Frederick MD working hearths ... Museums by Candlelight

On Saturday, December 9, there will be 26 sites open for free with music, activities, and crafts in Frederick and the County. Several homes have squirrel tail ovens (in small section in photo) and other interesting features. Always fun. If you are nearby, go visit.

Holiday spirits and Christmas taped talks

"Merry Christmas to All!!"
Image from Clement Moore's A Visit from Saint Nicholas. 1862

Christmas taped talks: Tudor; Victorian; Wartime - Am Rev, Civil War, WWII; PA German; how slaves were really treated on Christmas; 400 years at sea, many more.

Stir-up Sunday; also Christmas talks and tapes 2022

Everyone took a turn to stir the Plum Pudding for Christmas. More on Stir up Sunday on blog post HERE many posts on Plum Pudding HERE

Many upcoming talks on Christmas (over 30), Hanukkah and Kwanzaa. Variety of taped Christmas talks since 2020.

Egg Nog - setting the story straight

George Washington personally wrote the following recipe??? "...fold slowly into mixture... Taste frequently." No. Another false claim is that a travellor, Weld, wrote in 1796 that egg nog was first served at breakfast in City Tavern, Phila. No, in Maryland. Thanks to the internet, WAY too many bloggers and book authors are blindly passing these modern tales on.

Christmas talks 2021 and taped talks

Christmas – dinner by Annie Gray(De3) food & drink(1) feast in art(22) at sea(7) London railways(16) among enslaved(15) family recipes(2) Roman origins(2) Pagan festivals(20) Medieval(7,10) Georgian/ Regency(19,22) Victorian(8,15) WWII (16) Mid 1900s(6) Britain (8,9,10,17) Wales(9,16) Canada(5,12) US(9,11,15,16,20) New Eng(9,14) Germany(12,14,17) Italy(12,15,18) France(18) Mexico(8)

Hard Sauce and taped Christmas talks

Brandy Sauce or Hard Sauce is a butter and sugar mixture flavored with Brandy, Rum, Sherry or wine and put on Plum Pudding or Mincemeat pies.
Also, some holiday talks - upcoming and taped.

Holiday virtual talks 2020

The upcoming holidays - Thanksgiving, Hanukkah, Christmas, and a special day - 'Stir-up Sunday' to make Plum Pudding for Christmas - are the subject of many virtual talks this year.

Uncle Sam is depicted cutting the turkey for Thanksgiving dinner with various naturalized citizens following the ratification of the 14th Amendment in 1868.

Presents for landlords at New Years, Lent, Midsummer, Michaelmas, Christmas in the 16th century

Poets described the food that tenants gave to their landlords: capon at New Years, fish for Lent, fowl at Midsummer [June 24], goose at Michaelmas [Sept 29], and a capon at Christmas "for fear their lease fly loose" - lose their lease.

Lebkuchen - German honey cake for Christmas

19th century dough for these highly spiced honey cakes (cookies) was "rested" for months to improve the flavor and texture.1553 recipe; 1698 & c1520 images

16th century “Christmas Husbandly Fare” poem

Thomas Tusser (1524-1580) composed a poem of activities through the year, including a Christmas dinner of beef, mutton, pork, shred pies [mince], turkey, brawn pudding, souse, mustard and more...

Le marchand de marrons - roasted chestnut sellers

In the fall and winter, chestnuts were roasted in a “huge iron apparatus...cooking a bushel at a time" or on "charcoal-pans" on the street.  Images of French vendors.

Farmer Giles's Establishment - Christmas Day 1800, 1829

Printed in 1830, the image shows a well fed farmer, whose wife is slicing the plum pudding for dessert.  The children sit at a stool, while one is standing on a bellows with the dog waiting for a slice. The hearth mantle is decorated with greens.

18th & 19th century Christmas decorating with holly and mistletoe

Holly and other greens not only festooned homes, taverns, churches and "Christmas sports," they also decorated plum puddings, boar's heads and other food items. Hundreds of men gathered the greens - "a-Christmasing" - often trespassing.

Plum pudding for Old Christmas Day

"Old Christmas" was January 6th and new was December 25 in the following story. The father kept Christmas on the old date when the mother Martha Gold served her locally famous pudding - recipe below.  From an 1866 British magazine.

Flowering fruit tree branches as Christmas trees

Although fir trees were the most popular, small cherry or apricot trees were planted in pots, or branches were cut and put in water so the blossoms appeared during the holiday.  The picture of a flowering tree decorated with ornaments and candles is from 1790 Nuremberg Germany.

Luciadagen or St. Lucia Day breakfast

In Sweden, the oldest daughter in the family wears a wreath of candles on her head and serves breakfast ... then the family goes back to bed.  In the 'old calendar' the day fell on the shortest day of the year.

Belsnickel or Pelznichel

In Germany and Pennsylvania Dutch areas, Belsnickel or Pelznichel appeared on Dec.6 - the Saint's day of Saint Nicholas. He carried a rod and wore a scary disguise, with jingling bells and clanging chains... not a jolly Santa Claus.

German Christmas tree, sugar ornaments and garden board base

Gilded walnuts, apples, little cakes, and sugar figures adorned the trees in 1840s Germany. The 'sugar-baker' confectioners sold all kinds of sugar or chocolate characters "chiefly to hang upon the Christmas-tree:" grotesque figures, animals, students smoking, peasants, country women, child on rocking-horse, girls in various nations costumes, sausages, fruits, musical instruments...

1730 Christmas poem

This poem about Christmas coming contains flowing bowls, minced pies, capon, goose, brawn, sturgeon, a Christmas box of sweet plumb cakes and then, to the Christmas Ball.  The book has a delightfully long descriptive title with "fiddle faddle stuff" and pranks...

A Christmas dinner in antebellum Virginia

Bowls of calves foot jelly - like Saint Nicholas's belly.  Weeks spent preparing, such as the fruits for the "big fruit cake" and other treats.  On the table were a variety of traditional dishes: flaming plum pudding, egg shaped blanc mange on a nest of "thinly shaved lemon peel," turkey and pork or venison, calf's head or turtle soup, apple toddy and wines.