Researching Food History

The previous posting on Washington Pies, HERE described the round layered cake  with jelly or cream filling.  The second type of Washingt...

For Washington’s Birthday the other year I posted information on Washington Cakes, HERE and this year the topic is Washington Pie.   Durin...

Potage a la Julienne was/is a soup of broth with vegetables evenly cut in long thin square shapes, like wooden matchsticks or shoesting pota...

A Civil War treat sold in Alexandria, Virginia stores for a penny was a gingerbread cookie "cut in the flat, rude shape of a prancing h...

There are  6 historic food conferences and symposiums in the next three months:

Initially muffins were what we call "English Muffins" - a yeast dough prepared on a griddle in muffin rings.  Later American recip...

Early pumpkin pies were made from pureed or sliced pumpkin.   A third option was to use grated pumpkin. It is important to remove the exces...

Filling emptied orange rinds with jelly was a surprising change in serving 18th and 19th century jellies.  Here are a few recipes...

The 14 1/2 foot mirrored plateau in 7 sections was bought by President Monroe in 1817 from Matelin in France.  It had "...16 Figures ...

When boiling ham, hay would be placed in the bottom of a ham boiler. Ham cooked with hay would “…greatly improve the flavor ” [Leslie, Eliz...

There were several ways 18th century cooks prepared hog's ears. Two recipes to stuff the ears are given below.

John Murrell, 1621 in his receipt for White Gingerbread said to "...roule it in round cakes and print it with your moulds..."  Th...

While looking through Queen's Delight . London: 1683 in the LofC rare books room, I came across these interesting receipts using flower...

There is an interesting illustrated article HERE about cookbook author Mary Foote Henderson's entertaining and her huge mansion, Bounda...

7 activities...

Some early cakes, such as "Queen's Cakes" [ more info here ] were baked in small containers such as cups or small pans .   The...

What's Cooking Uncle Sam?   was an exhibit at the National Archives in Washington DC.  The Archives just hired a "Wikipedian in R...

4 events...

Cracking eggs competition in 1836 New York, a White House Egg Roll of 1874, and English Monday egg games in early 1800 are detailed.  Eggs h...

Wheatley's picture of a street seller carrying strawberries in pottles is actually on the fore-edge of a book of poems by William Cowp...