Food History

I’m taking a break from drinking. I promise to get back to it, though, and write more curiously influenced posts.

Today I have two things to talk about: search terms and one of the community cookbooks. They are in no way linked, nor is the fact that I spent this morning looking at stoves.

Normally search terms for this blog aren’t at all interesting. Everyone who comes is practical and sensible and looks for good stuff. This time, when I checked the stats, things were a bit different. That’s why I’m sharing. Everyone else gets strange terms to chuckle over so it’s about time we had some, too.

Right up the top is ‘brad and butter pudding’. I do wonder what Brad tastes like in a pudding, but I don’t want to kill him to find out. A few entries under Brad is ‘pleasure revenge food’ – if it was the same person who used both search terms and you are that person, please own up. There has to be a story in it.

Just for the record, photography was invented in the nineteenth century. This means that the poor soul who looked for ‘medieval beef photos’ was entirely out of luck. I hope that the person who keyed in ‘middle evil times people how to cook food’ had better success, though I can’t promise anything for ‘names of a Jewish butcher.’ I have met a Jewish butcher and I don’t think I called him names at all.

The rest is pretty sane and sensible. I’d really love to know what the person who googled ‘jewish herb garden’ found out. Why should a Jewish herb garden be any different from a non-Jewish one? Colour me mystified.

The next cookbook on my little pile of must-reads is The Tried-and-True Cookbook. It has a lovely blue cover and was put out by the Wesley Deep Creek Uniting Church in order to help primary school children at risk. It comes from the bottom end of mainland Australia rather than the top end, but it’s still about children and their needs.

Melbourne has a Mediterranean climate, and its food has a Mediterranean influence. Instead of tropical flavours, there is minestrone and Chinese barbecue pork, pilaf and lasagna. There is, however, also macadamia chicken, tomato curry and some truly wonderful-looking desserts that could be from anywhere European. In other words, the cookbook doesn’t reflect Melbourne, it reflects the congregation of that particular branch of the Uniting Church.

To celebrate that congregation and its efforts in helping children, how about a recipe? This one calls itself “Impossible Pie” and, despite the name, it looks delightfully simple.

Impossible pie

4 eggs
½ cup butter
½ cup plain flour
2 cups milk
1 cup sugar
1 cup coconut
2 tsp vanilla

Blend all ingredients together and pour into a 25 cm greased pie plate.

Bake at 180 degrees C for about 1 hour or until centre is firm.

Tonight is the night. Two gorgeous community cookbooks, randomly selected from the pile at my desk. Except the first one I picked up was a rather unexpected one. Friends and family didn’t just give me random cookbooks, it turns out. So tonight, you meet just one book, but it’s a special one.

The first book is slim and the cover is a splash of orange and yellow. It’s called “recipes from the tropics help a bush child”. The first four words are in a different font to the rest but no, there is no punctuation nor any space between the two phrases. So next time you meet a bush child, you know what to cook.

Inside, there is a really interesting cookbook. It was compiled in the far north of Australia by the Whitsunday Branch of the Queensland Bush Children’s Health Scheme. A community cookbook, sure, but with the funds raised reaching across a vast territory. This is one of the things I love about these books – they can be national or local or something quite, quite different. This booklet is quite, quite different.

It is a 1970s book, and a lot of trouble has been taken to show why it’s necessary. There’s a map on page c showing the places children have come from over a thirty year period to get help at the Rowes Bay Bush Childrens’ Home in Townsville. They travelled from as far north as Thursday Island and as far south as Winton, as far east as Mackay and as far west as Camooweal.

The map is a reminder that there are politics in cookbooks. In fact, the book is a reminder that there are politics in cookbooks. These children were some of the least privileged in the world, despite living in a prosperous country. One of the biggest public statements the new Prime Minister will ever make was the ’sorry’ he said to the Stolen Generation: the period covered by the map was just a part of the period and apart of the terrain covered by that apology. The cookbook is a reminder that nothing is as simple as it seems and that, throughout the bad years, there were goodhearted people doing their best: politics are complicated and stories are individual.

There are some fabulous tropical recipes in the book itself and a bunch of Australian classics. Zucchini and Lamb sounds like something from my childhood, while Tropical Trifle (with pineapple, mango and passionfruit) makes my mouth water. There is a Palm Island Pie I shall be making next summer and jellied pawpaw wedges that look perfect to serve to children. Ragout of Octopus appeals less, I’m afraid: I’d rather have Gingered Pacific Island Steaks or Polynesian Baked Chicken.

The recipes are so clearly Australian and have a lovely Islander influence. They’re the perfect reminder that peoples’ lives are never simple and that politics is never what it seems. And that community cookbooks to raise funds to help children are usually just that, and worth noticing.

Several thoughtful people gave me community cookbooks for my birthday. I’m delaying putting them away until I can blog them, because community cookbooks are way more fun when they’re shared. I looked at my little stack today and wondered where to start and how to go about it. The problem is that in some ways local cookbooks are all different and unique. In other ways, they’re a bit the same. It’s the latter that worries me. Normally I classify works by similarities of ideas or concepts or language. If I do that in these instances, what you will get are blog posts of the greatest boredom. It will strip the books of their individuality and quirkiness and render them intellectual sludge. That intellectual sludge might be the underlying material for really interesting academic papers, but I’ve decided against it in this case. Be proud of me.

What I thought I would do is introduce them in pairs. Not matched pairs, either. I’ll take two at random each day for three days and find you something cool in each and every one of them. After all, a lot of love and work goes into each and every community cookbook. Even the ones that use a set format and just modify it a little and then add their own recipes entails a bunch of effort.

I’m afraid my blogposts won’t lead to a sparkling little article on the nature of community cookbooks. It will help you retain your respect for them and understand just how fascinating they are, though, and the lack of sludge should mean that you won’t use my blog last thing at night to help you get a good night’s rest. So, three posts, two books a post, starting tomorrow.

Today’s biscuit recipes are from The American Economical Housekeeper, and Family Receipt Book by Mrs EA Howland. It was published in Cincinnati in 1845. For saleratus you can use baking soda, and everything else is pretty obvious. Is it equally obvious that I’m falling asleep at my desk? I hope not.

“17. Brown Bread Biscuit.
Two quarts of Indian meal, a pint and a half of rye, one cup of flour, two spoonfuls of yeast, and a table-spoonful of molasses. It is well to add a little saleratus to yeast almost always, just as you put it into the article. Let it rise over night.

18. Bread Biscuit.
Three pounds of flour, half a pint of Indian meal sifted, a little butter, two spoonfuls of lively yeast; set it before the fire to rise over night; mix it with warm water.

19. Tea Biscuit.
* Take one pint of sour milk, one tea-spoonful of saleratus, flour enough to knead up, a small piece of lard or butter, a little salt; roll it out, and cut it into small biscuits.

20. Light Biscuit.
Take two pounds of flour, a pint of buttermilk, half a tea-spoonful of saleratus; put into the buttermilk a small piece of butter or lard rubbed into the flour; make it about the consistency of bread before baking.

21. Rice Biscuit.
Two pounds of flour, a tea-cupful of rice, well boiled, two spoonfuls of yeast; mix it with warm water; when risen enough, bake it.

25. Rich Milk Biscuit.
Two pounds of sifted flour, eight ounces butter, two eggs, three gills of milk, a gill and a half of yeast. Cut the butter into the milk and warm it slightly, sift the flour into a pan, and pour the milk and butter into it. Beat the eggs and pour them in, also the yeast; mix all well together with a knife. Flour your moulding-board, put the lump of dough on it, and knead it very hard. Then cut the dough in small pieces, and knead them into round balls; prick and set them in buttered pans to rise till light, probably about an hour, and bake them in a moderate oven.

26. Butter Biscuit.
Eight ounces of butter, two pounds of flour sifted, half a pint of milk or cold water, a salt spoonful of salt. Cut up the butter in the flour and put the salt to it, wet it to a stiff dough with the milk or water, mix it well with a knife. Throw some flour on the moulding-board, take the dough out of the pan, and knead it very well. Roll it out into a large, thick sheet, and beat it very hard on both sides with the rolling-pin. Beat it a long time, cut it out, with a tin or cup, into small, round, thick cakes. Beat each cake on both sides with the rolling-pin, prick them with a fork, put them in buttered pans, and bake them to a light brown in a slow oven.”

On Saturday I went to see an exhibition of Medieval and Renaissance manuscripts at the State Library of Victoria. There were some great books on show, and many I had met already, in other place, at other times. None of them were cookbooks. This reminded me of things I know, but that I don’t articulate nearly often enough.

Just because more of a certain book survives, doesn’t mean that this book is more important in people’s lives. It might have survived because no-one read it. Think of the book that you get given as a present and cant get rid of because it reminds you of someone. As your favourite cookbook gets dog-eared and torn and loses ages and eventually gets replaced, the gift endures, unchanged and in perfect condition.

In the manuscript exhibition, most of the displayed books were religious. Yet there was an example of a cheap medical guide (cheap t produce, relatively speaking) which represented a zillion lost everyday manuscripts.

We don’t have many books of recipes for the Middle Ages. In fact, they are incredibly rare and special. This doesn’t mean that people didn’t cook. It might mean that recipes weren’t written down, or it might mean that what they were written on didn’t survive the ravages of time. Think of the zillions of community cookbooks that exist in there here and now (I have wise friends who have added to their number for my birthday): these cookbooks don’t survive easily. When I was trying to find one last surviving volume of the National Council of Jewish Women of Australia Cookbook (the original one, from fifty plus years ago) none of the women who had owned it could find a copy, nor could any library. Yet it had been printed and loved and used and quoted.

I’m trying to say that we can’t judge the importance of a cookbook by how many of them there are. We have to look for more evidence. I’m not saying it very well because my mind is still pondering those amazing Medieval manuscripts.

When I moved out of home I did a lot of overseas travel. When you can cook and you travel, everyone wants you to cook dishes associated with your native country. Some of the recipes in this section of my book of secrets (which now ought to be renamed my book of not many secrets) are because I love them (challah), some because I love making them (macaroons) and some because everyone demanded them (pavlovas). For most recipes, the person who gave me their version is written down – I’m going to include the personal name of the recipe-giver, just in case they happen upon these recipes. If you’re one of these people, it means I remember you fondly, even if we’ve lost touch.

Challah (traditional bread, for Friday nights –from Nancy)

Stir 1 sachet yeast in ¼ cup lukewarm water and let sit 5 minutes.

Mix 4 ½ cups flour, 2 tbs oil, 2 tsp salt, 2 eggs and 1 cup water together. Add the yeast mixture and stir well. Knead until smooth. Let rise one hour.

Thump down. Knead briefly. Break into three pieces. Braid.

Let rise one hour. Beat an egg yolk and brush the top of the load with it. Sprinkle with poppy seed. Bake at 350 degrees F for about one hour.

Coconut Macaroons (from my mother)

3 egg whites
1 cup sugar
2 tsp corn flour
2 cups coconut
vanilla essence
glace cherries to decorate

Beat egg whites until stiff. Add sugar in small quantities, beating well after each addition. Add cornflour. Beat over saucepan of fast boiling water until mixture begins to cook on the bottom of the basic. Fold in coconut and essence.

Place in small heaps on greased trays. Decorate with cherry.
Place in the lower half of a moderately slow over (160 degrees C) for c 25 minutes. Cool.

Pavlova (from my mother)

3 egg whites
12 tbs sugar
1 tsp vinegar
2 tsp cornflour
cream
fruit and other toppings

Beat egg whites until stiff and dry. Add sugar in small quantities, beating well after each addition. When sugar completely added and dissolved, add vinegar and cornflour.

Spread or pipe in desired shape on greased and cornfloured tray. Place in slower half of very slow oven (120 degrees C). Leave in oven with door ajar until cold. Fill with cream (whipped with sugar if you prefer it sweet) then top as desired.

It’s about time I opened my book of secrets. Yes, I have a book of secrets. The reason I haven’t mentioned it much is because, like all the best books of secrets, I had temporarily mislaid it. For at least two years I temporarily mislaid it. How this happened in a two bedroom unit is obviously related to it being a book of secrets and not a normal volume at all.

It chronicles some of the major developments in my own personal foodways and was what got me started in thinking that food is part of our history and is not just comprised of nutrition and taste and texture (or poor nutrition, bad taste and odd texture – so much depend son the cook and the culture and the training of the palate). I started it in 1977 and I began adding family recipes and foodways when I left home in 1979. About 50% of my favourite recipes are in it, and another 45% in my brain. I use cookbooks for the other 5%. This means that this old diary is entirely crucial if anyone were to look at my foodways the way I have examined my father’s mother’s family’s.

It’s also important because I didn’t start my scholarly interest with an historical approach. As I keep saying (because I like saying it), I am an historiographer by training, albeit one with some ethnography and archaeology and paleography and codicology. I care as much about how thoughts come together as what they give back to the reader from how they’re formulated as I care for the thoughts themselves. This means it’s important to me to know where a lot of little changes come from and how their expression changes. I always teach the development of how recipes are written to my students, which says something about how important it is to me.

To be consistent, it’s important that I share where I come from so you know my biases and also my favourite recipes (well, the ones I wasn’t sworn to deep secrecy on). I want to share how I read cookbooks and other texts with culinary information in as well as sharing the actual subjects I work with and my thoughts of the day.

If I spent hours writing long blog posts on the theory, it would send you to sleep. This might be good if any of you suffer insomnia, but it’s a tad dull. Instead, for the next few days (excepting Saturday, because I’m playing with time on Saturday) I shall give you a selection of recipes from certain periods of my life, starting from 1978. You can think it through yourself if you want to and discover how things have changed for me since my teens. If you don’t want to do the thinking, then you can just cook some simply wonderful recipes. Does that sound fair?

Many moons ago I wrote a post (which is somewhere in the archives, hiding from me) about the relationship between food and health in the Middle Ages. I love the thought that – if you follow the right principles – a feast won’t make you nearly as sick as when you don’t. Should I admit that I was foolish enough to try both a well structured meal and a poorly constructed one? Probably not a good idea.

Let me instead give you some principles of food and diet from ML Holbrook’s 1888 work. Or should that be a book by one ML Holbrook MD, author of Hygiene of the Brain and How to Strength the Memory? Whenever I see the word ‘Holbrook’ I think of submarines, because for some reason the very inland Australian Holbrook has a stranded submarine. Maybe someone should do a food history reading, sitting on the sub and reading from Eating for Strength, which is the source of the preface below? And isn’t the perfect state of agriculture in the late nineteenth century reassuring to know?

Quite obviously, though, the burning question is whether we should all take the grape cure?

I’m in a sarcastic mood, and the study of diet has changed in 120 years, but there are some fine sentiments in the preface, and it’s worth reading, with or without submarine.

“Preface

In no period of the world’s history has there ever been so deep an interest in the subject of foods as at the present. At no time since Adam and Eve left the Garden of Eden has agriculture and horticulture been so perfect, and the human race supplied with so many choice and nourishing articles of diet. And, also, at no time have so many been engaged in laborious researches on the nature of that which we eat and its relations to health and work. It would almost seem as if the time had nearly arrived when mankind would eat to live would feed themselves so as to nourish their bodies most perfectly and render themselves capable of the most labor, and least liable to disease.

The object of this volume is to present the most recent facts of science in a way to make them valuable for actual use in daily life. There is no doubt but man may double his capacity for work and for enjoyment by improving his dietetic habits. Many have already done this, and multitudes more are only waiting for the knowledge which will help them to do it. A thorough understanding of the different divisions of food and their right relation to the needs of the body is necessary, and this has been fully stated. Several new features have been introduced. To meet the requirements of that constantly increasing class who have more and more desire to draw their nourishment from the vegetable kingdom, carefully prepared and elaborate tables have been arranged showing just how much of each particular food one needs to consume in order to provide the body with the required amount of proteids, carbo-hydrates and fats.

These tables have been especially prepared for this work and are full of interest as well as being of practical value. Another interesting feature of the work relates to the cost of the different articles usually consumed, as for instance the cost of proteids, fats and carbo-hydrates in oatmeal, beef, mutton, corn, eggs, butter, cheese, beer, etc., etc. These tables are so arranged as to show at once which are the most economical articles for the table and which the most expensive, and will be of great value to all who would choose their food wisely, and also for those who desire to reduce the cost of living to a minimum and yet nourish themselves perfectly.

The chapter on the use of the apple as a means of preserving health and the one on the grape cure will, the author believes, meet a need long felt, as will also what has been said concerning the importance of the thorough mastication of our food.

The subject of drinks has also been treated fully, and a very large number of recipes for wholesome ones given. What has been said on this subject cannot fail to prove helpful to those who are in doubt on many points.

The directions for feeding young and delicate children have in practice proved most satisfactory.

The time is near when a knowledge of the principles of diet will be considered as important a part of our education as a knowledge of the multiplication table. That this little work may help to hasten this time is the sincere desire of the author.

M. L. H.”

PS Holbrook not only has a stranded submarine, it has a nice bakery.

For some reason today I keep thinking about writers and their food. I know this is because the whole authentic banquet for science-fiction convention thing began as a writers and their food thing. More and more of my speculative fiction writer friends became enthusiastic about the history side of things and it was totally inevitable that we would try for a Medieval feast. When that was a huge success, we had to try a Regency Gothic banquet. When that was also a raging success, we decided on this year’s theme. But it all started with foodie writers of fiction.

Speculative fiction is often described as ‘what if?’ fiction. “What if Celtic skins were green?” (in a book by Peter Dickinson). “What if mirrors were magic?” (All too many books, including one of my own which is slowly advancing in the queue towards publication.) “What if the world came to an end?” “What if teleportation was everyday?” I could line all the questions up and classify books according to their ‘what if’ and the books would probably line up vertically to reach the Moon. That particular ‘What if” hasn’t been done with ideas, as far as I can remember, but it has certainly been done with other things.

There are so many what ifs. I guess it was inevitable that a bunch of writers who enjoyed their food and were curious about the past would say “What if we actually knew what these things tasted like?” And it was equally inevitable that I said “But we do” and proceeded to prove it.

The thing is that we’re not the first group of writers to become fascinated with food. I might have to teach a course on writers and their food, one day. It would be great fun.

Alas, I’m still ill. In the absence of my brain, I’m giving you the preface to a cookbook. I had marked it down as one that deserved some commentary, but I don’t know if I can give you that tonight. (Isn’t it ironic that it’s a gastric virus that has made me so very exhausted?)

The book is The Complete Confectioner, Pastry-Cook and Baker by Parkinson, 1864. The title is much longer than that, to be honest. I love nineteenth century titles that try to edge over into a second page.

This is the preface to the American Edition. One day I need to compare other prefaces from other editions and find out just what the difference is. Not tonight, though. Tonight you get the writer’s comments, unadorned. Since lack of adornment includes such phrases as “Confectionary is the poetry of epicurism” which means my illness is not going to mean you suffer unduly.

“Almost every foreigner who visits this country remarks with astonishment the almost universal neglect of that art upon which, more than any thing else, depends the health and comfort of a people; and by many scientific men have most of the prevalent diseases of this country, especially the dyspepsia, been ascribed to the hurried, crude and unwholesome manner in which our food is prepared; of latter years, more attention has been paid to cooking; but the handmaiden of that parent art, confectionary, is still neglected and unknown, yet it is of little less importance than the graver branch referred to. Confectionary is the poetry of epicurism it throws over the heavy enjoyments of the table the relief of a milder indulgence, and dispenses the delights of a lighter and more harmless gratification of the appetite. The dessert, properly prepared, contributes equally to health and comfort; but “got up” as confectionary too often is, it is not only distasteful to a correct palate, but is deleterious and often actually poisonous.

In introducing to the American public the modes by which the table of hospitality may be enriched and adorned, we have consulted every authority, French or English, within our reach; but the basis of our little work is to be found in Read’s Confectioner, a late London publication.

Having for many years been connected with the oldest, most extensive and successful confectionary establishment in the country, we have been enabled to make from our own experience many important modifications and to introduce many additional receipts, particularly in relation to the various articles of luxury which the bounty of our soil and climate render almost exclusively American.

The volume has thus been increased in size, and we trust improved in value.

Trusting that our efforts to advance the popular knowledge of the art which has for many years engaged our attention, may meet with approbation, we present the result of our labours to a candid and indulgent public.

Chestnut Street,
Philadelphia.”

My mind keeps coming back to The Woman Suffrage Cook Book. I know I’ve given you the election cake from it already, but there’s another bit you might want to see. Let me start from the very beginning.

The very beginning in this case is the title, which is important to understanding why the book was put together. It’s The Woman Suffrage Cook Book, containing thoroughly tested and reliable recipes for cooking, directions for the care or the sick, and practical suggestions, contributed especially for this work. Edited and published by Mrs. Hattie a. Burr, 12 Wayne Street, Boston. In aid of the festival and bazaar, December 13-19, 1886. “Country Store,” April 21-26, 1890. Boston.

Women’s suffrage was more than the vote. It fitted the perceived role of women in society and when the vote was taken away from women in the various States, their roles diminished and their prestige suffered. The very first words acknowledge this, without being accusatory or sounding difficult.

“THIS little volume is sent out with an important mission. It has been carefully prepared, and will prove a practical, reliable authority on cookery, housekeeping, and care of the sick, especially adapted to family use. While many of the receipts are original, it is not claimed that all are so; but each has been thoroughly tested, and is vouched for as reliable by the contributor whose name is appended.

Among the contributors are many who are eminent in their professions as teachers, lecturers, physicians, ministers, and authors,-whose names are household words in the land. A book with so unique and notable a list of contributors, vouched for by such undoubted authority, has never before been given to the public.

Grateful acknowledgments are due to the kind friends,-many of them in distant homes,-who have so willingly contributed of their knowledge and experience for the accomplishment of this undertaking. I believe the great value of these contributions will be fully appreciated, and our messenger will go forth a blessing to housekeepers, and an advocate for the elevation and enfranchisement of woman.

HATTIE A. BURR.
BOSTON, NOVEMBER 25, 1886.”

I have an author interview for you. I carried the book to work today and read it on the way to the bus stop, then I read it on the bus, then I read it some more right until I got to class. Scott Gold has written a wholly entertaining volume devoted to his own experiences of eating meat. Along the way he manages to give useful advice on how to choose a good butcher, how meat ought to fit into a life (and he’s very scathing about quality) and a whole bunch more. It’s a US book, so his focus is on what is available in the US, legislation and animal rights, how hard rattlesnake is to fillet and other crucial morsels.

He throws himself so entirely into the experience of tasting 31 types of meat that the book (as I’ve found) is almost impossible to put down. I knew some of his lessons (quality not quantity; cooking counts; meat handling counts, not everything is equally edible) but that still didn’t prevent my copy of the book becoming rather battered in the 24 hours I’ve owned it.

The book is called The Shameless Carnivore, the author is Scott Gold and it was released today in US time. And no, I haven’t been paid to say nice things – I was given an advance copy of the book so I would know what questions to ask. No, you can’t have my copy of the book. Here, have this interview instead:

1. Could you tell us something about yourself and about your book.

Oh my - so much to say! I’m originally from New Orleans, so the love of food is basically written in my genetic code. I studied philosophy and languages in college as well as creative writing, and was working in the publishing business in New York, hoping to maybe one day write a novel (just like everyone and his cousin). Then, through a perfect-storm of serendipity, I got the opportunity to write a book proposal for a “carnivore’s polemic.” When I started writing about food — and especially meat — the passion flew out of me in a way it had never done with any other subject. So I decided to take my passion for carnivorism to its logical extreme. This meant a two part plan:
1) to examine the subject of meat philosophically, from all angles. It would be entirely too easy to write an anti-vegetarian screed, but that was never my desire or intention. As someone with an unabiding love of meat products, I really wanted to dig deeply into the subject of what it means to be an animal who survives on eating the flesh of other animals, from angles ranging from anthropological to dietary, historical (I’m a culinary history junkie), medical, ethical and spiritual, agricultural, environmental, you name it. And
2) to become the “ultimate carnivore” by trying to eat 31 different animals in month, and then every cut and organ of a cow. Along the way there were other adventures, mostly hilarious but sometimes poignant, that included hunting squirrels in Louisiana, attending the 24th annual Testicle Festival in Montana, and even helping a family farm butcher their cow for that year’s meat. It was all pretty amazing.

2. Did any part of your family food history inspire the book (anecdotes of the “No! Keep that out of your mouth!” type are the obvious, but I was thinking as well of maybe a particular attitude towards food eg an intellectual or emotional response.).

Again, it all goes back to being a native New Orleanian. Back home, food is an integral part of the culture in a way unique from any other American city — people adore food there, but not just the rich, and not just the fancy restaurants and haute cuisine. From a floor captain at a place like Galatoire’s or Commander’s Palace to the guy who collects trash on the side of I-10, everyone in NOLA has a love affair with the local cuisine. Sometimes that means a gorgeous turtle soup au sherry (a classic) — I made it from scratch for the book, and it took two days — or maybe just a muffaletta sandwich, chicken and sausage jamballaya, red beans and rice, or a roast beef po-boy swimming in mayonnaise and gravy. NOLA cuisine, as well as an ingrained atmosphere of fun (and, yes, maybe a little sin) is the ultimate bond of the people. Also, my mother is a wonderful cook in her own right, and used our family dinner table to experiment with different cuisines, everything from spiced lamb patties with couscous to chicken and tasso pasta, and everything in between. With an upbringing like that, winding up as a food writer was almost a foregone conclusion.

Great. I’m making myself hungry. Again.

3. Being Jewish myself, I looked at the description of the book and thought “If only I had the courage to do that, I could try all those Ancient Roman recipes.” How did the Jewish aspect affect what you did? How do you explain it/justify it/deal with it?

This is how I dealt with it: I didn’t. I’ve never kept kosher…being a lifelong, rabid omnivore, any sort of dietary restrictions (other than making sure that you try to keep a relatively diet most of the time) have always seemed crazy to me. In fact, by the time I’d finished the book I’d pretty much broken every dietary law laid down in Leviticus 11, in which the “ye shall not eat” category is filled with things that are spine-meltingly delicious. Oddly, locusts and grasshoppers are perfectly kosher, but I’ve never felt an overwhelming urge to eat them. Pork belly, on the other hand…

4. What is the meat you most want to see put onto modern menus (that isn’t there already)?

A great question. I have to say, unequivocally: goat. It has such a rich tradition in so many other cultures, and yet American goat consumption has been on a sharp, steady decline over the last hundred years or so. And this despite the fact that goat is every bit as delicious as lamb (though with its own unique flavors), not to mention that most foodies have little compunction about eating goat’s milk cheeses like chevre. But suggest to them a goat pate or maybe rack of goat, and suddenly they get all squeamish. This, to me, is utter lunacy. What is it about goat that’s so off-putting? Luckily, there’s a growing number of independent goat farms that now provide outstanding, humanely and organically raised goat meat, and I’m singing its praises every chance I get.

5. What is the meat you least want to see again and wouldn’t even feed your worst enemy?

Bull penis (or “pizzle”), hands down. Just unconscionably disgusting. Most everything else was great, though, especially all the savory variety meats like calf’s brains, kidneys, bone marrow (oooooohhhh), tripe, blood sausage, you name it.

6. Has the experience changed how you approach everyday foods?

It always surprises people to hear this, but I actually eat less meat now than ever before. Me: The Shameless Carnivore! After everything I’ve learned in my research, I’ve made a conscious decision to try to eat only truly splendid meat. Usually, this means that I have to pay significantly more for it, and hence have it in my diet a little less often. But I’d much rather eat vegetarian a few times a week if it means sitting down to a meal of truly succulent, humanely raised, grass-fed beef or lamb at the end of the day. And when you start to really consider your meat, to take it seriously, I’ve found that you actually end up enjoying it that much more.

7. Please, can we have a favourite recipe?

It’s too hard to pick just one, but please see my book for some of my favorites, including Crock-Pot Rabbit, Tibetan Yak Momos, Herb-crusted Rack of Lamb and more!

And now let’s find out what our esteemed writers say about wheat and wheat cookery during wartime. (more…)

Today and tomorrow are two parts of the same post. I was entirely fascinated by this particular book and thought you might be, too, but I wanted to give you a decent excerpt.

Writing during wartime (even at the tail end or just after – in the case of today’s book, obviously the preparation was done during the war) has a different feel to other writing. A country’s consciousness can change or there might be some restricted ingredients.

There have been many studies of this as regards to World War II, but very few relatively of how World War I affected the US. Published in 1918, C Houston and Alberta M Goudiss’ Foods that will Win the War and How to Cook Them is a lovely source for such a study.

The introductory bits are full of laudable intentions and how to translate those into changed eating habits. These days changes to eating habits are often about us and our health, sometimes about our carbon footprint, and very seldom how we can meet the nation’s military needs.

I’ve put it behind a cut, simply because (even cut in half) it’s long. I strongly recommend it as fascinating reading. The advice on breadmaking is particularly interesting. (I wish I knew why my writing was so formal today!)

FOREWORD (more…)

Tonight I crossed nikujaga with Irish stew for dinner. It tasted entirely delicious, but made me feel very guilty about warping history. I think the moral of that story is never to make Irish stew while you’re missing your Japanese friends.

The other thing I ate today was a test recipe for the Prohibition banquet. It was a rice pudding that just doesn’t make the cut. The flavour is almost divine, but the texture was so sad I nearly wept. I wasn’t sure about rice pudding on the menu anyway, so it’s gone. Well, except the last little bit, which is tomorrow’s breakfast.

To assuage my guilt and the recipe failure, I’m giving you recipes from 1838. There’s a surety and certainty about life in 1838 that is missing today. What’s also missing today is the level of adulterated foods for purchase in shops. We have occasional problems (cassava imported into Australia is an issue right now, for instance), but that’s all.

The book is The Virgina Housewife, by Mrs Mary Randolph. It’s from Baltimore.

What she called a drop biscuit, I call a biscuit. Tavern biscuit is also a biscuit in my book. It’s rather nice when Australian and US biscuit recipes overlap for a change. What this means is terminology overlap and that things are suddenly hotting up in the little collection of biscuit and scone recipes.

To make drop biscuit

Beat eight eggs very light, add to them twelve ounces of flour, and one pound of sugar; when perfectly light, drop them on tin sheets, and bake them in a quick oven.

Tavern biscuit

To one pound of flour, add half a pound of sugar, half a pound of butter, some mace and nutmeg powdered, and a glass of brandy or wine; wet it with milk, and when well kneaded, roll it thin, cut it in shapes, and bake it quickly.

To make nice biscuit

Rub a large spoonful of butter into a quart of risen dough, knead it well, and make it into biscuit, either thick or thin: bake them quickly.

Soufle biscuits

Rub four ounces of butter into a quart of flour, make it into paste with milk, knead it well, roll it as thin as paper, and bake it to look white.