Traditional Christmas Fare©

 

If you’ve ever wondered how they got the logs onto the massive fireplaces in times past, this illustration is probably a pretty accurate representation.  As we ponder on dragging in that huge yule log on Christmas Eve, we’ll have another look at Christmas customs the past including traditional foods. 

“First acknowledging the Sacredness of the Holy Time of Christmas, I proceed to set forth the Rejoicings which are generally made at that great Festival.

You must understand, good People, that the manner of celebrating this great Course of Holydays is vastly different now to what it was in former Days:  There was once upon a time Hospitality in the Land; an English Gentleman at the opening of the great Day, had all his Tenants and Neighbours enter’d his Hall by Day-break, the Strong-Beer was broach’d, and the Black-Jacks went plentifully about with Toast, Sugar, Nutmeg, and good Cheshire Cheese; the Rooms were embower’d with Holly, Ivy, Cypress, Bays, Laurel, and Missleto, and a bouncing Christmas Log in the Chimney glowing like the Cheeks of a Country Milk-maid; then was the Pewter as bright as Clarinda, and every bit of brass as polished as the most refined Gentleman; the Servants were then running here and there, with merry Hearts and jolly Countenances, every one was busy welcoming of Guests, and look’d as smug as new-lick’d Puppies; the Lasses were as blithe and buxom as the Maids in good Queen Bess’s Days, when they eat Sir-Loins of Roast Beef for Breakfast; Peg would scuttle about to make a Toast for John, while Tom run harum scarum to draw a Jug of Ale for Margery:  Gaffer Spriggins was bid thrice welcome by the ‘Squire, and Gooddy Goose did not fail of a smacking Buss from his Worship, while his Son and Heir did the Honours of the House; In a word, the Spirit of Generosity ran thro’ the whole House.

In these Times all the Spits were sparkling, the Hackin must be boil’d by Day-break, or else two young Men took the Maiden by the Arms, and run her round the Market-place, ‘till she was ashamed of her Laziness.  And what was worse than this, she must not play with the young Fellows that Day, but stand Neuter, like a Girl doing penance in a Winding-sheet at a Church-door…the Tables were all spread from the first to the last, the Sir-Loyns of Beef, the Minc’d-Pies, the Plumb-Porridge, the Capons, Turkeys, Geese, and Plumb-Puddings, were all brought upon the board; and all those who had sharp Stomachs and sharp Knives eat heartily and were welcome, which gave rise to the Proverb, Merry in the Hall, when Beards wag all.

There were then Turnspits employed, who by the time Dinner was over, would look as black and as greasy as a Welch Porridge-pot, but the Jacks have since turned them all out of Doors.  The Geese which used to be fatted for the honest Neighbours, have been of late sent to London, and the Quills made into Pens to convey away the Landlord’s Estate; the Sheep are drove away to raise Money to answer the Loss of a Game at Dice or Cards, and their Skins made into Parchment for Deeds and Indentures; nay even the poor innocent Bee, who was used to pay its Tribute to the Lord once a Year at least in good Metheglin, for the Entertainment of the Guests and its Wax converted into beneficial Plaisters for sick Neighbours, is now used for the sealing of Deeds to his Disadvantage…

Then let all your Folks live briskly, and at such a Time of Rejoicing enjoy the Benefit of good Beef and Pudding, let the Strong Beer be unlocked, and let the Piper play, O’er the Hills, and far away.” 

May we all be truly thankful for the joys in our lives and the love of Christ and may we strive to carry the merriment and good cheer of Christmas in our hearts all the year round.  Thehistoricfoodie©

Source: 

– Christmas Entertainments.  Originally published in 1740.  London.   ©

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The Victualling Trades

Tags

victualling

These terms were probably used well before the 18th century, but I’ve labeled them as such since the primary sources I took them from were published in the early 18th century.  They were used in both the New World and the old.

Baker:

The baker’s work and prices were set by law allowing him a fair profit but preventing his taking advantage of his customers.  “Poor are more at his mercy than the rich; small families more than great; for in Rolls, Two-penny and Three-penny Loaves, there is no Check upon him; in the Quartern and Peck Loaves, and such Families as take in the small bread are the chief support of the Baker.”  Customers could run a tally with him rather than paying in ready-money unlike many others. 

Bakers were generally strong, robust Men, and a lad could be bound at fourteen or fifteen when deemed strong enough to knead the masses of dough.

Butcher:

Butchers required more skill to learn their trade than any of the other victualling branches.  They had to know how to kill, cut up, and dress their meat to advantage, and how to buy a bullock, sheep, or calf, standing.  They knew how to judge its weight and fatness by eye, and without long experience were often liable to be deceived in both.  Butchers were necessary, requiring great strength and a disposition no ways inclinable to the coward.  A lad of fourteen or fifteen could be bound to a butcher.

In London, specific rules governed what a butcher could legally do within his trade.  He was not allowed to kill any animal within his scalding-house or within the walls of the city.  Selling meat at unapproved prices carried stiff penalties:  ten pounds or twenty days imprisonment for the first offense, twenty pounds or to be set in the pillory for the second; and a third offense carried a penalty of forty pounds or to be set in the pillory, and lose one of his ears.

A butcher was not allowed to buy oxen, steers, heifers, or calves in a market or fair and then re-sell them while yet living.  “No Butcher shall gash, or cut the hide of any ox, bull, steer, or cow, in flaying thereof, or otherwise, whereby the same shall be impaired or hurt, on pain of twenty-pence for every hide.  No butcher shall water any hide, except in the months of June, July, and August, or shall offer to sale any putrified, or rotten hide…”.

 “If any Butcher in London or Westminster, or within ten miles thereof, shall buy any fat cattle, and sell the same again, either alive or dead, to another butcher, he shall forfeit the value of such cattle”. 

Cheesemonger:

A cheesemonger was a retailer of cheese, butter, eggs, bacon, and sometimes hams.  His skill consisted of knowing the prices and properties of the goods he sold.  “It is pretty precarious, and liable to a great many accidents; their cheese lose in their weight, their hams stink, and their bacon rusts, notwithstanding all the care they are able to take; were it not for such accidents as these, their trade would be very profitable.”

His trade was often wholesale, he employing factors to buy and transport them to London.  “He requires from twenty to fifty pound with an apprentice; and it will require several hundred pounds to set him up”. 

Every kilderkin of butter had to contain 112 lb., neat, every pound to be sixteen ounces, besides the tare of the cask; every firkin fifty-six lb., neat, and every pot fourteen lb., neat of good and merchantable butter.  No butter, old or corrupt, could be mixed or packed with new or any whey butter packed with that of cream. 

Cheesemongers and tallow-chandlers were permitted to sell any quantity of butter or cheese for victualling ships, or for other purposes.   

Cook:

“In the Days of good Queen Elizabeth, when mighty Roast Beef was the Englishman’s Food; our Cookery was plain and simple as our manners; it was not then a science or mistery, and required no conjuration to please the palates of our greatest men.  But we have of late Years refined ourselves out of that simple Taste, and conformed our Palates to Meats and Drinks dressed after the French Fashion:  The natural taste of fish or flesh is become nauseous to our fashionable stomach; we abhor that any thing should appear at our tables in its native properties; all the Earth, from both the Poles the most defiant and different climates, must be ransacked for spices, pickles and sauces not to relish but to disguise our food.  Fish when it has passed the hands of a French cook is no more fish; it has neither the taste, smell, nor appearance of fish.  It, and every Thing else, is dressed in Masquerade, seasoned with slow poisons and every dish pregnant with nothing”. 

The writer went on to say rich and poor lived as if they were of a different species of beings from their ancestors, and observe a regimen of diet, calculated not to supply the wants of nature.  “But it is to no purpose to preach against Luxury and French cookery; they have too powerful a party in the nation:  we must take the Cooks as they are, not as they ought to be; they are not to blame, but those that employ them.” 

Cooks were of three sorts:  the roasting and boiling cooks; the pastry-cooks; and those that kept chop-houses and confined themselves to dressing a beef-steak, a veal-cutlet, or a mutton-chop. 

Boys at about age thirteen or fourteen could be bound, first learning to tend the fires.  Salaries ranged from “a hundred a year” to five to fifty pounds a year depending on skill.

Coffee-House man:

Coffee-houses were often taverns as well as coffee-houses that sold all manner of wine and punch and dressing dinners for gentlemen.  Those found adulterating coffee or tea incurred a substantial penalty. 

Fruiterers:

A fruiterer chiefly bought large quantities of fruit and retailed it out.  Some bought whole orchards of fruit while yet on the tree.  They were incorporated by James I in 1605. 

Grocer:

A grocer imported himself, or purchased by wholesale of an importer, raisins, sugar, figs, and all manner of foreign fruit (except oranges and lemons) and frequently sells tea, coffee, and chocolate as well as soap, starch, blue, and other small articles. 

Pastry-Cook:

“The pastry-cook is a very profitable business, requires a good palate and a disguising genius.  He is nice at making all manner of Pyes, Pasties, Tarts, Custards, &c. is skilled in the architecture of paste and judicious at charging his pyes with all manner of sculpture and statuary.  He deals in jellies and preserves, and in some few confections.  A lad may be bound about fourteen years of age and generally sets up for himself, or enters into the service of some gentleman, in quality of Superintendant of his pastry work”. 

Confectioner:

“The confectioner is a sweet-tooth’d tradesman:  He makes all manner of Sweet-Meats, preserves all manner of fruits, and is the architect of a desert.  He builds walls, castles, and pyramids of sweet-meats and sugar-plumbs. ..He makes sour things sweet and sweet things sour; he covers the products of summer, and the hottest season of the year with artificial frost and snow, and delights the eye as much with the arrangement of his pyramids as the taste of the delicious flavor of his wet and dry Sweet-Meats.  It requires no small knowledge to compleat a confectioner; though I never esteem him one of the most useful members of society.  The trade is profitable to the Master, and the Journeymen have from fifteen to twenty shillings a week”.

Poulterer:

The poulterer furnished tables with fowl and game of all sorts.  “He has the secret of making them pay very dear for what they have of him…If they pay their bills, the nobleman is bit; but if they do not, as frequently happens, the poulterer is bit.  The whole mystery of this trade lies in buying cheap and selling dear; a secret which may be learned in less than seven years”.

Fishmonger:

The fishmonger’s profits were without bounds, and bore no proportion to his out-layings.  His knowledge consisted of finding the cheapest market and selling at the greatest price.  His trade could be learned in less than seven years, “without any notable genius”.  The fisherman is a laborious useful trade, perfectly well understood.  It is fit only for robust lads.

Vinegar-Maker:

The vinegar-maker made vinegar from white wine that had spoiled, or brewed it from raisins.  The latter was the cheapest and most common. 

Chocolate-Maker:

“Chocolate is made of cocoa, the product of the West-Indies.  It is stripped of its shell, or rather husk, and wrought upon a stone over a charcoal fire till it is equally mellow, and then put into moulds, which shapes it into cakes.  To perfume it they mix it with Venello.  It is a hot laborious business, but does not require much ingenuity.  Journeymen’s Wages are from twelve to fifteen shillings a week, but are not employed much in summer.  They require heat to work with, but cold weather is necessary to dry it.”

Oil-Shop:

Those who ran an oil-shop sold oils, pickles, anchovies, soap, salt, hams, and, “several other family necessaries; he is a mere retailer, has enough profits, but is worth no lad’s while to slave seven years in this dirty shop for any knowledge he can reap from his Master or his Practice”.  The author advised young men that going into an apprenticeship or indenture with any sort of retail shop keeper was not a way to gather wealth.

Sugar-Baker:

“Sugar is made of the liquor of the Sugar-cane, boil’d and made to granulate by mixing it with lime.  The sugar-baker dilutes the raw sugars with water, boiling them and mixing them again with lime, till they are put into earthen molds of the form we see the Sugar-loaf; after which they are bak’d in an oven and clay’d.  The boyler, who is the principal workman, earns 40 or 50 l. a year; the rest of the people employed in it are common labourers”.

Spelling left as found.

See:  Baily, Nathan.  An Universal Etymological Dictionary.  1737.  London.  Campbell, R.  The London Tradesman.  1747.  London.                                          The General Shop Book.  1753.  London.

The Work of Sewers in the Middle Centuries

 

 This is the second installment in a series of posts inspired by my ancestor, Sir John Poyntz (ca. 1485-1544), Sewer (Knight whose duty it was to oversee the serving of food at high occasions).  [See definitions at the end of this post.]

Sewers were required to orchestrate the serving of food for others aside from the royals and one group for which such services were rendered was the Clergy. 

The great Feast at the Intronization of the Reverend Father in God George Nevell, Archbishop of York and Chancelour of Englande, in the 6^th Yere of the Raigne of King Edwarde the fourth took place in 1467 and below is a list of the supplies needed on that occasion and in the quantities indicated. 

Wheate 300 Quarters; In Ale 300 Tunne; Wine 100 Tunne; Ipocrasse one Pype; oxen 104; wilde bulles 6; Muttons 1000; veales 304; porkes 304; swannes 400; geese 2000; capons 1000; Pygges 2000; Plover 400; Quayles 150 dozen; foules called Rees 200 dozen; peacocks 104; mallards and teales 4000; cranes 4000; kyddes 204; chyckyns 2000; pigeons 4000; conyes 4000; byttors 204; herenshawes 400; fessantes 200; partridges 500; woodcocks 400; curlews 100; egrittes 1000; stages, buckes, and Roes 500 and mo.; Pasties of venison colde 4000; parted dyshes of gelly 1000; playne dishes of gelly 3000; colde tartes baked 4000; colde custards baked 3000; Hot Pastries of Venison 1500; Hot custards 2000; Pykes and Breames 608; porposes and seales 12; spices, sugared Delicates and Wafers plenty.

That quantity and array of food was made into dishes served as such:

The first course:  Frumentie and Venison; Potage Royal; Hart poudred for Standard; Roo poudred for Mutton; frumentie Ryal; Signettes rosted; Swanne with Galendine; Capons with whole Geese rost; Corbettes of Venison rost; Beef; venison baked; and great custard planted, as a Suttletie.

The Second course:  First, Jelly, and parted rayfing to Potage; Venison in Breake; pecocke in his Hakell; cony rosted, Roo reversed; lardes of venison; partridge roste; woodcocks rost; plovers rost; Bremes in sauce ponnyvert; leche cypress; fuller Naplyn; dates in molde, chessons ryal, a Suttletie.

The third course:  Blanke desire, dates in compost, bytters rost; feysauntes rost; egrittes rost; rabittes rost; quayles rost; martynettes rost; Great Byrdes rost; larkes rost; leche baked; fritter Crispayne; quinces baked, Chamblet Viander, a Suttletie; Wafers and Ipocras.

There were 30 men assigned to administer to the serving of the meal including sewers, steward, treasurer, comptroller, carver, cupbearers, knights for the hall, panter, ewerer, keeper of the cupboard, and surveyor in the hall. 

For the working class, such meals were the stuff dreams are made of.  They were unable to hunt for food as the animals of the forest belonged to the nobility, and taking them, even to feed a hungry family, was considered poaching which could result in a death sentence.  Such people relied on grains and common vegetables for the bulk of their daily meals. 

Let’s dig into the old English spelling and look at what some of these strange items actually are.

Ipocrasse:  wine; Suttletie:  subtlety, a delicate dish; Itronisation:  The installation of a bishop in his episcopal see; Ewerer:  one who brought and heated water for the nobles; Panter:  keeper of the pantry; Keeper of the cupboard:  lardner, keeper of the hall; Pygges:  pigs, probably suckling pigs prepared whole, not fully grown hogs; Quayles:  quails; Kyddes:  kid, young goat; Chyckyns:  chickens; Conyes:  rabbits; Byttors:  bitterns, a group of wild wading birds; Egrittes:  Egrets; Stagges:  Stags, bucks; Pasties:  a pie in a firm crust or coffyn, probably eaten out of hand; Dishes of gelly:  gelatin, probably flavored with orange or lemon; Pykes and breams:  small fish; Frumentie:    Hulled wheat boiled in milk and flavored with sugar and spices; Hart:  male red deer; Roo:  in later times this may have referred to kangaroo, the tail was the part most commonly eaten, but at this time it was probably the herb, rue; Capon:  A rooster castrated as a chick to render the meat tender; Feysauntes:  pheasants; Martynettes:  a swallow-like bird; Leche:  probably a mixture of milk, sugar, and vanilla cooked down into a caramel

Edward IV (28 April 1442 – 9 April 1483) was King of England from 4 March 1461 until 3 October 1470, and again from 11 April 1471 until his death. 

George Neville (ca. 1432-June 8, 1476) was the youngest son of Richard Neville, 5^th Earl of Salisbury.  He became bishop of Exeter in 1458 after which he took a keen interest in the politics of the era.  For his enthronement as Archbishop of York in Cawood Castle, Sept. 1465, approximately 2500 people were fed at each meal.

Following in Sir John’s footsteps, Royal Meals

Tags

Christmas dinner, medieval food, Sewer

I recently discovered an ancestor, John Poyntz, who was, “Sewer to Queen Catalina of Aragon”, and I found a medieval account of his having attended her in that capacity at the Field of Cloth of Gold.  What exactly were his duties?  As best I can tell it could have been one of two completely different occupations, one being a stitcher of fine quality garments, and the other being, “an Officer who comes in before the Meat of a King or Nobleman, and places it upon the Table…”.  The latter is a much simplified description of an occupation that was anything but simple.

Note that no Man under the Degree of a Knight bare a Dish to the Kings board. – Source:  The Register of the Most Noble Order of the Garter. 

I’ve tried to find a clue that would tell me which he was – a tailor/seamster or a glorified waiter, and so far have found nothing on which to form an opinion, except that I expect there was a lot more eating and entertaining done at the Field of Cloth of Gold than sewing, and serving seems to be the more common definition and example.

Given the number of dishes served at a royal banquet, knowing how and in what order to arrange them wasn’t a simple task and in order to do so correctly would have required extensive training.  For the coronation of King James II and his Queen, for example, an astonishing 1445 dishes were placed on three groupings of tables. 

The lengthy list of the dishes served just at the Majesties’ table, in all 175 dishes, included the following (Spelling is as it was in the original source):

Pistachio Cream in Glasses; Anchovies, Custards, Vollar’d Veal, cold; Lamb-stones, Cocks-Combs, Marrow Patie, hot; Jelly, Sallet, Stags Tongues, cold; Sweet-Breads, Patty Pigeon, Petty-Toes, hot; Cray Fish, Blumange; Bolonia Sausages, cold; Collops and Eggs, Frigase Chick, Rabbets Ragou, hot; Oysters pickled, Portugal Eggs, Dutch Beef, cold; Andolioes, Mushrooms, Veal, hot; Hogs Tongues, Cheese-Cakes, Cyprus Birds, cold; Tansie, Asparagus, a Pudding, hot; Ragou of Oysters, Scallops, Salamagundy, cold, 3 Dozen Glasses of Lemon Jelley; 5 Neats Tongues, cold; 4 Dozen of wild Pigeons, 12 larded hot; a whole Salmon, cold; 8 Pheasants, 3 larded, cold; 9 small Pigeon Pies, cold; 24 fat chickens, larded, hot; 12 Crabbs, cold; 24 Partridges, 6 larded, hot, a Dish of Tarts; Soles marinated, cold, 24 tame Pigeons, 6 larded hot; 4 Fawns, 2 larded, hot; 4 Pullets la Dobe, 12 Quales, 4 Partridges hasht, hot; 10 Oyster Pyes, hot; Sallet; Pease; 4 Dozen of Puddings, hot; Artichokes; Beef a la Royal, hot; an Oglio, hot; a Batalia Pye, turkeys a la Royal, hot, 4 Chicks, Bacon Gammon, Spinage, hot; 3 Pigs, hot; Almond Puffs; 12 Stump Pyes, cold, a square Pyramid, containing the Fruits in Season, and all manner of Sweet-meats; a whoel Lamb larded, hot; 12 Ruffs; 4 Dozen of Egg-Pies, cold; a very large circular Pyramid in the Middle of the Table, 6 Mullets, large, sous’d; 8 Godwits; 8 Neats tongues and Udders, roasted, hot; 18 Minc’d Pyes, cold; Marrow Toasts; 8 Wild Ducks Marinated, hot; Gooseberry Tarts, Lampreys, Shrimps, cold; 24 Puffins, cold, Smelts; Truffles; 4 Dozen of Almond Puddings, hot; Asparagus; 8 Ortelans, Lamb Sallet, cold; 5 Partridge Pyes, 18 Turkey Chicks, 6 Larded, hot; 12 Lobsters, cold; 9 Pullets, 4 Larded, hot; Bacon, 12 Leverets, 4 Larded, hot, Sturgeon, cold, 24 Ducklings, 6 larded, hot; Collar’d Beef, cold; 8 Capons, 3 larded, hot; 5 Pullet Pyes, cold; 8 Geese, 3 larded, hot; 3 sous’d Pigs, cold; 3 Dozen Glasses of Jelley; Botargo Gerkins, sous’d Trout, cold; Sheeps Tongues, Skirrets, Cabbage Pudding, hot; 8 Teals Marinated; French Beans, Leveret Pye, cold; Lemon Sallet, Smelts pickled, Periwincles; Chicks, marl’d; Cavear, Olives, cold; Prawns, Samphire, Trotter Pye, cold; Taffata Tarts, Razar Fish, Broom Buds, cold; collar’d Pigs, Parmazan; Capers, cold; Spinage Tart, Whitings marinated, Cockles, cold; pickled Mushrooms, Mangoes, cold; Bacon Pye, Cardoons, sous’d Tench, cold; 3 dozen glasses of Blamange, cold.

At another station many of the already mentioned dishes were found (639 dishes) with the following not listed above: 

Venison Pasty; Apricot and Gooseberry Tarts; Sous’d Mullets, cold; Chine of Beef, hot; Hung Beef; Rabbets frigas’d, hot; Collar’d eels, cold; Pistach Cream; Cucumbers, cold; pickled Scallops, cold; 5 Turkeys with Eggs; Mjushrooms; Hogs Feet; 4 Dozen of Oranges and Lemons; Dutch beef, cold; 6 Carps sous’d; Bamboo, cold; Portugal Eggs; 24 Puddings in Skins, hot; etc.

Another 631 dishes were served from the third station, making up the total of 1445.  – An Account of the Ceremonies observed in the Coronations Of the Kings and Queens of England.  1727.  London.

Nobility and attendants, according to custom, had to be seated and served, “with great Ceremony at their respective Tables”, after which, “the first Course of hot Meat is served up to Their Majesties Table in the manner following.  The Lords the Sewers go to the Dresser of the Kitchen, and the Earl of Scarborough, who is Master of the House, officiates that Day as Sergeant of the Silver Scullery, calls for a Dish of Meat, wipes the Bottom of the Dish, and also the Cover within and without, takes Essay of it, and covers it; and then ‘tis conveyed to Their Majesties Table with the following Ceremony…Then 32 Dishes of hot Meat, brought up by the Knights of the Bath bareheaded; after which, there is brought a Supply of several Dishes more of hot Meat by Private Gentlemen.  Then follows the Mess of Pottage, or Gruel, called Dillegrout, prepared by the King’s Master-Cook, and brought up to the Table by the Lord of the Manor of Addington in Surrey…”, and so forth until all 1445 dishes of food were served. 

Obviously great care was taken in serving the food on such an occasion and those doing so were rigorously trained to recognize and understand the hierarchy of guests and the order in which they were to be served while doing so in immaculate and splendid attire and with a flourish befitting the royal hosts. 

Perhaps Sir John’s talents were passed down through the several generations and are responsible for the enjoyment I get out of preparing period meals, albeit on a much less grand scale.  At any rate, getting to know him has been enjoyable and interesting enough to inspire the menu for our period Christmas meal this year.  The dishes will be those that Sir John would have known, served, and eaten.  Readers are invited to follow along as I research, shop, and prepare them.  Blissful Meals, all.

A Few Stray Facts About Drink in 18th Century France ©

Chocolate pot

Yet another in a series of research projects to document what would be most appropriate for Ft. Toulouse in the first half of the mid-18^th century. 

*  “As early as 1664 a tax was levied on sugar imported by France, but it was considerably lower than taxes on other crops and did not deter cane production.  In 1665 the French government placed a high import tariff on sugar from non-French areas, which benefited Guadeloupe.  For most of the eighteenth century the French market was protected from foreign sugar imports”.  Much of that sugar was used in drinks. 

*  In 1685, Sieur Monin, a celebrated doctor of Grenoble, France, first recommended café au lait as a medicine. 

*  In 1669, “coffee in France was a hot black decoction of muddy grounds thickened with syrup”.

*  In 1702, coffee in the American colonies was being used as a refreshment between meals, “like spirituous liquors”.  In 1711, the infusion idea in coffee making appeared in France.  It came in the form of a fustian [cloth] bag which contained the ground coffee in the coffee maker, and the boiling water was poured over it.  This was a decided French novelty, but it made slow headway in England and America, where some people were still boiling whole roasted beans…

*  By 1760, the decoction, or boiling, method in France had been generally replaced by the infusion, or steeping method.

*  In 1763, Donmartin, a tinsmith of St. Bendit, France, invented a coffee pot, the inside of which was “filled by a fine sack put in, in its entirety”, and which had a tap to draw the coffee.  The 1800, De Belloy’s original French drip method appeared.

*  “From the beginning, the French devoted more attention than any other people to coffee brewing”.  From the late 18^th century into the early 19^th, the French were granted a great many patents for brewing methods, most of which are still in use today.

*  In the 18^th century, both coffee and sugar were bought at the apothecary’s shop and the use of coffee is said to have caused an increase in sugar use because the ladies of Paris, “used to put so much sugar in the coffee that it was nothing but a syrup of blackened water”. 

*  “The best coffee, in the western part of the world, is made in France, where this beverage is in universal request”.

*  In 1822, the quantity of cocoa imported into French colonies was 314,829 kil. compared to 29,444 in England, and 5,705 in the U.S.

*  In 1753, the countries trading with France ranked in the following of importance:

Imports:  The Levant, Spain, Italy, Holland, England, Switzerland, Savoy, the Baltic, Germany, & Flanders.

Exports:  Spain, Holland, Italy, the Baltic, Germany, the Levant, England, Flanders, Portugal, Switzerland.

*  “About the middle of the last century [17^th century], the Dutch sold tea at Paris at thirty shillings a pound which they had bought in China for eight-pence a pound.”  (published July 1787)

*  “Formerly, the taste in this particular was improving and extending; and at one time tea found its best market in France”.  At the time of publication, 1832, the author predicted the use of tea in France would again rise.

*  “The bourgeois of Boulogne have commonly soup and bouillé at noon, and a roast, with a salad, for supper; and at all their meals there is a desert of fruit.  This indeed is the practice all over France.  On meager [meatless] days they eat fish, omelettes, fried beans, fricassees of eggs and onions, and burnt cream.  The tea which they drink in the afternoon is rather boiled than infused; it is sweetened all together with coarse sugar, and drank with an equal quantity of boiled milk.”  [published in 1766, these customs had probably changed little over the previous several years]

*  Smollett found the tea, chocolate, cured neats tongues, and Bologna sausages to be excellent in France.

*  “Each European race has chosen one special beverage of this class:  Spain and Italy delight in chocolate; France, Germany, Sweden, and Turkey in coffee; while Russia, Holland, and England drink tea”.  – The Friend.

*  “In 1720, the consumption was so much augmented, that the French, who had hitherto brought home only raw-silk, porcelain, and silken manufactures from China, began to import considerable quantities of tea into France…”  – Hanway.

*  In 1728, la plus ancienne chocolaterie de France in Paris was selling chocolate to patrons.

*  R. Brookes wrote The Natural History of Chocolate published in 1730.  He discussed its early use in Europe.

*  “The new drink [chocolate] was introduced by monks from Spain into Germany and France, and when in 1660 Maria Theresa, Infanta of Spain, married Louis XIV, she made chocolate well known at the Court of France”.  – Cocoa and Chocolate.

*  Chocolate was still being prepared in much the same way the Spaniards became aware of it in the New World during the 18^th century, and there are accounts describing the making of it in the mid-18^th century, including the French.  Napoleon was credited with inventing a chocolate mill to facilitate the preparation which he was very fond of.  “The mill is a round stick with a wheel on the end of it.  The stick passes through the lid of the chocolate pot.  Turning the protruding end of the stick between the palms of the hands turns the wheel within the pot while the chocolate is cooking and prevents any sediment from forming.  These mills are scarcely ever seen in this country except in antique shops.  Housewives use a cream whip for the same purpose, when they want an extra good cup of chocolate”.  [published history 1916]

SOURCES: 

Hoy, Don R.  Agricultural Land Use of Guadeloupe.

Clarendon, George William Frederick Villiers (Earl of).  First Report on the Commercial Relations Between France and Great Britain. 

The Country Magazine.  For the Years 1786 and 1787.  Vol. I.  1787.

Martin, Robert Montgomery.  The Past and Present State of the Tea Trade of England and of the Continents of Europe and America.  1832.  London. 

Smollett, Tobias George.  Travels Through France and Italy.  1766. 

The Friend.  Nov. 17,1867.  Philadelphia.

Hanway, Jonas.  A Journal of Eight Days Journey from Portsmouth to Kingston.  Vol. II. 

Knapp, Arthur.  Cocoa and Chocolate.  Their History from Plantation to Consumer. 

Boston Cooking School.  American Cookery.  Vol. 20.  Feb. 1916.

Mid-18th Century Foods in France, As Seen by Smollett©

In 1766, Tobias Smollett published an account of his family’s time spent in France some few years earlier, and rather than give the reader a long interpretation of what he found, the author will, instead, pass it on in his words (and in his spelling) for the truest picture of what he experienced.  The article is a continuation of blog articles on influences of foods prepared in French Louisiana prior to the French and Indian war.

I have likewise two small gardens, well stocked with oranges, lemons, peaches, figs, grapes, corinths, salad, and pot-herbs…It is very difficult to find a tolerable cook at Nice.  The markets at Nice are tolerably well supplied.  Their beef, which comes from Piedmont, is pretty good, and we have it all the year.  In the winter, we have likewise excellent pork, and delicate lamb; but the mutton is indifferent.  Piedmont, also, affords us delicious capons, fed with maiz; and this country produces excellent turkeys, but very few geese.  Chickens and pullets are extremely meager.  I have tried to fatten them, without success.  In the summer they are subject to the pip, and die in great numbers.  Autumn and winter are the seasons for game; hares, partridges, quails, wild-pigeons, woodcocks, snipes, thrushes, beccasicas, and ortolans.  Wild boar is sometimes found in the mountains;  it has a delicious taste, not unlike that of the wild hog in Jamaica; and would make an excellent barbecue, about the beginning of winter, when it is in good case:  but, when meager, the head only is presented at tables.  Pheasants are very scarce.  As for the heath game, I never saw but one cock, which my servant bought in the market, and brought home; but the commandant’s cook came into my kitchin, and carried it off, after it was half plucked, saying, his master had company to dinner.  The hares are large, plump, and juicy.  The partridges are generally of the red sort; large as pullets, and of a good flavor:  there are also some grey partridges in the mountains; and another sort of a white colour, that weigh four or five pounds each.  Beccasicas are smaller than sparrows, but very fat, and they are generally eaten half raw.  The best way of dressing. Them, is to stuff them into a roll, scooped of its crum; to baste them well with butter, and roast them, until they are brown and crisp.  The ortolans are kept in cages, and crammed, until they die of fat, then eaten as dainties.  The thrush is presented with the trail [entrails], because the bird feeds on olives.  They may as well eat the trail of a sheep, because it feeds on the aromatic herbs of the mountain.  In the summer, we have beef, veal, and mutton, chicken, and ducks; which last are very fat and flabby.  All the meat is tough in this season, because the excessive heat and great number of flies, will not admit of its being kept any time after it is killed.  Butter, and milk, though not very delicate, we have all the year.  Our tea and fine sugar come from Marseilles, at a very reasonable price.

Nice is not without variety of fish; though they are not counted so good in their kinds as those of the ocean.  Soals, [soles, flounder] and flat-fish in general, are scarce.  Here are some mullets, both grey and red.We sometimes see the dory, which is called St. Pietro; with rock fish, bonita, and mackerel.  The gurnard appears pretty often; and there is plenty a kind of large whiting, which eats pretty well; but has not the delicacy of that which is caught on our [English] coast.  One of the best fish of this country, is called ‘le loup’, about two or three pounds in weight; white, firm, and well-flavoured.  Another, no-way inferior to it, is the ‘moustel’, about the same size, of a dark grey colour, and short, blunt snout, growing thinner and flatter from the shoulders downwards, so as to resemble a soal at the tail.  This cannot be the mustela of the antients, which is supposed to be the sea lamprey.  Here too are found the vyvre, or, as we call it, weaver; remarkable for its long sharp spines, so dangerous to the fingers of the fishermen.  We have abundance of ‘soepie’, or cuttle-fish, of which the people in this country make a delicate ragout; as also of the ‘polype de mer’, which is an ugly animal with long feelers, like tails, which they often wind about the legs of the fishermen.  They are stewed with onions, and eat something like cow heel.  The market sometimes affords the ‘ecriviesse de mer’, which is a lobster without claws, of a sweetish taste; and there are a few rock oysters, very small, and very rank.  Sometimes the fishermen find under water, pieces of hard cement, like plaster of Paris, which contain a kind of muscle, called ‘la datte’, from its resemblance to a date.  These petrefactions are commonly of a triangular form, and may weigh about twelve or fifteen pounds each; and one of them may contain a dozen of these muscles, which have nothing extraordinary in the taste or flavor, though extremely curious, as found alive and juicy, in the heart of a rock, almost as hard as marble, without any visible communication with the air or water.  I take it for granted, however, that the enclosing cement is porous, and admits the finer parts of the surrounding fluid.  In order to reach the muscles, this cement must be broke with large hammers; and it may be truly said, the kernel is not worth the trouble of cracking the shell.  Among the fish of this country, there is a very ugly animal of the eel species, which might pass for a serpent:  it is of a dusky black colour, marked with spots of yellow, about eighteen inches, or two feet long.  The Italians call it ‘murena’; but whether it is the fish which had the same name among the ancient Romans, I cannot pretend to determine.  The antient murena was counted a great delicacy, and was kept in ponds, for extraordinary occasions.  Julius Caesar borrowed six thousand for one entertainment:  but I imagined this was the river lamprey.  The murena of this country is in no esteem, and only eaten by the poor people.  Craw-fish and trout are rarely found in the rivers among the mountains.  The swordfish is much esteemed in Nice, and called ‘l’empereur’, about six or seven feet long:  but I have never seen it.  They are very scarce; and when taken, are generally concealed, because the head belongs to the commandant, who has likewise the privilege of buying the best fish at a very low price.  For which reason, the choice pieces are concealed by the fishermen, and sent privately to Piedmont or Genoa.  But, the chief fisheries on this coast, are of the sardines, anchovies, and tunny.  These are taken in small quantities all the year:  but spring and summer is the season when they mostly abound.  In June and July, a fleet of about fifty fishing boats put to sea every evening about eight o’clock, and catch anchovies in immense quantities.  One small boat sometimes takes in one night twenty-five rup, amounting to six hundred weight; but it must be observed that the pound here, as well as in other parts of Italy, consists but of twelve ounces.  Anchovies, besides their making a considerable article in the commerce of Nice, are a great resource in all families.  The noblesse and bourgeois sup on salad and anchovies, which are eaten on all their meager days.  The fishermen and mariners all along this coast have scarce any other food but dry bread and a few pickled anchovies; and when the fish is eaten, they rub their crusts with the brine.  Nothing can be more delicious than fresh anchovies fried in oil:  I prefer them to the smelts of the Thames.  I need not mention, that the sardines and anchovies are caught in nets; salted, barreled, and exported into all the different kingdoms and states of Europe.  The sardines, however, are largest and fattest in the month of September.  A company of adventurers have farmed the tunny-fishery of the king, for six years; a monopoly, for which they pay about three thousand pounds sterling.  They are at a very considerable expense for nets, boats, and attendance.  Their nets are disposed in a very curious manner across the small bay of St. Hospice, in this neighbourhood, where the fish chiefly resort.  They are never removed, except in the winter, and when they want repair:  but there are avenues for the fish to enter, and pass, from one inclosure to another.  There is a man in a boat, who constantly keeps watch.  When he perceives they are fairly entered, he has a method of shutting all the passes, and confining the fish to one apartment of the net, which is lifted up into the boat, until the prisoners are taken and secured.  The tunny fish generally runs from fifty to one hundred weight; but some of them are much larger.  They are immediately gutted, boiled, and cut in slices.  The guts and head afford oil:  the slices are partly dried, to be eaten occasionally with oil and vinegar, or barreled up in oil, to be exported.  It is counted a delicacy in Italy and Piedmont, and tastes not unlike sturgeon.  The famous pickle of the ancients called garum, was made of the gills and blood of the tunny, or thynnus…

Thehistoricfoodie.wordpress.com©

MAIZE AND THE FRENCH IN LOUISIANA©

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foods colonial Louisiana, maize bread, sagamite

Maize grew better in Lower Louisiana than in French Canada, although it wasn’t unknown in the latter.  Paul le Jeune, Jesuit missionary, did comment on the Montagnais Indians northeast of Quebec making sagamite made from bled d’Inde, or maize. 

Francois-Rene Chateaubriand described sagamite as, “a sort of paste, made of Indian corn”, while another writer  evidently was more impressed saying it contained  corn meal, pork or bear meat, and beans flavored with salt or sugar.  – Atala:  Or, The Love and Constancy of Two Savages in the Desert.  1814.  Boston.  First trans. 1802.   2.  Bulletin, I 144.  New York State Museum.  Nov. 1910.  NY.

Some writers, including the Jesuits in North America, described it either as a thin pottage or as a thicker stew, one going so far as to compare it to wallpaper paste.  – Parkman, Francis.  The Jesuits in North America in the Seventeenth Century.  1867.  Boston.

Succotash was a mixture of green corn and beans, sometimes with the addition of other tidbits, cooked into a mush that in some instances may have been similar to sagamite.

Whether by choice or necessity, more often the latter, the French colonists were known to consume maize which they obtained from the Indians.  The men adjusted to cornbread faster than the French women who considered it coarse fare.  In 1704, Governor Bienville said in Mobile, “the men who are in Louisiana are accustoming themselves to maize, but the women, who for the most part are natives of Paris, are very reluctant to consume it.” 

Even those who like cornbread will admit that the texture is much coarser than wheat bread, even whole wheat bread, and it was that texture the French women objected to.  At some point, it was discovered that the finer the corn was ground for the meal the softer the loaf, and if the meal was slowly boiled into a mush before being mixed with a third the amount of wheat flour, yeast, and other ingredients it produced a much better bread.  – The Farmer’s Magazine.  April 1858.

Shannon Lee Dawdy reported on an archaeological survey saying that maize was found at all of the early French colonial sites that have thus far been analyzed.  That seems to indicate that the lower classes probably ate it regularly and I suspect fared much better than they had in France. 

Le Page du Pratz commented on maize consumption by the French. 

The parched meal is the best preparation of this corn; the French like it extremely well, no less than the Indians themselves:  I can affirm that it is a very good food…it is refreshing and extremely nourishing.

Marie Madeleine Hachard, a nun in New Orleans, noted eating sagamite, saying, “we eat it often [rice] along with sagamite, which is made from Indian corn that has been ground in a mortar and then boiled in water with butter or bacon fat.  Everyone in Louisiana considers this an excellent dish”.

Dumont wrote of colonial bread made from maize and cooked rice.

…pound them [corn kernels soaked overnight] into flour using a pestle and sift the flour in basket sieves made by local Indian women…

He wrote of a mixture of corn and French flour, approximately half of each, when wheat was available to mix with the maize meal. 

John Reynolds did document the French in Illinois cultivating maize.  “I presume for more than one hundred years the French plowed in their corn about the 1^st of June, and turned under the weeds and not many grew until the corn was up out of the reach of them.  They planted the seed corn in the furrows as they broke the ground, and turned the furrow on the corn planted; plowed a few furrows more and planted another row of corn; and so on, until the field was all planted”.  – Agricultural Resources of Southern Illinois.  Reprinted from Transactions of the Illinois State Agricultural Soc.  1856-57. 

Although this has been a brief look at maize and its uses in colonial Louisiana, it will prove useful information in interpreting the foodways of the French and natives at Ft. Toulouse and provide information interested visitors can look into afterward.

PERSIMMONS AND THEIR USES©

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persimmons

Persimmons are native to North America, and grew in the poorest of soils making them much appreciated by natives and European settlers alike.  They were used in a variety of ways, some of which we’ll touch on here as I continue to explore foods that were available at Ft. Toulouse between the years 1717 and 1760. 

The persimmon was described as growing wild, “about as large as the biggest Orleans plum, of a bright scarlet colour, with four or five very hard seeds in each, nearly of the size and shape of those of tamarinds, and the pulp of the fruit, when perfectly ripe, is of a sharp, but luscious sweetness”.

Fermented drink was important to the Europeans and probably the natives in the area.

In some places, where apples and cyder are scarce, the inhabitants gather the persimmons, after they are perfectly ripe, knead them into a kind of dough, or paste, with wheat bran, which they form into loaves, and bake in ovens:  of these they brew a fermented liquor, which is called persimmon beer.  This serves for their common drink, and is tolerably pleasant and wholesome.  It is sometimes, though rarely, distilled into brandy.  – Smyth, John Ferdinand Dalziel.  A Tour in the United States of America.  1784.  London.

The French in Louisiana were well acquainted with persimmons which they called Placminier.  “When it is quite ripe the natives make bread of it, which they keep from year to year…The natives, in order to make this bread squeeze the fruit over fine sieves to separate the pulp from the skin and the kernels.  Of this pulp, which is like paste or thick pap, they make cakes about a foot and a half long, a foot broad, and a finger’s breadth in thickness:  these they dry in an oven, upon gridirons, or else in the sun:  which last method of drying gives a greater relish to the bread.  This is one of their articles of traffick with the French”.  – du Pratz, Le Page.  The History of Louisiana.  1774.  London.

Joel Harris included persimmon bread in a list of colonial foods that were revived in the south during the shortages of the Civil War.  On the Plantation:  A Story of a Georgia Boy’s Adventures.  1919.  NY

As with many foods of earlier centuries, persimmons were inexpensive, free, in fact, but labor intensive to prepare.  Martha McCulloch-Williams noted one needed, “the patience of Job to free the pulp properly from skin and seed”.  I have found the best way to do that is to bring them to a simmer in just enough water to keep them from sticking to the pot and allowing them to simmer for 10 or 15 minutes before putting them through a colander to separate the pulp from the seeds and skins.  – Dishes and Beverages of the Old South.  1913.  NY.

Now that we’ve documented their use by both natives and French and briefly discussed how to extract the pulp from the seeds and skins, let’s look at what we can do with that pulp.

PERSIMMON PUDDING:  The Rural Carolinian.  Oct. 1871.  Pick over, rejecting the unripe ones.  Force through a sieve in order to separate from the seeds.  Add a little sugar and flavor to your taste.  Place in pans and bake quickly.  When done, grate some loaf sugar over them and put back to brown.

PERSIMMON CAKE:  Proceedings.  American Promological Soc.  1914.  1 cup persimmon pulp, ½ cup sugar, 1 egg, butter the size of a walnut, 1 c. of flour, 1 tsp. baking powder, ½ teaspoon soda.  Bake 40 minutes in a moderate oven.  For a soft pudding, leave out the egg.  For a custard leave out the flour and baking powder. 

PERSIMMON BREAD.  1 cup persimmon pulp, 1 cup water, ½ teaspoon soda, yeast, shortening, flour to make a stiff dough.  Set to raise, mould, and bake as other bread.

PERSIMMON PUDDING.  1 pint pulp, 1 cup sugar, 1 quart of sweet milk, 3 teacups flour, 1 teaspoon cinnamon, 2 teaspoons baking powder.  Bake in a moderately hot oven for an hour, or until it is nicely browned.  Cool and serve with whipped cream.  The fruit used for this purpose should be of superior quality and perfectly ripe before using.  – Troop, James.  The American Persimmon.  April 1896.  Lafayette, Ind.

PERSIMMON JAM.  Miss Leslie’s New Cookery Book.  1857.  Do not gather persimmons till late in the fall, when they are well sweetened with the frost.  They are unfit to eat till all the leaves are off the trees, and till they are ripe enough to mash.  Then pack them in jars with plenty of brown sugar.  Maple sugar will do.  In the back-woods they will be valued.  When cooked they will be improved by the addition of a little sweet cider.

COLONIAL PANTRIES, FOODS OF NORTH CAROLINA.©

The first area of North Carolina to be settled by Europeans was Albemarle, it extended from the coast to the border with Virginia.  The settlement at Roanoke collapsed by the 1580’s and some time around 1600 Virginians began to drift back toward North Carolina.  French Huguenots were among those who moved into Carolina.

The Cape Fear River was settled in the 1720’s by settlers from other colonies and by newly arrived Europeans.  By the 1730’s Welsh and Scotch-Irish arrived in the area.  The first Scots began arriving in the area in 1739 when some 350 people from Argyllshire stepped off the ship.  My own family was probably among them (McDougal, Morrison, Killen, Armstrong, and Campbell).  I know they had settled there by 1750, and as they came from Argyllshire, I suspect had arrived much earlier.  They settled on the Upper Cape Fear near present-day Fayetteville and Cumberland.   

The area was rich in native foods and very quickly was also sown in whatever the Europeans brought over from their native home land.  The Europeans learned to prepare the New World foods in the manner of their native neighbors or sometimes prepared them similar to whatever they resembled that they were familiar with.

Food was probably more varied and more plentiful in Colonial America than most of the colonists had known in the old countries. 

The following list for North Carolina is from:  Stevens, J., editor.  A New Collection of Voyages and Travels.  1711.  London.

Foods included:

Chinquapin nuts and hickory nuts to thicken venison broth; Chestnuts; Acorns; hazel nuts; filberts; black walnuts

Peaches; Mulberries; Grapes (see blog post on muscadines); persimmons; mulberries; black cherries; raspberries; huckleberries; dew berries, blackberries; maples for sugar; fig; plums; currants; haws; apples – several sorts ; pears; quinces; apricots; gooseberries; strawberries;

Corn/Maize; Rice, cultivated and wild; Wild onions; Pulse:  bushel beans (flat, white and mottled with a purple spot on each side), Rouncival or Miraculous pease, Field pease, Kidney beans; Carrots; Leeks; Parsnips; Potatoes, several delicious sorts (South America to Europe and U.S.); Ground artichokes; Radishes; Horse-radish; Beets; Onions; Shallots; Garlic; Cives (chives); Lettuce – curled and red; Cabbage, Savoy cabbage; Spinach – round and prickly; Fennel – sweet and common; Samphire; Dock; Wild rhubarb; Rocket; Sorrel – the French and English; Cresses of several sorts; Purslain – wild, and that of larger size grown in gardens; Parsley- 2 sorts; Asparagus; White cabbage; Colly-flower “we have not yet had an opportunity to make a trial of, nor has the; Artichoke ever appeared amongst us that I can learn”; Coleworts – plain and curly (see blog post on collards); Watermelons of several sorts; Very large and good muskmelons – Golden, Green, Guinea, and Orange; Cucumbers – long and short and prickly; Pompions yellow and very large; Burmillions ?; Cushaws “an excellent fruit boil’d”; Squashes; Simnals (cymlings) – (pattypan squash); Horns ?; Gourds; brake fern; Many other species of less value, too tedious to name

Angelica – wild and tame; balm; bugloss; borage; burnet; clary; marigold; marjoram; summer and winter savory; lamb’s quarters; thyme; hyssop; rosemary; lavender

Many sorts of fish, some known and others unknown in Europe; oysters; crabs; bull-frog; turtles; turtle eggs; terrapin; eels; cockles; mussels; clams; conch; whelk; scallops; periwinkles; shrimp; crawfish

Pigeons and squab (young tender pigeon); Wild ducks of several sorts; Turkeys; Swans; Geese; Cranes “good flesh”; Curlew; Woodcock; Plover; Snipe; partridge; pheasant; moorhen; dove; lark; rice birds; crows “they are as good meat as a pigeon”; large gray gulls “good meat”; the natives ate snakes, probably rattlesnake, and other accounts have said the same of colonists; “young wasps in the nest before they can fly, this is esteemed a dainty” (natives); stingray or skate; wild potatoes (natives);  

Deer; Buffalo/Bison; Elk; Bear; Coneys (hares); Rabbit; Alligators; Beaver, especially beaver tail; skunk – eaten by natives and settlers alike; raccoon; opossum; squirrels;

Cattle, sheep, swine, etc. which had been brought over earlier; the natives also obtained these from the colonists;  

Salt – processed for seasoning and preserving

IRISH POTATOES in the 18th Century©

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potato history

I researched “Irish potatoes” to see how early I could find the term in 18^th century gardening treatises or cookery books after a fellow historian asked me how early I’d seen that exact term in print.  The following may offer some insight into the use of it.

The term Irish potato can more than likely be explained by erroneous assumptions as to its origins because after being grown in Ireland for a while and then being circulated through other areas, still very early, some failed to note that it had been taken to Ireland and was not native to Ireland. 

The Boston Cooking School Magazine said as much, “It is called Irish potato generally in the United States to distinguish it from the sweet potato, and because it has become the chief food staple in Ireland”.  That article went on to document the early acceptance of the potato in Germany and the recent discovery of an 8 foot tall monument in Germany which read, “Here in the year 1747 the first trials were made with the cultivation of the potato”.  – Vol. 14.  Oct. 1909.

From 1710, I located a summary of potatoes, including the “English or Irish” potato.  The Virginian potato, “grows wild not only in Virginia, but almost every where thro’ the whole Continent of Florida.  The English or, “Irish Potato which grows in roots are sold by bushels in our London Markets.”  – Salmon, William.  Botanologia.  1710. 

Salmon described sweet potatoes of various colors, and also the Irish.  Of the Virginia potato he said the root was nothing like the sweet potato in form, magnitude, color, nor taste, nor resembles in any thing but the solid compact uniform substance thereof.  The roots are small, some about the bigness of Wall-Nuts, green and all, some lesser by much, and others greater, some of them almost round, some oval, some a long round and almost pointed at each end, some smooth, others knobby, all of them being tuberous, of a dirty brown whitish color on the out side, and white within; not of a pleasant sweet taste, as the Spanish are, but rather of a flatulent, or insipid taste, which yet being boiled, baked, or roasted and eaten with butter, salt, vinegar, and a little sugar, are most admirable food, and not much inferior to those of the Spanish kind.”

He described the, “English or Irish Potato”, as roundish tuberous root sometimes smooth, some times knobby of various magnitudes from the smallness of a filbert, to bigger than a large fist doubled, it is solid, compact, and of one uniform substance, white within, and reddish without.”  They were boiled in their jackets, peeled, and boiled again until the broth was as thick as heavy cream.  Some put in milk, some broth.  “the broth is made pleasant with sweet Butter, a little salt, and double refined Sugar, and so eaten”. 

Ambrose Phillips compiled a collection of old ballads which was published in London in 1723.  In A Dialogue Between Morgan, Sawney, and Teague on the 19^th of October, 1714, on the Eve of his Majesty’s Coronation, are found the words, “With Irish Potatoes, good Mustard and Honey, Which I’ll buy without e’er a Penny of Money”. 

“…in the same manner as solanum tuberosum, called Irish potatoes…” began a discourse by William Douglas.  [1755]  – Douglass, William.  A Summary, Historical and Political of the First Planting , Progressive Improvements, and Present State of the British Settlements in North-America.  1755.

Le Page du Pratz wrote of sweet potatoes in Lower Louisiana which he compared to, “Topinambous (Irish potatoes).”  – The History of Louisiana, Or the Western Parts of Virginia and Carolina.  1774.  London.

I remember, about twenty-five years ago, the large red potato, then called the Castonian…as also the oblong Spanish white potato, to be chiefly in use; but now a lesser sort, such as the Munster or kidney potato, of a whitish or lightish yellow colour, the leathercoat, or round red Cronian potato, with a rough thick skin and particularly that stiled [sic] the Spanish white potato, are mostly in use.  – The Royal Society of Arts.  Museum Rusticum.  1757.  London.

Continued……..See The French and Their Acceptance of the Potato©.