trail food 1775

[George]

In the spring of 1775, six men traveled in dugout canoes down the Ohio River to Harrodsburg on the first Kentucky frontier. Two men, James Nourse, Sr., and Nocholas Cresswell, kept journals. I've compiled a list of the foods they mentioned which might be of some interest.

Toward the end of the list, where lettuce and endive are mentioned, they are in Harrodsburg for a short while, have garden stuff there available.

grouse
corn
stewed pork
boiled chicken, fatback and bread
turkey
bread which they baked on the river bank
boiled fish soup with a sauce of butter and walnut pickle
catfish
fried fish
bacon
bacon frays made of the turtle eggs
flour
Buffalo Fish about six pound weight that an Eagle had just killed
venison
catfish soup
ducks
coffee and buttered bread

catfish "stewed under Capt. Smith’s direction in an iron pot with half a pint water and between each layer butter, pepper and salt putting sticks to keep the fish from the bottom and then putting fire over and under the pot, a good dish for those that love seasoned meat."

fried turkey eggs
soft shell turtle fried in hog fat
soft shelled turtle soup
fried soft shell turtle eggs from a turtle they shot
pancakes made with turtle eggs dug from a fresh nest in the river bank
buffalo jerky
buffalo heart, liver, kidney and sweetmeat broiled over coals on forks
jerky soup
bear fat and hot bread
hominy
salt
pepper
Indian corn
cornmeal
rice broth
boiled beef and buffalo
young cabbage plants
squashes
Cimbelines (cymblings, pattypan squash)
fritters
heart, suet, marrow bones and some beef of a buffalo cow
mulberries
wheat bread
buffalo stew with endive and lettuce
buffalo and deer stew
Mush made with flour and buffalo suet
buffalo milk from the udder of a cow they shot
jerky soup thickened with flour
sprouted Indian corn boiled and eaten with elk tallow
a little bread baked on sticks for supper
bread baked in a dutch oven
corn bread made of corn only beat
bacon soup thickened with crumbs of bread

Cooking methods mentioned: stewing, frying, roasting both bread and meat on sticks, broiling meat on forks, baking bread in a dutch oven, cooking fish in an iron pot with fire both above and below.

Cooking utensils mentioned: iron pots, dutch oven, camp and tin kettles, frying pan.

Spence

 

[BullRunBear]

Spence, Thanks for the list. This is a far cry from the pemmican and stream water I usually think of as 'frontier food'. These men ate surprising well which, considering the labor of their activities, makes sense and with more variety than I expected. I don't know how long they were in one place but it's interesting that they immediately planted some fast growing greens.

 

[George]

The group was on the move most of the time, floating down the river. They did stop and make temporary camp a couple of times, but just for a couple of days. I should have made clear that the settlement they were headed for, Harrodsburg, had been started a few weeks earlier, there were some crude cabins and gardens there. The lettuce and endive were obtained there, as well as the young cabbage plants. They were in the area of Harrodsburg, Boonesboro and their camp on the Kentucky river a few miles away for several days before starting their trip overland home.

"set off with a cane and my Great Coat slung on my back, walked along 15 miles to Harwoodstown which Consist of about 8 or 10 log cabins without doors nor stopped ”¦ about 70 Acres in Corn"

"When we got there an acquaintance of Johnston’s treated us with bear fat and hot bread for diner (their meat being just out) and hominy for supper, hominy also for breakfast. "

"Tom and I set off once more for Harrodstown, very hott, mett about half way 3 young Men, who told us of the Boston engagement..."

"Capt. Harwood and Mr. Moore of Dunmore arrived---dine under my Arbor---boiled beef and buffalo, bacon and young cabbage plants, fritters and hominy and wheat bread---"

"...got an excellent stew of buffalo and as much Lettuce and young Endive as I could eat but no bread, made as good a Meal as ever I would wish---a tolerable good house having a floor and a Chimney but not stopt---a pleasant situation & good water. Monday 19th Having breakfasted upon Stewed pork without Bread or Salad, proceeded for Boonsburg,"

Spence

 

[coloradoclyde]

I was amazed when I first read the list....both by the diversity and the quantity.

 

[Wes/Tex]

Amazing list, thanks for the post. Looks like a simple matter of "use what you can find" and they were good at that. Agree that most probably ate much better than the jerky and corn meal mush we usually think of!

 

[George]

Looks like a simple matter of "use what you can find" and they were good at that.

Stole a fish from an eagle, dug up eggs from a turtle's nest, milked a buffalo cow they had shot, mulberries off the tree...yeah, they were good at it. :grin:

Spence

 

[Silky921]

Always enjoy reading stories like this and imagining myself in their shoes. Living vicariously through them I suppose.

Sounds like they were pretty well fed too.

Thank you for sharing this.

 

[tenngun]

For whatever reason we oft like to look at the past through rose colored glasses or we see the ' nasty, brutish and short' things. I love old cook booksand recipes. On line there is a big store of Roman,medieval and Tudor. People love to eat and eat well. We might carry a hunk of bacon and corn meal on a treck as they did, but few turn their backs on a good feast . I've had plane in my pack but enjoyed wild black berries or cattail potatoes and wild asparagus (thank god for spell check) on the trail

 

[George]

There are quite a few interesting tales behind those simple entries on the list. Mush, for example. Nourse went back to Virginia overland, on the wilderness trail, but Cresswell went back in the canoe up the Ohio. He ended up switching to another small group which came by headed up river, and as they were getting near the end of their trip they flat ran out of provisions. Their salt beef went bad, their flour was damaged or consumed, their Indian corn ran out, and they were getting desperate. The came to a homestead with an old Dutch woman and made a bargain with her, 2 pounds of gunpowder for as much mush as they could eat. Not so fast, though, they had to grind the corn on a small hand mill and wait for her to cook the mush. After they had each eaten about a quart, she took it away to keep them from foundering.

I seem to have left potatoes off the list. During their starving times, earlier than the mush rescue, at a time just as desperate, they stopped at an abandoned homestead and found a potato patch. Cresswell said, "I ate about a dozen of them raw and thought them the most delicious food I ever ate in my life."

Spence

 

[tenngun]

I like fried mush but hoe cakes and ash cakes too :wink:

 

[nhmoose]

Now I know why Gramma liked patty pans so much! Thanks :hatsoff:

 

[coloradoclyde]

For whatever reason we oft like to look at the past through rose colored glasses

I know that no matter what
I learn.....it is only the beginning..

 

[tenngun]

Yup just when you think you got a good handle on things Spence throws a monkey with a wrench at you :haha:

 

[satx78247]

VERY TRUE.
(All of us in this subculture have very imperfect knowledge of the past, no matter how much reading/research that we may do.)

yours, satx

 

[tenngun]

We live now we can never unlearn what we know,and that will alway color our view of the past. We look to journals they most people didn't write, newspapers that left most stories unwritten, books that tended to say how things should be instead of how they were,ads for stores and probate list. You can't be a hero if you don't over come the monster, so many stories of events dwelt on the worse and how our intrepid hero persivered.
'We see through a glass darkly. '

 

[Vaino]

I imagine that if the recruiters for these forages or long trips into the wilderness had told the enlistees the truth, many wouldn't have signed up. But of course youth and a desire for the unknown by many ages was nearly a prerequisite for joining these groups and although I could never rationalize their thinking, they did go willingly.

The foods listed were varied and evidently plentiful, but one thing not mentioned .....they must of had gourmet cooks or cooks that knew what they were doing. Bad food or badly cooked food bordering on "inedible" instigates rebellious thoughts, but then again out in the wilderness, what other options are there?

I don't think we can ever "get into the minds" of these adventurers and can only guess what their thoughts might have been.

Thanks for the info on their food.......it was an "eyeopener".....Fred

 

[George]

I've only ever collected one comment about the quality of the cooks, and I don't think he was a gourmet. :grin:

Wm. Calk's journal, April, 1775, on the wilderness road to Kentucky, one of the very first settlers:

"tuesday 11th ....Mr Drake Bakes Bread with out Washing his hands...."

Spence

 

[coloradoclyde]

We live now we can never unlearn what we know,and that will alway color our view of the past. We look to journals they most people didn't write, newspapers that left most stories unwritten, books that tended to say how things should be instead of how they were,ads for stores and probate list. You can't be a hero if you don't over come the monster, so many stories of events dwelt on the worse and how our intrepid hero persivered.
'We see through a glass darkly. '

Not sure I understand what you're saying....or agree with it.

We certainly can unlearn what we know... We do every time we learn something new...

 

[Coot]

I think that he may be addressing those who will say something must have existed because it is "so simple - anyone could have thought of it" - which may be true for those living today who have seen millions of images on the net, in books, movies, tv, magazines, museums, etc. but our ancestors were not living in an information age. Like wise today we have widespread knowledge of germs, ballistics, and detailed maps of what was once unknown territory. It is very difficult to try to understand things as those with far more limited knowledge but very likely much more acute observational skills than is the case today.

 

[tenngun]

No, I mean the way we see the world. We can't look at the world the way they did. We know what happens at the end of the book. We don't share their knowledge their superstitions, their prejudices.When we walk in the woods we know there is not an NDN who will lift our hair( to late to do that with me) we know the importance wound care, or keeping food. We can read their notes,we can even try to understand what they thought but we can't get 'in to their heads'. We can't unlearn that slavery is wrong that women can vote and hold office that cock fighting is cruel that tomato are not poison ect.