While this is not the typical book you might think about reading to learn more about your ancestors, it can potentially tell you a lot about what they may have been eating, how it was prepared, and even how it might have been served. In addition to utilizing other books about the history of food as sources, this author also reviewed period cookbooks and books on etiquette. Some of the cookbooks referenced can be found on the “Feeding America: The Historic American Cookbook Project” at Michigan State University. This book is part of the Food in American History series; and there are two other books: American Indian Food by Linda Murray Berzok, and Food in Colonial and Federal America, by Sandra L Oliver.
The first chapter discusses what types of food were available in the US in the Victorian era. The next chapter discusses how food was prepared, starting with cooking over an open fire, and by the 1890’s, utilizing a new-fangled wood burning stove. This is the era that also saw the invention of Mason jars and rotary egg beaters, among other innovations. The chapter on regional foodways is self-explanatory, and basically what you might expect. The author includes the occasional recipe, which are very interesting to read. However, between the fact that recipes of that era usually did not have measurements and cooking instructions spelled out the way we are familiar with, and some of the ingredients are no longer readily available, these recipes would be a challenge to prepare.
According to the chapter on eating habits, dining at home was much more complicated in the Victorian era, at least for middle-class to upper middle class people. I’m sure the true upper class just left all of the complications to the servants! I had seen a few of the serving pieces this book mentions in flea markets, and I was aware that there were quite a few different varieties of forks and spoons. One of the more interesting chapter discusses concepts of diet and nutrition. This is the era of Sylvester Graham and John Harvey Kellogg, whose influence on crackers and cereal make them household names still today. Some of the other dietary suggestions have gone out of favor, probably for the better.
If this was your family, how would you research them? Does your family have any heirloom recipes? If you have one that seems to have come from a specific ethnic group, that might be a clue to a distant ancestral line. If nothing else, it is still a connection with all of your family members who have prepared and eaten that dish in the past. I am fortunate that we have found a number of cookbooks and booklets that were owned by ancestors, especially my Grandmother. I’m not sure how much she used them, however, since most of them look rather pristine. Of course, these were published around the 1920’s, when she was newly married, much later than time frame of this book. Many of the booklets were published by a company that manufactured the product they wanted you to use in the recipes.