Hearthside Cooking: Early American Southern Cuisine Updated for Today’s Hearth and Cookstove

352 Pages·2008·3.45 MB·English

by  Nancy Carter Crump

Hearthside
Cooking

Nancy Carter Crump
Early American Southern Cuisine
Hearthside Cooking
Updated for Today’s Hearth & Cookstove
SECOND EDITION Foreword by Sandra Oliver
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TheUniversity of N orth
© 2008 Nancy Carter Crump
All rights reserved
Manufactured in the United States of America
Designed by Kimberly Bryant
Set in MT Garamond by Tseng Information Systems, Inc.
This volume is a revised edition of the book published in
1986 by EPM Publications.
Line drawings are by Emily Whaley.
Frontispiece: Weights and measures as tested and arranged
by Miss Eliza Leslie from her 1857 New Cookery Book.
The paper in this book meets the guidelines for permanence
and durability of the Committee on Production Guidelines for
Book Longevity of the Council on Library Resources.
The University of North Carolina Press has been a member of the
Green Press Initiative since 2003.
Library of Congress Cataloging-in-Publication Data
Crump, Nancy Carter.
Hearthside cooking : early American Southern cuisine
updated for today’s hearth and cookstove / Nancy Carter
Crump ; foreword by Sandra Oliver. — 2nd ed.
p. cm.
Originally published: McLean, Va. : EPM Publications, c1986.
Includes bibliographical references and index.
ISBN 978-0-8078-3246-2 (cloth : alk. paper)
1. Cookery, American—Southern style. 2. Cookery—
Virginia—History. 3. Fireplace cookery. I. Title.
TX715.2.S68C78 2008
641.5975—dc22
2008018152
cloth 12 11 10 09 08 5 4 3 2 1
University of North Carolina Press books may be purchased at
a discount for educational, business, or sales promotional use.
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Street, Chapel Hill, NC 27514-3808.
This one is for my children:
Nancy Erin, Jacqueline Lindsay, Michael Carter, and Anne Courtenay
Mes raisons d’être
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Contents
Foreword ix
Preface xi
The Pleasures of Hearthside Cooking 1
Fires, Tools, and Techniques 7
Traditional Virginia Cuisine 19
Bills of Fare 41
Recipes
Breads 55
Beverages 71
Soups 81
Entrées 105
Vegetables 161
Cakes and Little Cakes (Cookies) 195
Sweet Pies, Puddings, and Cheesecakes 219
Custards, Creams, Ices, and Fruit 239
Sauces 261
Salad Dressings 277
Catchups and Condiments 283
Notes 293
Bibliography 303
Acknowledgments 319
Sources for Supplies 323
Index of Recipes 329
General Index 333
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Foreword
Nancy Carter Crump is a pioneer in American food history, or at
least one of the earliest settlers in the field. She has been my mentor in
Virginia food history, always generous and kind. This book is a revised
edition of Hearthside Cooking, one of food history’s earliest handbooks
for modern cooks using the hearth for cooking.
When it first appeared in 1986, it was part of a mere trickle of books
about food and history that would, in twenty years, turn into a mighty
stream. Many of food history’s early practitioners had begun, like
Nancy and myself, as museum-associated educators. Academia did
not yet deign to regard food history as a topic worth serious research
and writing about, but writing a cookbook was perfectly all right.
Cooking, using period technology and instructions, has always
been an essential part of truly understanding the history of cookery
and the people who cooked. Reading recipes or looking at antique
cooking equipment is informative, but these activities cannot provide
the understanding that is gleaned from using the early implements
themselves. We who grew up, as almost anyone under the age of sixty-
five has done, accustomed to precise recipes specific in every detail,
learn a great deal about the cookery of the past by actually getting
down and doing it.
Since people have begun to rediscover the joy of cooking on the
fire, some modern homes are being built with cooking hearths. For
those who don’t have a cooking fireplace, however, the recipes provide
alternative directions for the modern kitchen.
Hearthside Cooking provides the original recipe as written in the his-
torical source, then Nancy’s interpretation of it, side by side, so we can
readily see what her choices and adaptations are. When Nancy did not
have early Virginia voices to instruct her about how to prepare some-
thing, she then referred to one of the standard cookbooks of the time:
Mary Randolph’s The Virginia House-wife, Philadelphian Eliza Leslie’s
Directions for Cookery, or the Englishwoman Hannah Glasse’s The Art of
Cookery Made Plain and Easy, for instance. These cookbooks continued
to be published well into the nineteenth century. ix
The study of early Virginia kitchens includes many fascinating top-
ics, such as the dynamic interaction between slave cooks and the mis-