Monday, January 28, 2013

Flour bin at Zoar

Zoar Village in Ohio has a gorgeous flour bin in their 1845 bakery.  The top lid was made from one large width of wood and was constructed by community members. 

Sunday, January 20, 2013

Charles Darwin and... rice??

Emma Darwin kept a small handwritten recipe book, and about fifty of her recipes with modern interpretations are in Mrs. Charles Darwin's Recipe Book which also contains a lengthy information section.   Several of the recipes had differences from others in contemporary cookbooks, such as almonds replacing chestnuts in the Nesselrode ice cream...

Wednesday, January 16, 2013

Cochineal

The tiny purple shells of the Cochineal (found on cactus - see last section of this post) was used as a dye.  The scale insects were generally dried in the sun or oven.  In food, it's pink/red/purple color enhanced jelly, marmalade, blanc mange as well as pickled Eggs, "Golden Pippins to look like Apricots," collared Beef,  icing (as described on the Christmas or Black Cake HERE ) and other foods.

Saturday, January 12, 2013

Saturday, January 5, 2013

Twelfth Night pranks

The beguiling display of elaborate cakes in the windows lured those walking by and waiting patrons too close to the window sills.

Mischievous boys would nail, NAIL the coat tails to the sills or pin adults coats together.. as many as "eight to ten persons." ...