A Historic Thanksgiving

Thanksgiving is one of my favorite holidays. It's the beautiful, slow, cozy holiday that reminds us of what truly matters in life. Thanksgiving for me is smelling the scents of fresh baked bread and apple turnovers a day in advance, eating chex-mix the day before while watching A Charlie Brown Thanksgiving. It's eating quick bread while watching the Macy's parade. It's spending too long at the dinner table being reminded of blessing upon blessings. 

Despite these traditions, almost every year, with my fork half way to my mouth, I ask myself a question - "What did the pilgrims eat on the first Thanksgiving?"

This year, I decided to do some research. I found that they ate a lot of foods native to New England, but there is no true list of what foods and dishes that were actually consumed, (most sources say that there was neither turkey nor potatoes.) Of course, no one there had the foresight to think that the feast they had would some day be important to history, so no menu was written down.

Because of that sad lack of foresight on behalf of our ancestors, I decided to research early American cookbooks and pick recipes using ingredients that were likely used at the first Thanksgiving.

In my search, I came across the oldest American cookbook. American Cookery, by Amelia Simmons. It was written in 1796 - post revolutionary war, and post first Thanksgiving. Nevertheless, I decided that this book was likely the best source for accurate recipes. The important thing about American Cookery is that it was the first cookbook to combine European food preparation with American ingredients and Native American dishes.

Amelia's cookbook is written similarly to many of the cookbooks of the period - without many direct instructions. So, I put my apron on, picked out a couple of recipes and decided to try colonial cookery. Below I will share exactly what is mentioned in the cookbook, and my own version of the recipe (written in a more accessible way for the 21st century cook.)

A side note, in the text of the book the common practice of writing "s" like "f" is used. For example you might see "ftuff" when talking about preparing a turkey - this means stuff. It's just a thing that was adapted from handwriting of the time.

Sturgeon (but in this case, cod.)

I have to be honest, this one doesn't look all that pretty. The recipe itself isn't that different than contemporary recipes for fried fish, except for the fact that it only uses egg yolks, not both the yolk and the white. I decided to use Cod instead of sturgeon because it's more available and it's a very common fish in the New England area.

From the Text:

Some prefer it done in the form of veal cutlet, which is, by taking flices of furgeon, dipping them in the yolks of eggs well beat, then rolled in flour and fried in butter.

​What I did:

I started with a pound and a half of cod from the grocery store. I cut each filet into four inch pieces, and for ones that were especially thick I cut them in half.

I then heated a few tablespoons of unsalted butter in a cast iron skillet. 

Then, mixed together the breading: a few egg yolks beat together with salt and pepper in a bowl, and some flour on a plate also seasoned with salt and pepper. 

When the butter was heated, I dipped each piece of fish in egg, then flour, then into the butter. 

Then I cooked the first side until the breading was slightly browned, I flipped the fish and cooked it until it came up to 145 degrees Fahrenheit. I then transferred the fish to a tray lined with paper towels.

​Notes:

The fish was very simple, but still tasted good. I think it would be good if you squirted some lemon overtop once the fish is done. 

If I were to make this again I would also salt and pepper the fish before breading it.

Butter has a low burning point, so it browned very quickly, which is why some of the fish looked darker. I would recommend using a fairly large pan to cook more fish at a time so that some pieces aren't more brown than others. 

Succotash (from a modern recipe)

It's not Thanksgiving without having a vegetable side. I decided to try the classic Native American dish - succotash. I used a modern recipe instead of a colonial one because there aren't any vegetable dishes in Amelia Simmons's book. 

I used this recipe from Southern Living, omitting the okra (cause they wouldn't have had that at the first Thanksgiving.)

It's very good, though it does use more pans than I like for a side dish.

Cranberries and Royal Paste (AKA, Cranberry Tart)

 If you are going to make one historic recipe for Thanksgiving, this is the one I would recommend. Amelia has recipes for the classic pumpkin (she spells it pompkin) and apple pies, but people all over the internet have tried those recpies, so I decided to be different. Besides, cranberries are one of the most underrated autumn fruits. In the recipe she calls for you to use her ninth pie crust recipe "Royal Paste."

​A note on pies and tarts, in my research I learned that Amelia refers to any pie without a top crust as a tart. So although I would probably call this a pie, Amelia calls it a tart. Call it what you will. 

​From The Text:

Cranberries. Stewed, ftrained, and fweetened, put into pafte No. 9, add fpices until grateful, and baked gently

Royal Pafte
No. 9 Rub half a pound of butter into one pound of flour, four whites beat to a foam, two ounces of fine fugar; roll often, rubbing one third, and rolling two thirds of butter is beft; excellent for tarts.

What I Did:

I started out making the paste (pastry). I let half a pound (two sticks) of butter soften before I started. I used salted butter because that was likely what a colonial housewife would use.

Then I measured out one pound of flour. I have a scale so I used that, but if you don't, a pound of flour is about four cups.

Using my hands, I rubbed the softened butter into the dough starting with one third, then adding the last two thirds, rubbing until the texture was crumbly.

Next I separated four egg whites and beat them until they were slightly foamy. I poured them over the dough. This part of the recipe was really weird to me.

Then to that I added two ounces of granulated sugar (about a quarter of a cup). I then mixed all of the ingredients together.

Refrigerators didn't exist in the colonial/revolutionary era, so I left the dough on the counter top while I prepared the cranberries. 

I cooked 15 ounces of cranberries with some water in a small saucepan over the stove until they were heated through and some had split skin. I strained out the water and added in half a cup of granulated sugar. You can add sugar to taste. 

​I preheated the oven to 350.

I decided not to roll out the pie dough, but instead treat it like a press in crust, so I lined a pie plate with the dough, making sure to go up the sides (the dough recipe makes more than you need to line a pie plate. You can either make another pie with the excess, or, like I did, cut the dough into small pieces, sprinkle with cinnamon sugar and bake.) Then I poured the stewed and sweetened cranberries into the crust.

​Once they were in I added "spices until grateful". My interpretation of that was to sprinkle some cinnamon on top and then toss the berries around. 

I baked it for around an hour, but I would recommend just keeping an eye on it. The crust won't get very dark, even after a while hence the "baked gently".

Notes:

This pie/tart came out really good. The crust's texture was a little tough, that may be due to either the egg whites or the fact that I pressed it in to the pan instead of rolling it out. I would recommend making more cranberries so that the pie will be more full and you can make two pies with the extra crust and berries.

Well, that's my historic inspired Thanksgiving menu! What do you think? Would you be willing to give any of the recipes a try?

Sources:
 "Colonial Thanksgiving", Inn At The Crossroads https://www.innatthecrossroads.com/colonial-thanksgiving/

Lamb, Catherine, "What Was Actually Served At The First Thanksgiving" Food52 https://food52.com/blog/20949-what-was-actually-served-at-the-first-thanksgiving 

Fucarino, Chiara  "Eat Like The Pilgrims: 7 Easy Colonial Thanksgiving Recpies" Life'd https://www.lifed.com/eat-like-the-pilgrims-7-easy-colonial-thanksgiving-recipes​ 

Stavely, Keith, Fitzgerald, Kathleen "What America's First Cookbook Says About Our Country and Cusine" Smithsonian Magazine https://www.smithsonianmag.com/history/what-americas-first-cookbook-says-about-our-country-its-cuisine-180967809/

Simmons, Amelia, American Cookery, 1796 Accessed Through Google Books

Belle Thomas

​Belle is the writer behind An Old Fashioned Girl. She is passionate about Jesus, good books, and living a beautiful life.