Food History

Today at 4.20 pm East Coast Aussie Summer Time, hear all about the Worst Food Disasters in History, live. I have five minutes in Afternoons with Ingrid. Queenslanders can just tune in to ABC Queensland - everyone else might have to go via the ABC website. Apparently it’s findable from all sorts of places (not just Australia), so if you’re bored, check it out about 2 1/2 hours from the time this post goes up.

Note: ABC Australia, not America!!

Welcome to the Kosher Cooking Carnival! It’s a little late, and it’s all my fault. I forgot it was my first week of university teaching when I offered to do it. I also didn’t count on thunderstorms and about a dozen articles due at once. Everything’s a little late except my class on Edible History. That went delightfully. One of my students has a particular interest in the history of ice cream and is prepared to cook to prove it.

Now that it’s here, please enjoy the Carnival. Lots of good links and a couple of rather tempting recipes.

Let’s start with one of the recipes, perhaps. An absolutely delicious parve pie crust. Thank you, Leora, US friends have been known to tell me that something is ‘as easy as apple pie’ and I always wondered just what part the crust played in this.

There’s along history of Jews making sure that fellow Jews get a decent meal for Shabbos. Poor Jews a hundred years ago would scrimp all week to try to achieve this for themselves, too. It’s lovely to see this tradition continued, and with a bake sale, too. Food turning into more food. It makes everyone just that much happier.

Batya tells us about a Chanukat ha-kitchen. Worth doing just for the challah! To balance that challah, you can read about a less-perfect bagel. Having finally found a baker in my hometown who knows how to cook a bagel, I asked him why he gave some of his bagels the toppings I associate with onion rolls. “I don’t know what an onion roll is,” he said. It turned out he hadn’t eaten kosher bagels, either. Life is a city with almost no Jews can be very entertaining.

I envy Batya being snowed in and then finding a cheap sandwich (appropriately linked to Hillel’s name). We had some snowflakes here yesterday and decided it was a miracle. It’s summer in Australia, after all.

Summer doesn’t make me feel less hungry when I look at Batya’s beautiful pictures on eating out in Jerusalem.

Girls Who Network send in a shrimp dish for the Carnival. It looks interesting, but I won’t volunteer to taste it. We all have our definitions of kashruth, and mine doesn’t include shrimp. My great-grandmother’s apparently included bacon on occasion, which I agonise over from time to time, often on this blog. Batya agonises more carefully than I do, with interesting results.

To finish on a really glorious note, Batya sent me a joke from Bangitout. I don’t know the person in question, but I really like the joke. While you spend the next hour pondering restaurant ideas, I’m going to have a cup of tea.

Top Ten Worst Kosher Restaurant Ideas

10. Shalosh Seudos, The Restaurant!

9. All German Cuisine: Gestapos!

8. Just Herring: Shmaltzys

7. Shabbos Leftovers: dubbed ‘Tinfoil’

6. The Yeshiva Dorm Experience

5. Egg Nog and other foods Jesus Consumed

4. Cholent: Greetings and Flatuations

3. Everything fake! Bacon, Cheese Burger, Shrimp: Facons!

2. Fast Day Theme: dubbed “Fast food”

1. Kosher For Passover Food, All Year Round!

Today is such a foodie day that I had to share it.

I’ve just been cutting a picture of pepperberries and wattleseed down to size so I can use it for a project. Pepperberries and wattleseed are indigenous Aussie yummy things. Some of the stuff that are changing our food history – I wrote about them in general a few days ago and today I was playing with pictures.

I have five little article-y things to write, one of which will be illustrated by said picture. When these article-y things see the light of day, rest assured I shall mention it here. They’re food rather than food history, but no less interesting for that.

The other big thing in my day is revising my course notes. These course notes are a series of recipes, in modern menu form, so that my students can fully enjoy the food from the various eras we study. I want to add a couple more menus and about ten more recipes, and there are few recipes that I need to look at carefully and possibly change for something more interesting. Previous students have told me “Don’t get rid of the mulligatawny soup recipe!” so that’s definitely staying.

I have recipes to send out to three testers for the Prohibition banquet. Mostly soups and desserts, but also a couple of canapés. We have space for more testers, but since I want most things done by Passover (late April) you might want to email banquet (at) conflux.org.au now, rather than in a month’s time.

That’s not my whole day, but it’s my foodie day. I’m supplementing it with Milawa chevre and a parmesan/cracked pepper woodfired oven bread and green olives marinated in garlic. Foodie days are perfect when just a little gourmet food accompanies them.

Yesterday was setting a mood. Let me explain, before you get the wrong idea, that the mood was for me, not for you. It wasn’t setting a mood to lure you into some sort of dark corner of history, though, now I mention it, that sort of mood-setting seems like a good idea. What I was trying to do was remind myself that colds don’t stop work. Which they don’t. They just want to.

I’ve talked myself into enjoying work so much that I started blogging (on my other blog)about character introduction in a seventeenth century recipe book, using the opening recipe. It was possibly not the most sensible post I’ve ever written, but it was terribly educational. Almost frighteningly educational.

I’ll balance things (now that the worst of the cold is over) by giving you some more of Grandma’s recipes. After all, I mentioned them yesterday, so it’s almost as if I meant it.

Before I get to the recipes, I just thought I’d warn you that my Edible Past course starts next week. This means my thoughts will be ranging over different historical periods again. This is the time when – if you yearn for a Medieval recipe or a Jane Austen syllabub recipe – you really should say so. Otherwise I’ll go back to looking at the food descriptions in my favourite novels. I always threaten this and life always catches up with me before I can follow through. Maybe this time it will actually happen.

Now for a recipe!! 1950s Melbourne, of course.

Eggless Date Cake

Place in a mixing bowl ½ cup sugar, 1 cup dates ( chopped) & 1 tablespoon butter. Sprinkle with 1 teaspoon soda. Pour 1 cup boiling water over & beat a few minutes. Sift in 1 ½ cups flour & mix well. Bake in bar shaped tin in fairly hot oven for ½ to ¾ hours. 1 tablespoon chopped ginger.

There are just four more days to get a comment on any of the posts about Felicity Pulman or by her to be in the running for an omnibus edition of the first two novels in The Janna Mysteries.

Right now the biltong post is my favourite, because I have failed (yet again) to have a volunteer trial the Ancient Roman fish-sauce equivalent for me. Why won’t anyone make it? I mean, just because it takes six weeks and smells foul…

Food history alert: ABC 666 (Canberra) tomorrow at 11.30 am. It’s an interview. I might get to talk about murderous molasses!

I have no idea how to get radio stations from outside a region, though I do believe it’s possible. If any of you know, I’d be happy to post the details here.

Update: The radio station is and the interview will occur at 11.30 am Australian Eastern Summer Time, on Friday 8 February. It’s a short interview though, so better to be a bit early online if you want to catch it.

Latest update: the interview is now from 11 am until 11.30 am. I’m getting nervous!!

Do you remember the book by Felicity Pulman - the first two parts of the Janna Mysteries? Perfect reading for teenage girls, lovers of the Middle Ages, lovers of mystery and anyone else who enjoys a good read? Well, she has kindly given me a copy to give away. Comment on any post by or about her by February 23* and you will be in the running. You want a link back to one of her posts? Maybe I’ll give it to you.

Make sure your comment has a valid email address.

*Launch date of the next book in the series, Willows for Weeping.

The owner of the Carnival of Australia loves my blog and is becoming a grandmother. Two very good reasons to pay her a visit. (No, this is not the regular post of the day - this is a cool little extra - yes, there will be election cakes later. Really. Truly. Just because it’s sweltering outside doesn’t mean I don’t want to think about food today. Really. Truly.)

Three bits of news, mainly of interest to people who live in or near Canberra. I’ve added some excruciating jokes to keep non-Canberrans amused, though, because I’m in that sort of mood.

First of all, there will be an article of interest in the Canberra Times this Sunday. If there’s a picture of me with it you can use it to improve your dart-throwing skills. There may well be a picture, since a photographer is coming to visit me on Thursday afternoon. I plan to introduce the photographer to my moustache cup “Photographer – moustache cup; moustache cup – Photographer” because I think they may deal well together.

I don’t know what will be in the article, though I made sure to mention death-dealing molasses and suicidal gourmands when I was interviewed. The interview started off about my teaching in general, but it soon turned to food, as almost everything in my life does right now.

Secondly, Edible History, the food history course I’m teaching at the Australian National University starting 21 February is completely booked out. How about that for a totally useless announcement? By the time I told you about it, it was already too late to book. It’s a happy announcement though. It’s every educator’s dream to have courses that are much-enjoyed.

Thirdly, because Edible History has booked out so very early, the ANU decided to offer it a second time, starting 1 May. You can be absolutely certain that I will have all sorts of new ideas and enthusiasms for the second course, even though it will use the same handbook as the first.

Both courses will, of course include a formal introduction for my students. “Students – moustache cup; moustache cup – students.” They will also include a brand new element to my theory of the history of coffee, one which I shan’t say anything about till I’ve taught it at least once. After all, these hordes of food history enthusiasts need something more than a formal introduction to a moustache cup.

There is so much talk around about the US elections. They’re going to be with us for most of this year, too. Rather than ignore them, I thought it would be fun to treat them as an adjunct to food history. After all, the US is probably the only country where the results of the elections affect the rest of the world so very much.

I’m not going to tally votes or discuss policies. I would like to, but this isn’t the right blog for that (I heard that sigh of relief from most readers – it was such a big sigh of relief that it crossed continents and oceans). What I’m going to do is sample various historic US cookbooks and find their recipes for election cakes. I might even find out what other politics emerges in those cookbooks, for the minority of you who didn’t heave a sigh of relief. Either way, we’re not talking modern politics.

I’ll be watching the vote count later in the year, because my best friend and I always do an online check of the world’s level of sanity. Here, though, you’ll find recipes and places where foodways intersect politics.

Politics and foodways have natural meeting points. Polling booths in Australia often sport a sausage sizzle, which is usually a fundraiser for a local school or a local community organisation. Parties and individuals fundraise with food and cookbooks and all sorts of exciting foodie things. If any of you have cookbooks sold at election time, please email me, and I’ll mention your book as part of this new series on election food.

Election food. There’s so much of it. Conventions can have food, and caucuses. Party meetings can have food and post election get-togethers. I can’t promise to explore all of these. I can promise the historical cookbooks and other curious stuff as the occasion arises. It’s going to be fun. Even if you hate politics, some of the cakes are scrumptious. Politics can bring happiness. Sometimes.

It’s Australia Day. Well, it was Australia Day until 44 minutes ago. The thing is, I didn’t post French recipes on Bastille Day (I don’t think I did, anyhow) or American Recipes on 4 July, or any other recipes on any other national day. So I won’t type out Australia day recipes for you here. What would I give you if I did? A selection of potato salads and some discussion of how the mayo got replaced by yoghourt and sour cream? No, it just doesn’t rock my boat tonight. There are some nice photos of Australia Day-ish things here, if this saddens you also, a link here to suitable Aussie recipes (though not potato salad, sorry).

What rocks my boat tonight is recipes from my late Grandmother’s notebook, because I spent a very long time on the phone to my kid sister today, talking deep and meaningfully about the history of coffee. This doesn’t mean I’m going to give you coffee recipes.

I prefer bananas.

There are many bananas around the moment and I can’t eat even one of them (I had an unfortunate set of experiences while I was away and I’m super-sensitised to some foods). I can still enjoy reading banana recipes, though, so that’s what I’m giving you: banana recipes from Melbourne in the 1950s.

The picture is for me, since you lot get to eat the bananas. I don’t think even I can be allergic to a moustache cup (picture by Donna, in case you’d forgotten).

Banana Cream Pie

Make short pastry. Roll out & line a flat tart tin. Prick well before cooking in moderate oven. Take 6 large bananas mash & mix with 1 cup whipped cream. Add to the cream 1 tablespoon castor sugar & ½ teaspoon vanilla. Fill shell with this mixture.

Beat whites of 2 eggs stiff add 3 tablesp granulated sugar. Beat until creamy spread over the top of tart & place in oven (slow) until the meringue is pale gold. Serve hot or cold.

Banana Cheese Toast

Beat 1 egg slightly & add ¾ cup milk, ¼ teaspoon of salt, 1 teasp sugar. Dip 6 slices of bread in this mixture & fry a golden brown. While hot, cut into squares & cover with sliced banana & then thick grated cheese.

Next month the Kosher Cooking Carnival will be here, on this blog. Not that this helps you now, if you’re after amazing recipes for kosher food (which some of you surely are and others most certainly are not). me-ander is hosting it this month, which is good, because it means that interested readers can drop in on me-ander over the next few days and grab some good recipes, plus think about what they might want to contribute to the Kosher Cooking Carnival here, next month. Disinterested readers can ignore the whole thing and wait patiently for normal programming to mysteriously restore itself.

You know the posts you’ve been reading for the last two weeks? I haven’t been round to post them. I wrote most of them (and the ones I didn’t write are pretty obvious), but I wrote them round Christmas and then I disappeared to work on a novel. I forward-posted them to appear while I was hiding and typing madly.

I went with a group of writer-friends to Yackandandah in north-east Victoria. It’s a very lovely part of the world and I got two car trips to see bits of it. I know that area pretty well as an historian and a foodie (and even as a food historian). My greatest food history sadness was that I didn’t get to visit the sole vine (in Chiltern) that survived the Great Phylloxera Disaster, but the other members of my group made it to Chiltern and even did some shopping there. At least this means I know it still exists. Serves me right for not driving. I last saw it about a quarter of a century ago and I first saw it even earlier than that.

I can tell you about the vine, at least. All Victorian grapevines had to be replanted and the whole industry started again from scratch using resistant American rootstock. The region now produces some of the best fortifieds in the world, but it was devastated just about a century ago. I grew up thinking of it as a kind of phoenix. Maybe one day I will get to see that vine again: it’s an important part of our food history.

I finished my novel. It may take forever to find a publisher, but it’s done and over. Right now I think it is pathetic and awful and am very depressed about it. I always get like this when I read through a novel I’ve just finished, so don’t take it too seriously. I pity my fellow writers, who weren’t depressed and miserable and thinking their work was a waste of time. They were all dynamic and cheerful and incredibly hard-working while I was moping those last few days.

Sharyn (who posted here twice while I was away) saved me from myself on Monday and gave me some regional food and a bunch of local history. I’ll tell you about some of what I saw as the mood takes me. Or maybe as the cheese and mustard make me happy again.

While I was away, my friend Kate (who does those lovely photos) went to New Caledonia. She took some food pictures there, and maybe I’ll direct you to them once I’ve seen her and can tell a bit about her experiences.

Also, I have some much-delayed pictures from Trudi, who was writing away with me recently. I’ve delayed them because there’s a bit more work putting together the posts that explain them than for other posts and life has been impossibly hectic, but they’re too good to stay hidden.

In less than a month I have a course starting in Canberra. You can find details here, if you’re interested. It’s a fun course and I’m looking forward to it. I’ve taught it a few times now, but this year I plan to add a few twists. We have an excursion to a farm to meet historical cows and pigs (including, I hope, one called Beyonce) this time, for instance, plus a heap of new recipes, reflecting my recent research.

The next few days I’m still in the world of speculative fiction, though, as I have reviews to write. Isn’t it just as well that I created a menu for my just-finished novel. If any of you speak up and say “I want to see the menu” I’ll post it for you. It’s based on some rather sumptuous eighteenth century dinners, but modified for a future world that apes the eighteenth century but has certain problems re-creating it accurately.

And now you know where I’ve been and what I’ve been doing and why. Does it rejoice your heart?

I’m starting the New Year off nicely, thanks to all of you and everyone who has linked to me or comented on my posts. I’m in the top hundred Aussie blogs again. Thank you all.

Expect a real post soon. I just want to bask for a moment. Not in the top hundred thing, but in the 35 degree celsius heat. Oh, for a cool change!

Two in two days is worrying, especially as this is definitely from me. I’m not well. Nothing life threatening. Lots of graphic symptoms, inckuding headache and vomiting so it might be as simple as heat exhaustion and lots of tension underneath (the doctor said I needed time out, but that was before the most graphic symptoms appeared).

Anyhow, it is summer and I am prone to heat exhaustion. I’m also prone to never taking holidays. I hope you don’t mind not getting any posts until 1 January while I take a bit of a break and take care of myself a little.