Comment: This recipe is subtitled “From a recipe in the possession of Charles G. Leland, Esq.”, and a footnote to the 1934 reprint of the work notes that Leland was “An American author whose fame rests chiefly on the Hans Breitman Ballads. He was editor of The Illustrated News in New York for many years before the Civil War, and wrote many books. He also contributed to Graham’s Magazine, which published much of Edgar Allen Poe’s work.”  That seems like a bit of a stretch for a brush-with-greatness connection, and a rather unkind swipe at Mr. Poe’s famous fondness for excess in matters of drink besides. As to the drink itself, the claim that this is “sufficient for one person” has, we hope,  to be either a joke or a misprint. Aside from the alcohol involved, the thought of consuming almost a pound of sugar for a night’s drinking should bring on psychosomatic diabetes.  And also…yuck.

One-third pint of lemon juice
Three-quarters pound of white sugar
One pint of mixture, composed of one-fourth pint of peach brandy, one-half pint of Cognac brandy, and one-fourth pint of Jamaica rum.
Two and one-half pints of cold water

The above is generally sufficient for one person.

From The Bon-Vivant’s Companion, or, How to Mix Drinks by Jerry Thomas, 1864

          

Comment: This is neither an apple-flavored dinner roll nor the sort of sticky cylinder of “fruit” paste popular with very young people.  In fact it’s hard to think of exactly what modern day product, either commercial or homemade, that it does resemble, because the whole technique of boiled puddings and dumplings has gone so completely out of fashion. It was still extremely common in the mid 19th century though, so Mrs. Bryan didn’t feel a need to go into a great whacking lot of detail. The “pudding-cloth”  should be smooth fabric (no terrycloth or old towels, please) and slick, to discourage the food contents from sticking to it, but not waterproof since the water is what cooks the product. Probably your best bet is an old but clean and intact cotton pillowcase, with the side seams removed to make a single layer of cloth. For this dish you would probably want it about a foot square, and remember you need three of them, one for each roll. Pay close attention to the order to dip the cloth in boiling water then sprinkle it with flour: we suspect this forms a sort of shell to keep the crust of the roll from sticking to it. Peel it out carefuly. The result should be something like a boiled pie.

Roll out a sheet of common pie paste [crust], about one fourt of an inch thick, and put a thicksmooth layer of appe butter over it, roll it up into a scroll, making the roll about as large in circumference as a large glass tumbler, and about eight inches long; close the paste very securely at both ends and the side that is open, making the paste as smooth as possible where the edges meet. Having made out three in this manner, dust them well with flour, tie them up separately in dumpling cloths, havign first dipped them [the cloths] into boiling water and dusted them with flour, and boil them like puddings till they are done; then take them carefully out of the cloths, lay them side by side in a dish of suitable size, and eat them warm with cream sauce.

From The Kentucky Housewife by Mrs. Lettice Bryan, Cincinnati OH 1839

          

Comment: No, don’t start mixing a batch of curry powder. The word “Indian” in this case means Indian meal, or as it is known today, cornmeal. Why the exceedingly useful word “maize” for the premier grain of the New World did not become universal in the land of its birth is unknown. The word “corn” to a European could refer to any grain, be it wheat, barley or whatever, so was useless in describing the meal made from the grains of any particular plant. What we now call corn in America was created over millenia by crossbreeding Mexican grass plants, in what has been described as the most impressive feat of genetic engineering ever accomplished. Perhaps Native Americans deserve to have their name attached to their plant after all. Oh, and “sweet” milk is simply milk that is fresh and not soured. It does not imply the addition of sugar or other sweetener.

1 qt. (4 cups) cornmeal
1/2 tsp. salt
2 tbs butter OR 4 tbs. finely chopped suet
2 eggs, beaten
Milk
Molasses (optional topping)

Sift a quart of fine Indian meal, mix with it a salt-spoonful of salt, a spoonful of butter, or two of finely chopped suet, two well beaten eggs and enough sweet milk to make it into good bread dough. Work it well with your hands, make it into dumplings the size of a large biscuit, flour them well, drop them into a pot of boiling water, and boil them briskly until done. Be very careful in serving them, lest you break them. Eat them warm with molasses. Indian dumplings are sometimes eaten with corned pork or bacon. In such cases they should be boiled with the meat with which they are served.

From The Kentucky Housewife by Mrs. Lettice Bryan Cincinnati OH 1839

          

Note: As is usual in blog-formatted settings, this series is best read in reverse order. You would not want to engage in your Manuring, for instance, before properly preparing your Soil. This could be messy and also confuse your vegetables.  Just check the sidebar for the category “Gardening” and note the numbers assigned to each. Later entries can be looked up for each individual plant by name, so you can consult the 1863 advice on Gooseberries for instance without having to wade through articles on Okra or something else in which you have no interest. We think only and always of the convenience of our readers. Our notes will be interspersed as needed.

(From The Housekeeper’s Encyclopedia by Mrs. E. F. Haskell, New York, 1863)

TRENCHING–After the draining is accomplished [note, we skipped that part, it is a subject best left to professionals  with proper tools and expertise. Drainage has to be considered in the context of your entire yard, and your neighbors, and the surrounding landscape], the next object is to deepen, and if hard, to soften the soil. The very best method of benefiting such land permanently, is to trench, and at the same time, manure it.

Proceed as follows: Open a trench two feet wide; throw the top soil into a cart, or wheelbarrow, and dump it down on the opposite side of the bed that is to be trenched. This soil [note, depending on the history of your property you may not have a layer of good topsoil. Look for a change in color or consistency of the dirt on a consistent line as you dig] is usually about six inches to one foot deep; throw out a foot of soil from the bottom of the trench, and cart that to the other side of the bed, so that it can be shovelled into the last trench, after the top soil. Spade up so as to loosen the soil in the trench, one spade deep; throw into the trench one foot of long manure, and then proceed as before.

To open another trench, throw the top soil from this into the first trench, and afterwards the clay, and so proceed until each bed in the garden is finished; this should be done late in the summer, or early in the fall, so that the frost can act upon the clay; a great change in it being effected by the freezing.

Comment: This is actually a very good process for dealing with heavy clay soil, but it’s a hell of a lot of work without mechanical assistance.  As backhoes were not available in the 1860s we suspect hired laborers would have been called for. If you are thinking of doing this to an entire yard, either front, back or side, we again suggest consultation with a professional lest drainage problems be inadvertently created.

Next: On to manure!

          

Back in the old CWi Cookbook section we chose a number of historic recipes and actually made them, at home. One of the more popular results of this project was an item called “Chicken Pudding – Old Virginia Way.” Here’s the recipe as it appears in the 1875 version of Anna Maria Collins’   The Great Western Cook Book, Or Table Receipts, Adapted to Western Housewifery:

Take two very young tender chickens, cut them up, wash them in cold water, until perfectly clean and white, wipe them very dry with a linen napkin, roll them up closely, while you prepare your batter.

Break eight eggs in a pan, a tea-spoonful of salt, and one of black pepper, a quarter of a pound of butter, eight heaped table-spoonsful of flour, one quart of rich milk; beat this mixture until it is very smooth and light; then put in the chickens, stir it well, and pour it in a pan well buttered, set it in a very hot oven or stove; after it commences to brown on top, put a sheet of white paper on the top. It will take more than one hour to bake it.

Modern-Day Adaptation:

For “rich milk”, we used a blend of whole milk and Half-and-Half. We baked this dish in a 400 degree oven for 2 1/2 hours. After the first hour, we covered with aluminum foil in place of paper. Note that both raw eggs and raw chicken begin this dish, necessitating extra-long cooking to ensure thorough doneness.

Results:

The dish was tested by three people. All agreed that the “Pudding” which forms tasted like scrambled eggs, and enjoyed it. The chicken was as tender as could possibly be hoped for, with a pleasant taste that permeated the meat. A delicious entree which we served with Broccoli in cheese sauce – a good vegetable option.

For a family of three or four you might want to halve all ingredients. Using one chicken, and 1/2 of all other ingredients, we were left with the pictured result, which easily fed three adults with plenty left over.

A note on the amount of eggs – we used 4 “Jumbo” sized eggs. Eggs in the 1860’s tended towards the small side, and our dish could easily have been made with a smaller number of the larger eggs.

          

Let us compare two recipes for baked beans, one of the modern day and the other the oldest we can find. First the modern:

BOSTON BAKED BEANS (copied at semi-random from allrecipes.com, author “ajrhodes3″)

• 2 cups navy beans
• 1/2 pound bacon
• 1 onion, finely diced
• 3 tablespoons molasses
• 2 teaspoons salt
• 1/4 teaspoon ground black pepper
• 1/4 teaspoon dry mustard
• 1/2 cup ketchup
• 1 tablespoon Worcestershire sauce
• 1/4 cup brown sugar

1. Soak beans overnight in cold water. Simmer the beans in the same water until tender, approximately 1 to 2 hours. Drain and reserve the liquid.
2. Preheat oven to 325 degrees F (165 degrees C).
3. Arrange the beans in a 2 quart bean pot or casserole dish by placing a portion of the beans in the bottom of dish, and layering them with bacon and onion.
4. In a saucepan, combine molasses, salt, pepper, dry mustard, ketchup, Worcestershire sauce and brown sugar. Bring the mixture to a boil and pour over beans. Pour in just enough of the reserved bean water to cover the beans. Cover the dish with a lid or aluminum foil.
5. Bake for 3 to 4 hours in the preheated oven, until beans are tender. Remove the lid about halfway through cooking, and add more liquid if necessary to prevent the beans from getting too dry.
   

This appears to be exactly what you or I would think of as good old-fashioned homemade baked beans. Starts with dried beans, check. Long slow cooking, check. Onions, other ingredients, check. Good thing we are working or we would go off and make a batch right now.

Now let’s look at the historical sample. There were several cookbook authors working in or near Boston in the 1840s, including Mrs. N. K. M. Lee and  Sarah Josepha Hale. Mrs. Lee’s baked beans are boring beyond words: beans and salt pork comprise the entire ingredient list. Mrs. Hale’s receipt  isn’t appreciably different. It is the undeservedly obscure Mrs. M. H. Cornelius who gives us the best we can find from the era. From the 1859 revised edition of her The Young Housekeeper’s Friend (ingredient list added):

1 quart dried white or Navy beans
the rind (skin) from 1 lb salt pork, pork removed, rind cut in strips
1-2 spoonfuls molasses (size of spoon unspecified other than “large”)

For a family of six or seven, take a quart of white beans, wash them  in several waters, and put them into two or three quarts [of water] over night. In the morning (when it will be easier to cull out the bad ones, than before they were soaked), pick them over, and boil them until they begin to crack open; then put them into a brown pan, such as are made for the purpose. Pour upon them enough of the water they were boiled in almost to cover them. Cut the rind of about a pound of salt pork into narrow strips; lay it on the top of the beans, and press it down so that it will lie more than half its thickness in the water. Bake several hours; four or five is not too much. Where a brick oven is used, it is well to let beans remain in it over night. If they are baked in a stove, or range, more water may be necessary, before they are done.

Many persons think it a decided improvement to put in a large spoonful or two of molasses. It is a very good way.

Whee! We are all the way up to molasses! That’s the good news.

The bad news is we actually made this recipe once, exactly as specified. “A large spoonful or two” of molasses, and trust me we used the largest spoon we could find in the house, resisting the temptation to employ the gravy ladle,  is entirely insufficient for a quart of beans. We might as well have used an eyedropper for all the sweetening power that was conveyed.  Salty boiled beans which had done some time in the oven. Blegh.

No onion. No ketchup–and yes, they did have ketchup in the 19th century, albeit not quite in the form we use today.  No Worcestershire (understandable since the product was only invented in the 1840s, although tangy sauces of other sorts were in common use.) No dry mustard. Not even any brown sugar, perfectly well known and available almost anywhere in America at the time.

Of course you probably have dishes you make which started out as recipes in a cookbook or magazine, which you have modified over the years to suit your personal preferences to the point where the original author would not recognize it. It is entirely possible that cooks in 19th century  Boston and elsewhere were doing the same– tarting up Mrs. Lee, or Mrs. Hales, or even Mrs. Cornelius’ baked beans with additives to make those salty boiled beans a little more persuasive to the palate. If you are contemplating making baked beans for a reenactment or other historical setting, we hope this discussion has given enough background to embolden you to make your own modifications. Keep historical accuracy in mind of course, but beyond that, make something people will enjoy eating.

          

1 c. molasses
1/2 c. butter
1/2 c. buttermilk
2 eggs
1 tbs. brown sugar
1 tsp. ginger
1 tsp. baking powder (”saleratus”)
flour

One cup molasses, one-half cup butter, one-half cup buttermilk, two eggs, one table-spoonful ginger; one tea-spoonful saleratus, flour enough to make a stiff batter.

From Transactions of the Wisconsin State Agriculture Society, blue ribbon winners at the Wisconsin State Fair of 1860. Item entered by Miss Josephine Peffer in the “under 12 years” category

Comment: We found these gems of Midwestern contest cookery in a small eBay purchase of long ago bought for research into some other topic entirely. If you were fortunate enough to inherit your grand- or better yet great-grandmother’s “receipt box” you are probably familiar with the style: simply a list of ingredients and no further instructions. These were  prompts for personal memory, unlike a cookbook written for strangers and designed to instruct the ignorant in the “arts of cookery.” Our grands and great-grands back throughout time started cooking at about the age of three and when they stopped, the funeral was usually a day or two later.