Minced Pie of Beef

While preparing for an 18th Century event last week, I knew the weekend was going to be hot, but we needed to eat. I pre-planned a basic menu of fruit, bread, and cheese. While planning I thought of all the wonderful meat pies that the 18th Century has to offer, and how many of them are served cold. I landed in Amelia Simmon's American Cookery, since it is not a large book, it was easy to find what I wanted to cook- Minced Pie of Beef, and it didn't require a lot of ingredients.

This makes a very large pie, so I quartered the recipe, boiling a little over a pound of chopped beef ( I did cheat a little here and used "beef bites" instead of chopping the beef myself). While the beef was boiling, I peeled and chopped two apples (pink lady ones this time) and mixed the raisins in along with about a 1/4 tsp each of cinnamon, nutmeg, and mace. Since I do not have a local source for suet, and did not have time to order any, I used the best alternative I could find- frozen butter. I grated one stick of frozen butter over the apples. raisin, spices.

Frozen butter in with the apples & raisins.

After most of the filling was mixed together, I added the liquid. While the recipe asks for wine of cyder, I didn't have either on hand, however, I did have port! Being perfectly period appropriate, I added what I had- using about 1/2 cup of port over the mixture.

Port ready to add to the mix.

By this point the beef had been drained and cooled off a little. I sprinkled a little kitchen pepper over the beef to give it a little flavor. All of this (beef & apple mixture) was folded together and placed into a dish.

Pie filling ready for the crust!

While the recipe calls for the mix to be placed in "Paste No. 3", I used a store bought crust (yes, I know, but it was the night before the event, and I still had stuff to sew). All in the dish, top crust added, vented, and placed in 350* oven. It backed for close to an hour. 

Pie ready for the oven. 

I realized that I had absolutely no pictures of the finished pie or of it being eaten. It was eaten for lunch on Saturday. It was a very hot day and I had placed the pie in the refrigerator in the office the day before. It was good & cold, and tasted great cold. It was nice to share the pie with friends gathered around our sutler booth. Overall response was that it tasted great! Next time, mince the meat a little finer. 

*This post is made in memory of the fabulous deep pie dish I made this pie in, upon unpacking the car fell to it's end & broke when it landed on the driveway*

Sliced Apple Pudding

After browsing for recipes for a cooking workshop, I came across this wonderfully easy recipe. Mary Randolph's Sliced Apple Pudding looked easy and tasty.

The Virginia Housewife, 1838

I started by peeling and slicing my apples- I chose two Granny Smith and Two Gala (maybe?)- they were what I had on hand from a mixed box. Next-six eggs- I had whisked them for around five minutes to get them "very light"- added two cups of whole milk. Adding flour is always a trail for me- I added one cup at a time, mixing the batter very well between, I ended up with four cups- it seemed to be the thickness of a cake batter. Adding a small cup of melted butter (around 1 1/2 sticks) mixing well. Then poured in the apple slices, mixing them in well. Four apples seemed to be just the right amount for this dish. I added some sugar, butter & nutmeg to the top.

Pudding before going into the oven. (I am such a messy cook!)

This recipe is large- so be prepared to use a very large dish (I ended up with a Pyrex mixing bowl). Into a 350* oven. It baked for around 40 minutes.  I found out when dishing it out that the middle had not set very well, longer in the oven, or a slightly  higher temp would have helped. Top each serving with some butter, sugar, and nutmeg as suggested. 

Hot Apple Pudding! 

The pudding was very good, the apples were still a little crisp as well. If you do not like a very sweet dessert this would be great for you since the only added sugar is on top. If you would like a sweeter pudding, add some sugar to the batter before adding the apples- a cup or so should be enough. Overall I do think that this will go in the index to try again! 

Cider Cake

The holiday season brings with it a slew of sweet cakes, cookies, and other goodies. In that festive way I decided to try a new cake. This recipe comes from The Frugal Housewife, 1833.  I have seen many other recipes for Cider Cake, but this was the book I had in my kitchen and didn't have to look up another recipe!

Modern measurements for this recipe are 6 cups of flour, 1 cup of sugar, 1 stick of butter, 1 cup of apple cider and 1 tsp of baking soda.

Mixing all the ingredients in a bowl the batter seemed very stiff, almost like a bread, and less like a cake. I did add more cider as I went to moisten the batter and make it more manageable.  "Spice to your taste," well that can mean anything right? Well, almost. Looking at other recipes from the period, most of the Cider Cakes call for raisins, and of coarse some nutmeg. I added about a handful of raisins, and maybe less than a teaspoon of nutmeg ( I did not want to over-power the Cider).
Since I do not have any small loaf pans I decided to bake this cake in a small bunt cake pan that i have that has space for 6 cakes.  I did have enough batter to fill a small 8" round pan as well.  The batter was very thick, think cookie dough almost. In the oven at 350 for about 30 minutes, depending on your cake pan and oven. Start checking your cake about 20 minutes in to see if it is done.   Mine took about 30 minutes to cook, so Mrs. Child was right on with my oven!

The cake had a very good taste, but again, very dense and heavy.  I think next time I will try the Kentucky Housewife version which call for eggs, that may change the consistency a bit and make more of a "cake" that we are used to.

To Make a Cheshire Pork-Pie

So this recipe is a little older than the 19th Century, but I still wanted to try it. Besides, meat pies are timeless! After searching the books & finding many, many pies I still had not found one that I really wanted to try. Sure there were ones that looked good, and I have an idea for my next one, but this one sounded super good. I found the recipe on the Colonial Williamsburg Colonial Foodways page. The cool thing about the CWCF page is that they have already done the hard work for you! They give a period recipe, and the modern conversion for you, super easy!
 On to the pie! Today's recipe comes from "The Art of Cookery Made Plain & Easy", 1784.

So in the original recipe we need pork, pippins (apples), crust, seasonings & white wine. Luckily, we can still get all of these things today with ease!

Pork & Apples Layered in crust

I chose a thin cut pork chop, a little over a pound ended up being six pork chops. I seared them in the skillet as recommended by CW to ensure that the meat was fully cooked.  Don't forget to season them with salt, pepper, & nutmeg!! While the pork was cooking I started the crust. I chose to make the No. 1 Common Paste from The Practical Cook Book as made in the Apple Pie.  However, for this crust I only added about 3 cups of flour, and it was greatly improved!

So with the crust done & the pork seared, the apples pealed & sliced. Now time for assembly  I was using a deeper pie dish, about 8" wide and 3 or 4" deep to make sure I had enough layering room.

The bottom crust was already in the plate, and had been in the fridge while peeling & cutting apples.
 The dish was then layered with pork (3 chops on bottom) then apples & sugar, and the other 3 chops, followed by the rest of the apples.  When the layers are all in the plate, you add the wine.  I was able to find a "Rhine Wine" as CW called for, I had never heard of it, though I am not a wine person. I added a little over half a cup since I had a deep dish pie. Top crust added & closed.

Into the oven at 350 for about 40 minutes. It was a waiting game for this one, I was so ready to eat it, as was DH!  So as soon as I pulled it out of the oven he was ready to eat it. We did let it cool for a few minutes before I cut into it.  One thing I have noticed is that this crust does not really brown, so it looks almost the same coming out of the oven as it does going in! I did rub a little butter on the top crust when it was right out of the oven this time.  It smelled wonderful!  It was wonderful! The spices & wine & apples all work together to give a great sweet, but not too sweet taste. "These pork chops are amazing" So I had a pleased husband.

Dished out & ready to eat!

What I learned from this pie, next time cut the pork into smaller chucks rather than leaving the pork chop whole, it would really help the serving& eating of the pie. Maybe less apples, I used four, and it did seem a little apple heavy. And maybe a little less wine. The pie was very liquid-y, and that could have been from the apples, but since I used about 3/4 cup of wine, next time maybe only a half?
Over all, this was one of the tastiest  things tried so far!

No. 3 Apple Pie

In preparation of an upcoming event, I decided to try some new recipes, one of those being apple pie. I have never made an apple pie, so this would be my first adventure, and for some reason I seem to have better results with recipes that are 150+ years old, I don't know why, so please don't ask (however, my DH has a theory on this).
 So, the crust.
I chose a simple recipe for the crust and pie out of  "The Practical Cook Book", 1850. It seemed simple enough, and since I can't really have a food processor at a Civil War event I needed a new crust recipe (my usual crust recipe came out of a Woman's Day magazine from last year).  So I chose "No. 1 Common Paste".  Converted to modern measurements it called for 2 sticks of butter ( I used unsalted at room temp to blend better), 4 cups of flour, 1 Teaspoon of salt, and about  1 cup of water.  I mixed the dough with my hands to make sure I had a good consistency. I turned it out on my wooden board that I kneed my bread on. It was almost too much dough for the small board, so I halved it to form a top & bottom crust. With the bottom rolled out nicely, I placed it in my lightly floured pie plate.  Crust, successful, so far....

 The pie. I chose again out of the same book for the pie. "No. 3 Apple Pie" sounded good. The recipe did not specify what apples to use, I chose Gala, they have a sweet taste that I really enjoy.  Peeled and sliced 3 large apples were enough to fill the crust. I heaped them into the crust. Since there were no measurements for the spices, I guessed. I chose the molasses from my cabinet that my grandpa brought me last year from the mountains (that is some good stuff!!!). I drizzled until the apples looked nicely covered. Then added the cinnamon, sprinkling it over the molasses. I did not have any allspice, so I dashed in a pinch of nutmeg,and the salt.  It looked so good at this point that I decided to snap a picture! My DH was excited at this point too, despite the mess I was making in the kitchen. It smelled good too! I was giddy at this point, it really looked like pie! 
I rolled out the rest of the dough for the top crust, and pinched it together on the sides, pulling off the excess dough as needed. Cutting a slit in the top as directed for steam to escape. Hmm, this may actually work!

The pie went in a "Moderate Oven" which means anywhere from 350-375. Mine was set at 350. Baked for 45 minutes, the crust did not really brown, except part of the edges. I wasn't sure when I took it out of the oven, it looked the same as when it was put in.  We let it cool for a bit before being too excited to wait any longer. It smelled so good as I cut into it! We scooped out some! IT WAS PIE! I made a successful pie! The apples were so good! The crust was a little bland, but after it soaked in the syrup it was nice too! 

For the future pie I think I will use a bit less flour. It was too much for the size of my pie plate. I may add a little sugar to the crust as well since it was a bit bland. But with less flour it may have more flavor too. I may let it cool longer too. The insides were a bit runny, which I noticed later after cooling became more like syrup. Other than that, it was good experience, and I plan on making it again soon!!