Halloween 1832

Ivan Day's Dessert Tables

Ivan Day has set two tables in the U.S. with his exquisite sugar creations and extensively researched food displays. A dessert with ice cream table is at one of Marjorie Merriweather Post's homes, now Hillwood Museum and Gardens, Washington DC until May 30, 2010. The second installation of a recreated dessert table is part of Imperial Privilege: Vienna Porcelain of Du Paquier, 1718–44 at the Metropolitan Museum of Art, NYC until March 21, 2010.

In 1718, Du Paquier became the second true porcelain factory and in 1744 was taken over by the state. Listen to an informative podcast interview with Ivan Day, or click on bottom right "read entire transcript" link. http://www.metmuseum.org/podcast/detail.asp?eid=%7B0F667CB4-A4ED-4F46-B16A-44F09A5100AE%7D . Day based his sugar paste pavilions and artificial flowers - both paper and pastillage, on the engraving: The Feast of the Oath of Allegiance, Vienna, 1740.

The second display, in DC, entitled Sèvres Then and Now: Tradition & Innovation in Porcelain, 1750-2000 put together by Liana Paredes Arend, includes the 1770 dessert service of Prince Louis René Édouard, Cardinal de Rohan.

As usual, Ivan's website: http://www.historicfood.com/ contains much more information about both exhibits and marvelous pictures [as shown above] of the recreated tables, china, books, confectioner's tools and wooden moulds.

Scraping By - conference in PA

Scraping By: Wage, Labor, Slavery, and Survival in the Early Republic, by Seth Rockman. Friday, October 30 - 8th Annual PEAES Conference at the Library Company of Philadelphia http://www.librarycompany.org/

Museum libraries

Most museums contain a library available to the public. It may be one room in a small local museum or a large collection of books and manuscripts. Generally anyone may research their holdings, although a couple, the Folger (DC) and Huntington (CA) have restrictions.

Colonial Williamsburg has a two story library with a separate reading room for manuscripts, ledgers, rare books, etc. The Peabody Essex Museum library in Salem also contains manuscripts, ships journals and more in a centuries old building.

Occasionally, the library may not be in the facility. The Mariners’ Museum in Newport News, VA no longer maintains their library in the one end of their building, but has moved it to the Christopher Newport University. The Smithsonian has numerous libraries in its various museums, and even separate buildings.

If you are interested in visiting a museum library and its museum check their website or call for hours and any restrictions. Most have limited hours and are closed on weekends.

Belair Museum History Day - MD

On Monday, Nov 2, Belair House hosted its annual History Day.

Landis Harvest Days - PA

Landis Valley Museum in Lancaster held their 50th Harvest Days on Oct 10-11. This museum concentrates on German heritage in Pa from 1740 to 1940. Tom Martin has been the head hearth cook for 25 years and is well known for his delicious foods. This year he updated and added more recipes for the Landis Valley Cookbook. There are several working hearths and four working bake ovens, putting out delicious foods for the thousands of visitors to sample. Mary Sue Latini and I will be baking Gingerbread Cake and other baked goods in the Brick House outside bake oven.

Preserved Pumpkin Chips - 1840 & 1770

Pumpkins can be made into many other recipes other than pie. Be sure that they are of the 'eating' variety not field or jack-o-lanterns. These Chips are sweet preserves to accompany dishes or as a snack. I find the best way to make even pieces for this recipe, or for 18th cen. pies, is to cut horizontal rings from the Sugar Pumpkin [at right]. Remove the rind with a knife (or vegetable peeler if done at home) and cut to the thickness you need. The series of pictures were taken yesterday at home using modern implements. The finished chips are in a small bowl I made years ago in a blown glass class.  For another posting on Chip  - Pumpkin Pickles made from a long neck pumpkin click: Pickles

Pumpkin Chips
It is best to defer making this sweetmeat (which will be found very fine) till late in the season when lemons are ripe and are to be had in plenty. Pumpkins (as they keep well) can generally be procured at any time through the winter.Take a fine pumpkin of a rich deep colour, pare off the outer rind; remove the seeds; and having sliced the best part, cut it into chips of equal size, and about as thick as a half dollar. They should be in long narrow pieces, two inches in breadth, and six in length. It is best to prepare the pumpkin the day before; and having weighed the chips, allow to each pound of them a pound of the best loaf-sugar.
You must have several dozen of fine ripe lemons, sufficient to furnish a jill [gill] of lemon-juice to each pound of pumpkin. Having rolled them under your hand on a table, to make them yield as much juice as possible, pare off the yellow rind and put it away for some other purpose. Then having cut the lemons, squeeze out all the juice into a pitcher.
Lay the pumpkin chips in a large pan or tureen, strewing the sugar among them. Then having measured the lemon-juice in a wine-glass, (two common wine-glasses making one jill, [gill=1/2 C]) pour it over the pumpkin and sugar, cover the vessel, and let it stand all night.
Next day transfer the pumpkin, sugar, and lemon-juice to a preserving kettle, and boil it slowly three quarters of an hour, or till the pumpkin becomes all through tender, crisp, and transparent; but it must not be over the fire long enough to break and lose its form. You must skim it thoroughly. Some very small pieces of the lemon-paring may be boiled with it. When you think it is done, take up the pumpkin chips in a perforated skimmer that the syrup may drain through the holes back into the kettle.
Spread the chips to cool on large dishes, and pass the syrup through a flannel bag that has been first dipped in hot water. When the chips are cold, put them into glass jars or tumblers, pour in the syrup, and lay on the top white paper dipped in brandy. Then tie up the jars with leather, or with covers of thick white paper.
If you find that when cold the chips are not perfectly clear, crisp, and tender, give them another boil in the syrup before you put them up. This, if well made, is a handsome and excellent sweetmeat. It need not be eaten with cream, the syrup being so delicious as to require nothing to improve it. Shells of puff-paste [pie crust] first baked empty, and then filled with pumpkin chips, will be found very nice.[also make as ‘To Preserve Citrons’ p. 234-5]
Leslie, Eliza. Directions for Cookery. Phila: 1840

For an 18th century version:
To make Pompion Chips
Shave your Pompion thin with a plain and cut it in slips about the width of your finger, put shreds of Lemon peal among it, wet your sugar with orange Juice and boil it into Syrup. Then put in your chips and lemon Peal and let them boil till done.
A Colonial Plantation Cookbook: The Receipt Book of Harriott Pinckney Horry, 1770. Columbia: University of South Carolina Press, 1984.

Modern Interpretation
1 lb = 4 C pumpkin slices
1 lb = 2 C sugar
1/2 C lemon juice / 2 lemons
Lemon peel slice - not white pith

The chips soaked overnight will shrink considerably, 4 cups become 2 cups, then boil the mixture until chips are clear.

©2009 Patricia Bixler Reber
hearthcook.com

Beef Symposium - Chicago

Beef: From Plains to Plate: Follow the Cattlemen’s Trail to Savory Midwest Beef Traditions. The School of Culinary Arts at Kendall College. Chicago . this was held on October 23-25, 2009