HDTenEightyP/NetNews huggingface dataset:
From: grimjack@milton.u.washington.edu (Leslie Basel)
Subject: Haybox
Summary: Any experience with one?
Organization: University of Washington, Seattle
Date: Fri, 4 Sep 1992 07:26:31 GMT



A few weeks ago, I visited Tucson, and picked up the local
paper.  An article in the paper described an old cooking
implement called a haybox.  Apparently, a haybox is the
territorial, pioneer version of a crockpot (the article 
described how it was used to slow cook food on the wagon
train).

Directions for making one, from the Tucson Citizen:

1. Make, buy, or find a steamer trunk/wood chest.
2. Put casters on the bottom for movability.
3. Line the inside of the trunk completely with
   sheets of newspaper.
4. Fill the trunk 3/4 full with finely cut small
   bits of grass hay (finely shredded newspaper
   can substitute).
5. Make "nests" inthe hay the sizes of your pots.
6. Line the nests with muslin.
7. Heat your food on a high simmer for 5-10 minutes.
   Cover with a tight fitting lid.  Put into the 
   muslin nests.
8. Place a muslin pillow, stuffed with finely cut
   hay, on top of the pot.
9. Close the trunk.
10. Put a large heavy rug on top of the trunk to keep
    the steam from warping the trunk.
11. Wait hours.

Has anybody on the net tried this?  The paper claimed
that a number of things can be cooked this way, like
eggs, and vegetables, and pot roast.  Should you leave it out in 
the sun?  Any daring person have any experiences?

Leslie Basel
From: jtn@nutter.cs.vt.edu (Terry Nutter)
Newsgroups: rec.food.historic
Subject: Re: Mead recipes?
Date: 25 Aug 92 21:01:34 GMT
Organization: VPI&SU Computer Science Department, Blacksburg, VA

David Herron asked about pressure.  Schuldy wrote,

>Well, I had a glass grenade go off in my kitchen, once.  Once was enough.
>It threw glass 20 feet, fountained off the ceiling, dirtied all the food
>and dishes in the pantry, and trashed a number of cookbooks (none of the
>rare ones, fortunately.)

And someday I'll tell you all about the Incredible Fragged Bathroom.  These
days, I put my bottles inside a rubber trash can with a latching top, with
the trash can in the basement bathroom tub.  But these days I also don't
get many exploders.

Schuldy lets his go until done, so to speak, then adds a teeny touch of
sugar to get the sparkle.  I've been bottling mine before that point.  One
precaution is to use nice heavy bottles with Grolsh-like tops.  But another
is to bottle into (sterilized) 2-liter plastic bottles.  I've found that
when you _re_seal these, the seal leaks just enough to bleed off excess.

>Truly, here is where introducing modern techniques is a winner.  If you
>use a hydrometer to measure sugar and alcohol levels, you can bottle at
>the exact right moment, and never have a problem.  I'm doing historical
>brewing, and choose to experiment.  Your mileage may vary.  I no longer
>store the cookbooks and the mead in the same place.

Like Schuldy, I haven't gone the hydrometer route, though I know it would
probably give me better brew.  (For that matter, I haven't been brewing
nearly enough recently.  Have to do something about that....)  You can
get quite nice results without, but yes, it's a good idea to put the
bottles somewhere relatively out of the way until you're _sure_ they're
not grenades.

Cheers,

Terry Nutter     Blacksburg, VA     jtn@vtopus.cs.vt.edu     (703)552-1598
From: Alan Deacon
Newsgroups: rec.food.historic
Subject: Re: Isitt book (was Re: Apples Apples everywhere)
Date: 28 Aug 92 13:11:03 GMT
Organization: Bloomsbury Computing Consortium

sbloch@silver.cs.umanitoba.ca (Stephen Bloch) writes:

>schuldy@progress.COM (Mark Schuldenfrei) writes:
>>It's called _Take_A_Buttock_of_Beefe_, by Verity Isitt.
>>...
>>She has done a lot of research about food, cooking and regions in
>>general, but didn't include a single footnote (darn).  Each set
>>of facing pages has an original recipe, some text about the principal
>>ingredient, and the opposite page has a modern recipe in Metric units.
>>The modern recipe is sometimes a redaction, but more often is a
>>similar recipe, and sometimes is just some random recipe.  The
>>illustrations are very nice, too.

>I bought this one too, a bit over a year ago (i.e. at Pennsic, for the
>SCA-ers reading this).  As Mark points out, the "modern recipe" often
>has very little to do with the original one with which it's paired (in
>demonstrating this to someone, I opened the book at random and found
>that one original recipe and its modern mate had NOT ONE INGREDIENT in
>common!).  This wouldn't be so bad except for the facing-page
>presentation which gives the false impression that the modern recipe
>is somehow based on the original that precedes it.  The author never
>actually lies (that I've noticed), but this sort of misdirection smacks
>to me of bad scholarship.  Nevertheless, I bought it because it
>contains original recipes from a primary source I'd never seen before.
>I'd be hesitant about using it for anything else.

>					Stephen Bloch
>			(Joshua ibn-Eleazar ha-Shalib in the SCA)

Yeah I've got this book too. I got it cheap in a remaindered book sale.
Good to see some copies got to the far side of the pond! In addition to
the recipes which have been copied from the original source, there are
some photos of the original source. Some of these photos give recipes
not listed in the main text of the book. I just ignore the modern recipes
but the photos of C17 artifacts are quite good. 

Another book with some unintentional recipes is a modern version of
Richard the II's cookbook (sorry don't know author/title). The coverpage
consists of a facsimile of some lenten dishes not reproduced in the body
of the book. If you can read black-letter handwriting these are quite
interesting. The weirdest one which I had to read several times to make
sure was for `Frumentie with Porpoise'. I kid you not. This consisted of
fairly standard frumenty with almonds and other goodies, with porpoise
added as the meat content. I assume Porpoise was regarded as a fish and
was therefore okay to eat during lent. If the porpoise was too salty you
were advised to `seeth it separately'. I've heard of frumenty as an
accompaniment to Venison - but Porpoise! I wonder if you can get in cans
labelled `tuna friendly'.

				(:^)*	Alan Deacon
					White Company & Kentwell (not SCA)

--
	Alan Deacon
	Central Computing Service		Email: a.deacon@ucl.ac.uk
	University College London		Tel: +44 71-380 7359
	Gower Street, London WC1E 6BT		Fax: +44 71-388 5406
Newsgroups: rec.food.historic
From: stcmille@silver.ucs.indiana.edu (Stephen C. Miller)
Subject: Re: Food in sea novels
Organization: Indiana University
Date: Tue, 1 Sep 1992 17:09:06 GMT

I recall a scene from, I think, one of James Clavell's books.

It features a ship's cook pissing in the captain's soup.  Ye-hah!
-- 
--------------------
=
(former rock star turned grad student)
Steve Miller	 		    stcmille@copper.ucs.indiana.edu
From: dvf@kepler.unh.edu (David V Feldman)
Subject: Italian sandwiches and flags
Organization: University of New Hampshire  -  Durham, NH
Distribution: worldwide
Date: Wed, 26 Aug 1992 17:03:08 GMT


Lunch today was sandwiches of tomato basil fresh mozzarella on Italian
bread and we began to wonder whether these might have been contrived
as a symbol of their flag?  Would they predate it?
From: julie@eddie.jpl.nasa.gov (Julie Kangas)
Subject: Re: Mead recipes?
Organization: Jet Propulsion Laboratory, Pasadena, CA
Date: Tue, 1 Sep 1992 14:04:44 GMT


Well, I'd just like to let everyone know that, with all the help
and encouragement I got when I mentioned I was interesting in
brewing, I went out and got a brew kit yesterday.  My first batch
will be a wheat beer but after that I'm going to try a mead.

I also picked up the mead book by Papazian and <I-forgot-his-name>.
I had to laugh when Papazian describes mead brandy.  He says that
although it's illegal to make at home there are some interesting
points to note about it.  He then goes on to tell us the temperature
at which the alcohol will boil out (raise the temp a bit to get 
honey flavor with it) and how it easily condenses on cool surfaces.
Isn't pure scholarship great? ;-)

Julie
#include "std_disclaimer.h"
#include "witty_sig.h"
From: anvil@ducvax.auburn.edu
Newsgroups: rec.food.historic
Subject: Shaker Dried Corn?
Date: 31 Aug 92 14:22:27 GMT

Could someone please tell me about Shaker Dried Corn. All I have been able to 
find out is that it was pulled green and dried on drying spikes. How was it 
used in cooking etc.and was it ever canned after drying? Thanks.
From: jeq@i88.isc.com (Jonathan E. Quist)
Newsgroups: rec.food.historic
Subject: Re: Worcestershire sauce  and those pesky details
Date: 28 Aug 92 15:42:44 GMT
Article-I.D.: i88.1992Aug28.154244.4409
Organization: INTERACTIVE Systems Corporation, Naperville, IL

In article <1992Aug27.210506.28938@u.washington.edu> dave@nucleus.immunol.washington.edu writes:
>>In article <1992Aug25.231029.24762@col.hp.com> dnt@col.hp.com (Doug Teigland)  
>>writes:
>>Reprinted without permission from the BULL COOK and AUTHENTIC HISTORICAL
>>RECIPES and PRACTICES c 1969 by George Leonard Herter.

Goodness!  I didn't think anyone except my brother bought any of
George L.'s books.

>
>In this curious and sometimes entertaining book, it seems Mr. Herter is  
>confused. (It makes you wonder about the rest.)
>


George Herter has, shall we say, a unique point of view.  His philosophy
ranges from common sense to downright silly.  (On the other hand, my
"Herter's new improved Bowie Knife" is a fine piece of cutlery.... :')

Last I heard, Herter's and their Ruhr-American Corporation (sort of
the outdoors equivalent of Warshawsky/J.C. Whitney of auto parts fame)
had all gone bankrupt.  Has anyone heard anything more in the last 5 years?


Obligatory Historic Cooking Reference:  I've pretty much given up using
accurate measures for most of my cooking.  I'm finding it's really not
that difficult to get good results, going by instinct developed through
experience.  Just think what our great-grandmothers must have been capable
of preparing!
-- 
Jonathan E. Quist                              INTERACTIVE Systems Corporation
jeq@i88.isc.com  '71 CL450-K4 "Gleep", DoD #094        Naperville, IL
        There are many things a person should experience in a lifetime.
       Among them are an infant's first cry, and an infant's first laugh.
Newsgroups: rec.food.historic
From: schuldy@progress.COM (Mark Schuldenfrei)
Subject: Re: Mead recipes?
Organization: Progress Software Corp.
Date: Tue, 1 Sep 1992 13:44:44 GMT

Jeffery Scott asks:
  I have made a few batches and while they taste wonderful, how does one  
  know what "traditional mead" is supposed to taste like? Is there a  
  commercial product that you can buy to compare the homemade against?

All I can tell you, is that most of the commercial meads taste less
pleasant than the stuff I make myself.  I have no idea whose is closer
to "traditional taste".  I have tasted mead at agricultural fairs,
made by bee-keepers, and it tasted like an alcoholic honey, not very
sweet, but with all the complexity of that "honey flavor" that makes
honey different from sugar.  What's traditional?  I dunno.

	schuldy (Or, Tibor, if you know me in the SCA)
--
Mark Schuldenfrei (schuldy@progress.com)
Newsgroups: rec.food.historic
From: dcoder@u.washington.edu
Subject: Re: Worcestershire sauce  and those pesky details
Reply-To: dave@nucleus.immunol.washington.edu
Organization: University of Washington
Date: Thu, 27 Aug 1992 21:05:06 GMT

>In article <1992Aug25.231029.24762@col.hp.com> dnt@col.hp.com (Doug Teigland)  
>writes:
[stuff deleted]

>Reprinted without permission from the BULL COOK and AUTHENTIC HISTORICAL
>RECIPES and PRACTICES c 1969 by George Leonard Herter.

>	ORIGINAL WORCESTERSHIRE SAUCE BY JOHN CRAFTON
[most deleted] 

>... Commercial makers list tamarinds as a part
>of their recipe so that housewives will think that they cannot make their own
>as tamarinds are hard to find.  Actually tamarinds are nothing but the pod  
>from a tree in India ....

that has considerable flavor and probably adds a lot

>... Commercial recipes say that they use anchovies to confuse housewives.   
>Anchovies are actually nothing but a salt cured sardine.

Anchovies and sardines are completely different fish (they're even from  
different families). Their appearance and taste are distinct.

In this curious and sometimes entertaining book, it seems Mr. Herter is  
confused. (It makes you wonder about the rest.)

Newsgroups: rec.food.historic
From: grimoire@byron.u.washington.edu (John Greer)
Subject: Re: Food in sea novels
Organization: University of Washington, Seattle
Date: Fri, 4 Sep 1992 17:46:36 GMT

citrin@soglio.colorado.edu (Wayne Citrin) writes:
>Can anyone out there describe portable soup, sea pie, figgy-dowdy,
>or plum duff?

Here's a recipe for portable soup from _Mrs. Gardiner's Receipts from
1763_ (Boston: Rowan Tree Press, 1988):

Portable Soup - For Travellers, etc.
   Take three legs of veal, one leg of beef, and the lean part of half 
an ham; cut them into small pieces; put a quarter of a pound of butter
at the bottom of a large cauldron; then lay in the meat and the bones 
with four ounces of good anchovies and two ounces of mace.  Cut off the
green leaves of five or six heads of celleri, wash the heads of the
celleri clean, and then cut them up small, put them in, with three   
large carrots, cut thin, the cover the cauldron close and set it over a
medium fire.  When you find the gravy begins to draw, take it up, and continue  taking up all the gravy, as it draws, and untill you can draw no more.
Then put water in sufficient to cover the meat, and set it on the fire
again, & there let it stew for four hours when you must strain it, into
a clean pan, through an hair sieve.  Set the pan on the fire, and let it
boil three parts away; then strain your gravy also, which you drew from
your meat into your pan or pot, and set it again on th fire, and let the
soup boil gently untill it looks thick like glue, observing to skim it
the whole time it is on the fire very carefully, so as to skim off all 
the fat.  You must take great care, when it is near enough done, that it
don't burn.  Put in Chyan Pepper to your taste, pour it upon flat dishes,
a quarter of an inch thick and there let it stand untill the next day;
when you must cut it out with round tins, a little larger than a crown
piece.  Lay the cakes thus cut out on dishes and set them in the sun to
dry. It will answer best to make the soup in frosty weather.  When the
cakes are dry, put them into tin boxes, or a tin box, with writing paper
between every cake, and keep them in a dry place. 
    Pour a pint of boiling water on one cake, add a little salt, and you
have immediately a bason of good broth.  A little boiling water poured   
upon one of the cakes will make gravy sufficient for a turkey or fowls.
    The longer the cakes are kept the better. 
    N.B. As the cakes are drying, be carefull to turn them.


I haven't tried this one yet, nor do I have a "translation", but it
apparently produces some sort of primeval bouillon cube.  Anyone out
there done something of this sort?

--Sara Greer
(by way of her spouse's account)



Newsgroups: rec.food.historic
From: jerryg@ssd.intel.com (Jerry Gaiser)
Subject: Re: toxins in food
Organization: Supercomputer Systems Division, Intel Corp.
Date: Tue, 1 Sep 1992 16:31:08 GMT

Isn't horseradish also a poison? I remember reading somewhere that eating large
amounts is fatal. Of course we're probably talking about eating a complete root
in one sitting.
-- 
Jerry Gaiser
         Usenet: jerryg@ssd.intel.com
        Fidonet: 1:105/380
           PBBS: n7pwf@n7pwf.or.usa.na
From: jtn@nutter.cs.vt.edu (Terry Nutter)
Newsgroups: rec.food.historic
Subject: Re: Lamprey sauce
Date: 4 Sep 92 17:21:39 GMT

Hi!  Mark made some good comments on Gretchen's recipe.  Let me
add a small note to one.

>I wouldn't just combine the sauce, and blend it.  Heat everything
>liquid, and the spices, very gently in a cookpot, and stir until
>warm.  Take the bread, or crumbs, into a separate bowl, and add
>a little liquid at a time, and mash like crazy with a spoon. It
>will eventually form a nice paste, and you can tell when your done
>when the last addition of liquid makes it soupy.  Dilute heavily
>in the bowl, and then add to the pot.  This seems like a lot more
>work, but Chiquart didn't have a food processor.  (Yes, it's a
>contradiction for me to recommend a microwave, and to recommend
>avoiding a food processor.  I contain multitudes.)

Actually, what I frequently do is use the blender for the "mash like
crazy with a spoon" bit; if you don't, you really should use a strainer.
But otherwise, he's right: don't _just_ blend it, heat things in the
order given.  Both the order and the heating matter to the flavor.

Chiquart had lots of staff to mash like crazy, which I substitute a 
blender for about half the time (and yes, the other half, I do it all 
by hand, but I'm well known to be a nut ;^).  But the blender _only_
comes out for adding in the bread.

Cheers,

Terry Nutter     Blacksburg, VA     jtn@vtopus.cs.vt.edu     (703)552-1598
Newsgroups: rec.food.historic
From: justin@inmet.camb.inmet.com (Justin du Coeur MKA Mark Waks)
Subject: Re: Isitt book (was Re: Apples Apples everywhere)
Summary: Facsimile of original is available (but prob. out-of-print)
Organization: Many, Sundry, and Odd
	<JUSTIN92Aug26.132924@inmet.camb.inmet.com>
	<1992Aug27.145328.5804@progress.com>
	<1992Aug27.222544.25703@ccu.umanitoba.ca>
Date: Tue, 1 Sep 1992 19:07:08 GMT

Regarding _Take a Buttock of Beefe_: those who are really motivated to
plow through used book stores should note that there *is* a facsimile
edition available of _The Queen's Closet Opened_. As I recall, it's
a small blue hardcover, which contains both that and a companion volume
called (if my often-faulty memory is right) _The Complete Cook_. I
don't have the book with me, so I can't look up the publishing details,
but maybe I can do so after my imminent vacation. (Or Schuldy can post
them -- I'll be loaning the book to him shortly.)

(We found our copy at Pennsic a couple of years back, at Esperanza's
books. SCAdians who like old facsimiles are urged to check out this
booth -- I've never gotten away from there without finding *some*
neat old gem...)

I haven't worked from these sources much yet -- 1655 is a little late
for SCA cookery -- but they seem to be very nice little books. A tidbit:
this book was clearly in the possession of whoever wrote the so-called
"Martha Washington's cookbook". While skimming through both a few months
ago, my wife and I discovered that one of the recipes in The Complete
Cook is lifted word-for-word into MW's. (We only noticed it because the
name was something curious, involving, "snow" as I recall...)

				-- Justin du Coeur

Random Quote du Jour:

"Kids! You can enjoy *Mostest Glow-Dogs*, *too*! They're the only snack that
 *glows in the dark*! And they're packed with *nutritious sugar*!!"
		-- from The American
From: alex@bnkc08.Bell.CA (Alex Laney)
Subject: Wanted: Source of 'old' strains of seeds.
Organization: Bell Canada - Ops Dvlpmt (Ntwk Systems)
Date: Tue, 1 Sep 1992 19:44:39 GMT

Maybe this is not <exactly> the right newsgroup...

I have heard of 'heritage' seed programs, but I don't know of any addresses.

Specifically, are there any old strains of tomatoes? Before they became
hybridized for shipping? I grew some tomatoes from seed this year (admittedly
not a good year) and the texture was the same as commercial tomatoes trucked
in from wherever. (And, I don't care for.)

Are there any other foods which have lost positive qualities during the
'modernization' process? That might be grown in a home garden?
From: dcoder@u.washington.edu
Newsgroups: rec.food.historic
Subject: Re: toxins in food
Date: 2 Sep 92 20:51:11 GMT
Article-I.D.: u.1992Sep2.205111.14777
Reply-To: dave@nucleus.immunol.washington.edu
Organization: University of Washington

In article <1992Aug31.213702.29177@news.acns.nwu.edu> bayla@casbah.acns.nwu.edu  
(Bayla Singer) writes:
[parts deleted]
>Two "foods" to look into are apple pits/seeds and acorns: I've heard rumors
>that both contain amounts of cyanide which could be significant if eaten in
>large quantities.  
Peach and apricot pits do as well, (all Prunus species?)

There's a red mold which grows on wheat, and is widely thought to be the
source of hallucinations (and charges of witchcraft, etc) in stored wheat
during the middle ages.  

[parts deleted]
This is probably the fungus, Claviceps purpurea, the cause of rye ergot. As you  
mentioned, there's a substantial historical literature of the effects of eating  
moldy rye. LSD was originally derived from C. purpurea alkaloids. There are  
good illustrations of the physiological effects of ergotism on people in the  
paintings of Breughel (which I can't recall). 

Dave Coder
From: mikef@dcs.ed.ac.uk (Mike Fourman)
Newsgroups: rec.food.historic
Subject: Re: Boiled Pudding Question?
Date: 3 Sep 92 11:35:20 GMT
Organization: Department of Computer Science, University of Edinburgh

In article <2243@h.cs.wvu.wvnet.edu>, hooverb@h.cs.wvu.wvnet.edu (Bruce Hoover,Armstrong) writes:
> From article <cds.715391402@ossi.com>, by cds@ossi.com (Chris Seabrook):
> > 
> > 	The dough is a suet pastry, that is made using self raising flour and
> > shredded beef suet
> 
> also saw it at Wm Lowes in Scotland). Here in the US I can't even find
> regular shredded suet, much less the vegetarian kind. Any information
> about sources would be greatly appreciated.
> 

When I lived in New York City, I encountered this problem; I wanted to make
Christmas puddings. I found that the local slaughterhouse would give me as
much beef suet as needed. This is the white fat surrounding the kidney. 

To produce shredded suet, grate it through a coarse grater using flour to 
stop it sticking. (Just dip the cut end of the lump of suet in flour from 
time to time.)

By the way, you don't need self-raising flour. Plain flour works fine. Make
a fairly short (ie plenty of suet) and dry (not too much water) crust. I
normally use this for steak-and-kidney pie, asking the butcher for a little 
suet when I buy the kidney. 

To save your arteries, don't eat this too often. When you do wash it down
with ample red wine.

This is really suited to rec.food.contemporary, but I guess that *real* food
including blood and guts and squiggly bits is historic in the USA :-)

-- 
Prof. Michael P. Fourman                     email        mikef@dcs.ed.ac.uk
Dept. of Computer Science                    'PHONE (+44) (0)31-650 5198 (sec)
JCMB, King's Buildings, Mayfield Road,              (+44) (0)31-650 5197
Edinburgh EH9 3JZ, Scotland, UK                 FAX (+44) (0)31 667 7209
-------------------------------------------------------------------------------