“Take Two and Butter ‘em while
they’re Hot!” is the name of a cook book that boasts of “Heirloom Recipes and
Kitchen Wisdom”. The recipes from the 1880’s include such old time favorites as
Garden Fresh English Pea Soup, Tipsy Pork Chops, Fried Green Tomatoes,
Turkey corn Chowder and Lebkuchen.
Bits of kitchen wisdom include, “There’s not a pot so crooked that there isn’t a
lid to fit it.” Another, “A person who
gets all wrapped up in themselves makes a mighty small package.” “Life can only be understood backwards, but
must be lived forward.”
The book also contains some
advice to lovers such as, “Before marriage keep bot5h eyes open, after, shut
one”, or “A weddin’ without courtin’ is like vittles without salt”. Then there
is this romantic poem entitled; “Kiss and tell”. It goes like this: “As lightly as your love
for me, I bore my love for you. And
knowing you would kiss and tell, I kissed and tattled too. Until continuous
reports and whispers unabated revealed I only kissed and told, but you
exaggerated!”
They didn’t have Doppler radar
back then but they did have weather lore such as, “No weather is ill if you wind
be still.” “If February first is fair
and clear, the winter’s half done for the year.” Here’s one we can use this winter, “The
number of snows in December subtracted from 31 will give you the total number of
snows you can expect that winter.” (A
snow fall is counted if you can track a goose on a board). At this writing we
have had three qualifying snow falls, think I’ll keep track just for the fun of
it and put the old theory to test.
Speaking of theori3es, if I were taking a cooking
or baking course and needed to write a thesis for graduation it would be titled,
“The Meringue Theory”. In my years of
cooking and baking for my large family, meringue on pie seldom happened. Time
was short so fruit pies or crisps were the order of the day. When I started the Old Garden House it didn’t
take long for the guests to request lemon meringue or coconut cream pies and the
meringue making experience began. I studied all the tricks of the trade, like
how to keep it from “weeping” or pulling away from the edge of the crust. I even
found a good recipe that uses corn starch instead of cream of tartar, less
expensive. All was going well, but my inquisitive mind wondered why sometimes
the egg whites would beat into a huge volume and pile high on the pie, and other
times less volume. Just when I was sure I had it figured out as high humidity
produces high meringue volume, today happened and blew my theory! I baked two pie shells; first I cooked the
lemon filling and put it into the shell, then made the meringue. Wow, for
whatever reason it whipped up and piled higher than I’ve ever had it do. I was
so excited and couldn’t resist measuring the pie before I put it in the
oven. (From bottom of the pan to the
highest curl it was just less than five inches). Then I cooked the coconut cream filling, put
it into its shell and made the meringue. Same eggs, at room temperature, same
recipe, same procedure and not more than ten minutes after the first one, same
results, right? No, not really, it was good but only ordinary. So much for my
high humidity theory! Oh well, maybe we
aren’t given to know why. But the research is fun and my guests are more than
willing to help me keep trying.
Happy New Year to all! Enjoy the cold snow and the
warm fireplace, go sledding, fix hot chocolate and share a cup with a friend,
bake a pie with meringue on top and celebrate the news that LIFE IS GOOD.
Ms. Grace
