as to have all cook alike. Drain them and dry them, then peel them. They are excellent sliced and fried for breakfast next day; much better than at first.

Sweet Potato "Fries" by Ina Garten of Barefoot Contessa

Countdown to Thanksgiving, Day 7: ...and Sauced

Our Noble Bird is almost complete. In the 19th century, a bird without sauce was lonely... and we never serve anything lonely.

We'll look today into the new twists on turkey gravy and cranberry sauce.

For the gravies, the recipes are fairly traditional. Meat drippings, flour, butter, and "sweet herbs."
For a twist today red wine is recommended.

Little Italy Gravy from Rachel Ray Everyday

 Here's an 1803 gravy recipe that calls for red wine.

From: The Frugal Housewife; or, complete woman cook by Susannah Carter, 1803
No. 6. Gravy for a Fowl, when you have no Meat ready.
Take the neck, liver, and gizzard, boil them in half a pint of water, with a little piece of bread toasted brown, a little pepper and salt and a little bit of thyme. Let them boil till there is about a quarter of a pint: then pour in a glass of red wine, boil it and strain it; then bruise the liver well in, and strain it again; thicken it with a little piece of butter rolled in flour, and it will be very good.


.........................................................

While few recipes added the twists to cranberry sauce we've come to love, many gave options beyond cranberries to serve with turkey. We're seeing that too.

Roasted Turkey with Rosemary Peach Glaze by Sunny Anderson of the Food Network

Domestic Cookery by Elizabeth Lea, 1803
Cranberry and damson sauce are suitable to eat with roast poultry.

The New England Economical Cookbook by Esther Allen Howland, 1845
Serve up with cranberry or apple sauce, turnip sauce, squash, and a small Indian pudding; or dumplings boiled hard is a good substitute for bread.

Practical Cooking and Dinner Giving by Mary Newton Foote Henderson 1877
Besides the gravy, always serve cranberry, currant, or plum jelly with turkey. The currant or plum jelly is melted and remolded in a pretty form.

Directions for cookery, In it's various branches by Eliza Leslie, 1840
Cranberry sauce is eaten with roast turkey, roast fowls, and roast ducks.
PEACH SAUCE. --Take a quart of dried peaches, (those are richest and best that are dried with the skins on,) and soak them in cold water till they are tender. Then drain them, and put them into a covered pan with a very little water. Set them on coals, and simmer them till they are entirely dissolved. Then mash them with brown sugar, and send them to table cold to eat with roast meat, game or poultry.


For the traditionalists, here's a typical 19th century cranberry sauce recipe.
From: The New England Economical Cookbook by Esther Allen Howland, 1845
Cranberry Sauce. --Wash and stew your cranberries in water; add almost their weight in clean sugar, just before you take them from the fire.

Countdown to Thanksgiving, Day 8: Stuffed...

Roomie: They can keep the turkey, but it's not Thanksgiving without stuffing!

Poll: Your Thanksgiving table would be incomplete without...

Stuffing

Stuffing

Stuffing....Stuffing....Stuffing

Comment: ..."prefer cornbread stuffing with sweet basil..."

Comment: ..."my mom's sausage stuffing,..."

Comment: ..."I may try oyster stuffing..."

Comment: ..."my grandmother's cornbread dressing with apples, pecans, pimientos, spring onions, boiled eggs...can't go without!"

Comment: ..."cornbread dressing... I remember my mama saving bread scraps for weeks and drying it out to make dressing."

Comment: ..."oysters rockefeller stuffing..."

Comment: ..."bread stuffing..."

Comment: ..."my mom does the cornbread stuffing..."

Today we delve into the stuffing (or dressing) for a Thanksgiving favorite. 

To start, most folks taking the poll were commenting on cornbread stuffing. I went looking through the historic cookbooks and didn't find a recipe calling specifically for cornbread or any of the not politically correct titles used in the 19th century. Lest anyone think Great-Granny's recipe was slighted, the type of bread to be used was often not specified. We'll all of us with a family tradition of cornbread stuffing assume Great-Granny had an excess of stale cornbread. ;-p

The trend for stuffing this year seems to be herbs, apples, sausage, and different breads as a base.

Apple Walnut Stuffing from Delish.com

In The Presbyterian Cookbook, the Presbyterian ladies of Dayton Ohio shared stuffing recipes with apples, potatoes, herbs along side traditional chestnuts and oysters.

From: The Presbyterian Cookbook, by the First Presbyterian Church of Dayton Ohio, 1873
Potato Stuffing.
Mrs. J. Harris.
Take two-thirds bread and one-third boiled potatoes grated, butter the size of an egg, pepper, salt, one egg and a little ground sage. Mix thoroughly.

Apple Stuffing.
Take half a pound of the pulp of tart apples, which have been baked or scalded; add two ounces of bread crumbs, some powdered sage, a finely shred onion; and season well with cayenne pepper. This is a delicious stuffing for roast geese, ducks, &c.

Chestnut Stuffing.
Boil the chestnuts and shell them; then blanch them and boil until soft; mash them fine and mix with a little sweet cream, some bread crumbs, pepper and salt. Excellent for roast turkey.

Turkey Dressed with Oysters.
Mrs. W. A. B.
For a ten-pound turkey, take two pints of bread crumbs; half a teacupful of butter cut in bits (not melted); one teaspoonful of sweet basil, pepper and salt, and mix thoroughly. Rub the turkey well, inside and out, with salt and pepper; then fill with first a spoonful of crumbs, then a few well drained oysters, using half a can for the turkey. Strain the oyster liquor and use to baste the turkey. Cook the giblets in the pan and chop fine in the gravy. A fowl of this size will require three hours cooking in a moderate oven.

Countdown to Thanksgiving, Day 9: America's Bird, the Noble Turkey

Most cooks begin their menu by selecting the roast meat that will hold the place of honor during the entree. In the case of Thanksgiving, this is the Turkey.

We'll feature two recipes for the noble bird, boneless stuffed turkey and a Turducken.

First up, the one I haven't tried myself.
In 1980, a chef in Louisiana was searching for the perfect twist to the tired turkey. He deboned a chicken, filled it with stuffing and put it in a deboned duck, which in turn went into a deboned turkey. The famous Proudhomme Turducken was unleashed on the culinary world. The patent was issued in 1986 to Chef Proudhomme and the dish enjoyed some popularity. A decade later, it took the culinary world by storm and remains a popular twist on the traditional turkey.

Turducken by Peggy Trowbridge Fillipone of About Food

This dish traces it's ancestry back further than a mere 40 years. The tradition of "illusion" dishes was going strong in the Medieval era and was a perfected art by the Georgian era.
As a means of showing largesse and feeding multitudes, many traditional holiday standing pies included boned birds layered.

Here's a recipe from House and Home: Or, The Carolina Housewife by Sarah Rutlidge, 1849, page 74.
Christmas Pie
Make the walls of thick standing crust, to any size you lie, and ornamented as fancy directs. Lay at the bottom of the pie a beef steak. Bone a turkey, goose, fowl, duck, partridge, and place one over the other, so that, when cut, the white and brown meat may appear alternately. Put a large tongue by its side, and fill the vacancies with forcemeat balls and hard eggs, and add savory jelly. This last is better for being kept in a mould, and only taken out as required. Bacon, chopped or beat up with the forecemeat, is preferable to suet, as it is nicer when cold, and keeps better.

Mrs. Bliss includes a New Year's Pie in her Practical Cook Book: Containing Upwards of One Thousand Receipts... which gets yet closer to the bird in a bird. (1850, page 244)
New Year's Pie
Boil a neat's tongue, skin it, and put it into a boned chicken; put the boned chicken into a boned duck; put the boned duck into a boned turkey; put the boned turkey into a boned goose; season the whole with lemon and spice to your taste, and bake it in a hot oven. Make a jelly of beef's feet, as are baked, and put them into a deep dish, or into a deep-plated dish cover, with the breast of the goose downwards; the pour upon them the jelly, covering the fowls with it; set the whole away, for the jelly to harden; when it has become hard and stiff, turn the whole out carefully upon your dish, and serve, cutting through it all. The dish may be garnished with small moulds of the jelly.

For those who don't want quite that much practice boning a fowl, a simple stuffing filled boned turkey is also found in period recipe books and modern magazine pages.

 "The Lady’s Receipt Book; A Useful Companion for Large or Small Families" by Eliza Leslie, 1847, page 104.

-For this purpose you must have a fine, large, tender turkey; and after it is drawn, and washed, and wiped dry, lay it on a clean table, and take a very sharp knife, with a narrow blade and point. Begin at the neck; then go round to the shoulders and wings, and carefully separate the flesh from the bone, scraping it down as you proceed. Next loosen the flesh from the breast, and back, and body; and then from the thighs. It requires care and patience to do it nicely, and to avoid tearing or breaking the skin. The knife should always penetrate quite to the bone; scraping loose the flesh rather than cutting it. When all the flesh has been completely loosened, take the turkey by the neck, give it a pull, and the whole skeleton will come out entire from the flesh, as easily as you draw your hand out of a glove. The flesh will then fall down, a flat and shapeless mass. With a small needle and thread, carefully sew up any holes that have accidentally been torn in the skin.
Have ready a large quantity of stuffing, made as follows:--Take three sixpenny loaves of stale bread; grate the crumb; and put the crusts in water to soak. When quite soft, break them up small into the pan of grated bread-crumbs, and mix in a pound of fresh butter, cut into little pieces. Take two large bunches of sweet-marjoram; the same of sweet-basil; and one bunch of parsley. Mince the parsley very fine, and rub to a powder the leaves of the marjoram and basil. You should have two large, heaping table-spoonfuls of each. Chop, also, two very small onions or shalots, and mix them with the herbs. Pound to powder a quarter of an ounce of mace; a quarter of an ounce of cloves; and two large nutmegs. Mix the spices together, and add a tea-spoonful of salt and a teaspoonful of ground black pepper. Then mix the herbs, spice, &c., thoroughly into the bread-crumbs; and add, by degrees, four beaten eggs to bind the whole together.
Take up a handful of this filling; squeeze it hard, and proceed to stuff the turkey with it,--beginning at the wings; next do the body; and then the thighs. Stuff it very hard, and as you proceed, form the turkey into its natural shape, by filling out, properly, the wings, breast, body, &c. When all the stuffing is in, sew up the body, and skewer the turkey into the usual shape in which they are trussed; so that, if skilfully done, it will look almost as if it had not been boned. Tie it round with tape, and bake it three hours or more; basting it occasionally with fresh butter. Make a gravy of the giblets, chopped, and stewed slowly in a little water. When done, add to it the gravy that is in the dish about the turkey, (having first skimmed off the fat,) and enrich it with a glass of white wine, and two beaten yolks of eggs, stirred in just before you take it from the fire.
If the turkey is to be eaten cold at the supper-table, drop table-spoonfuls of currant or cranberry jelly all over it at small distances, and in the dish round it.

About three years ago now, I had an opportunity to feed 20 people 19th century meals for three days. One dinner meal, I used a line-up of fall classics that reads much like a Thanksgiving meal. I didn't take photos at the time because it was an immersion event and flashing photos are bad form. The food was well received, though many weren't sure they were ready to give up the modern incantations of classic dishes.

What I Did:
Turkey
Breadcrumbs
Butter 1 lbs
Majoram, Basil, Parsley
Onions/Shallots 2 small
Mace, Cloves, Nutmeg 1/4 oz.
Salt, Black Pepper teaspoon
Eggs 4
I needed to save time, so I bought a pre-cooked turkey. So I heated the turkey according to included directions. I made the stuffing separately according to above directions. I used crouton pieces. I soaked them in water. Drain them by hand. It’s a messy process not meant for those who don’t like to get their hands dirty.  I added the seasonings. I melted the butter and added it. I added the eggs. Bake at 350* for 20 minutes. It will have the consistency of bread pudding. Once the turkey and stuffing are both done, introduce them to each other.

Need a visual? Here's a YouTube Video.

Everything Old is New Again, being a Countdown to the quintessential foodie holiday, Thanksgiving.

One of my favorite foodie holidays is Thanksgiving. It's easy to understand. Food plays a central role in the festivities. For a few glorious weeks, the entire country goes foodie as plans are made and recipes tried.

In that quest for the new and different, many recipes turn right around to the past. In this series, I will share an historic recipe that is seeing a new popularity this season. From de-boned turkey to cauliflower macaroni to pear pie, we're looking back to look ahead.

What are the "classic" Thanksgiving dishes? I polled my friends in the Civil War Kitchen on FaceBook and they responded graciously with tid-bits from their own families and traditions. Overwhelmingly some dishes stand out as gracing just about all Thanksgiving tables. A few suggestions are classics within a particular family and those should be experienced within that tradition. (I'm coming to your house. When do we eat?)

So, tuck a napkin in your collar and enjoy the season. 

Happy Thanksgiving! :-)

Historical Food Fortnightly Challenge: #4 "Foreign" Foods, part 4- A French Charlotte

The Challenge:
Make a dish that reflects the historical idea of "foreign"- either foods with a loose connection to foreign lands, named after faraway places, or attributed to foreigners.

A French Charlotte
Of the two principle kinds of charlotte, the unbaked charlottes are purported to have begun by Chef Marie-Antoin Careme of France. Chef Careme worked for the Prince Regent of England in the early 19th century and likely encountered a baked charlotte popular in the 18th century. He introduced the charlotte a la parisienne by 1802. While he was working for Tsar Alexander, the name changed to charlotte russe.
American bakers in New York City would put their own spin on the confection by the 1880s.

I first began researching charlottes for portraying a confectioner and exploring all the elegant made confections on a 19th century dessert table. For Americans looking to impress, the association with the classically fashionable French makes the French Charlotte a welcome finish to the dinner party or theatre supper.

The Recipe:
From: The Lady's Receipt Book; A Useful companion for large and small families by Eliza Leslie, 1847
A French Charlotte.
--Lay in a deep dish or pan half a pound of bitter almond maccaroons (chocolate maccaroons will be still better) and pour on sufficient white wine to cover them well, and let them stand till entirely dissolved. Whip to a stiff froth a pint of rich cream, sweetened with sugar and flavoured with rose or lemon. Have ready a large circular almond sponge cake with the inside cut out, so as to leave the sides and bottom standing in the form of a mould, not quite an inch thick. Ornament the edge with a handsome border of icing. In the bottom of this mould put the dissolved maccaroons; over them a layer of thick jelly, made of some very nice fruit; and fill up with the whipped cream, heaping it high in the centre.

This is a very fine Charlotte, and is easily made, no cooking being required, after the materials are collected.


The Date/Year and Region: 
Mid Atlantic United States, 1840-1870

How Did You Make It:
The first step was to collect the ingredients. I will confess here I bought the jelly, as mine is a disaster every time.
Assemble the ingredients.
Set the macaroons to dissolve in white wine.

Prepare the whipped cream.
Add cream, sugar, and dash of lemon juice to a mixing bowl.
Blend with a spoon until sugar is moist.
Continue with an electric beater until the cream is stiff.

Cut the cake to form sides and bottom. I cut a ring at about 1.5 inches, removed the center circle and sliced it at about 0.75 inches, and returned it to the cake.

Now build the charlotte.
Add a layer of dissolved macaroons.

Add a layer of cherry jelly.

Ice the cake. (if one iced the cake before the center was filled, the icing would come off on the hands.)

Add a layer of whipped cream to cover.

Add a garnish of cherries.

Time to Complete:
Monday: Macaroons, 40 minutes
Tuesday: Sponge Cake 50 minutes
              Cooling the cake and dissolving the macaroons, 60 minutes
              Whipped Cream, 10 minutes
              Assembly, 15 minutes
Almost 3 hours total

Total Cost: 
This is definitely not something for the every-day table.

How Successful Was It: 
Day 1: You ARE gonna share that bite of gluten free heaven, right?
Day 2: Is there more? I could definitely have seconds... maybe thirds. Would you mind if we finish this off tonight?

How Accurate Was It: 
I would say fairly close, with exception of the store bought jelly.

Bonus Recipes:
Also from "The Lady's Receipt Book..." by Eliza Leslie.
Chocolate Maccaroons.
--Blanch half a pound of shelled sweet almonds, by scalding them with boiling water, till the skin peels off easily. Then throw them into a bowl of cold water, and let them stand awhile. Take them out and wipe them, separately. Afterwards set them in a warm place, to dry thoroughly. Put them, one at a time, into a marble mortar, and pound them to a smooth paste; moistening them, as you proceed, with a few drops of rose-water, to prevent their oiling. When you have pounded one or two, take them out of the mortar, with a tea-spoon, and put them into a deep plate, beside you, and continue removing the almonds to the plate, till they are all done. Scrape down, as fine as possible, half a pound of the best chocolate, or of Baker's prepared cocoa, and mix it, thoroughly, with the pounded almonds. Then set the plate in a cool place. Put the whites of eight eggs into a shallow pan, and beat them to a stiff froth, that will stand alone. Have ready a pound and a half of finely-powdered loaf-sugar. Stir it, hard, into the beaten white-of-egg, a spoonful at a time. Then stir in, gradually, the mixture of almond and chocolate; and beat the whole very hard. Drop the mixture, in equal portions, upon thin white paper, laid on square tin pans, smoothing them, with a spoon, into round cakes, about the size of a half-dollar. Dredge the top of each, lightly, with powdered sugar. Set them into a quick oven, and bake them a light brown. When done, take them off the paper.

For the first experiment, in making these maccaroons, it may be well to try a smaller quantity. For instance, a quarter of a pound of shelled almonds; a quarter of a pound of chocolate; four eggs; and three-quarters of a pound of sugar.

Historical Food Fortnightly Challenge: #4 "Foreign" Foods, part 3- Rice Sponge Cake

The Challenge:

Make a dish that reflects the historical idea of "foreign"- either foods with a loose connection to foreign lands, named after faraway places, or attributed to foreigners.

Rice Sponge Cake

My French Charlotte recipe includes several components that must be created before the final creation can be assembled. Next up is a sponge cake. 

Since I wanted my roomie to be able to enjoy this dessert, it needed to be gluten free. I was delighted to find a period cake recipe that didn't call for wheat flour mixed with the rice flour. 

The Recipe:

From: The Lady's Receipt Book; A Useful companion for large and small families by Eliza Leslie, 1847

Rice Sponge Cake
--Put twelve eggs into a scale, and balance them in the other scale with their weight in broken loaf-sugar. Take out four of the eggs, remove the sugar, and balance the remaining eight eggs with an equal quantity of rice-flour. Rub off on some lumps of the sugar, the yellow rind of three fine large ripe lemons. Then powder all the sugar. Break the eggs, one at a time, into a saucer, and put all the whites into a pitcher, and all the yolks into a broad shallow earthen pan. Having poured the whites of egg from the pitcher through a strainer into a rather shallow pan, beat them till so stiff that they stand alone. Then add the powdered sugar, gradually, to the white of egg, and beat it in well. In the other pan, beat the yolks till very smooth and thick. Then mix them, gradually, a little at a time, with the white of egg and sugar. Lastly, stir in, by degrees, the rice-flour, adding it lightly, and stirring it slowly and gently round till the surface is covered with bubbles. Transfer it directly to a butter tin pan; set it immediately into a brisk oven; and bake it an hour and a half or more, according to its thickness. Ice it when cool; flavouring the icing with lemon or rose. This cake will be best the day it is baked.

In every sort of sponge-cake, Naples-biscuit, lady-fingers, and in all cakes made without butter, it is important to know that though the egg and sugar is to be beaten very hard, the flour, which must always go in at the last, must be stirred in very slowly and lightly, holding the whisk or stirring-rods perpendicularly or upright in your hand; and moving it gently round and round on the surface of the batter without allowing it to go down deeply. If the flour is stirred in hard and fast, the cake will certainly be tough, leathery, and unwholesome. Sponge-cake when cut should look coarse-grained and rough.

The Date/Year and Region: 

Mid-Atlantic, 1840-1870

How Did You Make It:

6 eggs separated

2 cups rice flour

1.5 cups sugar

dash of lemon juice for flavoring

Separate the eggs into whites and yolks.

Beat the whites into a froth and add sugar.

Add the yolks and keep stirring.

Add the rice flour slowly, while stirring.

Grease your pan and set the oven.

Bake 40 minutes at 375* or until the center is squishy but not runny.

Here is the cake prepared for the charlotte.

Time to Complete: 

About 10 minutes to prepare, 40 minutes to bake.

Total Cost: 

I should have used a full recipe instead of half, so $2.00 for the dozen eggs and $4.00 for the rice flour adds up.

How Successful Was It: 

Like many gluten free baked goods, this cake is fabulous when warm and fresh. The egg flavor comes through like the finest of French crullers and the cake is moist and dense. As the cake sets, it becomes too dense and hard quickly. Interesting to see a baker in the past made the same observation, "...best the day it is baked."

How Accurate Was It: 

With recipes that base weights of items in proportion, we have to guess on quantity. I used 12 medium eggs (modern) equals one pound as a base. A website called Traditional Oven has conversion calculators for different types of flour, sugar, and pantry staples. 

I think this is as close to accurate as I can get until I borrow someone's antique baking pans and wood oven. :-)

Bonus Recipe:
From: The Lady's Receipt Book; A Useful companion for large and small families by Eliza Leslie, 1847

French Icing For Cakes.
--Dissolve some fine white gum arabic (finely powdered) in rose-water. The proportion should be, as much of the gum-arabic powder as will lie on a ten-cent piece to a tea-spoonful of rose-water. Beat some white of egg to a stiff froth that will stand alone. Stir in, gradually, sufficient double-refined powdered loaf-sugar to make it very thick, (a good proportion is four ounces of sugar to the white of one egg,) add to this quantity a tea-spoonful of the rose-water with the gum arabic dissolved in it, and beat the whole very hard. Instead of rose-water you may dissolve the gum in fresh lemon-juice. Previous to icing the cake, dredge it with flour, and in a few minutes wipe it off with a clean towel. This, by removing the greasiness of the outside, will make the icing stick on the better. Heap the icing first on the middle of the top of the cake; then with a broad-bladed knife spread it evenly all over the surface. Dip the knife frequently in a bowl of cold water as you proceed, and smooth the icing well. If not thick enough, wait till it dries, and then add a second coat.


What I *REALLY* did:
1 cup of confectioner's sugar
2 spoonfuls of milk
Mix well.

Results:
This was easy and didn't have any raw egg to pose a threat.

Historical Food Fortnightly-Challenge #4 "Foreign" Foods, part 2- Maccaroons

The Challenge:
Make a dish that reflects the historical idea of "foreign"- either foods with a loose connection to foreign lands, named after faraway places, or attributed to foreigners.

Maccaroons
My French Charlotte recipe includes several components that must be created before the final creation can be assembled. In this case, I'm starting with Maccaroons.
These macaroons are more like the coconut ones we are all familiar with, rather than the filled cookies popular at bakeries at present.

The Recipe:
From: The Lady's Receipt Book; A Useful companion for large and small families by Eliza Leslie, 1847

Ground Nut Maccaroons
Take a sufficiency of ground-nuts, that have been roasted in an iron pot, over the fire; remove the shells; and weigh a pound of the nuts. Put them into a pan of cold water, and wash off the skins. Have ready some beaten white of egg. Pound the ground-nuts, (two or three at a time,) in a marble mortar, adding, frequently, a little cold water, to prevent their oiling. They must be pounded to a smooth, light paste; and, as you proceed, remove the paste to a saucer or a plate. Beat, to a stiff froth, the whites of four eggs, and then beat into it, gradually, a pound of powdered loaf-sugar, and a large tea-spoonful of powdered mace and nutmeg mixed. Then stir in, by degrees, the pounded ground-nuts, till the mixture becomes very thick. Flour your hands, and roll, between them, portions of the mixture, forming each portion into a little ball. Lay sheets of white paper on flat baking-tins, and place on them the maccaroons, at equal distances, flattening them all a little, so as to press down the balls into cakes. Then sift powdered sugar over each. Place them in a brisk oven, with more heat at the top than in the bottom. Bake them about ten minutes.

Almond maccaroons may be made as above, mixing one-quarter of a pound of shelled bitter almonds with three-quarters of shelled sweet almonds. For almond maccaroons, instead of flouring your hands, you may dip them in cold water; and when the maccaroons are formed on the papers, go slightly over every one, with your fingers wet with cold water.

Maccaroons may be made, also, of grated cocoa-nut, mixed with beaten white of egg and powdered sugar.

The Date/Year and Region: 
Mid-Atlantic, 1840-1870

How Did You Make It:
I went the easy route of buying prepared almond meal.
2 cups almond meal
2 egg whites
1.5 cups powdered confectioner's sugar
dash of powdered nutmeg

Separate the eggs. Stir the whites to a froth and discard the yolks.
Add the almond meal, sugar, and spice to a bowl.

Blend to a tacky batter.

Form into balls the size of a walnut.

Bake at 375* for 15 minutes.

Time to Complete: 
About 30 minutes

Total Cost: 
About $6.00 for the almond meal, the rest I had on hand. I had plenty of almond meal left for other tasty creations.

How Successful Was It: 
A terrific sweet treat, like coconut macaroons only better 'cause they aren't coconut. :-p

How Accurate Was It: 
I would say the ground meal would give a fair approximation of hand grinding, so fairly accurate.

Historical Food Fortnightly Challenge: #4 "Foreign" Foods, part 1

The Challenge:
Make a dish that reflects the historical idea of "foreign"- either foods with a loose connection to foreign lands, named after faraway places, or attributed to foreigners.

A French Charlotte
Of the two principle kinds of charlotte, the unbaked charlottes are purported to have begun by Chef Marie-Antoin Careme of France. Chef Careme worked for the Prince Regent of England in the early 19th century and likely encountered a baked charlotte popular in the 18th century. He introduced the charlotte a la parisienne by 1802. While he was working for Tsar Alexander, the name changed to charlotte russe.
American bakers in New York City would put their own spin on the confection by the 1880s.

I first began researching charlottes for portraying a confectioner and exploring all the elegant made confections on a 19th century dessert table. For Americans looking to impress, the association with the classically fashionable French makes the French Charlotte a welcome finish to the dinner party or theatre supper.

The Recipe:
From: The Lady's Receipt Book; A Useful companion for large and small families by Eliza Leslie, 1847
A French Charlotte.
--Lay in a deep dish or pan half a pound of bitter almond maccaroons (chocolate maccaroons will be still better) and pour on sufficient white wine to cover them well, and let them stand till entirely dissolved. Whip to a stiff froth a pint of rich cream, sweetened with sugar and flavoured with rose or lemon. Have ready a large circular almond sponge cake with the inside cut out, so as to leave the sides and bottom standing in the form of a mould, not quite an inch thick. Ornament the edge with a handsome border of icing. In the bottom of this mould put the dissolved maccaroons; over them a layer of thick jelly, made of some very nice fruit; and fill up with the whipped cream, heaping it high in the centre.

This is a very fine Charlotte, and is easily made, no cooking being required, after the materials are collected.


The Date/Year and Region: 
Mid Atlantic United States, 1840-1870

How Did You Make It:
The first step was to collect the ingredients. I will confess here I bought the jelly, as mine is a disaster every time.
Humm... maccaroons, sponge cake, whipped cream... I have some preparation to do first.

Time to Complete:

Stay tuned. This is gonna take awhile. :-)

Part 2: Maccaroons
Part 3: Rice Sponge Cake
Part 4: Putting it together

Historical Food Fortnightly Challenge #22: Sweet Sips & Potent Potables

The Challenge:
Whether it’s hard or soft, we all enjoy a refreshing beverage! Pick a historic beverage to recreate - remember to sip responsibly!

Intro
     As the sun warms the earth and the world is awash in color, my thoughts turn toward the beverages that refresh our summers. I just had to bring out a favorite, ginger beer.

Ginger Beer:
From: Directions for Cookery, In It's Various Branches by Eliza Leslie, 1840, page 391.

 --Break up a pound and a half of loaf-sugar, and mix with it three ounces of strong white ginger, and the grated peel of two lemons. Put these ingredients into a large stone jar, and pour over them two gallons of boiling water. When it becomes milk-warm strain it, and add the juice of the lemons and two large table-spoonfuls of strong yeast. Make this beer in the evening and let it stand all night. Next morning bottle it in little half pint stone bottles, tying down the corks with twine.

The Date/Year and Region: 
1837-1865, Mid Atlantic

How Did You Make It:
I halved the recipe. It now reads:
0.75 pound of sugar (or about 1.75 cups)
1.5 oz. ginger
1 gallon water
1 lemon, grated peel and juice
1 large tablespoon of yeast (one packet proofed in .25 cup water at 110*)

Prepare the grated items, peeled ginger and lemon peel.

Bring water to a rolling boil.

Add sugar, grated ginger, and grated lemon peel to a large bowl.
Pour on the boiling water and set aside to cool.

Squeeze and strain the lemon juice.
Prepare your ginger beer fermenting bottle. (I'd recommend a plastic bottle for the fermenting process, then a stone bottle for period aesthetics. Ask me how I learned this valuable lesson.)

Once the mixture has cooled sufficiently, proof your yeast.

Strain the grated bits from your mixture.

Add your lemon juice to the strained mixture.
Add the proofed yeast to your fermenting bottle.
Add the mixture to your fermenting bottle.
Set the fermenting bottle aside to cool thoroughly.

Cap the fermenting bottle lightly and place in a shady place overnight.
The next day, it should have a fizz... that is from the fermentation process and means it has a slight alcohol content.
Decant your ginger beer into ginger beer bottles and enjoy!
Store in the fridge from this point to stop the fermentation process. Your ginger beer is good for about two weeks.


Time to Complete: 
Active: about one hour, Inactive: overnight

Total Cost: 
$3.00

How Successful Was It: 
Definitely a fresh burst of sunny flavor. Hello, Spring!

How Accurate Was It: 
The biggest inaccuracy was the use of powdered yeast. Others include a plastic fermenting bottle and modern kitchen equipment.

Bonus:
Absolutely No Alcohol Version:
Proceed through the steeping to the point "Strain your mixture."
Add the lemon juice to the mixture.
Decant into your stone bottles.
For fizz when you drink, add several spoonfuls of mix from your bottle to carbonated water.
Enjoy!

Historic Food Fortnightly Challenge #21: Rare and Scarce Ingredients

The Challenge:
Just where does one find some of the ingredients for these recipes? That’s your job for this challenge! Find a recipe that relies upon an ingredient that can’t be had from the corner store, locate the ingredient, and recreate the dish.

Intro
Consider the 19th century market. Go on, close your eyes and get a good picture in mind.
This challenge gives  me an excuse to feature a favorite 19th century book.
The Market Assistant, Containing a brief description of every article of human food sold in the public markets of the cities of New York, Boston, Philadelphia, and Brooklyn by Thomas F. DeVoe
As noted in the preface, the information was compiled prior to the firing on Fort Sumter and publication was held until after The War.
Many entries surprise the history enthusiasts with their notions of when Americans began enjoying certain fruits and seasonings. Bananas at Gettysburg? Oh, yes, just a short train trip from the Philadelphia dock. Tamarinds, a staple of South American and Asian cooking were regularly imported. The "best" oranges  come from St. Augustine, Florida according to Mr. DeVoe, in direct contradiction to when Floridians think citrus made Florida famous.
A surprise to me, with all the other citrus listed as readily available imports, were limes being somewhat scarce. In honor of the scarce lime, we present a dried apple pie seasoned with lime.

The Recipe:
From: The Cook Not Mad, or Rational cookery published by Knowlton and Rice, 1831
No 57.
Dried Apple Pie.

Take two quarts dried apples, put them into an earthern pot that contains one gallon, fill it with water and set it in a hot oven, adding one handful of cranberries; after baking one hour fill up the pot again with water; when done and the apple cold, strain it and add thereto the juice of three or four limes, raisins, sugar, orange peel and cinnamon to your tase, lay in paste No. 3.

Paste No 3. To any quantity of flour, rub in three fourths of its weight of butter, whites of eggs; if a large quantity of flour, rub in one third or half of the butter, and roll in the rest.

The Date/Year and Region: 
1831-1865, mid-Atlantic

How Did You Make It:
Prepare the paste: I used a gluten free flour so my Roomie could join in the apple pie (hopefully) goodness.

While it was chilling in the fridge, I started on the apples.
In a large casserole, I added the apples, cranberries, and enough water to cover them.
Bake in the oven at 350* for 1 hour. {TIP: add a baking sheet with sides underneath if your casserole may boil over.}
Drain the water. Fill the pot again.
Set aside until the apples are cold.
Strain the remaining water.

Add Juice of 4 Limes, Raisins, 1 cup of Sugar, 2 generous tablespoons of Orange Marmalade (in place of the orange peel), and Cinnamon.






Mix well and fill the paste.
Bake at 350* for 30 minutes or until the crust is golden.

Time to Complete: 
2 hours 30 minutes, inconsistently... unless you need to start with drying the apples, then 12 to 14 hours, 30 minutes. :-p

Total Cost: 
Highest item was the gluten free flour at $4.00 per bag.

How Successful Was It: 
Roomie and I think it tastes good, kinda tangy.
If I were to make this again, I'd cut the apples into smaller pieces and use less sugar and limes so the innards would be less liquid. I'd also bake the paste a bit before adding the filling as some gluten free recipes recommend.

How Accurate Was It: 
I'd consider this in the spirit of period cooking, though with gluten free paste and marmalade instead of peel it reads like a modern recipe indeed.