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elizabeth_mnThe Challenge: 7. The Best Thing Since Sliced Bread August 24 - September 6
Create a food item that reflects historical food improvements. Showcase a new discovery in food preparation, a different way of using food, or a different way of serving it. Make sure to include your documentation!
I decided to base my challenge on the introduction of potatoes to Europe by using the earliest potato recipe I could find. My recipe is from 1664, by which point potatoes were commonly cultivated and eaten, but as you can see in the introduction to the book linked below, people were still trying to increase production of potatoes and encourage their general use as a food.
The Recipe: Potato Pudding, recipe here: http://povertystudies.org/Links/Rhwymbooks/Ode/Ode-PoliticsOfPotatoes.htm
How to Make Puddings of Potatoes, either Baked or Boiled
For to make puddings of potatoes, you must take one half of the roots, boiled and broken, as before for bread, and one half of wheaten or barley flour, and mix them well together, with some kind of liquid, adding also two or three eggs to make it hollow, and what other cost you please, and having so done, you may either bake them in an oven or boil them in a bag, and being well baked or boiled, and then buttered (or they may be made with suet if you please), they will be as pleasant in taste and as wholesome as if they were made only of wheat.
In this case I am interpreting "pudding" as an eggy bread-type thing, like Yorkshire pudding for example. Not a custard or wet boiled suet thing.
The Date/Year and Region: 1664, England
How Did You Make It: I started with potatoes grown in my garden. Yum!
I scrubbed, washed, and boiled these, and as the book suggested, “cut the great ones into halves or quarters, otherwise the small ones will be boiled to pieces, before the great ones are boiled enough.”
I pushed them through a sieve, as described: “put them out into a wire sieve, made for the purpose. . . let them all be broken, and rubbed through the bottom of the sieve, into a vessel underneath; by which means the skins of the roots will remain behind, and the meal will pass through, being much like unto boiled rice.”
While I was doing this, my HB made me some flour. I wanted to add some barley flour as suggested in the recipe but we had only whole barley in the house. So: tiny, hand-cranked basement mill to the rescue!
I measured out 2 cups of riced potatoes, added one cup of barley flour and one cup of "wheaten flour," and mixed it with 3 eggs, about 1/4 cup of cream, and some milk.
I buttered a large muffin tin and spooned the mixture in. As soon as I got this in the oven I thought I really should have added more liquid and made the mixture more of a batter consistency. But the recipe was quite vague on this point and anyway it was too late, so I just let them bake. Alas.
They baked for about 30 minutes at 400 F. We had them spread with butter and I made a dish of cabbage, onions, and carrots to go with.
Time to Complete: About 2 hours
Total Cost: Since we grew the potatoes, not much. A few dollars for the eggs and such?
How Successful Was It?: They were yummy! Kind of like a cross between a muffin and mashed potatoes, in the best way. The interior was soft and bready and the outside had a slight firm crunch. Carb-a-licious!
Still, I have the idea they were supposed to have a runnier batter and puff up more, like popovers. I couldn’t find pictures of anything like this online so I kind of just made it on faith. So if “successful” means “just like olden times people had,” then I really can’t say.
How Accurate Is It?: It’s hard to say whether I made this correctly, but I did follow the recipe without substitutions or changes.
Create a food item that reflects historical food improvements. Showcase a new discovery in food preparation, a different way of using food, or a different way of serving it. Make sure to include your documentation!
I decided to base my challenge on the introduction of potatoes to Europe by using the earliest potato recipe I could find. My recipe is from 1664, by which point potatoes were commonly cultivated and eaten, but as you can see in the introduction to the book linked below, people were still trying to increase production of potatoes and encourage their general use as a food.
The Recipe: Potato Pudding, recipe here: http://povertystudies.org/Links/Rhwymbooks/Ode/Ode-PoliticsOfPotatoes.htm
How to Make Puddings of Potatoes, either Baked or Boiled
For to make puddings of potatoes, you must take one half of the roots, boiled and broken, as before for bread, and one half of wheaten or barley flour, and mix them well together, with some kind of liquid, adding also two or three eggs to make it hollow, and what other cost you please, and having so done, you may either bake them in an oven or boil them in a bag, and being well baked or boiled, and then buttered (or they may be made with suet if you please), they will be as pleasant in taste and as wholesome as if they were made only of wheat.
In this case I am interpreting "pudding" as an eggy bread-type thing, like Yorkshire pudding for example. Not a custard or wet boiled suet thing.
The Date/Year and Region: 1664, England
How Did You Make It: I started with potatoes grown in my garden. Yum!
I scrubbed, washed, and boiled these, and as the book suggested, “cut the great ones into halves or quarters, otherwise the small ones will be boiled to pieces, before the great ones are boiled enough.”
I pushed them through a sieve, as described: “put them out into a wire sieve, made for the purpose. . . let them all be broken, and rubbed through the bottom of the sieve, into a vessel underneath; by which means the skins of the roots will remain behind, and the meal will pass through, being much like unto boiled rice.”
While I was doing this, my HB made me some flour. I wanted to add some barley flour as suggested in the recipe but we had only whole barley in the house. So: tiny, hand-cranked basement mill to the rescue!
I measured out 2 cups of riced potatoes, added one cup of barley flour and one cup of "wheaten flour," and mixed it with 3 eggs, about 1/4 cup of cream, and some milk.
I buttered a large muffin tin and spooned the mixture in. As soon as I got this in the oven I thought I really should have added more liquid and made the mixture more of a batter consistency. But the recipe was quite vague on this point and anyway it was too late, so I just let them bake. Alas.
They baked for about 30 minutes at 400 F. We had them spread with butter and I made a dish of cabbage, onions, and carrots to go with.
Time to Complete: About 2 hours
Total Cost: Since we grew the potatoes, not much. A few dollars for the eggs and such?
How Successful Was It?: They were yummy! Kind of like a cross between a muffin and mashed potatoes, in the best way. The interior was soft and bready and the outside had a slight firm crunch. Carb-a-licious!
Still, I have the idea they were supposed to have a runnier batter and puff up more, like popovers. I couldn’t find pictures of anything like this online so I kind of just made it on faith. So if “successful” means “just like olden times people had,” then I really can’t say.
How Accurate Is It?: It’s hard to say whether I made this correctly, but I did follow the recipe without substitutions or changes.
