Travels to Sturbridge Village

I promised not to wait too long before posting this, and then I went and waited almost a whole month! And as a matter of fact, I think I might do this as a series, there’s just so much that I could nerd out about that to do it as a single post it would be reeeeeally long.

In case you missed it before, in November I had the opportunity to go to Massachusetts and visit Sturbridge Village, to learn how to bottom (or attach the soles to) pegged shoes with their shoemaker there, Peter Oakley.

I was really excited to go, about 50% because of the learning opportunity and 50% because this was my first road trip on my own (which almost didn't happen because I left just as Snow-vember hit Western NY). The drive was great – I made up a playlist for my iPod and got an audio version of Walden by Henry David Thoreau to listen to in the car. Armed with snacks and coffee, I was on my way!

I was fortunate enough to be staying in Sturbridge for free, in the Village’s intern housing. It’s so close to the Village that the parking lots are actually all interconnected and if I really wanted to, I could walk. Another great perk of the Village is that I got free coffee (I’m not even joking. It was so incredible to get free coffee whenever I wanted that I could have cried tears of joy) and discounts on food. I had a spectacular gluten free brownie there. Well, two actually.

Jim (my coworker, who has been teaching me the parts of shoe-making that are general leather-working, like constructing the uppers) and I went over to the Sturbridge Village Visitor’s Center to meet up with the staff-member who was serving as our liaison to orient us. We met Shaun, who is an awesome shoemaker from Fort Ticonderoga and then we met Derek, our liaison, who took us to costuming. I had realized about halfway through the drive to Massachusetts that I had forgotten my corset at home, so I was feeling pretty ashamed that I had forgotten a crucial part of my luggage. Still, we managed to sort me out and my back didn't suffer too much from hunching over on a bench without support. After that we went and got coffee and then headed to the shoe shop to get to work.

Photo used courtesy of Shaun Pekar. Peter Oakley is in the background there - a very patient teacher!

We spent two days working in the shoe shop, not just learning but also interpreting – it started to feel a little like being back home in our little Museum. I didn't quite finish my shoe, but all that needs to be done is to put on the heel and some little cosmetic finishing touches.

I had a wonderful time, loved the learning experience, and definitely want to go back to Sturbridge, but perhaps next time as a regular visitor so that I can take lots of pictures! 

Flint Hill, '64 Chapter 3: In Which Our Heroine Oversleeps and Everything Goes Downhill from There

Read Chapter One here and Chapter Two here.

As I mentioned at the end of Chapter Two, the house was much warmer Saturday night than it was Friday night. As a result, I slept much too soundly and didn't get out of bed until 7:30! Breakfast was not done on time and the poor children were sent off to school with nothing but applesauce and a single piece of French Toast shared between them in their bellies. Mr and Mrs Craig got a slice each as well but that was all - the fourth had sat too long in the batter and fell apart and that was the last of the bread. The ham that we were going to pretend was bacon took ages and ages to cook and was never eaten. I certainly wasn't figuring that I was going to be a cook for much longer.

The Aid Society tea was at ten thirty and my suffering only grew when I opened the jar of apple pear chutney, thinking that it would be something sweet to serve with the cider cake, and discovered that it was in fact a PICKLE! A pickle cannot be served on top of cider cake! So I ran to Hosmer's Inn where I pleaded with the cooks there to give me some sweet preserves to serve with the cider cake and plain bread to serve with the chutney. I was prepared to drop to my knees and sob, if necessary. Thankfully, that wasn't necessary, my friend Allison (who was Clara for the weekend), gave me the last of their bread and some apple butter and strawberry-raspberry preserves. I ran back to the farm and did my best to plate our Savory and Sweet as nicely as possible. Perhaps it was a little too haute cuisine for the period, but I was feeling desperate. Actually, I wish that I had a camera so I could take a picture of the two plates and show off my biggest success of the weekend.

The cider cake I sliced and arranged in a fan on the platter, with dollops of preserves alternating between the slices and a dollop of each preserve right in the middle of the fan. The chutney was put into a bowl and placed in the middle of the other platter, with slices of bread arranged fan-like (again) around it, topped with sage leaves. The coffee pot, tea pot, creamer, and sugar went in the middle between the two platters. It was all deemed very good and my self esteem was a little boosted. All's well that ends well.

After the Aid Society tea disbanded, all that was left to do was clean up, go to Thomson Tavern for the group picture, and go home. The event's main theme was actually the presidential election of 1864 and the men in the village had been given ballots in order to vote. Lincoln won by a landslide in our town, but the election part of the event was very insignificant to me - there was far too much to worry about that had nothing to do with some stranger in a city very far away for me to sit around and worry about who was going to be president.

Another aspect of the event was mail service - we were each to contribute two letters to the mail service that weekend. I wrote one note to Allison/Clara, and one letter to myself from a fictionalized version of my very dear boyfriend. In truth, I Googled Civil War love letters and plagiarized one. It was not a very good result, really - I knew that I had mail and I knew who it was from and what it said, because I had written it. I also failed miserably at writing in a masculine hand. In the future, I think my mail contributions will all be to other people.

All in all, I enjoyed the weekend. It was hard to stay in character when we weren't around other people, though I did my best, and I didn't have any moments where I felt like it was really 1864, but that I contribute to being in a building that has become something of a second home to me rather than anything else. I'm looking forward to more opportunities to be in First Person in the future!

In the meantime, I'm preparing for a trip to Old Sturbridge Village in Massachusetts on the 18th - I'm getting my hands-on training from their shoemaker there. Very exciting!

Flint Hill, '64 Chapter 2: In Which Our Heroine Sleeps Very Little and Cooks A Lot

Read Chapter One here.

We left our brave heroine recovering from a battle with a mattress tick. After my embarrassing trip back and forth between Kieffer and Jones, I waited some more for the Craigs to arrive and then decided to bank the fires and head over to Hosmer's, where I knew there would be people to keep me company, as I was getting lonely in that cold, dark house.

The Craigs arrived, I guided them back to Jones farm, and then they left to get dinner. I lay down on my defeated bed to have a little nap until it came time for the Meet 'n Greet in Thomson Tavern. With everyone having met and my employers back in the village, everyone headed to their temporary homes. I decided it was time for bed and was encouraged to lounge luxuriously (while I had the chance) while the Craigs moved in their belongings.

With a chilly house and my own paranoia that the fire would go out and we would all suffer, I slept in short bursts and frequently found myself trying to quietly sustain the fire. Around 4:30 in the morning I was forced to restart it entirely and it responded angrily by being the crackliest, brightest, most obnoxious fire it could be. Mr. and Mrs. Craig's twin children slept in front of the fire near me and I threw telepathic daggers at the fire for risking waking them. I lay in bed, feeling very restless, for another half hour and then gave up and got up to get dressed and start the day.

I lit the fire in the stove, hauled wood, hauled water, heated water for washing faces and for washing dishes later, read the entire volume of the American Frugal Housewife that was in the kitchen, and started up breakfast. I had intended to make waffles, but had no waffle receipt handy and tried to make do with using a tweaked variation of pancake batter. HA! Not a chance! So we had pancakes and bacon. I burned the bacon. Quite the start, right?

Mrs. Craig and I went for a walk down to Kieffer to get cheese for the macaroni pudding I was making for lunch and then I mixed up a tin of cider cake for the Aid Society tea the next day. The macaroni pudding went over very well, although the water decided to be cruel and took ages to boil (The biggest downfall of a cast iron stove, even with a lid on it and the burner cover removed). The cider cake baked and then I made cottage tea cakes, which are like mashed potato hash browns, to bring along with my Indian pudding to the get-together at Hosmer's Inn that evening. We were meant to bake some squashes as well but they had done nothing at all when the time came for us to head to the inn. I was really batting a thousand.

Dinner was good and the entertainments were wonderful! We heard a very nice recitation of the Lady of Shalott, I got over-enthusiastic when I correctly solved a riddle and then was stumped when the others were read out, we played a game with conversation cards (a row of men and a row of ladies sit opposite each other. Each man reads a "question" card, the lady opposite reads the "answer" on her card, the cards are moved to the back of the deck and passed on to the next pair. They were very flirty cards and I was awkwardly paired with my boss at one point. I told him we should just be friends, since he was my boss), and read a parlor play. I also had the opportunity to play a doll-sized version of the Checkered Game of Life with Miss Craig and Miss O'Byrne, who whupped me very soundly. The game is similar to the modern game of Life, but centered around morals and the impacts of one's choices. At one point, I was forced to choose between poverty and suicide. I ended the game with 15 points, while the girls tied with 25 each. I think I might like to find a people-sized version of the game, it was very fun to play, although difficult by candlelight.

After the evening's entertainment, we all went to bed. This time the house was much warmer!

Read on for the final installment of our adventures!

Flint Hill, '64 Chapter 1: In Which Our Heroine Battles A Mattress

As promised, my post about my very first immersion event. An immersion event is a progressive reenacting event where there is no public wandering around ogling, taking pictures, and reminding you that reenacting is not entirely for reenactors to have fun and experience the mid-19th century. Other than certain unavoidable modern features (like bathrooms - I keep telling people that chamber pots are no more disgusting to deal with than a diaper, but no one seems to be converted by that), everything is period-appropriate. On top of that, not only are the material objects period-correct, but, as you are acting as a "persona", your brain is also period-correct. At least, it should be.

My hopes were that I would just copy down the diary entries I had written during the event, but I had no time to write any! At all! I was just that busy!

My persona for the weekend was that of Lydia Scriner - a young hired cook. Poor Lydia was included with the house (like a piece of furniture.... with her wages listed in between the costs of firewood and lamp oil in the contract....) by Mr. and Mrs. Jones (harrumph) when the house was offered up for rent to the Craigs.

In real life, even though I don't know very much about them, I love the Joneses - I call them Mr. Harry and Mrs. Harry, as their given names were Henry and Harriet. I have a tendency to bond with the buildings I work in at the Museum. It's strange, I know; I call Dr. Frederick Backus of the Livingston-Backus house Freddie and am of the opinion that his only daughter, Wealtha, and I would be very good friends. I have yet to bond deeply with the Shoemaker's shop, but soon enough, soon enough.

Read a Really Long Story After the Jump:

And Now, Something Completely Different

I have a spare moment and have just finished something that I'm actually pretty proud of, considering my fear of doing anything with millinery other than attaching ribbon trims and flowers.

I made myself a quilted bonnet! My first immersion event is coming up this weekend and I made this to keep my head warm and look presentable and all that.

Tada! Pictures!

Front View

Side View

Inside of the Bonnet. I chose this lining in case I have to permanently retire my wash dress of the fabric, I love this print so much I want to remember it!

Cat hair and Chalk marks, but also the quilting pattern I used on the brim

More cat hair, more chalk marks, and the different quilting I did on the tip of the bonnet. I chose not to quilt the bavolet and like it better that way.

Fabric: Wool outer, cotton lining

Pattern: Anna Worden Bauersmith's Quilted Bonnet pattern

Year: 186-?, it's a quilted model of the spoon bonnet

Hours to Complete: DANGIT, I never do remember to time these things! Uhh, probably somewhere around 5-8 hours? I did it all by hand and over the course of several days, when I had time.

Notions: Cotton batting, wire, grosgrain ribbon

How Historically Accurate Is It?: Uhhhhhhhhh 90-something%? I used a well-researched pattern, 100% wool and 100% cotton (in a period appropriate print), hand-quilted appropriate designs, and it's a period-appropriate shape. I don't know what the fiber content on the ribbon is, but it's probably rayon or something and they're too narrow (though they're temporary anyway, everything came from my stash and I don't have a collection of ribbon for bonnet ties just laying around). I also used cotton batting where it should have likely been wool, and the wire I used to stiffen the brim isn't millinery wire, it's mystery coated wire.

First Worn: For pictures, and will be worn this weekend at GCV&M's Flint Hill event

Total Cost: Stash project, yeeeeeah! The wool is from Renaissance Fabrics and is $16/yard (I used half a yard), the cotton batting is from Joann's but I don't remember how much it was, the cotton lining was leftover from a dress and the fabric for that was $3.29/yard (I used half a yard. And yes, you're reading that correctly, and it wasn't even on sale!), and the grosgrain ribbon was part of a candy package or something like that so I didn't actually buy it.


I'll try not to let ages and ages pass before my next post - I plan on my next post being a reflection of my first immersion event ever.

The Girl REALLY Out of Time

Hey, everyone (in my likely extremely small, if at all existent, group of readers), if you've been wondering why I did two challenges for the Food Fortnightly and stopped posting, it's because I've all of a sudden lost all that free time I thought I had.

So what's eating up my time?
Preparing for my first cold-weather reenacting events, Christmas gift production, higher education, and work!

I promise that I will get back to my resolution to regularly post on a blog as soon as the universe rights itself, and that when I come back, I'll come back with details (read: photos) of my exploits.


Pray for extra hours added to the days!

HFF Challenge 2: Soups and Sauces

This challenge I completed at work. There are some pretty obvious pros and cons when it comes to working on an HFF challenge when you work at a living history museum. Pros: it ups the authenticity as I'm working with a hearth or a cast iron stove and totally period correct cookware, ingredients, etc; it's freeeeeeeeee because it's all the Museum's ingredients. Cons: Because it's a living history museum, I can't exactly pull out a proper camera and snap tons of pictures of the process and everything; the dish may not turn out as well as it might if I made it at home, because although to a lot of people it may seem like my main job is "cook", it's actually "docent." Don't get me wrong, I like to have an audience and I get very sad and lonely when people don't come to visit me, but sometimes you sacrifice a great demo because you're too busy talking to visitors and whatever you're making doesn't turn out.

For the second challenge, my entry is the oyster soup from the Williamsburg Art of Cookery. It's actually a more modern compilation of 18th century receipts, but it was printed in 1938, so I'm still safely in our time-frame. Unfortunately, I can't post the receipt, as I don't have my own copy of the cook book, and I didn't actually make oyster soup.

What? How could I enter oyster soup and not have made oyster soup?

When I looked in our cupboards, I saw that I didn't have enough oysters to make the receipt properly. In that same cupboard, however, was plenty of canned salmon to use instead. So, rather than using oysters in the receipt, I simply switched in salmon.

I hashed up the salmon until it looked exactly like a large amount of cat food, seasoned it with salt, pepper, mace and cloves (the mace and cloves are extra; I never could control myself around a spice cupboard). I heated up the salmon and....waited for someone to bring me cream. I had asked a couple people to help me out with that, since for some reason the kitchen I was working in did not have any kind of milk product save cheese and butter. I ended up having to go and borrow cream from another kitchen during my lunch break. Upon my return, I mixed in the cream, added some flour, and put it back over the fire. It was a remarkably simple soup to make, really, except for the lack of cream. I put the creamy white soup in a tureen, garnished it with some lovage, boxwood, and dry parsley, and popped it under a fly screen for visitors to admire.

Challenge: Soups and Sauces
The Recipe: Oyster Soup, Williamsburg Art of Cookery
Date/Year and Region: 18th century, American colonies (collected and printed 1938)
How Did You Make It?: Followed the recipe in the book, only changing oysters to salmon and adding in mace and cloves.
Time To Complete: Once again, I don't know. It's hard to keep track of things like that when you're working during a special event.
Total Cost: $0 for me
How Successful Was It?: The only successful thing I did that day................................
How Accurate Is It?: I'm not entirely sure about that one actually, because of my major substitution, but pretty accurate I hope.

Join me next for challenge 3, Today in History!

HFF Challenge 1: Literary Foods (Part Two)

Happy Birthday to Me!

I had really wanted to get the challenge done as soon as possible after my last (first) post, but you know how time slips by and all of a sudden my mother was asking me what I wanted for my birthday dessert. What better opportunity than today to make up the pie and have my birthday dessert and the first challenge of the HFF all in one?

I got my five d’Anjou pears pared (haha), sliced, and chored. Generally the pears are left whole and simply pared and chored with the stems cut off so that they can stand up in the coffin (pie crust) but I’m making a slight change. Since my main era of historic cooking is the mid-19^th century, we’ll just say that the recipe has been adapted for modern times. The recipe also calls for the pears to be poached in a white wine, sugar, and water liquid, but since this is only my nineteenth birthday and not my twenty-first, I had to make do with 

regular old water and sugar.

Poaching the pears in Sugar-Water.

As the pears were poaching, I preheated the oven and got to work on my pie crust. When the recipe was originally written, pie crusts or coffins as they were called, were much more of a cooking vessel than a part of the dish. Oftentimes they were elaborately decorated, as we eat with our eyes as much as our mouths, regardless of era. Most of the time when I do a standing crust pie like this one, I go with the recipe for pie crust that James Townsend gives in his blog Savoring the Past. However, this crust is the harsh epitome of a coffin. It’s not particularly flavorful, it’s a huge amount of flour, and it’s much better suited to savory pies when it is going to be eaten as part of the dish. So, my pie crust is the no-fail pie crust that I copied into my trusty Mead Composition from my mother’s trusty Mead Composition.

That big fat one on the left is hers, I haven't been collecting favorite recipes as long as she has!

The pie crust recipe makes 4 9-inch crusts, or enough for two regular two-crust pies. Standing crusts are like the deep dish pizza of the pie world, except that since my form for molding them is a spring-form cake pan, I think my pies are more deep-dish than even the deepest deep-dish you could find in Chicago. Normally I would halve the recipe, but for this special occasion, and to follow along with history as much as I can aside from my alterations, I wanted to add some pretty decoration to the crust. Cue my historic culinary hero, Ivan Day. On his blog Food History Jottings he notes some decorative pie tops found in a really, really old Austrian cookbook, namely the popular lattice pattern we're familiar with today. My pie top isn't nearly as impressive as some of these (another day I’ll make even more crust and really deck out a pie). It’s a really simple diamond shaped lattice, done by two’s and alternating sides instead of weaving them. The effect (were my attempt not so clumsy) is that it creates an illusion of depth. Then, because I don’t know when to stop when I’m ahead, I added on my initial, L, in the middle.

I think I poured too much of the poaching liquid in because it came out of the crust as soon as I cut into it, even after it had baked the full time, still, it came out beautifully and tasted delicious, similar to a mild apple pie. We ate about half of it, just the four of us (mom, stepdad, mom’s friend, and I).

The Date/Year and Region: 1623, England

How did you make it?: I followed the recipe (with a very few alterations) mentioned in my last post. The alterations that I made were: a different pie crust than would have likely been used in the 17^th century, no wine in the poaching liquid, sliced pears rather than whole, powdered spices rather than whole.

Time to Complete: Oh goodness, I forgot to time it! Well, it took maybe about two hours from prep-work to baking.

Total Cost: I purchased the pears but everything else we had on hand, so $4.99 (5 d’Anjou pears from Wegman’s Supermarket)

How Successful Was It?: I’d say about an 8 out of 10. I didn't have quite enough crust to do the decorative top that I wanted to, there was too much poaching fluid that didn't cook out, and it made the bottom crust a little soggy. 

How Accurate is It?: For 1623, probably only moderately, due to the alterations that I made and the fact that pears aren't actually in season for my area right now.

I'm so excited for the next challenge!

HFF Challenge 1: Literary Foods (Part One)

Hello, Internet!

I'll skip introductions - there isn't much noteworthy about me anyhow- and get right to the point; the very first challenge of the very first round of the Historical Food Fortnightly! If you don't know, the Food Fortnightly is a series of themed "challenges" revolving around historic food. The challenges are two weeks apart (thus, fortnightly). You can read more about the challenge themes here.

My choice for the first challenge is a warden pie. Warden pie refers to a pie made out of Warden Pears, which come from the English county of Bedfordshire and may actually refer to any number of pear breeds that don't ripen fully and have to be cooked in order to be edible. Where do Warden Pies appear in literature, you ask? Well, prepare to experience post-traumatic flashbacks to high school.... they're mentioned in Shakespeare. While apparently they appear in several of the Bard's plays, my source comes from The Winter's Tale.

IV, 3:
CLOWN: I cannot do't without counters. Let me see; what am I to buy for our sheep-shearing feast? Three pound of sugar, five pound of currants, rice,--what will this sister of mine do with rice? But my father hath made her mistress of the feast, and she lays it on. She hath made me four and twenty nose-gays for the shearers, three-man-song-men all, and very good ones; but they are most of them means and bases; but one puritan amongst them, and he sings psalms to horn-pipes. I must have saffron to colour the warden pies; mace; dates?--none, that's out of my note; nutmegs, seven; a race or two of ginger, but that I may beg; four pound of prunes, and as many of raisins o' the sun.

As I can't afford saffron and can't stand prunes, dates, or raisins, I'm going to use a recipe from Covntry Contentments, or, the English Housewife (1623). 

Here's the recipe, in it's original wording and spelling. 

Take of the fairest and best Wardens, and pare them, and take out the hard chores on the top, and cut the sharp ends at the bottome flat, then boyle them in White-wine and suger, vntill the sirrup grow thick; then take the wardens from the sirrup into a clean dish, & let them coole; then set them into the coffin, and prick cloues in the tops, with whole sticks of cinnamon, and great store of Suger as for Pippins ; then couer it, and onely reseue a vent-hole, so set it in the ouen and bake it. When it is bak’t, draw it forth and taste it, and take the first sirrup in which the Wardens were boyled, and taste it, and if it be not sweet enough, then put in more suger and some rosewater, & boile it again a little, then power it into the vent-hole, and shake the pie wel; then take sweet butter and rose-water melted and with it anoint the pie-lid all ouer, and then strow vpon it store of suger and so set it into the ouen againe a little space.

Join me in a few days, when I actually cook the pie and post it in preparation for the challenge!