Gherkins & Tomatoes

Gherkins & Tomatoes

Meditations and Photographs about Food, Cooking, and Life

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Medieval medicine Aristotle

Medicine (and Food) in Medieval England: A Select Bibliography

September 25, 2009 by Cynthia Bertelsen

Let food be thy medicine, and let thy medicine be food. Hippocrates Food and medicine, always intertwined in the human  imagination. Because (obviously) the earliest English settlers brought their food habits and medicinal beliefs with them to what is now the United States, I relish books that provide background to the English way of viewing the world. At least the world of food and, not exactly indirectly, medicine. The following list of tomes* — by no means complete (and with […]

Categories: England, English Cooking, Europe • Tags: England, Medicine, Middle Ages

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Food in Medieval England Diet and Nutrition

Food in Medieval England: Diet and Nutrition

September 19, 2009 by Cynthia Bertelsen

Food in Medieval England: Diet and Nutrition (Medieval History and Archaeology), by C. M. Woolgar, Dale Serjeantson, and Tony Waldron (paperback, 2009) In the unending quest to find models for culinary historiography, here’s another fairly up-to-date addition to the growing list: This book draws on the latest research across different disciplines to present the most up-to-date picture of English diet from the early Saxon period up to c.1540. It draws on a wide range of sources, from the historical records […]

Categories: Agriculture, Archaeology, England, English Cooking, Local foods, Middle Ages • Tags: Archaeology, C. M. Woolgar, Dale Serjeantson, England, English cookery, Food History, Food in Medieval England: Diet and Nutrition, Middle Ages, Tony Waldron

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Fishcakes 1

Fish Stomachs?????

September 10, 2009 by Cynthia Bertelsen

Fish Stomachs???? You might believe that fishcakes, along with fritters and croquettes, began as members of the thrifty Leftovers family. But in fact, early medieval English cooks made fishcakes from fish stomachs, which many might consider carrying thrift just a little too far. There is actually a fishcake recipe, on page 170 of Madeleine Pelner Cosman’s Fabulous Feasts: Medieval Cookery and Ceremony, which calls for 1 cup of fish stomachs. (For those of you with a weakness for all things […]

Categories: American Cooking, Asia, Asian Cooking, Cookbooks, English Cooking, Fish • Tags: England, Fabulous Feasts, Fish, Fishcakes, Madeleine Pelner Cosman, Medieval Cookery, Middle Ages

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Costmary Ale glass

Aleing Herbs: Costmary

September 8, 2009 by Cynthia Bertelsen

Ale making in medieval and Renaissance England depended upon a number of herbal flavorings, especially before hops became the predominant taste. While doing a bit of research for another project, I came upon many mentions of Costmary, hence today’s post. An aleing herb (and a medicinal one, too), Costmary (Tanacetum balsamita, also Chrysanthemum balsamita), a cousin to Tansy, appears in the literature in the 16th century, mentioned in Green’s Universal Herbal (1532). Markham in The Countrie Farmer (1616) refers specifically […]

Categories: Beer, Cooking, England, English Cooking, Europe • Tags: Ale, Breweries, Brewing, Costmary, England, Herbs

Africa colonial the vegetable garden

Food and the British Raj in Africa: A Photographic Interlude

September 4, 2009 by Cynthia Bertelsen

Because photographs and artwork lend insight into time periods that words might not (a picture is worth a thousand words, right?), it behooves those of us with a penchant for food history (and just plain prurient curiosity!) to examine visual renditions of the past. While reading old diaries, journals, and letters of the British Raj, I want to chide the authors, “Just take a picture!” or “Why didn’t you take a picture, so we can see what you really mean.” […]

Categories: Africa, Cooking, English Cooking, Menus, Methods • Tags: Africa, Photo Archives, Photos

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Charles_Elme_Francatelli

To the Queen’s Taste: A Brief Meditation on Written Recipes, Part III

September 2, 2009 by Cynthia Bertelsen

Carrying on our examination of the written recipe and its significance in what usually was an oral culture (in more ways than one) — the kitchen and cooking — it’s time to turn to a nineteenth-century English chef named Charles Elmé Francatelli, who briefly cooked French food for Queen Victoria.* But before we get to the man of the moment, the meat of the matter, let’s pause for a moment and revisit Mr. Manfred Görlach, who undertook one of the […]

Categories: Books, Cookbooks, Cooking, England, English Cooking, France, French Cooking, Methods • Tags: A Plain Cookery Book for the Working Classes, Antonin Carême, Book of Household Management, British Food, Charles Elmé Francatelli, Colin Spencer, Cooks, English Cooking, French Cooking, Isabella Beeton, Louis Eustache Ude, Manfred Görlach, The French Chef

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Book of Household Management

Mrs. Beeton Goes to India

August 25, 2009 by Cynthia Bertelsen

English women going out to colonial India packed cookbooks in their steamer trunks. Among the many possible tomes available, Mrs. Beeton’s brick-sized Book of Household Management,[1] took up little room but it packed a powerful wallop on lives. Valuable not only for the food and the ties to home, the Book of Household Management also included much medical advice, valuable to those living in isolated stations without medical help nearby. Even today, Where There is No Doctor and an updated […]

Categories: Cookbooks, England, English Cooking, India, Spices • Tags: Alison Blunt, Book of Household Management, Cooks, Curry, David Burnett, Dr. William Kitchiner, Helen Saberi, India, Indian Domestic Economy and Receipt Book, Isabella Beeton

Alexander Pope

Pope on Posset, Alexander That Is

August 24, 2009 by Cynthia Bertelsen

Rumored to be from the pen of Alexander Pope, the following recipe for “East-Indian style posset” in poetic form illustrates what impact East India merchants had on English tastes in the early eighteenth century. Actually a punch, the name for which came from the Hindu word for “five” (the number of ingredients in the original dish),  it found great favor with the Portuguese in Goa. From there the drink spread to the English enclaves in Calcutta and Madras and back […]

Categories: English Cooking • Tags: Alexander Pope, East-Indian Posset, Posset, Punch

British Raj Hats

Cooks of the British Raj: In the Shadows of the Cantonments

August 20, 2009 by Cynthia Bertelsen

Moonlight, shadows, and frangipani fluttering  in air rich with the smell of curry — many people today might harbor such images of India trending toward those seen David Lean’s film, “A Passage to India,” based on E. M. Forster’s novel of the same name. And yet, to anyone who’s spent time on the ground in certain countries around the globe, an untold backstory surges against the gorgeous scenery, the nights filled with starry skies, the nattering of songbirds in the […]

Categories: Asia, English Cooking, India • Tags: Chota Mem, Cooks, David Lean, E. M. Forster, English Cooking, India, Mrs. C. Lang, The English Bride

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Lady Harriet Georgina Blackwood of Dufferin and Ava

Supping in British India

August 18, 2009 by Cynthia Bertelsen

As the wife of the eighth viceroy-to-India, and like many privileged women of her day, Harriet Georgina Blackwood, Marchioness of Dufferin & Ava, worked hard for the social good. She created the Dufferin Fund (The Countess of Dufferin’s Fund for Supplying Medical Aid to the Women of India), which provided medical care to Indian women, assisted in the building of hospitals, and encouraged Indian women to study medicine. Traveling in India, whether from place to place as the Viceroy’s wife, […]

Categories: Asia, England, English Cooking, Europe, India • Tags: British Empire, Cooks, Dak Bungalows, Harriet Georgina Blackwood, India, Marchioness of Dufferin & Ava, Simla, Viceroys

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Simla, 1850s

Summer Fare, or, Steamroller Chicken

August 17, 2009 by Cynthia Bertelsen

Today, when the throbbing heat of a summer day might mean grabbing a salad at the local deli, it is hard to realize that in the past people conjured up other solutions for food on the days when sweat poured off of brows like tiny streams rushing to meet a river. Everyone knows that the dog days of summer used to lead to a flurry of canning and preserving, an all-out assault on bacteria, the eternal enemies of freshness. But […]

Categories: American Cooking, Chicken, Cookbooks, English Cooking, India • Tags: British Raj, Chris Casson Madden, Cooks, Elizabeth David, Hill Stations, India, Judith Olney, Simla, Steamroller Chicken, Summer Cooking, Summer Food

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Monastic Gardens 2

The Random Herbalist: The Monastic Physic Garden

July 24, 2009 by Cynthia Bertelsen

Most of the gardens originally associated with monasteries contained numerous plants used for medicinal purposes. And, if nothing else,  at least these gardens provided the background for mystery novelist Ellis Peters’s sailor-turned monk and herbalist, Brother Cadfael. The cloister-garth was a square, planted with grass and possibly shrubs, divided by two intersecting paths into four equal quarters. In the centre was a savina, supplying water for drinking and washing purposes. These cloisters were south of the church, and surrounded by […]

Categories: English Cooking, Gardens, Monasteries • Tags: England, Gardens, Monasteries, Monastic Gardens

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Photo credit: John Menard

The Random Herbalist: An Introduction to Early Monastic Gardens

July 23, 2009 by Cynthia Bertelsen

A series on monastery cooks (“At the Tables of the Monks“)*, and a recent comment on the impact of medieval monks on the spread of dill throughout Europe, led me to reflect in more detail on the influence of monks on early European agricultural practices. For the next several days, I will be sharing notes from my reading. Thus within the walls of the Benedictine monasteries were large gardens cultivated by the monks in common, and often smaller ones assigned […]

Categories: English Cooking, Gardens, Herbs, Monasteries • Tags: Gardens, Monasteries, Monks

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Photo credit: Nigel Judson

Idylls of Cuisine #18

June 21, 2009 by Cynthia Bertelsen

[A photograph, and nothing more, for silent contemplation.]

Categories: Castles, English Cooking, Festivals, Photography • Tags: Banquets, Castles, England, Food Photography

Photo credit: Jeremy Stanley

Moonshine

June 17, 2009 by Cynthia Bertelsen

Living as I do in the heart of moonshine [white lightning] country, I just about dropped the cookbook when I saw the word “Moonshine.” If it had been a Southern cookbook or a Foxfire book, I would have turned the page without a second thought and been done with it. But this reference to “Moonshine” came from English food writer Elizabeth David’s book, Summer Cooking (pages 65-66). And when my eye darted from the title of the recipe to the […]

Categories: Eggs, English Cooking, French Cooking, Southern Food • Tags: Cooks, Eggs, Elizabeth David, Moonshine, Robert May, The Accomplisht Cook

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Mob cap

Reveling in Books: The Garden Cottage Diaries

June 8, 2009 by Cynthia Bertelsen

Most of the time, I judge food by its looks and books by their covers. Sorry, but give me a little art, a bit of color, and a mob cap any day of the week. Mob cap? Take the cartoon-like cover of The Garden Cottage Diaries for example. Like a magnet, this visual rendition of a locavore’s dream popped the romantic in me right into the scene:  an intrepid woman wearing a mob cap digs in the ground with a […]

Categories: Book Reviews, Cookbooks, English Cooking, Gardens, Scotland • Tags: Book Reviews, Cookbooks, Cottage Garden Diaries, Culinary History, Eat Local, English Cooking, Fiona J. Houston, Locavore, Scotland

Monks Medieval-kitchen-sink

At the Tables of the Monks: The Larderer

June 2, 2009 by Cynthia Bertelsen

With this blog post, our tales of the monastic kitchen come to an end —  for now. THE LARDERER (p. 203-204) [Note: The Abbey paid the larderer for his services, since this person did not belong to the cloistered community.] The larderer should be “as perfect, just, and faithful a servant” as could be found. He had charge of the keys of all the outhouses attached to the great larder of the monastery, which in one Custumnal are specified as […]

Categories: English Cooking • Tags: Cooking, Cooks, England, Larderer, Monasteries

Lavander, St. Remy, France (Photo credit: Holly hayes)

At the Tables of the Monks: The Infirmary Cook

June 1, 2009 by Cynthia Bertelsen

THE COOK FOR THE INFIRMARY (p. 204-205) [Note: The Abbey paid the infirmary cook for his services, since this person did not belong to the cloistered community.] For the infirmary, and especially for the use of those who had been subjected to the periodical blood-letting, there was a special cook skilled in the preparation of strengthening broths and soups. He was the chief or meat-cook of the establishment, and had under him two boys, one as a general helper, the […]

Categories: English Cooking, Middle Ages • Tags: Cooking, Cooks, England, Food, Middle Ages, Monasteries, Monks

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Photo credit: Howard Stanbury

At the Tables of the Monks: The Fish-Cooks

May 31, 2009 by Cynthia Bertelsen

THE FISH-COOKS (p. 206) [Note: The Abbey paid the fish-cooks  for their services, since these people did not belong to the cloistered community.] In the large monasteries, such as, for example, Edmundsbury, there were two cooks for the fish-dishes ; the first was properly called the “fish-cook,” the other was “pittance-cook.” Their appointment was made for life, and by letterspatent signed by the abbot in Chapter, with the prior and the community as witnesses. Though called the “fish-cooks” these servants […]

Categories: English Cooking, Fish • Tags: Cooks, England, Fish, Middle Ages, Monasteries, Monks

View from the Guesthouse (Photo credit: Christ Phillips)

At the Tables of the Monks: The Guest-Hall Cook

May 30, 2009 by Cynthia Bertelsen

THE GUEST-HALL COOK (p. 206) [Note: The Abbey paid the gust-hall cook  for his services, since this person did not belong to the cloistered community.] The cook to attend to the needs of visitors was appointed by the cellarer, and had under him a boy to help in any way he might direct. His office was frequently for life, and certainly, once appointed, he could be removed only with difficulty. He had to get everything ready for the entertainment of […]

Categories: English Cooking • Tags: Cooking, Cooks, Middle Ages, Monasteries, Monks

Glastobury Kitchen Window

At the Tables of the Monks: The Abbot’s Cook

May 29, 2009 by Cynthia Bertelsen

THE ABBOT’S COOK (p. 202-203) [Note: The Abbey paid the abbot's cook  for his services, since this person did not belong to the cloistered community.] This official held more the position of a steward, or valet to the superior, than that of a cook. He had to go each morning to the abbot or prior for orders, and to find out what would be required for the superior’s table for the day, and he had then to proceed to the […]

Categories: English Cooking • Tags: Cooking, Cooks, England, Monasteries, Monks

Photo credit: Brianna Privett

At the Tables of the Monks: The Caterer (or Buyer)

May 28, 2009 by Cynthia Bertelsen

THE CATERER, OR BUYER, FOR THE COMMUNITY (p. 202-203) [Note the Abbey paid the caterer for his services, since this person did not belong to the cloistered community.] The caterer, says one Custumal, “ought to be a broadminded and strong-minded man : one who acts with decision, and is wise, just and upright in things belonging to his office ; one who is prudent, knowing, discreet and careful when purchasing meat and fish in the market or from the salesman.” […]

Categories: English Cooking • Tags: Cooks, England, Middle Ages, Monasteries, Monks

Monks cellarer's domain

At the Tables of the Monks: The Kitchener

May 27, 2009 by Cynthia Bertelsen

THE KITCHENER (p. 80-81) The office of kitchener was one of great responsibility. He was appointed in Chapter by the abbot with the advice of the prior, and he should be one who was agreeable to the community. According to the Custumal of one great English abbey, the kitchener was to be almost a paragon of virtue. He ought to be “a truly religious man, just, upright, gentle, patient, and trustworthy. He should be ready to accept suggestions, humble in […]

Categories: English Cooking • Tags: Cooks, Kitchener, Middle Ages, Monasteries, Monks

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Refectory (Photo: James Long)

At the Tables of the Monks: The Refectorian

May 26, 2009 by Cynthia Bertelsen

THE REFECTORIAN (p. 76-77) The refectorian had charge of the refectory, or as it is sometimes called, the frater, and had to see that all things were in order for the meals of the brethren. He should be “strong in bodily health,” says one Custumal, “unbending in his determination to have order and method, a true religious, respected by all, determined to prevent anything tending to disorder, and loving all brethren without favour.” If duties of this office required it, […]

Categories: English Cooking, Middle Ages • Tags: Cooks, Middle Ages, Monasteries, Monks, Refectory

Adam the Cellarer, St. Alban's

At the Tables of the Monks: The Cellarer

May 25, 2009 by Cynthia Bertelsen

Until June 2, because of a time-consuming project, “Gherkins & Tomatoes’ ” posts will cover the key players in medieval monastic kitchens.* We begin with The Cellarer. THE CELLARER (p. 71-73): The cellarer was the monastic purveyor of all foodstuffs for the community. His chief duty, perhaps, was to look ahead and to see that the stores were not running low ; that the corn had come in from the granges, and flour from the mill, and that is was […]

Categories: English Cooking • Tags: Cellarer, Cooks, England, Monasteries, Monks

Monks Beaulieu Abbey floor plan

Monastery Kitchens

May 23, 2009 by Cynthia Bertelsen

Abbatia quae vocitatur Bellus Locus Monasteries in the Middle Ages tended to follow similar layouts. Beaulieu Abbey, a Cistercian abbey in Hampshire, England, now in ruins, once supported a large number of people. It started out with 120 cows and 20 bulls, all very conducive to cheese-making. Beaulieu Abbey’s floor plan shows a tiny kitchen some distance away from the “frater” or dining area (go HERE to see a large picture):

Categories: Archaeology, English Cooking, Middle Ages • Tags: Beaulieu Abbey, Cooking, Kitchens, Middle Ages, Monasteries, Monks

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alice-de-bryene

Dame Alice de Bryene’s Household Book: Easter 1413

April 8, 2009 by Cynthia Bertelsen

One of the most spectacular “finds” related to English medieval history, The Household Book of Dame Alice de Bryene (1931 edition) provides a detailed glimpse into the daily life of an English gentry household over the period 1412 – 1413, down to the exact food purchases and the price paid. It tells of widowed Dame Alice de Bryene during one of her seventy-five years. That year Easter fell on April 23, a late date, and Dame Alice served the following […]

Categories: Chicken, Easter, English Cooking, Middle Ages, Recipes • Tags: Chicken, Cooking, Curye on Inglish, Dame Alice de Bryene, Easter, Food, Forme of Cury, Middle Ages

colonial-baking

Baking in Colonial Virginia

March 7, 2009 by Cynthia Bertelsen

Lara Templin, an historical interpreter at Jamestown Settlement in Virginia, demonstrates how people baked bread over 400 years ago, in a Cloam oven. Click on the picture to go to the video, shot by Culinary Media Network:

Categories: American Cooking, English Cooking, Video • Tags: Colonial Cooking, Jamestown, Lara Templin, Southern cooking, Virginia

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Postcard of the "Bund" in Shanghai

“The White (Wo)Man’s Burden”: Household Management in the Colonies (With Bibliography)

March 4, 2009 by Cynthia Bertelsen

European women who lived in nineteenth- and twentieth-century foreign outposts sought authoritative voices to guide them through the challenges of living far from the familiar. Although local labor bore the brunt of  daily domestic work, wives of the colonialists need information on how to direct their servants. And as the list below amply illustrates, plenty of authors and authoresses took up their pens to relieve the white woman’s burden.  Today, many of the books are scarce and rare. Take Bon […]

Categories: Bibliographies, China, English Cooking, Recipes, Russia, Wine • Tags: Africa, British Colonial Shanghai, Cocktails, English Cooking, Recipes, Zakuska

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Photo credit: Robin Hutton

A Dish (or Two) for Children in British Colonial Africa

February 20, 2009 by Cynthia Bertelsen

(A tribute to those women who endured the challenges of living in unfamiliar and far-flung places, raising their children without their extended families around. And cooking what they could.) Sometimes it literally WAS a dog’s breakfast. And mothers couldn’t do anything about it. Feeding their children properly preoccupied those mothers who followed their English husbands to isolated outposts in Africa or India or China. And rightly so. Yes. Most mothers, no matter where they live (or when) pay strict attention […]

Categories: Africa, Beef, Cookbooks, English Cooking, Potatoes, Recipes • Tags: Africa, British Colonial Africa, Children's Food, Cooks, Kenya

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Baroness von Blixen's Huose, Kenya

A Cook in Colonial Africa

February 18, 2009 by Cynthia Bertelsen

Esa nearly drops the wine bottle, all because of colonial British ideas about propriety in cooking and dining. That’s from an unforgettable scene in the film, “Out of Africa,” epitomizing the British way with food in their colonies. And their focus on the cooks, mostly male, who worked for them. Meryl Streep, as Baroness Karen von Blixen (Isak Dinesen), insists that Esa wear white gloves while serving at table. And in the kitchen, her cook Kamante immerses his wooden spoons […]

Categories: Africa, Beef, English Cooking, Recipes • Tags: Africa, Colonial British Cooking, Cooking, E. G. Bradley, Food, Household Book for Tropical Colonies, Kenya, West Africa

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George Washington

George Washington’s Family Cookbooks

February 11, 2009 by Cynthia Bertelsen

Martha Washington’s cookbook tells a tale, one that really needs no elaboration:  George went through life toothless. Recipes for soft puddings, quidonys (a type of fruit preserve), and jellies abound. Of course, puddings testified in part to the, well, Englishness of the Father of Our Country and his wife. But the fact of the matter remains: George’s wooden teeth just didn’t cut it. In spite of the lack of modern dentistry, George Washington lived in interesting times. Washington, the first […]

Categories: American Cooking, Apples, Cookbooks, English Cooking, Potatoes, Recipes • Tags: Apples, Cooking, Cooks, Food, Fritters, George Washington, Martha Washington, Mary Anna Randolph Custis Lee, Nelly Custis Lewis, Potatoes, Recipes, Robert E. Lee, Southern cooking

fdr-1944

Plum Pudding & Franklin Delano Roosevelt’s Christmas Message, 1944

December 25, 2008 by Cynthia Bertelsen

During the Roosevelt years. FDR spent time talking to the American people via radio; these became his famous “Fireside Chats.” On Christmas Eve, Roosevelt would do one of his chats and then read Charles Dickens’s  “A Christmas Carol” to his grandchildren. This what he said in 1944, the turning point of World War II: “The Christmas spirit lives tonight in the bitter cold of the front lines of Europe and in the heat of the jungles and swamps of Burma […]

Categories: Desserts, English Cooking, White House • Tags: Christmas, Cooking, Food, Franklin Delano Roosevelt, Henrietta Nesbitt, Plum Pudding, Recipes

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flummery-2

George Washington’s Christmas Brunch, 1769

December 24, 2008 by Cynthia Bertelsen

Happy/Merry Christmas/Hannukah/Holiday Season/Winter Solstice and a wonderful, hope-filled New Year. A big “Thank You” to each and every one of you for reading “Gherkins & Tomatoes.” Seven years before the sonorous words of the American Declaration of Independence rang out in Philadelphia, George Washington ate the following Christmas brunch. Betty, the only sister of his who survived to adulthood, served a very English-American menu: Holiday Egg Nog Virgina Ham Beaten Biscuits Corn Pudding Chicken and Oyster Pie Pumpkin Chips Cucumber […]

Categories: American Cooking, Christmas, Desserts, English Cooking, Recipes • Tags: Christmas, Cooking, Food, George Washington, Recipes, Southern cooking

Fruitcake (Photo credit: Peter Boothe)

NUTTY AS A…*

December 9, 2008 by Cynthia Bertelsen

The worst gift is fruitcake. There is only one fruitcake in the entire world, and people keep sending it to each other. ~~ Johnny Carson ~~ It’s like liver: either you love it or you hate it. What? Fruitcake, that’s what. Just to prove a point, a few years back some enterprising journalists conducted a survey on the most hated Christmas gifts. Guess what people most hated to receive as gifts? Fruitcake. Described variously as full of “gooky” candied fruit […]

Categories: Cakes, Christmas, English Cooking • Tags: Christmas, Cooking, Food, Fruitcake, Recipes

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mrs-charles-darwins-recipe-book

Mrs. Charles Darwin’s Recipe Book

December 6, 2008 by Cynthia Bertelsen

Nearly everyone on the planet, or at least those with access to education — unfortunately many areas of the world and even this country lack miserably in the teaching of the young — will know the name of Charles Darwin, as the blurb below allows. Now, maybe  some people don’t buy into the theory of evolution,  but the fact of the matter is that the issue is here to stay. And perhaps convince and persuade doubters as more and more […]

Categories: Beef, Book Reviews, English Cooking, Recipes • Tags: Book Reviews, Charles Darwin, Cookbooks, Cooking, Cooks, Emma Darwin, Food, Recipes

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Monticello (Used with permission.)

Celebrate Colonial American Cooking: Cookbooks for Thanksgiving and Christmas

November 13, 2008 by Cynthia Bertelsen

Want to celebrate American food history and ingenuity this year? The great state of Virginia gave birth to eight U.S. presidents — George Washington, Thomas Jefferson, James Madison, James Monroe, William Henry Harrison, John Tyler, Zachary Taylor, and Woodrow Wilson. And they all liked to eat, some more than others. In fact, Thomas Jefferson still claims the title of being the most gourmet-minded of the lot. The following books will help you greatly in planning meals, especially Thanksgiving and Christmas […]

Categories: American Cooking, Bibliographies, Cooking, English Cooking • Tags: American Cooking, Bibliographies, Colonial America, Colonial Virginia, Cookbooks, Cooking, English Cooking, Food

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thomas-jefferson

All the Presidents’ Tables: A. Lincoln’s Inaugural Beef à la Mode

October 27, 2008 by Cynthia Bertelsen

Thomas Jefferson’s cook quit upon seeing the kitchen at the White House. And George Washington placed a want ad for a cook: ”A cook is wanted for the family of the President of the United States,” it said. ”No one need apply who is not perfect in the business, and can bring indubitable testimonials of sobriety, honesty and attention to the duties of the station.”  Tavern owner, staunch patriot, and spy Samuel “Black Sam” Fraunces got the job, probably because […]

Categories: Beef, English Cooking, Recipes • Tags: Abraham Lincoln, Cooking, Food, Samuel Fraunces

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wyvern-india-colonialists-cookbook

A PASSAGE TO INDIA, REVISITED … SORT OF (AND BOOKSTORES)

October 8, 2008 by Cynthia Bertelsen

For those lucky souls living in one of the larger cities of the eastern United States, bookshops purveying only cookbooks exist just around the corner. In Portland (Maine), Philadelphia, and New York City, to be exact. Who knows? You might find a copy of one of Elizabeth David’s favorite books, a rather pompous Anglo-Indian cookbook from the nineteenth century, Culinary Jottings for Madras: A Treatise in Thirty Chapters on Reformed Cookery for Anglo-Indian Exiles Based Upon Modern English and Continental […]

Categories: English Cooking, India • Tags: Bookstores, Cookbooks, Cooking, Culinary Jottings, English Cooking, Food, India

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Food forms the very essence of life, from the fruit fly to the elephant, with humans in between. So much of what we do revolves around cooking, eating, and the finding of food. Here you'll discover stories, meditations, and photographs celebrating the places that we call home. And, of course, the food that garnishes it all.

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What’s Cookin’ Here

  • A Bare Table is Like an Artist’s Canvas
  • “Stew’s so comforting on a rainy day.” *
  • Singkong, Manioc, Mandioca, Mandió, Tapioca, Yuca: Singing the Praises of Manihot esculenta (Cassava)
  • The Promise of Apple Blossoms

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