June/July 2021
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June / July 2021 FOR THE RECORDS St. Louis eats An historical overview of food and food culture in St. Louis When researching ancestors, the customary goals concern finding their origins, proving relationships, and documenting the specific events of birth, marriage, and death. Historical records can pinpoint these milestones, but their day-to-day lives are often shrouded in mystery. Issues such as quality of life and the things that brought them enjoyment may seem greatly removed from our present-day circumstances. One thing that ties generations together is food. The author of The American History Cookbook, Mark Zanger states, “You can‐ not go back in time, but you can go back in taste.” European settlers encounter Native American food ways When the first Europeans arrived in what is now the United States, they were confronted with unfamiliar climate and ter‐ rain, as well as flora and fauna. Native Americans had been growing corn, squash, and beans together for centuries, refer‐ ring to them as “The Three Sisters.” They formed the base for succotash, a stew sometimes supplemented with meat. This protein might be in the form of fish, or the deer, elk, and buffalo they hunted. Some of the fresh meat would also be sliced thinly, salted, and then rolled up in an animal skin to Manuscript page from Julia Clark’s recipe book. Source:Missouri dry. The preserved meat was referred to as jerky, which is be‐ History Museum <https://bit.ly/3wL7uKD> lieved to come from the Spanish word “charqui.” To endure winter or distant travel, they prepared pemmican, not, starvation was never far off. consisting of dried meats, animal fats, and berries. They also knew about other edible plants such as acorns, sunflower As the colonies developed during the 1700s, the colonists be‐ seeds, and cattails. If relations were good, the struggle for mu‐ came more self-sufficient at maintaining a food supply, either tual survival encouraged exchanges in foodstuffs and recipes through agriculture or trade with Europe. Immigrants often between colonists, Native Americans, and enslaved people. If brought Old World cookbooks or manuscripts with them or JUNE / JULY 2021 | PAGE 2 obtained cookbooks from Europe. When cookbooks appeared age farming. He complained that, though the land was very on American presses, they were often reprints of English amenable to raising a variety of crops, “the settlers are only cookbooks and sometimes adapted for the use of locally interested in trading with the Indians and neglect their farm‐ available ingredients. ing. All are, or wish to be, merchants…” The first cookbook written by an American about American Their attitude towards agriculture notwithstanding, the set‐ foods was published in 1796. The author was Amelia Sim‐ tlers’ diet ws likely better and more varied than that of their mons, and though it bears a very long title, it is usually re‐ compatriots in France. French women were renowned for ferred to simply as American Cookery. Its popularity in New their cooking prowess. One specialty of the area was bouil‐ England, New York, and the Midwest endured for 30 or more lon, a type of broth, as well as fricassees and stews. Henry years, and the Library of Congress named it as one of the 88 Marie Brackenridge, a writer and politician, spent time in Ste. “Books That Shaped America.” It bolstered American iden‐ Genevieve as a child and lauded their cooking. In his book, tity while retaining the familiarity and perceived refinement Recollections of Persons and Places in the West, he wrote, of British cuisine. Her book introduced innovations such as pearlash, a leavening agent similar to baking soda, and used With the poorest French peasant, cookery is an art well un‐ American terms in place of British ones, such as molasses for derstood. They make great use of vegetables, and prepared treacle and cookies for biscuits. It was the first cookbook to in a manner to be wholesome and palatable. Instead of roast feature the combination of turkey paired with cranberries. and fried, they had soups and fricassees, and gumbos (a dish supposed to be derived from the Africans), and a variety of Colonial French cuisine other dishes. Many of the same influences were at work in the Missouri- Not everyone was smitten. William C. Carr, an early Ameri‐ Illinois region but with a distinctive French influence. The can lawyer, complained that, French fur trappers and voyageurs cultivated close relation‐ ships with Native Americans, as their livelihoods were depen‐ The breakfast is composed of a single cup of coffee with dent upon them. Their nomadic lifestyle encouraged them to some bread without butter; the dinner of soup, very seldom adopt many of the Native American ways of eating (pemmi‐ of any other kind of meat besides that of which the soup is can, maize, and rubaboo–a stew made from corn and/or peas made together with lettuce of which the French are ex‐ with bear grease or other fat and thickened with flour). How‐ tremely fond, using with it some kind of oil, commonly ever, as French settlers began farming, they sought to distin‐ Bear’s oil. guish themselves socio-economically from their Native American neighbors. Though they raised corn, they preferred Traces of French food origins are reflected today at Soulard not to eat it themselves. It was reserved for animals, laborers Market, where one can buy fresh produce and meats. The or slaves, reflecting a hierarchy based on race and class. Nev‐ market, occupying what was originally part of St. Louis’s ertheless, they availed themselves of other native foods like common fields, originated in 1779. The property was given to pumpkins and maple sugar. Antoine Soulard, a surveyor general of Upper Louisiana at the time, as payment. His widow, Julia, donated two city Food customs in early St. Louis blocks for use as a public market in 1841. It has the reputation of being the oldest public market west of the Mississippi. In early St. Louis, the regular food supply was tenuous and difficult to maintain. Flour was often imported from Ste. Southern U.S and African-American Genevieve, which had a flourishing agricultural tradition. traditions in St. Louis This earned St. Louis the nickname Paincourt (short of bread). Fernando de Leyba was appointed lieutenant gover‐ With the advent of the nineteenth century, settlers and specu‐ nor of Upper Louisiana in 1778 with instructions to encour‐ lators began pouring into Missouri from Kentucky, Virginia, JUNE / JULY 2021 | PAGE 3 and other states from the Upper South bringing their food tra‐ virons, a group of farmers met in St. Louis to exchange infor‐ ditions with them. Dishes like fried chicken and greens mation in the early 1820s and went on to form the Agricul‐ cooked with bacon were often a fusion of European and tural Society of St. Louis County. In 1824 they held the first African cooking, exemplifying an ongoing cultural pas de agricultural fair in Missouri. After the Civil War, African deux <https://bit.ly/3ryGwVu>. Fried chicken is believed to American farmers in Kirkwood and Carondelet sponsored a have originated with Scottish immigrants, but the spices and Freedmen’s Fair in 1868 to pay for schools and churches. flavorings were added by enslaved Africans preparing their Eventually, the Missouri legislature passed a law in 1899 call‐ food. ing for an annual state fair. Sedalia was chosen as the loca‐ tion, where it remains at present. Early American cooks preserved their family recipes (or “re‐ ceipts,” as they were then known) in manuscript cookbooks. As the century progressed, two important crops emerged: One such manuscript is The Julia Clark Household Memo‐ black walnuts and apples. Missouri became and remains the randa Book. Published in the 1820s, it serves as an example number one producer of black walnuts. The Midwest also of Missouri cookery within a particular strata of society. dominated the apple market by the early 1900s, surpassing Though it had been assumed to have been written by Julia, it the eastern states, until disease and insects caused the industry is now believed to have been written by her husband William to move westward again. One notable grower, Stark Brothers Clark, of the Lewis and Clark Expedition. Her use of spices Nursery and Orchard, has been in operation since 1816, when and more exotic ingredients was the province of a more cos‐ James Hart Stark came to Pike County from Kentucky with mopolitan and well-heeled background. These items would apple scions from his father’s orchard. not have been available to the average Missouri resident, es‐ pecially outside of a city. The original manuscript is held by 19th-century immigrants bring new food the Missouri Historical Society. traditions Agricultural food traditions in Missouri When successive waves of immigrants arrived they brought their respective cuisines. Often adaptations would have to be For the average Missourian of this era, however, corn was the made to accommodate unfamiliar ingredients or the lack of staple. Though farmers would grow vegetables and fruits and access to their preferred ones. Germans began arriving in own cattle, chickens, and pigs, corn was supremely important large numbers in the middle of the nineteenth century and, by because it fed both humans and animals and could be planted the 1850s, comprised one third of the population of St. Louis. in areas that had not been fully cleared. Native American life Their influence over the city’s food scene was extensive. also centered on corn, so much so that William Clark, on his Potato pancakes, sausages, and cheesecakes are but a few of expedition with Meriwether Lewis, gave corn mills to the Na‐ their contributions.