Mincemeat: Victorian America by Kristin Holt

by Kristin Holt, USA Today Bestselling Author of
Sweet Romance set in the American Old West

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Mincemeat

Mincemeat pie, as known today, would be barely recognizable by King Henry V (died 1482). This English king served the meaty fermented pies at his 1413 coronation feast. A variety of meats (venison, fowl, mutton, together with their sweetbreads) were minced (chopped finely)--hence the name mince pie or minced meat pie. Other ingredients included fruits (dates, raisins), vinegar and/or wine, and suet. 

Nineteenth century recipe books and newspapers offer many examples of Victorian-era mincemeat pies--and many other minced meat dishes. Peering into kitchens of yore through their recipes sheds so much light on how our great-great grandmothers lived! Some of their methods may surprise you (I still wonder how their methods diminished food-borne illness.) After all, mincemeat apparently took all day to make and required at least 24 hours to sit before sending to table. Cooks made batches so enormous they would keep all winter by virtue of their alcohol content, cool temperatures, and the magic of fermentation.

Edwardsville Intelligencer of Edwardsville, IL, June 1870.

Through the centuries, mince pies became a Christmastime staple in English-speaking countries and were banished in an attempt to thwart paganism in Christmas celebrations. Outlawed foods and parties couldn't be silenced. By the 19th century, mince was back, fully entrenched in the hearts of Englishmen. Americans embraced the tradition of mincemeat pies no matter where they began.

 

I'm not sure how I'd feel, had I read this article back in 1872. The manager's comment leaves me uneasy: "Age don't hurt our mince-pies--they are good a year old."

Just as cheese is milk's leap into immortality, so is a mincemeat's edibility ensured for months to come.

Victorian Mincemeat Ingredients

By the time Victoria reigned, mincemeat pies had at least 500 years to slowly morph. The traditional rich filling now included spices like cinnamon, nutmeg, cloves, mace, allspice and rose water. Wine had given way to brandy and cider. Temperance recipes expressly called for cider instead of liquor. Fruits minced into the filling included apples, raisins, currants, citron, lemons, and oranges. Some ingredients, like suet, remained a significant inclusion. Now, instead of mostly meats, recipes called for one-third to one-half meat to two-thirds or one-half fruit. With the increase in fruit-to-meat ratio and the addition of refined sugars, mincemeat had become far more of a dessert dish than a main course. But don't forget the mincemeat pies in nineteenth-century America still contained meat. Far more than today's commercial mincemeat's nod toward beef.

Vintage Mincemeat Recipes

Imagine how long it took great-great grandma to whip up a batch of mince pies? Reading these instructions, I see hours of labor. Notice the last line of paragraph one: "This will fill twenty pies." Not all at once, of course. This filling would be stored in a cool place, packed into stone jars. Some vintage recipes instruct cooks to cover the mincemeat surface with paper soaked in brandy, or to simply tie down fabric coverings. Others employed jar lids.

Mince Pies recipe from 1851 publication: The American Matron on Practical and Scientific Cooking by a Housekeeper

Many 19th century mincemeat recipes start with a fresh beef tongue or two. Others start with a beef heart. Many recipes (a.k.a. receipts) suggest any lean beef will do. After boiling to fully cook and tenderize, the meat is minced fine along with all sorts of good things.

This American Civil War-Era recipe (1864) for Mincemeat (and storage of prepared mince) appeared Poetical Cook Book by Maria J. Moss. Note the recipe calls for a beef heart or fresh tongue.

Mincemeat in Poetical Cook Book by Maria J. Moss, 1864.

Mincemeat Sold Commercially, Victorian U.S.A.

With the quantity of hours required to make homemade mincemeat, no wonder many cooks turned to commercially available products. Vintage newspapers throughout the American Victorian-era show how readily available mincemeat was at markets in cities and rural frontiers alike.

It's curious, at a time when contamination and adulteration of food was unregulated, well-known, feared, and sickened (and killed) people, that Americans would embrace a product like factory-made mincemeat.

Victorian Factories Crank Out Mincemeat

None Such (a brand still around today) advertised in 1896 the labor-saving ease of their "very finest, purest and cleanest materials."

None Such Mince Meat, Factory Made. Advertised in Record-Journal of Meriden, CT, May 1896.

Mail Order Mincemeat

The 1897 catalogue from Sears, Roebuck & Co. (No. 104) sold both Challenge Brand Mince Meat (wet) put up in quarter barrels or pails of various sizes (including glass pails) and a dry mince meat preparation by Richelleu.

Two brands of mince meat sold in the 1897 Sears, Roebuck & Co. Catalogue (No 104).

 

Invitation

Do you have fond memories of Grandma's Mincemeat Pie?

Have you baked a mincemeat pie?

Comments are welcome! Please scroll down and contribute.

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Copyright Ⓒ 2021 Kristin Holt LC

How to Make Vinegar Like a Victorian by Kristin Holt

by Kristin Holt, USA Today Bestselling Author

of Sweet Romance set in the Victorian American West

Where does vinegar come from? 

The grocery store, of course. Even pioneer women could purchase vinegar at their nearest town general store or grocery. Yet knowing the twin Victorian virtues of THRIFT and ECONOMY, it's evident many penny-pinching homemakers would have taken the advice in cook books of their day (yes, spelled as two words back then) and in their city newspapers. Thrifty advice: Make Your Own.

How?

Why, with ingredients and tools you have lying about the homestead, my dear. Things like rainwater, apple peels, cider, yeast, molasses, and brown paper. Never forget the brown paper. 

Why?

Beyond the economy of making your own vinegar, what if you live a long way from your corner store? With all those long hours of daylight, homesteading women had plenty of time (hear my sarcasm) to make their own vinegar. 

Let's explore a few short recipes, beginning with one shared in 1852:

Vinegar Recipe explaining use of brown paper strips. The Perry County Democrat of Bloomfield, PA. November 24, 1852.

The instructions, ingredients, and method are worth revisiting, especially in the absence of this 1852 Pennsylvania newspaper clipping. Here's a careful transcription:

Making Vinegar.--Vinegar, according to a writer in the Genesee Farmer, is cheaply made. We re-publish his recipe: "To eight gallons of clear rain water, add three quarts of molasses; put into a good cask, shake well, and add two or three spoonfuls of good yeast cakes. If in summer, place the cask in the sun; if in winter, near the chimney, where it may be warm. In ten or fifteen days, add to the liquor a sheet of brown paper, torn in strips, dipped in molasses, and good vinegar will be produced. The paper will, in this way, form what is called the 'mother,' or life of the vinegar."

In 1860, Scientific American's recipe for vinegar appealed to the editors (??) of  The Mountaineer (Salt Lake City, Utah Territory), and they reprinted it. This one starts with forty gallons of rain water. Note that the key ingredient in this vinegar recipe is acetic acid.

Vinegar Recipe calls for Acetic Acid. Published in The Mountaineer of SLC, Utah Territory. April 14, 1860.

Pretty cool, isn't it?

Now, it seems, some people will buy anything. Including a simple recipe for vinegar. In 1873, some dude sold a vinegar recipe to anyone who'd send him 50 cents.

Vinegar Recipe for sale (50 cents), Democrat and Chronicle of Rochester, NY. November 26, 1873.

This 1883 recipe appeared in Our New Cook Book and Household Recipes, providing a good vinegar that costs only a pint of honey... and another that requires only apple peelings and hard work.

Vinegar recipes: one calls for honey, another for daily apple peels. Published in Our New Cook Book and Household Receipts, 1883.

The following Corn Vinegar Recipe calls for field corn as a 'starter,' and also references a "mother that has formed on other vinegar...." I understand contextually, but have never seen one.

Wikipedia Image: Mother of Vinegar: "Wikipedia image: Mother of Vinegar. "Mother of vinegar is a substance composed of a form of cellulose and acetic acid bacteria that develops on fermenting alcoholic liquids, which turns alcohol into acetic acid with the help of oxygen from the air. It is added to wine, cider, or other alcoholic liquids to produce vinegar."

Note to Victorian-era housekeepers. Do not throw away the muck in the vinegar. You'll wish you had it later.

Corn Vinegar Recipe published in New England Farmer of Boston, Mass. September 25, 1886.

Ah! At last! Cider Vinegar-- something that sounds more familiar to our 2020 palates.

Cider Vinegar by the drip method. Published in The Daily Journal of New Bern, North Carolina. August 5, 1888.

After comparing and contrasting this small collection of vinegar how-to-make-your-own recipes, United States Victorian-era style, I do believe I'll continue to buy mine at the store. But the ideas are percolating, brewing, about vinegar trouble to put my characters through...

Thanks for reading!

Come see a few related articles both here on Sweet Americana Sweethearts and on my own site, KristinHolt.com.

 

Copyright Ⓒ 2019 Kristin Holt LC

*Practical* Knowledge of the 1800s

(necessary disclaimer... because I need you to know 1) I have NOT tested this receipts/recipes/helpful hints so if you want to try them out I can't say how they'll turn out or even if they are safe to try (these were from the late 1800s where things like asbestos were 'amazing' things and 2) receipts is an antiquated form of the word recipe and what it's called in these period books, so that's why I use that word to describe them)

Along with the instructions on starch for clothing and jams, or a stew, you might find such practical information as to how to revive a drowned person... or aid someone suffering with Cholera. In the 1800s they didn't have the corner 24 hour drug store, or urgent care. EMTs? Nope. Sometimes the only people they could count on to 'save' those they loved... were themselves.

These two gems were included in one of my bound editions of a Ladies Magazine from the late 1800s...

What would you think of these instructions?

THE DROWNED

To Recover Drowned Persons. – First empty the stomach, etc., of water. To do this, place the patient face downward, put a roll of something hard under the pit of the stomach, so that it is above the level of the mouth, and then press with force on the back. Afterward, to set up artificial breathing, instead of the partial rolling of the body, or the pumping action of the arms, now practiced, lay the body upon the back, with the clothes stripped down to the waist. The pit of the stomach is now raised to the highest point by something under the back. A bundle of clothing, or the body of another man will do for this. The head is thrown back, and the tongue must be drawn forward by an assistant, so as to keep open the entrance to the air tubes. The hands are passed above the head, the wrists crossed, and the arms kept firmly extended. In this position the chest is fully expanded. The operator then kneels astride the body, places his hands on the lower part of the ribs, and steadily and gradually makes compression. Balancing on his knees, he inclines himself forward till his face nearly touches that of the patient, and so lets fall the whole weight of his body upon the chest. When this had yielded as much as it will, he throws himself back by a sudden push to his first erect position of kneeling, and the elastic ribs, by their expanding bellows action, draw air into the lungs. These maneuvers must be repeated regularly, twelve of fifteen times in the minute.

FOR INVALIDS

Dysentery Cholera Cordial. – Two ounces tincture cayenne, one ounce spirits camphor, one ounce tincture rhubarb, two ounces essence peppermint, two ounces best brandy, two drachms laudanum. Dose for an adult, one teaspoonful every hour until relief is obtained.

Interesting, yes ?  Misguided? I wouldn't know... but keep in mind that I have NOT tried either remedy.

Next month... I'm going to give you the option... What would you like to learn about Receipts/Recipes for Meat? Vegetables? Or... do you want to know how readers of this ladies magazine learned how to remove RATS from their homes?

If I select your 'request' for the next post, you'll win an ebook from my list -

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Back in the Day with Berries - Jelly Receipts from 1870s

When I was a little girl our yard had a strawberry guava tree and in the summer months I would pick baskets and baskets of the tiny fruits that were between the size of a nickel and quarter. After I had a box full of the little things, we'd drive into town and take them to one of my great grandmother's friends, Mrs. Sato. And I'd sit in the kitchen with Mrs. Sato for hours while she made Strawberry Guava Jam or jelly. For the life of me, I can't remember how, but I remember the perfect head of silvery gray curls that crowned her head and the way the breeze would blow in through the glass slats from the direction of the mountains. 

Today, as I sit in the stifling heat of my room, I came across some Jelly receipts in my Peterson's Ladies Magazine from 1878. 

Perfect timing I think... 

(necessary disclaimer... because I need you to know 1) I have NOT tested this receipts/recipes so if you want to try them out I can't say how they'll turn out or even if they are safe to try (these were from the late 1800s where things like asbestos were 'amazing' things and 2) receipts is an antiquated form of the word recipe and what it's called in these period books, so that's why I use that word to describe them)

Gooseberry (Green). - Boil some carefully picked green gooseberries in water, three-quarters of a pint to each pound of fruit, reduce them to a pulp - it will take about half an hour - strain through a jelly bag, weigh the juice, and to every pound allow one pound of pounded sugar; boil up the juice quickly, add the sugar, boil till reduced to a jelly (about twenty minutes), skim and stir well; pour into pots. 

Gooseberry (Red). - Make it in the same way as the green, but three-quarters of a pound of sugar will be sufficient for each pound of juice. In straining the juice, be careful not to press the fruit. The surplus fruit, with the addition of some currant juice, can be made into common jam for children and servant's pudding, etc.

Barberry. - Take ripe barberries, carefully reject any spotted or decays ones, wash, drain them, and strip off the stalks. Boil with a very little water till quite tender, press out and strain the juice, weigh it, and allow three-quarters pound of pounded sugar to every pound of juice; boil up the juice, add the sugar, and boil for ten minutes, skimming and stirring as above.

Currant (Red). - Pick the fruit and simmer it in water for about one hour, or until the juice flows freely; strain, weight and allow three-quarters of a pound of sugar to the pound of juice; boil up the juice, add the sugar, and boil again, skimming and stirring well for fifteen minutes. Put into small pots, and when cold and firm cover it.

Currant (Black). - Make it in the same way, but use rather a larger proportion of sugar.

Currant (White). - Pick the fruit carefully, weigh it, and put into the preserving pan equal quantities of fruit and sugar. Boil quickly for ten minutes, and strain the juice into the pots; when cold and stiff cover them.

I think receipts like this in Peterson's or Godey's magazines were valuable to ladies who lived in cities, but I can imagine how much the ladies in the west who were sometimes more isolated than others would use these to add to their own knowledge in preparing foods for their families.

In my latest release, "Home to Roost," Brigid may need some of these helpful receipts in the near future after she meets and marries her husband...

HOME TO ROOST -

She didn’t have a place to belong. He thought he was happy by his lonesome. When she stumbled into his life, everything changed.

Brigid Belham had always done what was expected. She worked for her father in his accounting office and managed his home. When he married, she knew it was her time to move on, and traveled to Bower, Colorado to meet a prospective husband. Her ‘best laid plan’ goes horribly awry, leaving her stranded. Caught in a storm of both rain and tumultuous emotions she ends up lost in the woods, until she’s found by a mountain man grumpier than a bear. All he wants to do is send her away. What if she wants to stay?

Most people in Bower know him as a hermit, a mountain man who hardly talks and likes company even less. His parents named him Livingstone Quinn, but unlike his namesake, he doesn’t want to explore. He doesn’t want to discover. He just wants his peace and quiet, all by his lonesome with his animals on his homestead. When Brigid literally falls at his feet, he keeps telling her she needs to leave, but shocks himself when he keeps finding reasons for her to stay. What will he do when he runs out of excuses?

In the whole wide world they managed to find each other. Would they walk away from their happiness, or would they bring their love home to roost?

Receipts of the 1800s - Part 2

I'm a bit of a book pack rat. The annual Friends of the Library sale in Honolulu, Hawaii, is my crack... errr laudanum. I have more books than I could possibly read in  my lifetime and perhaps a few more besides. Part of my excessive collection is comprised of Civil War Era Ladies Magazines bound by year.

I thought I'd share some of the 'gems' I found in these editions, as it fits the Old West/Historical books that I write and I think it informs the world around my characters.

The first thing to note is that Recipes were called RECEIPTS. When I mentioned Receipts on another blog, people always wanted to correct me. I completely understand why, since we don't use Receipts in that manner in our modern world.

**Please Keep in Mind that I have NOT tested any of these recipes, so try them at your own risk**

Today, I have a trio of soups!!

Vegetable Soup. – Four quarts of cold water, a half-pint of small barley, and two tablespoonsful of beef dripping, or a lump of fat from cold roast beef, or any fat from meat which is not otherwise needed; a teaspoonful of salt; of pepper, half a teaspoonful.  Let this boil gently for two hours, the four quarts will then be reduced to two. Shred up two large well-cleaned carrots in slices not too thick, also four large onions finely shred or chopped, two heads of celery, and three or four turnips cut up in very small pieces; put all these in when the soup is boiling. Let it boil gently for an hour and a half. Mix in a basin, a piled tablespoonful of flour with a little cold water till it is like cream; burn in an iron spoon, a teaspoonful of moist sugar till it resembles treacle.  Pour on this a little boiling water, and mix it with the flour, then pour the whole into the soup, stir it well, let it simmer once, and the soup is ready.

Godey’s Lady’s Magazine 1864

Carrot Soup. – Take six or eight full-grown carrots, scrape them clean, and rasp only the outer rind, or soft red part, and if you have a ripe tomato, add it, sliced, to the raspings, but use no other vegetable except onions.  While this is being done, the brother of any kind of fresh meat which has been got ready should be heated and seasoned with a couple of onions fried in butter, but without pepper, or any other kind of seasoning, except a small quantity of mace and a little salt; put the raspings into two quarts of the skimmed broth, cover the stewpan close, and let it simmer by the side of the fire for two or three hours, by which time the raspings will have become soft enough to be pulped through a fine sieve; after which the soup should be boiled until it is as smooth as jelly, for any curdy appearance will spoil it.

Godey’s Lady’s Magazine 1864

LOBSTER SOUP (French). – This soup is certainly most excellent, and worth all the care which must be bestowed upon it.  Take three young lobsters, boiled, or four small ones; take out the meat and cut it in small square pieces; take out the coral, not the berries, pound it so as to separate it, and sift it through a coarse strainer; take two quarts of good veal stock, quite a jelly, and cold; add to it the berries bruised, a tablespoonful of anchovy sauce, two ounces of butter, melted before the fire, into which rub two tablespoonfuls of flour; put it into the stock with a blade of mace, let it boil for ten minutes, then strain it:  add to it the meat of the lobsters and the whole of the coral, stir it up so as to make all thoroughly warm, but  if it now boils the color will be lost; put half a teaspoonful of anchovy sauce into it and sent it very hot to table.  Forcemeat ball, of minced meat out of the head of the lobster, with the soft part, the tips of the tails, and other scraps, some bread crums, a teaspoonful of flour, a few minced shrimps, and a very little grated nutmeg, mixed together with the yelk only of an egg, made into balls the size of marbles, and fried, should be thrown on the top of the soup directly it goes to table.

Godey’s Lady’s Magazine 1864

NOTE: you may see some words that 'look' like I didn't know how to spell, but I have typed the entries here as they are printed in the book itself.

Thanks for getting hungry with me today!

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Receipts of the 1800s - Part 1

I'm a bit of a book pack rat. The annual Friends of the Library sale in Honolulu, Hawaii, is my crack... errr laudanum. I have more books than I could possibly read in  my lifetime and perhaps a few more besides. Part of my excessive collection is comprised of Civil War Era Ladies Magazines bound by year.

I thought I'd share some of the 'gems' I found in these editions, as it fits the Old West/Historical books that I write and I think it informs the world around my characters.

The first thing to note is that Recipes were called RECEIPTS. When I mentioned Receipts on another blog, people always wanted to correct me. I completely understand why, since we don't use Receipts in that manner in our modern world.

**Please Keep in Mind that I have NOT tested any of these recipes, so try them at your own risk**

Godey’s Lady’s Magazine 1864 – August 

ONION SOUP. – Chop fine six onions, and fry them in a gallon saucepan, with two ounces of butter or dripping fat, stirring them continuously until they become of a very light color; then add six ounces of flour or oatmeal, and moisten with three quarts of water; season with pepper and salt, and stir the soup while boiling for twenty minutes, and when done, pour it out into a pan or bowl containing slices
of bread.

Godey’s Lady’s Book 1865

ORANGE WATER ICE –

Take as many oranges as will be necessary*, cut them in half, press the juice from them; take the pulp carefully from the rind, and put it in a bowl, pour a little boiling water on it, stir it well and strain it through a sieve; mix this with the orange-juice, and stir in as much sugar as will make a rich syrup. If the oranges are fine, rub some of the sugar on the peel to extract the essence.  Freeze it like ice cream.

Godey’s Lady’s Magazine 1864 – August

Have ready one pound of pounded loaf-sugar, one and a quarter pounds of chocolate, also in powder, and four new laid eggs. Beat up the whites of the four eggs to a stiff whip, and add to them the sugar and the chocolate.  Beat all well together, and with a spoon drop the mixture in little cakes on paper, or on paper buttered or sugared, and bake the cakes in a moderately cool oven. 

*I have some frustration when reading through the receipts/recipes in Godey’s books… their lack of actual measurements. Some of their instructions do have specifics but the majority of them don’t. So, I guess they’re going to make you work for it. Or, rather, make me work for it.