My grandmother’s peanut butter cookies: crispy, delicious addictive. And linked to the story of Jewish immigration in America. Check out the Tenement Museum blog to get the story and the recipe, along with two other posts I wrote for them this week: How to Make Dinner for 15 Cents and Baking with Schmaltz. Read the blog here!
The Pineapple Julep.“This is a tricky time of year for cocktails. We’ve turned the corner into fall, and yet it’s still hot enough to fry an egg on the sidewalk. How can we ease the transition from frosty summer concoctions to warm winter imbibements? Make a bowl of punch!”
This week, I’ve got an article up on The Spirit ( thespir.it ) on fall punches. For a brief history of punch and delicious recipes, read the full article here.
Ruby Punch.
This essay, by my friend Patrick Gaughan, arrived in my inbox last night. I only wish I could write something so beautiful. Please enjoy.
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Georgetown, Colorado is a gold rush town. Jagged Rockies rise on all sides. The buildings down Main St. boast the original dust-burned facades from the height of Pikes Peak fever, but now house cash registers and rustic railroad prints and myriad variations on the classic black cowboy hat (some with chin ties, some without).
And there are two main attractions from those Wild West glory days, one being the Hamill House, home to a family of mine owners during the gold rush and subsequent silver boom. A woman named Ellen gave me a tour. She pointed at things. She told me what was original and what was not. She let me wander upstairs by myself. In the Hamills’ stable, she informed me that the floors were ‘very original.’ I asked questions. Ellen looked at me quizzically. I left.
At the south end of Main St. sits the second, the Hotel De Paris, opened in 1878. The man behind the place was Louis Dupuy, a French linguist who squandered an inheritance, moved to the States, deserted the US Army, changed his name, fled halfway across the country, and opened the most exclusive hotel in Colorado. Louis charged twice as much as his competitors and filled his rooms every night. He imported the newest technologies from France and China. He let restaurant guests point to a trout in an indoor fountain which was then whisked away to a massive kitchen and prepared just as they pleased. I learned all this from Carl, a guide at the hotel. Carl was a slow-talking charmer of a storyteller. He flipped an anecdote in every room and underlined each of them with a quip. When I told him I was from New York, he said, ‘I forgive you.’
I told Carl about Ellen.
In turn, Carl told me how much he loved his job and how he felt like he knew the eccentric Louis Depuy as well as Louis knew himself.
Without Carls, we will forget where we came from. Old things will simply become old things, nothing more, separate entities from the human beings who built them, chose them, put them there. Tours need not be about how ‘original’ something is. Rather, they’re about the people who walked there and sneezed there and fucked there and died there and how we, in the present, can learn something from them.
A couple weeks ago, I joined friends for a summer drive to Eddie’s Sweet Shop in Queens. This soda fountain and ice cream haven hasn’t changed much since the turn of the century. I read about it in a neat little book called The Historic Shops and Restaurants of New York; all the quotes in this post are pulled from this book.
The candy counter. The interior of Eddie’s is “…preserved in near perfect turn-of-the-century condition.”
“The refrigerator is Frigidaire’s first electric mode, some 75 years old…” A vintage canister filled with malt sits on top.
“Nine original wood-topped revolving stools still face the mahogany counter with its cool-to-the-touch white marble top.” The surface of the stool has been worn smooth by the seats of many pants.
“They…serve only homemade ice cream, sherbert, syrups, and freshly whipped cream, all prepared on the premises.” I had a chocolate malt, and a strawberry soda, made with syrup and seltzer. Next time, I think I’ll get an ice cream float!
I’ve been busy preparing for a bevy of wonderful events! Take a look at the schedule:
Thursday, September 9, through Monday, November 29
Exhibition: “Memento Mori:” The Birth & Resurrection of Postmortem Photography
The Merchant’s House Museum, 29 East Fourth Street, New York, NY
In collaboration with the Burns Archive & featuring artists Joel-Peter Witkin, Hal Hirshorn, Marian St. Laurent, & Sarah Lohman. Trace the evolution of postmortem photography in America through eerily beautiful 19th-century daguerreotypes and prints from the Burns Archive collection as well as modern art inspired by the iconography of these historic images. Then stage your own “postmortem” photograph in our reproduction coffin.
For this exhibition, I’ll be curating “senses”: the sounds, smells, and tastes associated with Victorian mourning customs.
Price: Included with regular admission to the Museum.
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Saturday, September 18th 6pm – 2am
The Last Supper Festival
3rd Ward, 195 Morgan Ave, Brookyln, NY
The Last Supper is a multimedia, project-based collaborative festival that addresses the act of consumption. Viewing the creative process as a cyclical, communally interactive conversation between media, it is a non-profit benefit for artists and the Food Bank for NYC. The Last Supper is a curated, indoor-outdoor salon of ideas occurring in Brooklyn during the crux of seasonal change from Summer to Fall.
In this event, I’ll be featuring a set of jewelry crafted from raw seafood. Models will wear the pieces at the event, and photographs will be on display as well. Take a look at a few of my past seafood jewelry pieces here, and read more about the event on the Last Supper webpage here.
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Saturday, September 25th, 6pm-7:30pm
Seneca Village Reenactment
Central Park, New York, NY
To build Central Park, the city had to disband Seneca Village, a squatter’s town far north of the city limits comprised of African Americans and Irish immigrants. The village was in existence until the late 1850s and was a thriving community for those that were considered to be on the fringes of society. This 90-minutes tour will teach you what it took to survive in rural Manhattan, and I’ll be doing a presentation on foodways.
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Saturday, October 2nd, 5pm-12am
The New York 19th Century Pub Crawl
Join us to tour some of New York’s oldest bars and most notorious dens of vice! This fall’s tour will have a whiskey theme, featuring free sips of single malt scotch and custom-made 19th-century whiskey cocktails. But never fear, beer drinkers: We’re going to make a stop at Pete’s Tavern for some of their famous 1864 Original Ale. Stay tuned for more information, including exclusive drink specials. Free to attend, drinks are additional.
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Thursday, October 14th, 6pm-9pm
Bread & Beer: A New Amsterdam Tasting Menu
The Old Stone House, 5th Ave. at 3rd St., Brooklyn NY
Featuring a five-course tasting menu, this event will explore two foods the Dutch made extremely well: Bread and Beer. Looking at recipes from New Amsterdam, I’ll be preparing fresh baked bread, including buttery, lemony holiday rolls and wholesome barley waffles; as well as sweets like spicy Deventer cake and caraway and orange cookies. Beer will brewed by the gents at Brouwerij Lane, using 18th and early 19th recipes as inspiration. Try a sip of beer made from fresh ginger, spruce limbs, or maybe even beef. $45, tickets available soon.
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Wednesday, October 20th, 6pm-8pm
What Dickens Drank
Part of You can’t get there from here but you can get here from there
apexart, 291 Church Street, New York, NY
I don’t know if there’s something wrong with me, but I would definitely eat these. Maybe I’ll make them…
My dear friend Eva has always wanted to taste Cherry Bounce, an infusion of dark, ripe cherries in bourbon. Well Eva: this post is for you.
I had to commission my friend Mike in Cleveland to make the Bounce. It involved fermeting things in jugs in dark cool places for months at a time. I live in a Tenement with two roommates. It’s not the ideal brewing environment. Mike has a normal person house and is also an avid brewer.
Below is Mike’s account of Bounce creation; it will take about 3 months to infuse, so we’ll do a tasting around Christmastime. The results will be a mystery until then!
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Cherry Bounce
Adapted by Mike from Directions for Cookery By Eliza Leslie
Philadelphia: E.L. Carey & Hart, 1840.
I weighed out the cherries with my digital scale; hand pitted them and crushed them into the jar one by one. My mortar and pestle was far too small for all those pits, so I put them in a sandwich bag and used my meat tenderizer to crack them open (Pro tip: If you pit and crush cherries by hand, don’t wear a white shirt and use an apron). I got about 70% of them well shattered and the rest should at least be cracked.
Cracking the pits.I added 385ml of water from a filtered tap source.
I next weighed out 8 oz. of brown sugar and mixed it with the cherries.
I added the bottle of Wild Turkey, sealed the lid, and wiped down the outside of the jar.
The jar sits in my basement near my lagering fridge and will be agitated daily throughout August.
I expect to yield approximately 2 pints at 70° proof.
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Do you have a challenge for the blog? A recipe you’ve always been curious about? A food you want to subject me to? A mystery to solve? Leave your requests in the comments on this post!
I’ve been doing a little research on early American taverns, and early American tavern food. While reading Taverns & Travelers: Inns of the Early Midwest (yes, this is what I like to do in my free time) I came across a passage that made me bust out laughing in the middle of the New York Public Library reading room. The room is giant and silent, so it was embarrassing. But worth it. Read on.
“Featherstonhaugh found the most primitive table service at an Arkansas tavern, operated by a lady whom he called a ‘she-Caliban.’ The colored servant, Nisby, had set the table, attempting to make the best of a poor situation. When landlady Caliban inspected the result she raised her voice in apparent indignation, demanding where poor Nisby had placed the ‘new forks.’
‘I ha-ant put not forks nowhar,’ said Nisby in seeming desperation, ‘I never seen no forks but them as what’s on the table; thar’s Stump Handle, Crooky Prongs, Horny, Big Pewter, and Little Pickey, and that’s jist what ther is, and I expec they are all thar to speak for themselves.’ It was apparent that the dialogue about the new forks was entirely for the benefit of the guests.
Stump handle ‘consisted of one prong of an old fork’ with one end ‘stuck into a stump piece of wood.’ Crooky Prongs ‘was curled over on each side,’ and more adapted to catching codfish than for eating purposes. Horny was a sort of imitation of a fork’ made out of cow’s horn. Big Pewter was merely ‘the handle of a spoon with the bowl broken off.’ Little Pickey looked ‘like a cobbler’s awl fastened in a thick piece of wood.”
And don’t forget, this illustration is available on the brand new Four Pounds Flour Etsy page!