Wendi Schroeder is a member of Kris, Carrie and I's Civil
War reenacting unit, the 21st Michigan .
She wrote an article about "eating right"; the perfect foods
for reenactments. With convincing of another member, Mr. G, her article was
published in Citizens' Companion May/June 2011 issue.
Mrs. Schroeder has been reenacting ever since Ive known her and she strives for accuracy and authenticity. She is one of the fine women I look up to!
Eating Authentically at an Event
Wendi Schroeder
Knowing that it's just as important to get the little things
right at a reenactment, taking a look at the food you bring can help improve
your impression yet one more notch. Eating according to what was available in a
given month can help you come that much closer to being "there".
This doesn't mean that you can't eat very well for the
weekend. You can bring a surprising variety of things to camp throughout the
year. As an added bonus to eating seasonally, it's cheaper. Things still ripen
around the same time every year.
Before I start, please understand the limitations of this
article. It's NOT an exhaustive list of everything you can bring, for that you
really need to start reading antique cookbooks.
That being said…
Let's start with April. This is the end of the winter
season so you would most likely be using up things in the root cellar.
In the meat category, Ham would be very appropriate since it
is getting warmer and whatever is left in the smokehouse isn't likely to keep
much longer. (I personally suspect that's how Ham for Easter got to be so
popular). If you are willing to be a bit more adventuresome there is also lamb
and veal (newborn animals that didn't make it were not wasted). Fresh beef
maybe but most likely there wouldn't be any left. Salted beef would be much
more likely.
For vegetables, you would have the last of the potatoes, winter
squash, carrots, onions, dried beans, and perhaps fresh asparagus if you grew
it.
There would also be fresh lettuce especially if you had cold
frames or hot frames to grow them in.
Pickled items of all sorts would be on the pantry shelves,
cucumber pickles, watermelon rind pickles, sauerkraut, pickled peppers, pickled
onions etc…
For fruit you would have jellys, jams, and the last of your
cellar apples. Raisins would be around, but pay attention to your economic
position, as they would have been imported. I can't find evidence that grapes
were grown in
As a side note…this is what you plant in April in Michigan …onions,
potatoes, peas, lettuce, leeks, cabbage. If you plan your breeding your sow is
farrowing and you have piglets to raise. If one doesn't make it you have
sucking pig to eat for Sunday.
Ok, moving on to May.
In May you would have eggs, (the chickens are
laying again HURRAY). You would also start to see radishes, more lettuce, and
new peas perhaps.
May is when the main garden goes in. You plant tomatoes and
peppers and beans and corn and squash and pumpkin and melon and cucumbers and
whatever else your little heart desires to put into the ground. New chicks are
being born about now.
June is when strawberries are in season. Your meat
poultry is coming along nicely, but they aren't quite big enough to eat yet.
But the laying hens are going gang busters and the cow is giving lots of milk
(or the goats). You are still eating lettuce and radishes. This is a great
salad month.
This is when you shear the sheep and take the wool in to be
washed and carded for spinning…unless you do this all at home. You also plant
your cabbage and peas for the fall garden about now.
July: The peas are getting ripe. You have new potatoes
(which are very small). Blueberries are in season. You might get some cabbage
out now, and the Broccoli is ready to eat. You have some meat chickens (born
last fall) that are big enough to eat, so you start butchering them one or two
at a time as you want one for dinner. Early raspberries are in now too.
It's too hot for the lettuce to be doing well, so it's rather scarce.
August: You are starting to get beans. A melon or two
is ripened, and if you planted short season corn it should be coming in towards
the end of the month. More potatoes, these are larger, especially if you
planted midseason varieties. Tomatoes and Peppers are starting to come in and
they pretty much overwhelm you at the end of the month. Peas are in completely
and they start to wane early in August. The pigs are growing nicely and you are
getting really tired of poultry and salted beef and pork. However, the fish are
biting and fresh fish can be had whenever someone has the time to go catch
some. You can harvest onions now too, or you can leave them growing until cold
weather.
September: This is when you kick yourself for planting
a large garden. EVERYTHING is coming in. You put things down cellar and
dehydrate a lot of things in the sun, and if you know how and have the jars you
put things up in those fancy new mason jars, which requires HOURS of boiling
for some things. (Modern note…if you want to try canning do NOT water bath can
anything but fruit and tomatoes-botulism still exists.)
Apples are starting to ripen and so are the peaches. Lots of
pie right about now.
October: The garden season is finally starting to wind
down. You still have beans and late ripening squash, but pretty much everything
else is put up for the winter. Apple harvest is in full swing although you
probably have all the peaches dried or made into jam already. The pumpkins are
finishing up as is the squash. Your late corn is ready to pick and your
potatoes are ready to dig up…hurry and do this last before the ground freezes.
You have fresh apples and dried apples and apple cider. (Or hard cider if
that's your preference.)
November: Butchering time is usually around the third
week of the month. Those cute little piglets from spring are nasty tempered
ugly hogs and you are glad to see the last of them; although processing one pig
takes three days if you have lots of help in the kitchen. You also butcher your
beef at this time, and the deer hunters go out to get some venison.
And that takes us to the end of the season. If it seems like
this was more about gardening/farming, I chose to structure it this way to
illustrate how eating was directly tied to the gardening year and the weather,
until refrigeration and international shipping allowed us to eat whatever we
wanted to all year round. And there are some exceptions. Larger cities might
have access to more fresh meat in the summer since a farmer could sell a whole
beef or pig in portions at the Market. The Military would also have more access
to fresh meat in the summer since there were enough men to eat a whole animal
before the meat spoiled
As I said in the beginning this doesn't cover everything.
But if you pay attention at the grocery store to what's on sale and what is
listed as locally grown you can get a pretty good idea of what your options are
month by month.
You can also get really adventuresome by reading cookbooks,
I've read some recipes that I wouldn't even WANT to try, but they are out there
for the culinary brave.
Some things I didn't mention (like bread) because they were
available year round. Wheat stores very well until its ground into flour.
Oatmeal stores very well.
I hope this little paper has been informative. I'm hungry
now, so I'm off to the kitchen to find a snack…
#
I know its a long read, but very informative! I hope you take
something into consideration and "eat right" this season!
