Hoopskirts

   Roast Duck Challenge #5:  Roasts   They’re a staple of the historic table, in many different shapes and forms and types. It’s also a cooking technique. Try a historic recipe for a roast, or a recipe that involves roasting, and tell us how it turned out. This challenge was a bit more, um, challenging.  I had already made a roast beef for the first challenge (meat and potatoes) and puzzled over what to make.  I wanted to try something totally different and chose duck. The Recipe, Year and Region Today's recipe comes from The Virginia Housewife by Mrs. Mary Randolph, published in 1838 in Baltimore.  Some people consider it to be the first truly American cookbook.   There are actually several recipes involved We also need to make onion sauce as an accompaniment From the Virginia Housewife, 1838 Let's Cook! How Did You Make It:         Ingredients:     1 whole duck, app...

One more look at black walnuts in the 19th-century.  My previous posts focused on the amazing coloring properties of the husk.  Today it is time to look at the black walnut as food. I was very intrigued and a bit puzzled at the number of references to black walnut catsup/ketchup in cookbooks of the time.  Today tomato catsup is the sole survivor of a variety of catsups: tomato, grape, lemon, mushroom, cucumber, oyster, tomato, and black walnut, to name a few.  It is a shock to modern sensibility to realize that "ketchup" or "catsup" (both spellings were used) simply meant a vinegar based sauce.   The American Heritage Dictionary gives a good definition:                             Word History:  The word  ketchup  exemplifies the types of modifications that can take place in borrowing both of words and substances. The source of our word  ketchup  may be the Malay ...