Ice house 1854 and a pile of ice kept above ground for a year

Although the ice house image and description are nice, the second paragraph is intriguing. Ice piled on the ground, covered with a layer of firewood, then a layer of straw, then thatch as the outer layer. It should be on "dry ground (the north side of a hill being preferable), in a conical form, of a considerable size, in winter during a hard frost..."

Several interesting virtual talks at the end.

Arrangements about an Ice-House—Economical Contrivance.

Ice-houses.—These are so intimately connected with the subject of preserving food, that some general plan of constructing them seems appropriate in this place. Fig. 81 is an outline of the method commonly adopted. A well is sunk in the form of an inverted cone, a, b, which is lined with cement or brick-work, of a brick and a half in thickness, and arched over. The ice is put in through the opening, at top, and taken out at the side door, c; a drain, d, e, at the bottom carries off the water of the melted ice. The conical form of the well is for the purpose of having the ice keep compact by sliding down as it melts. The walls of the cone should be built with good hard mortar or Roman cement. At the bottom the ice should be supported on a thin wooden grating, or an old cart-wheel, as represented in the cut. Where the situation will not admit of a drain, the bottom of the ice-well may terminate in a small well sunk still deeper, and this emptied by a pump. The passage to the ice-house should be divided by two or more doors, so as to keep a current of external air from reaching the ice.

It is said that ice may be kept for a whole year in the open air by making a pile of it on dry ground (the north side of a hill being preferable), in a conical form, of a considerable size, in winter during a hard frost, and covering it a foot thick with a layer of fagot-wood, then with a layer of straw, and lastly one of thatch. It should be placed on elevated dry ground, and in a shaded place if possible.

Trall, Russell Thacher. The New Hydropathic Cook-book: With Recipes for Cooking on Hygienic Principles. NY: 1854

Blog posts on ice - harvesting, ice in refrigerators, ice cream HERE

ICE HARVESTING TAPED TALKS HERE

UPCOMING TALKS

Mar 4 Mon 7 Betty Crocker and Her Cookbook That Changed How America Cooks. Dr. Leslie Goddard. Southold Free Library NY HERE

Mar 5 Wed 5:30-7 Ice Cream! The History of America's Favorite Dessert. Erik Hodgetts. Replay for one week. New York Adventure Club $12 HERE

Mar 6 Thu 12:30 Richard II’s Recipes. Andrea Hugill; 2d session: Medicinal Past of Vodka. Alexandr Gorokhovskiy. IHR The Institute of Historical Research. HERE

Mar 6 Thu 8 Preserving Family Recipes: How to Save and Celebrate Your Food Traditions. Author Valerie Frey. Chicago Foodways Roundtable. HERE TAPE may be HERE

Mar 8 Sat 10:30-11:15 History in the Kitchen – Charlotte. George Mason’s Gunston Hall HERE TAPE maybe HERE

Mar 9 Sun 2 The American Community Cookbook: Eccentric and Yet Powerful. Don Lindgren. his bookselling business, Rabelais Inc. CHOW Culinary Historians of Washington DC HERE

Mar 10 Mon 11-12:30AM Clay-eaters: A Brief History of Geophagy. “How earth has been used as folk medicine, famine prevention, and as a natural dietary supplement for centuries.” Jennifer Lucy Allen. Viktor Wynd & The Last Tuesday Society. £6.72 HERE

Mar 11 Tue 7 Ireland’s Great Hunger and Mass Migration to America. Elizabeth Stack. AARP not have to be a member HERE

Mar 11 Tue 7 Taproom Tastings: Food in Propaganda and Politics. Catherine Prescott and Mary Tsaltas-Ottomanelli. Keeler Tavern Museum & History Center HERE TAPE maybe HERE

Mar 12 Wed 6:30 The Women Behind Pyrex, America's Favorite Dish. Regan Brumagen. The International Museum of Dinnerware Design IMoDD HERE; TAPE maybe HERE or HERE

Mar 12 Wed 8 Chef Jason Hammel. Culinary Historians of Chicago. HERE TAPE may be HERE

Mar 16 Sun 10AM Food Stories from the Middle East: Hello from Scotland! Ramadhan Festival. Dr. Zarina Ahmad. MACFEST - Muslim Arts and Culture Festival. HERE

Mar 16 Sun 4 Reading Between the Lines: American Cookbooks of the Interwar Period WWI-WWII. Thomas Gordon. CHAA Culinary Historians of Ann Arbor HERE TAPE may be HERE or HERE

Mar 18 Tue 6:30 How Refrigeration Transformed Our Food, Our Planet, and Ourselves. Nicola Twilley author of Frostbite. Culinary Historians of New York $10 HERE TAPE may be HERE

Mar 20 Thu 12:30 Food and Memory Across Eras: from Nazi Concentration Camps to Contemporary Prisons in Italy and Brazil. Gaia Messori. The Institute of Historical Research. IHR. HERE

Mar 20 Thur 1-2:30 The Renaissance banqueting table of the Hunting Lodge of Lord Wilhelm of Rosenberg. Milan Svoboda. The Society for Court Studies - European Branch HERE

Mar 20 Thu 5 How the Humble Anchovy Flavored Western Cuisine. Christopher Beckman. HFSDV HERE TAPE may be HERE

Mar 20 Thu 7 The Franklin Stove: An Unintended American Revolution. Joyce E. Chaplin. George Washington Presidential Library. Mount Vernon HERE TAPE may be HERE

Mar 22 Sat 10AM Celebrating Ramadan in Iraq: History, Culture, Art, and Food. Hello from Iraq! Ban Saleh and Luhaib Abboud. MACFEST - Muslim Arts and Culture Festival. HERE

Mar 23 Sun 10AM Gastronomy in Medieval Baghdad: cooking for Pleasure and Health as depicted in a Tenth-century Baghdadi Cookbook. "Written more than a thousand years ago, Sayyār al-Warrāq’s cookbook Kitāb al-Ṭabīkh offers a rich insight into the culture of food that flourished in Abbasid Baghdad during its prosperous times." By MACFEST - Muslim Arts and Culture Festival. HERE

Mar 24 Mon 7 Special Cooking with the First Ladies: Women’s History Month Program. Calutron Girls wartime Oak Ridge Tenn. cookbook Cooking Behind The Fence. Sarah Morgan. National First Ladies' Library & Museum. HERE TAPE may be HERE


CALENDAR OF VIRTUAL FOOD HISTORY TALKS HERE

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