The Old Foodie

It is probably very timely too, to revitalise this thread - with so many feasts and festivals coming up! I have always wondered how you in the USA manage to get rid of the Thanksgiving leftovers in time to start storing up the Christmas stuff!

OK... first, by "coriander stems" ... is that cilantro? Second, which type of oil should I use? I do not like canola; can I use peanut? Also, and this applies both to this recipe and the others suggested, but can I use the upper, thin part of the stalk or are you talking about just the inner part of the base. I would love to find uses for all of it, even if it means doing a bunch of separating first... ← Hello chappie - sorry for the delay, I "lost" this thread. Yes, coriander = cilantro. Yes, the stalks (including the leaves) are what are used here, not the white root (although I am sure they would work just fine). Any oil is good. I hope it turned out OK. Janet

There was a charity dinner held at Claridges (London) in February 2001 (I think), and I understand that Chef John Williams created an “Egg Fabergé” which was a lobster mousseline stuffed with a quail egg and garnished with a mosaic of macaroni and truffle, served on a bed of celeriac. Actually, I'm not sure that that was when the dish was created, or whether that happened a few years before at the Claridges centenary celebrations, and it then became a signature dish. Perhaps that was discussed or featured in the TV program you mentioned? Sorry, dont know any more than that, but Claridge's might be able to help. [edited because i think i got the date wrong initially]

There are two great online collections of historic menus: <a href = "http://www.lapl.org/resources/en/menu_collection.html">Los Angeles Public Library</a> <a href = "http://digitalgallery.nypl.org/nypldigital/explore/dgexplore.cfm?topic=all&collection=MissFrankEButtolphAm&col_id=159">New York Public Library</a>

Librarians are my favourite people in the world, next to good cooks who invite me for a meal. Thanks Karen, I am going to contact your friend today. Servants ... Agreed, what's not to like? As long as you weren't one yourself of course. Back to the topic of foodbooks: if you go to Google Book Search and enter search terms such as "cookery" or "recipes" and tick the "full view books" you get some good stuff. You get some good stuff whatever your interests are. I do love the Internet. Janet

I have been working on a list of historic cookbooks that are available free online - so far there are over 250, but there are more to add yet. I am culling them from my own database of resources by removing actual books, and pdf files which I have downloaded from such sites as Early English Books Online (and to which I do not have copyright) I have it on an Excel spreadsheet, and so far have date of publication, title and author, country of origin, and url or name of the site where each can be found. I have only included English language ones, apart from a couple of instances, but there are many more available in other European languages. It would make a great online community project - there will be many I dont know about, and there are books being added online all the time (just found a little cache on Google Books) - everyone could add others that they find in whatever language. Books about food (not primarily recipe books) could be included too - there are a couple of version of Physiologie du Gout available online for example. I have no idea how to make the data available in this way - but I am sure someone out there does! I am not technically inclined (understatement of the century), I have no idea how to make the data available in this way (as a community effort) - but I am sure someone out there does! I will happily make this first draft available to anyone who is interested when it is finished (this weekend if I put my mind to it). I am guessing that there will be 300 or so books. Unless I add other languages and the general food books in which it will take longer. What do you think? Is it of interest to anyone other than my own food-history-nerdy self?

Sorry about the non-linking links in the earlier post, folks - Usually I check them before I post but was obviously in too much of a hurry today. I still cant make them look good, but I have edited the previous post, and they do all work now. Thanks to Carrot Top for alerting me via PM Janet

Hello everyone. I am honoured to have had my blog mentioned by Sandy Oliver in her newsletter! Here are some really good food history sites, with historic cookbooks and recipes: Gode Cookery at http://www.godecookery.com Online Culinary History Networkan ongoing project to transcribe and make old culinary history texts available online at http://culinaryhistory.org Thomas Gloning’s Culinary and Dietetic Texts - a hugely scholarly site, cookbook and food book transcriptions in German, Italian (and other languages I think) as well as English at http://staff-www.uni-marburg.de/~gloning/kobu.htm Feeding America Project - fanatastic project to digitise historic American cookbooks at http://digital.lib.msu.edu/projects/cookbooks Edited to fix the links - I cannot make them work any other way today!

Thanks, Linda. One other question: the original recipe from Janet says to use either a chocolate liqueur or brandy/rum/etc. Do you think the fruit will be too sweet if macerated in a chocolate liqueur? ← Hello everyone - I'm just catching up with this thread. Linda's answer on my behalf was exactly right - there's little actual liquid left. I have used chocolate liqueur and it is fine - probably a little sweeter, but fruit cake is meant to be sweet, isn't it? You could always reduce the sugar by a tablespoon or two if you wanted, I'm sure it would turn out OK. MY favourite combination a couple of years ago was about half choc liqueur and half orange-y (Grand Marnier I think). I think next year I might use something nutty like Frangelico.

I love the idea of these - same principle as Scotch Eggs. Haven't made them yet, but they are on my to-do list for the next casual lunch. Surprise Potatoes. Wash some large potatoes, but do not peel them; cut a small piece off the top and scoop out the centre; fill with sausage meat; replace the lid and bake in rather a hot oven from one to one and a half hours; a slice should also be cut from the bottom part of the potatoes, that they may stand flat on the dish. [From: “The Day by Day Cookery Book”; Mrs A.N. Whybrow; 1900]

The ABC (Australian Broadcasting Commission) has that sort of feature <a href = "http://www.abc.net.au/backyard/" >HERE</a>. When you get there, click on the Recipe tab in the Navigation bar at the top of the screen.

A less obvious contribution would be a dessert based on potatoes - I am pretty sure I have a chocolate potato cake recipe somewhere, and I am almost as certain I have a coconut-ice recipe somewhere. Do you need something like that? Benjamin Franklin - during his career as an American diplomat in Paris - attended an all-potato dinner orchestrated by Auguste Parmentier, who at that time was trying to promote the potato as a good food, especially for the poor. I did something like that once myself, for the birthday of a good friend who "hadn't met a potato he didn't like". It was great fun. You will let us know the final outcome, wont you?

The primary purpose was to preserve produce (remember, no fridges or freezers) - and if you have a lot of pickled or preserved produce, you find extra ways of justifying its use, so all of the other "reasons" are secondary. The idea of pickles giving strength to the troops would probably have been because there were a lot of pickles available when not much else was, so there may have been a propaganda element to the troops. Plus, in olden times, inferences were drawn from the character of the food - so a long-lived, well preserved food might suggest that those characteristics would be transferred to the eater. In the case of proud housewives such as your grandmother - having an abundance of well-made pickles would signify skill at housekeeping and cookery. Of course, if you grow up eating pickles with every meal, you end up feeling that a meal is not complete without pickles, so iti is a sort of circular explanation. I have absolutely no idea why it is a particularly big thing in the South, as you suggest. The answer is probably a blend of the origin of the settlers (their own food preferences and history), and what grew well in the climate where they settled. In some parts of England it would probably be pickled beetroot, in some parts of Asia it is pickled cabbage and so on. I look forward to other comments.

That must be what it is.... ← I guess all guesses are correct - (even the joke ones) once upon a time "Venison" meant any sort of game - the OED says: "The flesh of an animal killed in the chase or by hunting and used as food; formerly applied to the flesh of the deer, boar, hare, rabbit, or other game animal, now almost entirely restricted to the flesh of various species of deer" I dont know when it started to be applied to deer only. Adam?

In the light of the global debate on scones (and I dont think anyone claimed they were "American") - I just have to share this little hilarity with you. I was researching something else and came across an article in the London Times of February 1939, called "IN AN AMERICAN KITCHEN, Dishes Men Like". After recipes for Yankee Meat Cakes, Chipped Beef in Cheese Sauce (used to fill Shredded Wheat breakfast cereal biscuits?), Baked Beans and Sausage, and Strawberry Shortcake, and a couple of other things, it had this: A TEA SUGGESTION. This is one man’s favourite tea “accessory”. Take any scone recipe and cut dough in small rounds ½ in thick. Spread chopped marmalade on half the rounds, being careful not to go over the edge, and cover with the remaining rounds. Press the edges together and bake in a hot oven until lightly browned and puffed. Remove and coat with melted butter and serve immediately. So - marmalade filled scones are an American Man's treat! Any comments? Naturally, the article was aimed at women, and started with: Men’s culinary enthusiasms range from the sublime to the ridiculous, but with one accord they all cheer certain dishes. Cooking for men is one of the few efforts in which a woman can invest her time and energy with selfish abandon and yet emerge with the men entirely on her side and gastronomically grateful. You might try these American favourites and let them turn into your triumphs.

Pikelets! A tablespoon of Golden Syrup in the batter is my secret.

Thank Goodness eGullet ans saved you from the deep fried Twinkie. Speaking of toast - whereas (as you know) scones dont keep well, and need to be eaten on the day of baking, there is nothing wrong with splitting and toasting any leftovers and eating them up with jam and cream the next day. Or Golden Syrup is good too. Please keep us informed of your experiments!

Yes, scone-making is all about method. As long as the flour/fat/liquid ratio is right, the minor details dont matter. (Low gluten flour is best though). There must be quick mixing, minimal handling (if you roll them, roll them quickly and lightly, or better - gently pat the dough out), and hot oven. If you like them to have a crisp crust all down the sides, put them on the tray a little apart, if you like them soft, put them almost touching (so they rise and join together in the oven) and then cover them with the tea-towel when they come out of the oven. Disappointing texture is usually due to over-handling or over-cooking. And, as mentioned, it is the jam and cream that you put on top that is crucial. Those of you in the States are going to need recipes to use up a lot of pumpkin soon, and pumkin scones are an Aussie icon. Here is my recipe: 1 oz butter 1/2 cup sugar 1 egg 2 cups mashed pumpkin 2 cups self-rising flour (or plain plus baking powder) You can rub the butter in, or melt it, or cream it with the sugar - then make the dough up and cook as usual. These Lemonade Scones are easy too (that is, lemonade as in fizzy carbonated drink - soft drink, pop, soda, whatever you call it wherever you are) 2 cups self-rising flour (or the plain with baking powder) pinch salt dessertspoon sugar 2/3 cup lemonade 1 cup cream Usual method.

OOPS! thats what I get for rushing to get your birthday present to you in time. Instead, here is an entry from Samuel Pepys for the day (which I did check!). Oct 22 1660 “…. After that to dinner at home upon some ribbs of roast beef from the Cooks (which of late we have been forced to do because of our house being always under the painters’ and other people’s hands, that we could not dress it ourselfs…” Janet.

Hello again Sandy, Here is my promised birthday gift of some food history. I had real trouble deciding what to choose for you, not knowing you personally. You didn’t include Timothy Leary (1920) in your list of people who share your birthday, in spite of a tenuous food connection in his use of what he called “sacramental vegetables” in order to “turn on, tune in, and drop out” (supposedly in the form of “Leary biscuits”) – but perhaps this is a little too tenuous, not to mention illegal. How about Sarah Bernhardt? She also shares your birthday (1844), and had several dishes named after her (a common compliment paid to female artistes at the time). I have not had chance to chase up the provenance of “Sarah Bernhardt Cake”, but there are lots of recipes online. You could have a whole meal of Sarah Bernhardt dishes – soup, sole, soufflé, and the cake – not to mention a garnish of foie-gras, and probably a potato dish. You do mention John-Paul Sartre, and I am sure you have read “his” cookbook, which is a giggle. If you haven’t, it is <a href = "http://www-berkeley.ansys.com/wayne/sartre-cookbook.html" >HERE</a> As for other food history factoids – as you have many global friends celebrating your birthday with you via eGullet, I thought I would give you this banquet story, as it involves international co-operation. It’s probably too late to give it to your friends to inspire them for your birthday dinner, but here it is, taken from a newspaper of the time. The dinner took place on October 22, 1913, in Berlin. One of the most remarkable dinners ever served in Berlin was given at Imperial Automobile Club … when the foreign Military Attachés entertained in honor of the German officers who were attached to them in the recent Kaiser manoevres in Silesia. One of the features of the dinner was a brace of turkeys imported from New England for the occasion by Major George Taylor Langhorne, the American attaché. Each attaché supplied the culinary specialty of his own country. … roasted at the club for Major Langhorne under the personal supervision of American women, who also supplied home-made cranberry jelly and the usual stuffing for the birds. The company of international warriors and the four Germans who were at the table voted Major Langhorne’s contribution not only the most substantial item on the ample menu, but the most toothsome as well. Other attachés supplied the following delicacies: Russia, red Siberian caviar; Japan, fish à la Nagasaki; Italy, ham; Belgium, ham; Austria, rice and Tokay; Spain, Malaga and Sherry; Bulgaria, yoghurt and milk; Brazil, cigars and preserved fruits; Turkey, nougat and candies; France, champagne; England, plum pudding. The guests at the dinner report that each and all of them have survived without medical assistance. Not a bad menu? Thank Goodness someone supplied the wine. Keep on having a good birthday. Janet

Why Sandy - you listed all that history for the day and narry a whit of FOOD HISTORY there! A terrible oversight from a food-enjoying person such as yourself (I hesitate to designate you a "foodie" lest you be one of the eGulleters who abhor the term). It is already the 23rd here, so your birthday was yesterday to me, but I will send a little food history for this day for you later this afternoon when I get home from work (and hope to get you while it is still your birthday "over there"). Have a happy day. Janet.

I will follow this project with anticipation. ← I think we are overlapping with <a href = "http://forums.egullet.org/index.php?showtopic=91731&hl=birth+of" >The Birth of Wieniercello</a> thread !!

Here is a question that will sort out the serious from the dilettantes. Tonight it appears I am a cricket and/or rugby (Union? League?) widow. Curse cable TV. I decide to amuse myself with another man, and chose Dr William Kitchiner. My copy is 1845, but the first edition of "The Cook's Oracle" was 1817 (or thereabouts). He has a lot of "essences" and "tinctures", and I wondered how many of you (a) have ever made any of your own (b) how many of you would like to. What is surprising, I think, is the "savoury" essences and tinctures. We are all familiar with the idea of essences such as vanilla and almond in sweet dishes, but he has quite a few "savoury" ones. Here is a selection for your comment - I can post some more if you wish: QUINTESSENCE OF LEMON-PEEL. Best oil of Lemon, one drachm Strongest rectified spirit, two ounces Introduced by degrees, until the spirit kills, and completely mixes with the oil. This elegant preparation possesses all the delightful fragrance and flavour of the freshest Lemon-peel. Obs.- A few drops on the Sugar you make Punch with will instantly impregnate it with as much flavour as the troublesome and tedious method of grating the rind, or rubbing the Sugar on it. It will be found a + for every purpose that it is used for: Blanc Mange, - Jellies, - Custards, - Ice, - Negus, - Lemonade, - and Pies and Puddings, - Stuffings, - Soups, - Sauces, - Ragouts &c. TINCTURE OF LEMON-PEEL. A very easy and economical way of obtaining, and preserving, the flavour of Lemon-Peel, is to fill a wide-mouthed pint bottle half full of Brandy, or proof spirit; and when you use a Lemon, pare the rind off very thin, and put it into the Brandy, &c.: in a fortnight it will impregnate the spirit with the flavour very strongly. ESSENCE OF CELERY. Brandy or proof spirit, a quarter of a pint. Celery-seed, bruised, half an ounce, Avoirdupois weight. Let it steep for a fortnight. Obs.- A few drops will immediately flavour a pint of Broth, and are an excellent addition to Pease, and other Soups, and the salad mixture of Oil, Vinegar, &c. AROMATIC ESSENCE OF GINGER. Three ounces of fresh-grated Ginger* and two ounces of thin-cut Lemon-Peel, into a quart of Brandy, or Proof Spirit (apothecaries’ measure); let it stand for ten days, shaking it up each day. Obs.- The proper title for this would be “Tincture of Ginger”**, however, as it has obtained the name of “Essence”, so let it be called. N.B. If Ginger is taken to produce immediate effect, to warm the Stomach or dispel flatulence, this is the best preparation. *The fragrant aroma of Ginger is so extremely volatile, that it evaporates almost as soon as it is powdered, and the fine Lemon-peel goût flies off presently. ** Tinctures are much finer flavoured than Essences. TINCTURE OF CINNAMON. This exhilarating cordial is made by pouring a bottle of genuine Cognac on three ounces of bruised Cinnamon – (Cassia will not do) This restorative was more in vogue formerly than it is now: - a tea-spoonful of it, and a lump of Sugar, in a glass of good Sherry or Madeira, with the yolk of an Egg beat up in it, was called “Balsamum Vitae”. Obs. – Two tea-spoonful in a wine-glass of water, are a present and pleasant remedy in Nervous Languors, and in relaxation of the Bowels: - in the latter case, five drops of Laudanum may be added to each dose. SOUP-HERB SPIRIT. Of Lemon Thyme Winter Savoury Sweet Marjoram Sweet Basil – half an ounce of each. Lemon-Peel, grated, two drachms Eschalots, the same Celery-Seed, a drachm Avoirdupois weight. Prepare them as directed in 389 [instructions for drying the herbs]; and infuse them in a pint of Brandy, or Proof Spirit, for ten days: they may also be infused in Wine or Vinegar, but neither extract the flavour of the ingredients half so well as the spirit. “These preparations are valuable auxiliaries to immediately heighten the flavour, nd finish Soups, Sauces, Ragouts, &c., and will save much time and trouble to the Cook, and keep for twenty years.” Janet.

I make this lemon grass paste - usually keep it in the fridge with a layer of oil on top, but I'm sure it would freeze OK. 2- 3 stalks lemon grass 2x1 inch piece ginger, roughly chopped 3 garlic cloves, slices 3 shallots, sliced chillies to taste 3 tablespoons chopped coriander stems 1 tablespoon coarse soalt oil - about 5 tablespoons Chop/blend it all to a smooth-ish puree, with 2 tabs of the oil. Store in a jar with the rest of the oil on top. Use it wherever your culinary imagination suggests. Janet

The idea is older than that. Cassells' Dictionary of Cookery (English book, circa 1870's) says this about garlic: Garlic requires to be used most judiciously, or it will spoil whatever is cooked with it. If used carefully however, it will impart a most delicious flavour to salads and sauces; but it is so strong that, for many dishes, all that is necessary is to rub the dish with which it is to be sent to table sharply round with a slice of it, or better still, to rub it on a crust of bread, and put the bread in the soup, &C for a few minutes....