American Cookery by Amelia Simmons

American Cookery

By Anna Kathryn Lanier

I love cookbooks and probably have more than I should, but that doesn’t stop me from looking for more.  One book I found recently in an antique store is: AMERICAN COOKERY by Amelia Simmons.  The copy I found was printed in 1969.  Amanda’s original cookbook was printed in 1769. At the time, “it was the first American cookbook to be printed in the United States.  The original volume contained 48 pages of solid type. It was bound in paper and sold very well at 2 shillings 3 pence a copy.”

According to the forward, “the recipes or the volume were gathered from Continental Europe and England, adapted to ingredients generally available in the United States at the time.  Some, however were distinctly American, such as “pompkin pie,” cramberry sauce,” and “Indian flapjacks.”  Amelia also included household hints, such as “how to keep peas green till Christmas.”

Amelia hired someone to help write her cookbook, because of what she felt were her own inadequacies.  However, the person she hired deliberately inserted errors of measurements to discredit Amelia.  Future printings corrected these mistakes.

In addition, Amanda's book uses the long ‘f’, even though at the time the round ‘s’ was replacing it. (and my reprint carried over the long f, as you will see in recipes below).  The original edition contained many errors of grammar, typography and speech; which to some degree the editors of the 1969 copy changed, but they left enough errors to leave the proper flavor of the original.

While this book was written before the Western Movement began, it is more than likely that one or two copies made the journey overland, tucked safely in a trunk.

Here's what the full title of the book is:

I hope you enjoy the small selection of recipes I've chosen from the dozens Amelia Simmons wrote down for us.

Pompkin: No. 1 One quart stewed and strained, 3 pints cream, 9 beaten eggs, sugar mace, nutmeg and ginger, laid into pafte (paste) No. 7 or 3 and with dough spur, crofs (cross) and chequer it. Baked in difhes (dishes) three quarters of an hour.

No. 2 One quart milk, 1 pint pumpkin, 4 eggs, Molaffes, allfpice and ginger in crust, bake 1 hour.

Paste:  No. 3 To any quantity of flour, rub in three fourths of its weight to butter, (twelve eggs to a peck) rub in one third or half and roll in the rest.

No. 7. Rub one third of one pound of butter and one pound of lard into two pound of flour, wet with four whites well beaten; water q:s: to make a paste roll in residue of shortening in ten or twelve rollings – bake quick.

Cramberries: Stewed, strained and sweetened, put into paste No. 9, and bake gently.

Royal Pafte         No. 9 Rub half a pound of butter into one pound of flour, four whites beat to a foam, add two yolks, two ounces of fine sugar; roll often, rubbing one third and rolling two thirds of the better is beft; excellent for tarts and apple pies.

To Alamode a Round: Take fat pork cut in slices or mince, season it with pepper, salt, sweet marjoram and thyme, cloves, mace and nutmeg, make holes in the beef and stuff it the night before cooked; put some bones across the bottom of the pot to keep from burning, put in one quart Claret wine, one quart water and onion; lay the round on the bones, cover close and stop it round the top with dough; hang on in the morning and stew gently two hours; turn it, stop tight and stew two hours more, when done tender, grate a crust of bread on the top and brown it before the fire; scum the gravy and serve in a butter boat, serve it with the residue of the gravy in the dish.

To Make the Best Bacon: To each ham put one ounce saltpeter, one pint bay salt, one pint molasses, shake together 6 to 8 weeks or when a large quantity is together, baste them with the liquor every day; when taken out to dry, smoke three weeks with cobs or malt fumes. To every ham may be added a cheek, if you stow away a barrel and not alter the composition, some add shoulder. For transportation or exportation double the period of smoking.

Apple Pie: Stew and strain the apples, to every three pints grate the peal of a fresh lemon, add cinnamon, mace, rosewater and sugar to your taste – bake in paste No. 3.

                Every species of fruit such as peas, plums, raspberries, black berries may be only sweetened, without spices – and baked in paste No. 3.

Anna Kathryn Lanier

Salvation Bride

www.aklanier.com

Cowboys and Cookouts

By Anna Kathryn Lanier

One of the things I like to collect is cookbooks. One book I picked up a few months ago is COWBOYS AND COOKOUTS: A Taste of the Old West by Lewis Esson.  Not only is it full of recipes, but quotes, songs, poems and stories straight out of the nineteenth century. 

As the introduction says, “It is a truly extraordinary phenomenon that a ragtag group of itinerant agricultural workers that really only flourished for a couple of decades … should have left such a lasting legacy.”  Esson goes on to say, “Even in its own time, the romance of the range and trail was recognized, and the native cowboys—including disaffected Texas Confederate soldiers, who couldn’t find a place in the post-Civil War Untied States—were joined, from quite early on, by young bloods from all points of the compass, hoping to savor the unique and heady mix of danger and freedom that was cowboy life.”

After the Civil War, ranches sprang up across the Great Plains and cowboys were hired to drive the cattle to railheads for shipment to the eastern and western cities.  “The cowboys,” Esson says, “usually traveled the trails in crews of twelve, including their leader—trail boss—and the cook. [The cook] drove and ran the “chuck wagon,” which not only served as a mobile kitchen but often carried all their supplies, including foodstuffs, medical supplies (if any), ammunition, and bedding.” Common cooking equipment included the all important coffee pot, assortment of pots and pans, skillets and ever versatile Dutch oven.

Here are a few recipes from Esson’s book for you to enjoy on your next campout or cookout.

BISCUITS ON STICKS

Ingredients

4 cups flour

1 ½ tbsp baking powder

1 tsp salt

¾ cup cold lard

About 1 cup cold milk

Directions

1.       Combine flour, baking powder and salt in a large mixing bowl.  Grate the lard into the bowl and mix in lightly with the fingertips until the mixture resembles coarse crumbs.

2.       Make a well in the center and pour in three-quarter cup of the milk. Stir until the dough starts to come away from the sides of the bowl. If too dry, add a little more milk a little at a time.

3.       When smooth and pliable, turn the dough out on a lightly floured surface and knead quickly for a minute or so, folding no more than ten times.

4.       Divide the dough into about 18 pieces and flatten each out with your hands. Wrap each piece around the tip of a well-scrubbed, thick, green, nontoxic shrub branch that is long enough to use safely on the fire.

5.       Cook over the fire or barbecue for about 10 minutes, turning from time to time, until golden brown all over.

6.       When cool enough to handle, pull out the branch and fill the center of the biscuit with butter, cheese, jam, or even shredded meat and gravy.

 TEXAN SPARE RIBS

Ingredients

6 ½ pounds pork spare ribs, separated

For the marinade:

1/3 cup brown sugar

1 tbsp paprika

1 tsp salt

1-2 tsp English mustard powder

1-2 tsp chili powder

1 tsp ground cinnamon

2 tbsp Worcestershire sauce

4 tbsp white wine vinegar

5 tbsp tomato paste

Juice of 1 lemon

1 small onion, finely chopped

Directions

1.       First prepare the marinade by mixing together all the ingredients in a saucepan and simmering the mixture over a low heat for 10 to 15 minutes.

2.       Arrange the ribs in a single layer on a large sheet of heavy-duty foil with its edges folded up to make a tray.  Pour the marinade over the ribs and wrap the foil around them to make a big parcel. Double wrap with another sheet of foil. Refrigerate for at least an hour or until ready to cook.

3.       When ready to cook, place the parcel on the side of the fire or barbecue and cook slowly for 1 to 1 ½ hours. Once in a while, using oven mitts, remove the parcel and give it a quick shake in order to baste the ribs.

PORK ‘N’ BEANS

Ingredients

1 ½ pounds cooked beans, such as navy or kidney beans

                or two cans of beans, drained and rinsed

8 oz salt pork or fatty bacon, diced

1 onion chopped

2 garlic cloves, finely chopped

4-6 tbsp tomato ketchup

Salt and pepper

4 oz cheddar cheese, grated (optional)

1.       Fry the pork or bacon, stirring regularly, until the fat runs. Add the onion and garlic, and sauté until the onion is translucent. Remove the pan contents, leaving as much of the fat as possible.

2.       Add the beans to the pan and lightly mash them with a fork as you mix them with the hot fat.

3.       Add the bacon and onion mixture back to the pan and mix with the beans, ketchup, and salt and pepper to taste.  Add a little water if the mixture isn’t creamy enough.

4.       Cover, set over a very gentle heat, and cook until a crust forms on the bottom of the pan, about an hour.

5.       Sprinkle with cheese to serve (optional).

You can also add chopped chilies, chili flakes or pepper sauce to taste.

**Texan and President Lyndon B. Johnson was the first president to host a barbecue on the lawn of the White House.

Anna Kathryn Lanier
Romance Author, A GIFT BEYOND ALL MEASURE

http://aklanier.com/

Never let your memories be greater than your dreams. ~Doug Ivester 

Cowboys and Cookouts

By Anna Kathryn Lanier

A few months back I found another neat book “COWBOYS AND COOKOUTS: A Taste of the Old West” by Lewis Esson.  It’s full of tidbits about chuckwagons, cooks and cooking on the trail, along with some recipes. He quotes liberally from other sources and I’ll share a bit of the information given, plus a couple of recipes today.

“The chuckwagon was a commissary on wheels, a stout wagon covered with canvas and equipped with a box at the rear for storing tin dishes, a Dutch oven, a frying pan, kettle, and coffee pot. The standard staples also had their exact places; green-berry coffee, salt pork, cornmeal, flour, and beans.  For fresh meat, of course, there was always plenty of beef handy. A folding leg was usually attached to the chuckbox lid, so that it formed a table when lowered for action.”  ~ Dee Brown in THE AMERICAN WEST

THE COWBOY LIFE: A SADDLEBAG GUIDE FOR DUDES, TENDERFEET, AND COW PUNCHESERS EVERYWHERE by Michelle Morris, includes unwritten rules of Chuckwagon Etiquette.  According to Morris, these rules were “strictly followed by the trail crew.” 

1.       No one eats until Cookie calls.

2.       When Cookie calls, everyone comes a runnin’.

3.       Hungry cowboys wait for no man.  They fill their plates, fill their bellies, then move on so stragglers can fill their plates.

4.       Cowboys eat first, talk later.

5.       It’s okay to eat with your fingers. The food is clean.

6.       Eat with your hat on.

7.       Don’t take the last serving unless you’re sure you’re the last man.

8.       Food left on the plate is an insult to the cook.

9.       Don’t even think of going back to work without putting your dishes in the wreck pan.

10.   No running or saddling a horse near the wagon. And when you ride off, always ride down wind from the wagon.

11.   If you enjoy the water bucket, refill it—pronto

12.   If you’re refilling the coffee cup and someone yells “Man the pot,” you’re obliged to serve refills.

13.   If you come across any decent firewood, bring it back to the wagon.

14.   If you ride by the campefire and Cookie’s nowhere in sight, stop and stir the beans.

15.   Strangers are always welcome at the wagon.

This week, it looks like Canada and most of America are in a deep freeze. Even here in Houston, Texas, we only got into the 40’s on Thursday (and dropped below freezing at night). So, here’s two recipes from COWBOYS AND COOKOUTS  to help warm you up.

TRAIL SOUP

Ingredients:

10 oz (300 g) dried beans, ideally a mix of equal parts of navy, pinto, anasazi or cannellini, black beans,

and red kidney beans

1 tbsp oil

1 large onion, chopped

2 celery stalks, chopped

2 large carrots, chopped

2 garlic cloves, chopped

1 bay leaf

7 cups ( 1½  liters) beef, chicken or vegetable stock or water

Directions:

Soak beans in water overnight.

Heat oil in a large pot and sauté the onions, celery, carrots, and garlic until soft.  Add the drained beans, bay leaves and stock or water.  Bring to a boil, lower the heat, and simmer for 2 or 3 hours, until all beans are tender. Season to taste and serve.

TURKEY STEW

Ingredients:

3-5 lb. (1.35-2.25 kg) turkey pieces, raw

3 onions

3 carrots

2 celery stalks

1 garlic bulb

Salt

A few peppercorns

2 tbsp oil

2 tbsp flour

6 tbsp tomato paste

14.5 (400 g) can diced tomatoes

1 tsp dried oregano

½ tsp. ground cumin

4 potatoes

A day ahead, put the turkey in a pan, add water to cover and add 2 of the onions, cut in half, 2 of the carrots, and the celery stalks, coarsely chopped, and all but 2 cloves from the head garlic. Season with salt to taste and add the black peppercorns. Bring to a boil, reduce the heat, and simmer very gently for 3 hours.

Remove the turkey from the liquid, remove the meat from the bones, cut into bite-sized pieces, and refrigerate overnight. Return the bones to the pan and simmer for 1 hour more, adding more water if required to make a rich broth. Strain and chill overnight.

The next day, skim off any fat from the stock. Heat the oil in the large frying pan. Chop the reserved onion and cook until translucent. Stir in the flour, tomato paste, diced tomatoes, reserved garlic, finely chopped, the oregano, cumin, and 3 cups (700 ml) of the stock.  Add the potatoes and remaining carrot, both diced, and cook until these are tender, about 20 minutes.

Stir in the turkey and simmer for a few minutes a warm though before serving.

Anna Kathryn Lanier
Romance Author, A GIFT BEYOND ALL MEASURE

http://aklanier.com/

Never let your memories be greater than your dreams. ~Doug Ivester 

Pioneer Recipes

by Anna Kathryn Lanier

Cooking in the Old West was often an adventure in itself.  Though iron cook-stove were available by the 1860’s, most households in the west did not have them.  First, the massive size and weight made them hard to ship over the crude wagon trails.  Most cooking, from boiling to roasting and baking to steaming were therefore done open-hearth with cast iron kettles, Dutch ovens and frying pans. 

Corn was a mainstay for the pioneer and the common staple found its way into much of food placed on the table: johnnycakes, corn fritters, and corn pone. Sweet potatoes, squash, cabbage, turnips, wild berries, mushrooms and dandelion greens were also common pioneer foods.

Here are some recipes our pioneer forefathers and mothers would have enjoyed:

Baked Squash

3 butternut or acorn squash

6 teaspoons butter

6 teaspoons brown sugar

Salt

Cut squashes in halves. Clean out seeds and fibrous membrane.  Place one teaspoon of butter and brown sugar into each half.  Dash each with salt.  Arrange squash halves in a shallow baking pan with water to a depth of ½-inch.  Cover pan with loose foil. Bake in 400° F. oven 45-50 minutes.

Butterscotch Bread

2 cups flour

1 teaspoon baking powder

½ teaspoon baking soda

¼ teaspoon salt

1 cup brown sugar

½ cup chopped walnuts

2 eggs, beaten

1 cup buttermilk

2 tablespoons melted butter

In a large mixing bowl sift together flour, baking powder, baking soda and salt. Stir in brown sugar and nuts. In a separate smaller bowl blend eggs, milk and melted butter.  Stir into dry ingredients just enough to moisten.  Pour into batter into a greased loaf pan.*  Bake in 350° F. oven 45-55 minutes. Cool on rack.

*I made this recipe and it’s very good, but my loaf pan was only a 2-pound pan and the batter spilled over the pan while cooking and the bread didn't cook right. I realized I needed to use a larger pan. I would recommend either using a 3-pound pan or two 2-pound pans.

Dried Apple Pie

Soak 2 cups of dried apples in water overnight. Drain off water and mix apples with ½ cup sugar and 1 teaspoon each of allspice and cinnamon.  Line an 8-inch pie pan with a crust, and add the apple mixture. Dot with 3 tablespoons butter and cover with a second pie crust.  Make a few slashes in the top for ventilation and bake in a 350° oven for about 1 hour or until crust is golden brown.

Cabbage Salad

2 cups grated cabbage

1 cup chopped apples

½ cup chopped onion

½ cup chopped turnip

½ teaspoon salt

2 tablespoons sugar

½ cup vinegar

1/3 cup water

Toss all ingredients lightly.

I've posted on old west cooking before.  Click HERE and HERE to read those blogs. Some of the recipes are repeated on this blog post.

PS. I'm teaching THE HERO'S JOURNEY via TITANIC at Hearts Through History campus in August.

THE HERO'S JOURNEY VIA TITANIC

Whether you’re a plotter or a panster, knowing The Hero’s Journey will help you with your story’s plot. Using Christopher Vogler’s guidelines, I will lead you through your own The Hero’s Journey, including a special journey via the TITANIC and other romance movies.

Find out more HERE.

Anna Kathryn Lanier
Romance Author, A GIFT BEYOND ALL MEASURE

http://aklanier.com/

Never let your memories be greater than your dreams. ~Doug Ivester 

Cooking on the Western Trail

by Anna Kathryn Lanier

Happy Valentine’s Day!  I thought about doing something in honor of the day, but decided against it.  Most other bloggers are doing such blogs, but really, truly I just didn’t feel like doing research on the history of Valentine’s Day.  So instead I found an article on cooking on the western trail in THE OLD WEST: THE PIONEERS, from Time-Life Books. One of the articles includes recipes, so here’s a blog on cooking on the western trail.

Though the pioneer women were used to cooking, doing so on an open flame was not something they knew how to do.  Cooking on the trail was not easy and they learned by trial and error.  Helen Carpenter, a new bride making her way west on her honeymoon, wrote: “Although there is not much to cook, the difficulty and inconvenience in doing it amounts to a great deal—so by the time one has squatted around the fire and cooked bread and bacon, and made several dozen trips to and from the wagon—washed the dishes….and gotten things ready for an early breakfast, some of the others already have their night caps on—at any rate it is time to go to bed.” (1)  She also comments, “It is hurry scurry to get breakfast and put away things that necessarily had to be pulled out the last night…nooning is barely long enough to eat a cold bite—and at night all the cooking utensils and provisions are to be gotten about the camp fire, and cooking enough to last until the next night.” (2)

THE OLD WEST says that pioneers built campfires twice a day (in the morning and at night) using what fuel they could find: buffalo chips, sagebrush or weeds. “Bread, bacon and coffee were staples of their diet, augmented by any random harvest they could reap en route: fresh buffalo meat, rabbit or sage hen.” Eliza Ann McAuley writes “In cutting a way for the road, the boys find thickets of wild currants. There are several varieties, the black, the red and the white. The boys cut the bushes, some of them ten feet long and loaded with ripe currants, which we strip off and make into jelly, currant wine and vinegar, dried currants and currant pie.” (3)

THE OLD WEST tells us that in the early years of emigration, the pioneers could find and kill buffalo or antelope along the trail, but “a more dependable supply of fresh meat was a herd of cattle led behind the wagon.” And the milk provided by the milk cow was highly prized.  Not only was there a supply of fresh milk, but butter could be churned during the day’s journey by hanging pails on the jolting wagon; by day’s end, the butter was ready for the freshly baked bread.

The pioneer cook had to be resourceful and ingenious when it came to cooking.  She would have to improvise when supplies ran short, because no matter how well one packed the wagon, supplies did not always last as planned. For example, bacon if not protected from the heat of the plains would go bad.  It was standard for bacon to be packed in a barrel of bran to insulate it.  Eggs were similarly packed in corn meal to keep them from breaking, but also because they’d be used to make bread. 

The women usually cooked breakfast and dinner.  Lunch would have been ‘leftovers,’ often baked beans or stew with bread or biscuits from the night before.  Below are a few recipes from common ‘trail’ foods. Thankfully, THE OLD WEST updated the recipes for us.

Soda Bread:

To make dough, mix 1 teaspoon of baking soda with 1 cup warm water, add 2¼ cups flour and 1 teaspoon salt. Knead well. The dough may be used at once or allowed to rise overnight in a warm place. In either case, flatten dough to a thickness of 1 inch. Place on a greased cookie sheet and bake in a 400° oven for 25 minutes.

Dried Apple Pie:

Soak 2 cups of dried apples in water overnight. Drain off water and mix apples with ½ cup sugar and 1 teaspoon each of allspice and cinnamon.  Line an 8-inch pie pan with a crust, and add the apple mixture. Dot with 3 tablespoons butter and cover with a second pie crust.  Make a few slashes in the top for ventilation and bake in a 350° oven for about 1 hour or until crust is golden brown.

And just for fun – Buffalo Jerky

Slice buffalo meat along the grain into strips 1/8-inch thick, ½-inch wide and 2 to 3 inches long.  Hang them on a rack in a pan and bake at 200° until dry.  To prepare outside, suspend them over a fire or drape them on bushes to dry in the sun.

Other references:

(1)    WOMEN’S DIARES OF THE WESTWARD JOURNEY by Lillian Schlissel

(2)    PLAINS WOMEN: Women in the American West by Paula Bartley and Cathy Loxton

(3)    COVERED WAGON WOMEN: Diaries & Letters from the Western Trails, 1852 by Kenneth L. Holmes

  

Anna Kathryn Lanier
www.aklanier.com http://annakathrynlanier.blogspot.com/ 

Never let your memories be greater than your dreams. ~Doug Ivester