FOOD FOR THOUGHT

food ephemera that's standing the test of time

I have been spending a lot of time in Suzallo Library at the UW. Libraries are some of my favorite places on earth and this one’s no slouch. In the maze-like basement recesses of the t’aint between the Allen and Suzallo is the SPECIAL COLLECTIONS zone.

I got to see some daguerreotypes and look through an old stereoscope earlier this month but most of what they have is stored away all the time. The department mounts multiple curated shows throughout the year to help share just the tiniest fraction of the enormous collection of AMAZING SHIT they have in the archives. The current big one, “Magik and Mystery”, is FULL of treasures. There is book made of agates and stamps! AGATES AND STAMPS! However, there is a smaller show in the breezeway and it’s called “Breaking Bread: Foodways and Cuisine in Print” and it’s like one of those cake cases at the diner - full of thought provoking foodthing petit fours for your consideration and delight!

Ancient cook books, reproductions of sexist ads for Karo syrup, recipe collections from the vibrant Chinese community here in town- the show doesn’t hold any punches and asks the tough questions but also shows off some beautiful art and truly quirky gems. I do wish there was more info on Coast Salish/Indigenous foodways which are so deeply ingrained in their culture and the region. Their saying goes “when the tide is out, the table is set” and the history of salmon in the state alone is both fascinating and fucking infuriating and is an issue that is still contentious and highly politicized.

The man is OBVIOUSLY wearing a CHEF’S HAT. The President has a CHEF not a COOK. UNPAID. CHEF.

Apparently this is not Hercules Posey, the slave who was George Washington’s Chef and one of the 9 slaves that were brought to the White House to serve him during his presidency, nor was this even painted by Gilbert Stuart. BUT Hercules did live and did ESCAPE! the fuck outtt on GWash and stayed out! He was only “given his freedom” when Old Wooden Teeth kicked the bucket. Hercules was apparently a righteous force in the kitchen and known as an “Artiste” yet there are no recipes I can find accredited to him. I highly recommend going on a deep dive into the history of African American foodways with Micheal W. Twitty’s “The Cooking Gene”. He narrates the book, which I listened to, and it was a deeply affecting, illuminating and delicious book. He is also a historical reenactor which is maybe one of my deepest, dorkiest desires so he is The Actual King in my humble opinion.

I also learned that Shrove Tuesday or Fat Tuesday or Carnivale or Mardi Gras are all synonyms for PANCAKE DAY with the idea you would use up all your eggs and milk and fat before the drudgery that is is Lenten fasting. Poor Author’s pudding sounds pretty good. Pancakes for dinner’s gotta happen soon…

I especially enjoy reading old handwritten recipes. Sometimes they are totally CRAZY whether it be the way they express measurement or the outrageous proportions of ingredients. Take Emily Dickinson’s Recipe for Black Cake (not shown in “Breaking Bread”…just tangenting) for example

i love the way she writes “a”

Five.

Pounds.

Of Raisins.

19 EGGS! only two pounds of flour?

If this doesn’t give us an insight into her sensualist nature I don’t know what does.

Hand written recipes can give us unique insight into the homes and minds of cooks gone past. I especially enjoy when the cards and the pages of the books are all beat to shit and covered in stains. So many of us have recipe cards and cookbooks from our dearly departed. What talismans! It was actually there in the hands of that person at one time, in the room, proof they were. Making the dishes they documented and cooked are a particularly strong kind of magic; they can instantly transport us back to specific moments, can conjure ghosts and are sometimes the only thing that can soothe our hearts so broken from missing. I am thinking about my grandmother’s chocolate cake which has, so far, completely eluded all of us who try to recreate it. Maybe it’s just because she wasn’t the one making it…

I’ll put the recipe here and maybe you can give it a try. DON’T JUDGE HER FOR USING CRISCO it’s of a time and also it really was fucking delicious. The frosting is an even bigger shit-show of us-not-getting-it-right so i’m just going to skip it.

Grandma’s Chocolate

1 cup shortening

2 cup sugar

1 tsp salt

1 tsp vanilla

2 eggs

2 1/4 cup flour

1 cup buttermilk (or milk curdled with one tsp lemon juice; she taught me the trick)

1/2 cup cocoa

2 tsp soda

1 cup hot water (combine the last three ingredients and set aside)

cream sugar & shortening , add salt/vanilla/eggs and beat well. Alternate flour mix with buttermilk and when combined then add cocoa mix

pour into a greased and floured 9x11 pan and bake at 350 for about 50 minutes

Quit making your kids go down to the sa-loon for you, for crissakes. Hope you have some pancakes for dinner sometime soon!

C U Next Tuesday!