Bread, Pg. 193

I chose to make Mrs. John Andrew Hamilton's (a.k.a. Elizabeth Verner's) receipt for bread this week before I had a chance to check the calendar.

Oops. It's less than two week's until my sister-in-law's wedding. In true Lauren fashion, that, of course, means no carbs. Or, to be precise, minimal carbs. Lots of eggs. Lots of cheese. Handfuls of cashews. No bread.

Add cheese and this makes Christine's favorite meal.

The receipt - which unusually calls for the dough to rise in the icebox (a.k.a. fridge) - was tasty (Okay, yes, I tasted it) but too labor intensive.

It called for two eggs - is that normal? I didn't know bread had eggs. Anyway, I made the dough - which never really rose "like mad" - into two loaves. (One is tucked away in the freezer, to be enjoyed post-wedding.) Mrs. Hamilton also provides instructions on how to make the dough into rolls or coffee cake.

To be honest, though, I probably won't try either.

I can buy a baguette for $2 dollars at the grocery store - and canned cinnamon rolls and biscuits for not much more. Does this make me a lazy cook? Probably.

My favorite part about this receipt was this particular line: "the smell of it makes your family feel home is really the place it's cracked up to be." I think there's a typo in there somewhere, but no matter. I got Mrs. Hamilton's point.

I'll admit it did make our apartment smell great - and just smelling it costs me no carbs at all.

-Lauren

Lemon Meringue Pie, pg. 264....Easy as Pie

Sorry for the long absence away from the blog. I actually had some form of employment this past couple of weeks (no, don't get too excited, it is babysitting, not anything that puts those months of studying for NY and SC bars to use). And since I am starting to get more on a schedule with temporary employment, I need to get back to the kitchen!

   The last receipt I made from our beloved cookbook was Mrs. Walter A. Davis's Lemon Meringue Pie. I made it while out in Darien for the weekend and I chose it for a couple of reasons. One being, Mrs. Lloyd had all of the ingredients already, and two, Mr. Lloyd is allergic to peanuts. And many of the desserts in Charleston Receipts favor a nut of some sort. It is great having a dessert receipt that doesn't require a trip to the grocery store.

   I decided to make the pie crust from scratch because I do think they taste better. And I had access to Mrs. Lloyd's food processor. For those who fear the handmade crust, fear not. I found the best recipe for novices like me in Virginia Willis's great cookbook Bon Appetit Ya'll . She combines classic french techniques with the southern recipes she was raised with. It is a beautiful book too, and I would highly recommend it. The real key to the crust is keeping the butter and crisco ice cold. I found the pie crust receipts in Charleston Receipts as a bit iffy. I know I need to try them out in the adventurous spirit of the blog, but on this day I needed something bulletproof. 

     Anyway, back to the Charleston Receipt. I was amazed the receipt only required one lemon, but it tasted very lemony (is that a word?). I think the addition of the lemon zest adds a lot of flavor. The only problem I had was with the meringue. I was beating happily and getting peaks, but then I noticed when reading the directions I still needed to add the sugar. The cookbook reads as follows: "Beat egg whites very stiff. Add 1/2 cup sugar slowl, beating all the while." Well those eggwhites did not want to rebeat after I added the sugar, so it sorta made a less pretty meringue pie. I probably should have added cream of tartar to aid the limping peaks. Oh well.

  We were in a rush to take the train back to the city, so we ate the pie quickly and I never got a picture of it either. But it is an easy pie, and a receipt I would recommend. (though I prefer a good chess pie, and I am shocked this cookbook doesn't contain such a classic southern dessert).

   One last note, while this is easy, if you are making the pie crust it becomes a bit more time consuming than one expects. The crust requires 30 minutes to chill. 20 minutes to blind bake. 20 minutes to assemble (I am slow at that stuff), and 20 minutes to bake. And you really want another hour or so to cool. But nothing beats homemade!

Please Pass the Sherry- Chicken Tetrazzini

Last week I made Chicken Tetrazzini, pg. 120 by Mrs. Henry P. Staats. Chicken Tetrazzini reminds me of babies and funerals. It is definitely the classic put in the freezer and bring to someone's house kind of dish. But this is a dish I might start making for myself instead. This was delicious and I definitely want to make it again.
   The main reason I think I loved it was the sherry. I didn't realize how much I loved it. I always generously put a  lot of sherry in my she crab soup, or actually I put in all the sherry they put on the table. The receipt called for the mushrooms to be sautéed in butter and sherry (and I also added in all the sherry to the sauce that was not absorbed by the mushrooms). The apartment smelled fantastic.

whisking forever

    Some other notes on the receipt. I used chicken leftover from a rotisserie bird we ate the night before. So it was a lot of dark meat, which I usually don't like but it tasted pretty good in the casserole.  I do think I failed a bit in making the cream. It required continuous stirring for 30 minutes over a double boiler. The apartment gets so hot when cooking that I find it hard to stand over the stove for that long. (anyone who has lived in a tiny ny apartment knows what I am talking about!) But it tasted really great anyways.

only negative, it does not plate in a picture pretty kind of way

   I also halved the receipt because it makes a lot and Andrew won't eat leftovers (high maintenance!).  And this will put some weight on the hips kind of receipt with all the cream, butter, and cheese. This has been my favorite dish, and I am going to seek out the rest of the sherry receipts asap!

Fried Shrimp, Pg. 76; D.P.L.'s Cocktail Sauce, Pg. 99; Hot Slaw, Pg. 177

Today was my first day as a Lady of Leisure.

My husband started a new job and, as I'm still woefully unemployed, I made the most of my free time. I even took a trip to the grocery store and made a Charleston Receipts Feast! Each of these recipes was really good - I'm counting them among my first true successes with this ancient cookbook.

1. Fried Shrimp:  Mrs. Henry Chisolm (Elizabeth Edwards) recommends removing the heads of each shrimp and peeling them, leaving the last segment and tail on.

No, thank you Mrs. Chisolm.

Instead, I went directly to the freezer section of the Fairfax, Va. Whole Foods and picked out a pound of shrimp that came conveniently de-headed, peeled and vein-less. Some magical mystery shrimp picker even left the last segment and tail on for me. How cute.

This recipe was surprisingly simple as far as Charleston Receipts go. I paused momentarily over the listed ingredient "cracker meal," used for breading the shrimp before frying. I thought cracker crumbs would work just as well. All I had were the Keebler Multigrain Club Crackers, which I crushed with my own bare hands because I forgot plastic baggies at the grocery store.

These shrimp were good. And they cooked super-fast. Two thumbs-up from Brent.

2. D.P.L.'s Cocktail Sauce: Mrs. Lionel K. Legge (Dorothy H. Porcher) managed to submit a receipt that calls for 11 ingredients where two would have sufficed. Mayonnaise, lemon juice, ketchup, chili sauce, horseradish, whipped cream, hot sauce, mace, celery salt, cayenne pepper and nutmeg. That's 11. Count 'em.

I'm with you Christine: Screw the mace. I don't know where to get it, either.

This cocktail sauce was fine. Could've been spicier. I'll probably just stick to ketchup and horseradish next time.

3. Hot Slaw: Mrs. R. Bentham Simons (E. Marion Small) hit a home run. This was fantastic! Christine posted earlier this week her attempt at some green beans cooked in bacon fat. Pretty much the same concept here except I used the hot bacon grease to make a salad dressing with brown sugar, vinegar, dry mustard and a few other spices.

I tossed my chopped napa cabbage in the dressing, so that the cabbage wilted, but didn't cook through. Crunchy bacon bits. Crunchy cabbage. Makes sense to me.

I can't wait to eat this for leftovers tomorrow. Brent wasn't crazy about it - he doesn't like sugar masquerading in savory-sounding dishes. He prefers high fructose corn syrup and artificial flavoring.

Speaking of Brent, I'll leave you all - our faithful followers - with a laugh he gave me this afternoon after I picked him up from the Metro station.

As I mentioned at the beginning of the post, I told him, "Today was my first day as a Lady of Leisure."

"Isn't that a prostitute?" he asked. "Oh, no wait. That's a Lady of the Night."

-Lauren

Now that it is no longer bathing suit season....New Cut Plantation String Beans, pg. 173

I am sure all of our readers spent today packing up their linens, whites, and seersuckers. While I am mourning the end of summer, I think the best season of all is fall, especially with football! (go cocks, I think our readership is more tiger in nature!)  And now that I am safe from the boatrides in bikinis, it is time to get cooking our veggies in fat. Bacon fat that is. 

  We always seemed to eat a good amount of green beans growing up. But the beans always seemed soggy and salty. Not sure if it was always a canned variety or what. Actually I am pretty positive they were from a can (disclaimer, my mom also cooked with a lot of fresh vegetables too).

  The receipt I cooked the other day is titled New Cut Plantation String Beans* by Mrs. Robert Gamble.
   Essentially it involves frying some bacon up, then cooking the onions and beans in the bacon grease, and at the end adding back in the crispy bacon. All the green bean recipes  I have seen require at some point for the beans to be blanched in boiling water. But this receipt just requires some fat, water, and onions. I thought they were quite tasty and crispy. Although the next day, the fat covered beans didn't seem quite as appetizing. Andrew liked them, though I think I hid the unhealthy aspect of it. They look so bright and green, and don't taste as though they were lying in inches of bacon fat.  I would definitely make these again, and they are definitely much much better than the canned variety. 
* New Cut Plantation was on wadmalaw island, and there are a few more receipts in the book that reference New Cut, a small trivia fact for geography and history dorks out there. 

Receipt vs. Recipe

To those who ask the question most of us are dying to know, what is the difference between receipt and recipe?....the answer the ladies give is posted below! if you can't read it, click on it to make it bigger.


On another note, I am wishing right now that I could be tailgating with my family in Cola and eating some good boiled peanuts! Go Cocks!

Some Tips on Charleston Receipts

Charleston Receipts has a few quirks to it. Some of it is due to its age. Certain ingredients appear to have fallen out of favor in the past 60 years. (for example, I don't see too many people drinking sherry these days, but every other recipe in this cookbook has some sherry in it). Some of it is due to the fact that I think a lot of these recipes were really prepared by cooks in the kitchen and not housewives. These would be ladies with help, and I am guessing that for receipts that involve slautering calves or turtles, that the cooks in the kitchen were more involved than the housewives. I of course could be wrong on that fact, who knows. Also, the cookbook itself was designed in a manner that is not quite the norm for cookbooks. For example, the very helpful index is sorta hidden away in the back. Meaning the ladies often leave out pretty key info like what temperature to cook the roast.
   For ingredients, the cookbook focuses repeatedly on a few that I was not familiar with. An ingredient that the ladies love is mace. What is mace?! I figured they weren't referring to any anti-attack solvent. From the gourmet sleuth mace is "A product of the Myristica fragrans tree - mace is the exterior web-like membrane that surrounds the nutmeg. Mace is normally sold in dried, ground form and used in many cuisines including Indian, Asian and Europe." If you cannot find it in your local grocery store, nutmetg pumpkin spice, and allspice are good substitutes. Another popular ingredient in several recipes is benne seeds. If you are reading this (since you know one of us), you likely grew up eating benne seed cookies and know what they are. Benne seeds are simply sesame seeds.
And finally, to address an issue I know Lauren has faced. A lot of the receipts use the old fashioned term for oven temperature being moderate or slow. The appendix on pg. 351 addresses these temperatures. Who knew that very slow meant 250 degrees? I wish I knew why slow means low, but moderately hot means, well hot. Perhaps it has something to do with how ovens functioned in the late 19th century.  By the time the cookbook was written the gas stove was commonly used. But some of these receipts were definitely date back to the days of another era. The picture below is a common 19th stove called a box stove.  And I think cooking in a New York Kitchen is a challenge!