Civil War era recipes

[donna]

Another recipe for coffee from Milledgeville Ga. Southern Federal Union: May 13, 1862.

Burnt Sugar Coffee

Brown Sugar
Hot water
real coffee

"Take some brown sugar, says the New Orleans Picayune, and burn it perfect black, Then add hot water till it is reduced to the consistence of syrup, and put it in a bottle for use. For six persons, take five tablespoons of the liquid and put in your coffee pot; then put in the dripper one tablespoonful of ground coffee, and drip the boiling water through the syrup, in such a quantity as suits your taste. It is now ready for the table, where it is prepared in the usual manner with milk and sugar. To the above proportions can be added more coffee, if you have it to spare. The burnt syrup will keep any length of time. Care must be taken not to pour the burnt syrup through the dipper."

 

[LondonLizzy]

Thank you, Elaine and Donna, that is very helpful.

 

[Mina_LeBrun]

Another book on the history of sugar is "Bittersweet", sorry I don't have an author. There were many forms of sugar during the war. According to an ad at the time (from least expensive to most expensive): pressed raw, pressed refined, granulated raw, granulated refined, and bakers sugar (confectioners sugar). The price of the last wasn't even listed it was so costly. When they stopped wrapping pressed cone sugar I don't know. But yes it was blue and used for blueing white clothes to give them that extra bright look.

 

[donna]

Mina I found two books on sugar with Bittersweet in title.

"Bittersweet: The Story of Sugar" by Peter Macinnis and "Sugar: a Bittersweet History" by Elizabeth Abbott.

They both sound interesting.

 

[donna]

One of things my Grandmother always made which was passed down in her family was Chow Chow. Chow Chow is a Nova Scotian and American pickled relish made from combination of vegetables. Vegetables used are green tomato, cabbage, red tomatoes, onions, carrots, beans, asparagus, cauiflower, and peas. These ingredients are pickled in a canning jar and served cold.

Chow Chow is associated with the Southern United States, Pennsylvania, the Appalachian Mountains and soul food. The recipes vary greatly. Chow Chow found its way to the Southern United States during the explusion of the Acadian people from Nova Scotia and their settlement in Louisiana. Acadians were originally from France. After the British defeated the French (French and Indian War), the British sent the Acadians out of Nova Scotia. Many came to Louisiana and became known as Cajuns.

An old Kentucky recipe for Chow Chow dating to mid 19th Century.

4 cups cabbage
4 cups bell pepper
4 cups onions
4 cups green tomatoes
6 cups sugar
1 tsp. celery seed
1 1/2 tsp. turmeric
2 tbsp. mustard seed
4 cups vinegar
2 cups water

Grind first 4 ingredients and soak in one cup of salt overnight. Rinse with cool water the next morning. Squeeze all water from the ground vegetables. Mix last 6 ingredients with the vegetables. Cook about 5 minutes. Pour into sterile jars and seal.

 

[donna]

Civil War Milk Pie Recipe from Old Kentucky Home and Gardens

Unbaked pie shell
1 cup white sugar
Milk
1/4 cup flour Butter
1/4 tsp. salt
Cinnamon or nutmeg

Mix the dry ingredients lightly. Pour whole milk over the dry ingredients. Adding a little at a time until ingredients resemble thick pudding. Mix well and pour into pie shell. Dot the top with butter.

Bake for 15 minutes at 400 degrees. Turn oven down to 350 degrees and continue baking as additional 35 to 40 minutes. The top should be slightly browned.

 

[donna]

A couple of recipes I found on Civil war Recipe site I hadn't found before.

Crawdada or crayfish to many folks

2-3 quarts water
Juice from 1 lemon
1/2 cup onion, chopped
1 stalk celery with leaves, chopped
1 clove garlic, chopped

2-2 dozen crawdads, gathered from nearby stream. Upstream from where men have bathed., relieved themselves, or exercised the horses. Chop or twist off upper body of crawdad and throw them to company dog, as only the tail has enough meat to be worth eating. Combine everything else except crawdads in pot fire and heat to boiling. Add crawdads and heat till it boils again, then back off from the fire and cook until meat is opaque (white) all the way through. Remove and eat at once or put in cold water to eat later; if left in hot water they will get overdone and tough.

 

[donna]

Eggs on the March

Eggs may be roasted by standing them on end in hot ashes. They may be boiled hard to carry in the pockets on forced marches.

Now after this gourmet repast, you may feel the need for something to wash it all down with. Keep this trick in mind; If you have any tea left, do not throw it away. Fill your canteens with it. It is definitely more refreshing than almost any other drink upon a hot, weary march. If, instead of filling your canteen with fresh water, you would boil it in the morning, before starting, with enough tea to favor it and keeping it from becoming insipid when warmed by the sun, it would be a thousand times more healthy, and the best prevention of dysentery. Water which has been boiled is freed from the bad effects it frequently has. The southern people boil their lemonade, and then allow it to cool before using it. Learn from your enemies how to protect yourselves in their climate.

 

[1stSgt E]

That is beyond my scope, I know that they were typically selling sugar in cakes, some funnel & pyramid shapped. Past that my wife is the knowledgeable one.

I've seen it sold that way in Mexican markets..now I know why

 

[pamc153PA]

In post #185 from donna, for Molasses Sticky Buns, is that "scalded" milk as the first ingredient, instead of "scaled"? If it is scaled milk, what's that?

Just wondering! This thread makes my stomach growl everytime I read it!

 

[donna]

In post # 185 it should be scalded milk. This was an important process when this recipe first made.

Scalded milk is milk that has been heated to 82 degrees C/180 degrees F. At this temperature, bacteria and enzymes in the milk are destroyed. We have to remember that back in Civil War times, milk was not pasteurized as today. So the scalding accomplished both these goals. Today, milk is scalded to increase its temperature and to change its consistency due to the denaturing of proteins.

It is still recommended to scald milk for certain recipes like this one. Some other recipes where scalded milk preferred are:

Bechamel sauce, to prevent the sauce from thickening excessively.

For bread to make a more tender loaf.

Scalded milk is used in yogurt to make the proteins unfold. The acid produced during the yogurt development causes less whey separation and a firmer yogurt.

Cafe au lait, baked milk, and ryazheunka also use scalded milk.

Scalded milk is used in many doughnut recipes.

Cook, Alton Brown in his Good Eats episode "Churn Baby Churn" states that another purpose for scalding milk is that heat increases the amount of flavor that is extracted from some ingredients, such as vanilla beans, for those recipes where other ingredients may be added to the milk while it is being heated. It is always recommended when making vanilla ice cream and custards.

Hope this is helpful.

 

[pamc153PA]

More than helpful--thanks! I love all this info. I just got Civil War Recipes, Receipts from the Pages of Godey's Lady's Book, and am finding it fascinating!

 

[ole]

More than helpful--thanks! I love all this info. I just got Civil War Recipes, Receipts from the Pages of Godey's Lady's Book, and am finding it fascinating!

Question is, Pam, how does hubby like the testing/tasting?

 

[Nathanb1]

In post # 185 it should be scalded milk. This was an important process when this recipe first made.

Scalded milk is milk that has been heated to 82 degrees C/180 degrees F. At this temperature, bacteria and enzymes in the milk are destroyed. We have to remember that back in Civil War times, milk was not pasteurized as today. So the scalding accomplished both these goals. Today, milk is scalded to increase its temperature and to change its consistency due to the denaturing of proteins.

It is still recommended to scald milk for certain recipes like this one. Some other recipes where scalded milk preferred are:

Bechamel sauce, to prevent the sauce from thickening excessively.

For bread to make a more tender loaf.

Scalded milk is used in yogurt to make the proteins unfold. The acid produced during the yogurt development causes less whey separation and a firmer yogurt.

Cafe au lait, baked milk, and ryazheunka also use scalded milk.

Scalded milk is used in many doughnut recipes.

Cook, Alton Brown in his Good Eats episode "Churn Baby Churn" states that another purpose for scalding milk is that heat increases the amount of flavor that is extracted from some ingredients, such as vanilla beans, for those recipes where other ingredients may be added to the milk while it is being heated. It is always recommended when making vanilla ice cream and custards.

Hope this is helpful.

Scalded milk is one of those basic skills you should learn in the kitchen. I can't add anything to Donna's explanation except how to do it. In a saucepan, heat milk until you see teeny tiny bubbles around the edge. What you want is milk that's thick enough to coat the back of a spoon, without scorching the milk (a double boiler is handy!). Stick a stainless steel spoon halfway down in the milk and pull it out. If it's coating the spoon, that's right. (Half the spoon will literally be white) Remove from heat and cool. Scalded milk will form a slight "skin" on top as it cools--that's fine, no need to discard. If you use the spoon to test the milk and it's not scalded, you'll need to wash the spoon before you try it again--and dry it!


There's no doubt a more technical way to do it, but that's how grandmas like me scald milk.

 

[Nathanb1]

From:
"How Sweet It Is:A History Of Sugar and Sugar Refining In the United States, Including a Glossary Of Sweetners" by Virginia Mescher

SORGHUM — Another source of sweetening, newly introduced into the United States in the midnineteenth
century, was sorghum or Chinese cane (Sorgo) or the African cane (Imphee). It was
introduced in France by Count de Montighy in 1851, and it was granted a patent in the United States
in 1854. An advantage of sorghum was that it could grow in colder climates than sugar cane and
was produced as far North as Minnesota and Wisconsin. Sorghum was processed much like sugar
cane, but only syrup was produced. In the 1860 census, 6,749,123 gallons were produced in the United States. During the Civil War, when little domestic sugar was made and the imported supply
was diminished, sorghum was common in the South. Even in the North sorghum was grown and
used, because sugar products were more difficult to import during the war. A number of wartime
diaries and post war articles about wartime conditions, recount the growing and processing and the
use of sorghum. The taste is stronger and more bitter than that of either molasses or golden syrup.
It is still grown and is available in some speciality food stores and historic sites. Sometimes, in the
countryside in the fall, there will be roadside stands selling sorghum.

Very close to the same taste--try some Steen's Pure Cane Syrup. It's very dark and has sort of a bitter taste. I prefer it. (There's also a brand available in Louisiana I can't think of right now). Tastes just like what's in sweet feed (as kids, we used to chew lumps of sweet feed and spit like the grownups with their chewing tobacco!)

 

[pamc153PA]

Question is, Pam, how does hubby like the testing/tasting?

He's actually pretty patient, although he tends to like the sweets more than the savories. The Washington cake and gingerbread went over very well, as did the rhubarb fool I made back in May in rhubarb season here. The snitz and knep is an old PA Dutch dish we'd both had before--ham and apples. And last week I made what Godey's calls Sinee Kabaub--the 1863 version of a shish kabob! The Godey's recipe even told how to make ghee (clarified butter), although I didn't use clean fowl feathers to baste the kabobs, like the recipe said to!

 

[donna]

Pam Its great you making these different recipes. The Godey's book is a great find. As I have written before, I love cook books and try to collect as many as I can. In talking about Pa. Dutch recipes I have an old book my Mother got in the early 60s which has recipes going back to when Dutch first settled in Pa. She got in on a trip my folks made to Pa. Dutch Country. It is called "Pennsylvania Dutch Cookbook". It was published by Culinary Arts Press Reading, Pa. I will try to add some recipes if any are interested.

 

[donna]

It is cucumber time here. We love them. Here is cucumber recipe from "Pennsylvania Dutch Cookbook". It is very old recipe.

Cucumbers in Cream Dressing

1 large cucumber, pared
1 teaspoon salt
1/2 cup thick sour cream
1 table spoon cider vinegar
1/3 teaspoon paprika

Slice cucumber very thin, put into a bowl, and sprinkle with salt. Set in refrigerator ( or in cold place in olden days). After at least 2 hrs., rinse thoroughly two or three times in cold water, pressing the cucumber slices between the hands each time to remove all salt. After the last rinsing, toss with a dressing made by blending together the sour cream, vinegar, and paprika. If desired, chopped chives or sliced onions may be added.

 

[pamc153PA]

Donna, my mom has made this ever since I can remember. My father's side of the family is PA Dutch (not old PA Dutch or old Mennonite, but with deep German roots), and I grew up with things like this cucumber salad, filled cabbage, chicken pot pie and ham and string beans. I think my mom might use Miracle Whip instead of sour cream, though, which gives it a sweeter taste (don't know that that's very PA Dutch, tho!). I'd like to think that my ggggg-uncle in the 153rd PA ate these kinds of things regularly before he went off to the CW.

 

[donna]

Swamp Cabbage Stew made by troops during Civil War

green cabbage
stewed tomatoes
salt pork
salt
pepper
cajun seasoning or cayenne pepper (Not both)
onion
garlic

It is hard to tell exact portions as this is a taste to see if it's right.

Method:

Cut up salt pork into chunks. Fry in cast iron pot. Slice, not chop, onions and cabbage. Fry these in pot with salt pork. Add stewed tomatoes to make a stew. Remember this will cook down so add water if necessary so it doesn't burn. Add spices to taste. Add slowly and a little bit at a time, the taste will blend the longer it cooks. Cook at a very low heat for 4 to 5 hours. Taste at least once every hour so you can tell if you need more seasoning.