I have recently been challenged by a few of my friends to write a blog on the first American cookbook, Julie and Julia style. This is the biggest dare that I have ever agreed to undertake, but I did not need too much prodding, and I think that I will give it a go. How hard can it be, right? It is mostly puddings, custards and cakes. It is only 47 pages, not Julia's 700 or so. I think I can do that. But there will definitely be some challenges that I am already foreseeing. I just don't know if I have what it takes to poke around inside a calf's head a cook and eat its brains.
For those of you who are not familiar with historic American cookery, here is the shpil. Until Amelia Simmons (a self proclaimed American Orphan) published her modest 47 page work in 1796, Americans were either using British cookbooks, or using the oral tradition. The problem for Amelia with the oral tradition is that she was an orphan. She had no mommy to teach her. The problem with using British cookbooks is that the ingredients are not the same, and the culture is not the same. Also, she wanted to impress her friends, she wanted to be one of “the young and the gay, bend and conform readily to the taste of the times, and fancy of the hour.” Get with the times people, its 1796, and its a free country! Amelia wanted to make American cookery more accessible to Americans. Julia Child wanted to make French cookery more accessible to Americans. I want to make Historic American Cookery more accessible to Americans. Why? I'll leave you hanging for now on that one. After all, this is a blog and there will be more entries. For now I will continue to hypothesize my challenges.
The first problem is that I don't have access to many of the necessary 1790s American ingredients and aspects of material culture. I will have trouble cooking Amelia's dishes for the same reasons that she had trouble cooking British ones. I have been trying for weeks to find rose water. Does anyone know where to get pearl ash? My eggs are monstrous compared to Amelia's, as are my chickens. Who will supply me with my turtle to dress? I will have to figure all of this out as I go, and I will need your moral support and connections. Any turtle catchers out there?
My second problem is that to a modern reader, Amelia's work is full of cryptic mysteries. After all, she was writing for orphans, not aliens. There are some things that everyone in the 1790s would have known, which is why she omits key steps in recipes, as well as basic recipes for bread and boiled dinner. I foresee that it will take several attempts to make most of these successfully. For example, the other day I made “A light Cake to bake in small cups” but it turned out to be a dense brick cake with raisins. Well, Amelia, you should have told me to let it rise! I think that the pig will be happy with my trials.
Although I am not an orphan in the real world, I am an orphan of the 1790s. I have no living relative from two hundred and twenty years ago. My only living teachers on the subject are my fellow historic food enthusiasts. Amelia has this advice to offer: "The orphan, tho' left to the care of virtuous guardians, will find it essentially necessary to have an opinion and determination of her own."
So there it is, I have committed, with opinion and determination. Are you out there, virtuous guardians?
This sounds fun! As a person who has been cooking with Simmons' Book for over a decade I applaud your ambition! I head up hearth cooking at a living history museum in MA. I noticed you mentioned that you can't find rosewater. We source ours from a mediterranean marketplece in central MA. You can also find it online. Pearlash is chemically equivalent to baking powder, although it is potassium carbonate (refined woodash) and not sodium carbonate (baking powder). We just use baking powder. Salaeratus is the 18th/early 19th century equivalent of baking soda. When baking in the English style, you must first rub butter/fat into flour, add the rest of the dry ingredients (sugar was considered dry, unlike now), add milk or water and add eggs beaten to a foam last (as that is usually the only leavening if yeast and pearlash are absent).Fold eggs in gently and bake immediately. If pearlash is used, often it calls for you to dissolve it. That means you should take a portion of the milk or cream and mix the pearlash in that. I usually take a gill (1/2 a cup) and fill it with milk and add the pearlash to it and then the whole gill to the batter right before I'm going to add the eggs. As I have done on many occasion, don't forget to butter your pans! With calves' head and pluck (windpipe and lungs attached) you can special order that at a local butcher (if there is one near by).As far as sourcing a turtle, I'm stumped. All in all, good luck!!! and don't hesitate to ask for help!!- Ryan Beckman, Old Sturbridge Village
ReplyDeleteThanks Ryan! There will most certainly be questions, and it is so wonderful to have your support.
ReplyDeleteDo you use baking powder in the quantity specified in the receipts, or do you usually use a little less?
I have also been experimenting with emptins. I am not yet convinced that mine are active. I will post about it in the future.
Yes I do use baking powder and soda in the same amounts specified and it seems to be fine. I've made emptins a couple of times. They will look bubbly and frothy and smell like bread (yeasty) when they are active. Usually it takes about a week or so, stirring the batter every day until 'frothiness'occurs. Good luck!!
ReplyDeleteMary, this sounds like a great project. thinking about thisreminds me of a visit I made to Plymouth Plantation at least... well, a long time ago. I went into one of the houses and the lady of the house was inside cooking I think and I looked around and I saw something on a window sill that looked like a piece of pottery to me. So I asked her what it was used for and she said, Oh, that is not earthenware, that is a (something) pie.... our dinner.. more or less..boy was I embarrassed. oh well, I bet yours products will look way better than a piece of pottery... have fun.
ReplyDeleteSounds exciting. Culinary adventure in my book is cooking one of those centra pa/family dishes that don't come with a recipe: stomboli with mustard, slippy pot pie, or chicken corn noodle soup. Cooking a turtle never crossed my mind--good for you!
ReplyDeleteI know where you can find turtle. There is an asian supermarket in Quincy MA called Kam Man - the have live turtle sold to be eaten. They also sell other live creatures that they will kill and clean for you! Just google Kam Man in Quincy you will find it!
ReplyDeleteMary this is such a great idea!!! I was just looking Amelia Simmons cookbook a few weeks ago, I'm very interested in reading more.
ReplyDeleteThat is a most excellent challenge! I look forward to following you on your historic culinary adventures!
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