Time For Corned Beef

With Saint Patrick's Day falling on a "school night" Tuesday, today's our day to do the lengthy simmering required for corned beef and cabbage, in this house fleshed out to what's classically called a New England boiled dinner that includes the addition of things like potatoes, onions, and carrots. I've always primarily followed the recipe for it in another classic, my old copy of The Joy of Cooking. For fun this morning, I compared that to the one in my favorite read, the 1896 edition of the Fannie Farmer Cook Book. Coming from the Boston Cooking School, I thought Fannie would be uniquely qualified to describe a true "boiled dinner," and it's interesting that the recipes between the two books are essentially the same, except Joy of Cooking also adds parsnips to the veggies that go into the pot. Ever entertaining, Fannie's commentary regarding corned beef opens with: "Corned beef has but little nutritive value. It is used to give variety to our diet in summer, when fresh meats prove too stimulating. It is eaten by the workingman to give bulk to his food." So fun to watch how historical foods morph into holiday traditions.

Indian Pudding Reverie

My favorite dessert on earth is an old New England classic, Indian pudding.  Way back in my racing form days, I used to make it frequently, but since these days consuming any dessert requires doubling my time at the gym, it's a rare occasion.  The pudding is composed primarily of cornmeal, molasses, and milk, so as desserts go, it practically qualifies as health food, and with the arctic temperatures we've been having, last night was time.

I had fun comparing my mother's timeworn recipe with the one in Fannie Farmer's 1896 Cook Book, received earlier this year as a gift from a thoughtful friend.  The two recipes are nearly identical, probably no surprise since my mother was born not far from Fannie's Boston just a couple of decades after Fannie published her book.  For comparison, I checked the recipe in Yankee magazine's Favorite New England Recipes and also the one from Durgin Park, a restaurant that has been in Boston's Quincy Market since the dawn of time, and horrors, both of those included eggs.  I'm glad Fannie and my mother were on the same wavelength, and their Indian pudding last night transported me back in time to a classic New England setting.

More Fun With Fannie Farmer

I was pondering what to serve along with the beautiful swordfish I was going to get at Whole Foods Friday, and thought to consult my new Fannie Farmer Cook Book to see what Fannie would have done in 1896, and that consultation sent me into a tailspin of thought.  Sure enough, Fannie had a recipe for grilled swordfish (she was from Boston, after all), with which she recommended serving Cucumber or Horseradish Sauce.  Not wanting to challenge my swordfish with horseradish, I looked up the Cucumber Sauce, and found this straightforward concept.  "Grate two cucumbers, drain, and season with salt, pepper, and vinegar.  Serve with Broiled Fish."  My kind of recipe.  I tried it, and it was great with the fish.  These days one has to be careful to use organic cucumbers from a place like Whole Foods, Sprouts, or Vitamin Cottage, but I started thinking about how at the time she wrote that, everything probably already was local and organic.  Which in turn got me wondering about the history of agriculture in the 20th century, and how we ever "progressed" to the idea of cucumbers grown with chemicals and waxed for shipment thousands of miles away.

Perusing the fish section of the book also started me thinking about how our attitudes towards it have changed and how some fish have become endangered through overfishing.  While we've taken to revering our fish, giving some near cult status and paying a king's ransom for it, fish was clearly not on such a pedestal in 1896.  Among the things Fannie says in her introduction to the fish chapter are "Fish meat, with but few exceptions, is less stimulating and nourishing than meat of other animals...," and "Fish meat is generally considered cheaper than meat of other animals."  But ringing ever true today, "To obtain from fish its greatest value and flavor, it should be eaten fresh, and in season."  We might be willing to pay $25 a pound for a piece of halibut to showcase from Whole Foods, but in Fannie's day, it was a fish that could simply be stuck in boiling water.

This train of thought brought me to how much of this change I've seen in my own lifetime, growing up when it was a "sacrifice" to eat fish on Fridays.  As a kid, that usually meant swordfish or shrimp, both of which were plentiful and cheap.  Which brought me to one further realization, that my lifetime stretches halfway back to when Fannie Farmer published this book in 1896.  Now, that one's a shocker.  Oh gift giver of this book, you are messing with my mind.

Fannie Farmer Fun

This past weekend, a sweet friend gave me a copy of a reprint of the 1896 Fannie Farmer Cook Book, a landmark publication.  I can't wait to delve into sensibility of the time, with recipes like birds in aspic and even housekeeping tips!