Posted on 12/06/2016 10:33:08 PM PST by nickcarraway
Sarah Lohman has made everything from colonial-era cocktails to cakes with black pepper to stewed moose face. She is a historical gastronomist, which means she re-creates historical recipes to connect with the past.
That moose-face recipe dates back to the 19th century, and it wasn't easy. She recalls spending hours trying to butcher the moose from Alaska in her kitchen in Queens, New York. She tried scalding the face in hot water to remove the fur, but it didn't quite work and her apartment stunk of wet moose.
But "at the end of the day, people showed up and ate it, someone actually liked it, and then we ordered a pizza," she says.
Spurred by her friends' enthusiasm, she started a blog. "Every time I made something, a conversation would start. It was just this gateway ... as soon as they were eating, they were asking questions," she says. "They loved the good recipes and the schadenfreude of the bad ones."
Lohman's work got her wondering about the flavors that represent American cuisine and where they came from. That's the subject of her new book, Eight Flavors: The Untold Story of American Cuisine.
"Chili powder spread across the country because of entrepreneurial Texan-Mexican women who fed soldiers and tourists, and a clever German immigrant who was looking for a culinary shortcut," Lohman writes. Peter Van Hyning She made a list of common flavors from many historical cookbooks, and used Google's Ngram viewer to count how often the various flavors were mentioned in American books from 1796 to 2000. Eight popular and enduring flavors emerged: black pepper, vanilla, curry powder, chili powder, soy sauce, garlic, MSG and Sriracha.
"I didn't so much choose the flavors that appear in this book, as discover them," Lohman writes.
Researching the book "really upended my idea of these flavors that always stood on the shelf in my kitchen," she says. "I would always pick up a pepper grinder or a bottle of vanilla extract and would never think about what it was and where it came from."
Many historical recipes don't exactly work now — like one for black pepper cake from Martha Washington. Lohman says the original recipe is "really gross" because it used as much ground spice as flour.
She reworked it for our modern tastes, and says more people should be open to adapting recipes to taste rather than following instructions to the letter.
"I find when I'm teaching cooking classes ... my students are often afraid of doing something so massively wrong in the process of cooking that will be irrecoverable that they don't even try in the first place," she says. "I would love to get back to a world where we can be a little bit more relaxed and confident in the kitchen."
But Lohman quickly discovered there was much more than translating historic recipes for modern use: "I didn't realize I was going to be telling the story of disenfranchised people in America throughout history."
She says food study "wasn't really seen as a real way of looking at society and culture" until recently, because it's mostly a history of women, slaves and immigrants — "the people that have been cooking for the people that have been enfranchised for the past 200 years."
She hopes the book is "a successful ode to these people that have affected our history in this country just as much as the establishment, but up till this point, have not gotten the attention they deserved."
For instance, "vanilla is here thanks to a 12-year-old slave who figured out a botanical secret no one else knew. Chili powder spread across the country because of entrepreneurial Texan-Mexican women who fed soldiers and tourists — and a clever German immigrant who was looking for a culinary shortcut," she writes.
Slave Edmond Albius and a vanilla plant: "Vanilla is here thanks to a 12-year-old slave who figured out a botanical secret no one else knew," Lohman writes.
One story that stands out to her is the creation of Sriracha, which, according to the book, has "seen a meteoric rise in popularity" since its debut in 1980. Lohman notes sales of bottled Sriracha exceeded $60 million in 2014.
She calls it a "quintessentially American story" — founder David Tran is ethnically Chinese, but he is also a Vietnamese refugee. He combined elements of French and Thai cuisine, using peppers grown on a farm north of Los Angeles to make a hot sauce produced entirely in Southern California.
After the Vietnam War ended, the new government systematically targeted and forcibly expelled ethnic Chinese from the country, while charging each person $11,500 for the "privilege" of leaving. Tran, along with his immediate family and more than 3,000 refugees, boarded a Panamanian freighter called the Huey Fong.
After arriving in the U.S., Tran needed to support his family. He was a hot-sauce maker in Vietnam, so he decided to try that in his new home. Now Tran's company is called Huy Fong Foods.
"This ... says immigrants are our culture; they are who we are," Lohman says. "We have to broaden our idea of what an American is."
She points out the Italians, who brought us garlic, were initially "considered a separate race of people that were damaging to the climate of our country."
She says that attitude is still playing out today.
"Food is something that is often accepted in this country before we accept the immigrants themselves. ... We happily buy hummus in our grocery store, but in the meantime, they were going to ban Muslims from entering this country."
I see what you did there!
I wonder if they fit in like regular contacts?
You are right. Hummus came to America from Lebanese Christians driven from their homeland by Muslims. Lebanon was Christian country before 1973.
...and the ‘raisins’ in rice pudding are rabbit droppings. A little cinnamon and nutmeg, and you’re good to go. YUM!
I know. Miss my dogs a whole lot. You call them, and they actually come with their tails wagging.
A cat comes when he thinks he is ready for you. One cat, Fred, is due in here now to stick his whiskers in my nose or eyes. He thinks that is so much fun.
I have blue, black and green. My eyes are hazel. They are bigger than normal lenses, but they are soft. No problem. The bright blue ones don’t come out brigh blue because of my natural eye color. Really easy to wear.
Go for it!
Don’t like spicy food? Otherwise, you’re missing out. It’s good stuff.
And rice moves just like maggots. Ewwwww!
Spicy food burns my tongue. I have to have some sour cream close by when I eat anything spicy.
OMG...we have lived parallel lives!
o.O
LOL. Maple cement.
It was a *lick* to keep you kids quiet for 5 minutes.
great minds think alike
Twins separated at birth, for sure!
You can yell for a snake until your lungs explode.
They have no ears and I doubt they’d pay heed, even if they did.
Years ago [as made infamous on FR] one of my Ball Pythons went on a 3 week slitherabout.
I looked everywhere, hundreds of times over, barely slept...and I kept yelling his name.
Once in a while, I’d think to myself, why are you even doing that?
He can’t hear and wouldn’t come, anyway!
Lo and behold, he finally showed up in the bathroom that all the other snakes seem to find so irresistible.
Thank you. I was just going to check The Forme of Curry - that medieval cookbook which features some of these flavorings. Well, maybe not MSG but who knows?!
More like 5 hours.
:D
Black Water Falls is hours away and we both got into a grudge-lick match.
Tried to see who’d finish theirs, first.
I was sick for days.
who knows what evil? has to live somewhere in Hillbilly Heaven.
Flatlanders don’t know any of this stuff.
I knew it!
who knows what evil? in is TN.
I have kin there.
Wouldn’t that be a kick in the head?
LOL
Nopardons strikes again! A cookery book of America through the ages manages, in its oh-so-politically-correct way to come up with Siracha! All the spices you mention and are in all the early 18th century cookbooks - including garlic. And vanilla was discovered by an American slave??
Lived in Williamsburg for a year. Remember the Restaurant at the east end of the Town that used the old recipes. Still have a Williamsburg cookbook.
What is that? Sorghum?
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