Gram's Cottage Pudding Recipe, An Odd Old Man, and 1886 Advice from Aunt Patty

Something from almost nothing....that is cottage pudding.  It is something you make when being a good, frugal housekeeper.

This is Gram's recipe.  Gram was born in 1889, so Aunt Maggie's recipe is probably from this pre-20th century period.   Compared to more modern recipes this does not have much sugar. Check out the sauce, for instance! Did Gram forget to write down the sugar or did the strawberries carry the sugar?   Guess I'll have to try it...waiting til strawberry season, of course, like a good housewife should.

Recipes for everything and anything are in this, not atypical, book for 1888.  

Would you buy a pudding from this man?

Cottage Pudding - 1894 Style
By Jone Johnson Lewis on About.com
From a 19th century recipe for cottage pudding
Ingredients:
1 cup sugar
1/2 cup milk
1 1/2 cups flour
1 Tablespoon butter 2 Tablespoons butter 1 cup white sugar
1 Tablespoon flour
1 pint boiling water lemon to taste
Preparation:
One cup of sugar, one­half cup of milk, one and one­half cups of flour; and one tablespoonful of butter; bake as a cake, and serve with this­­
SAUCE.­­Two tablespoonfuls butter, one cup white sugar, and one tablespoon flour, wet in cold water; one pint of boiling water. Let boil two or three minutes, stirring all the time. Flavor with lemon.
MRS. JENNIE KRAUSE.
Recipes 1894 Style1 |Puddings 1894 Style2
Adapted from Recipes Tried and True, compiled by the Ladies' Aid Society of the First Presbyterian Church, Marion, Ohio, 1894, a source in the public domain.
The recipes in this collection are representative of cooking in America in the late 19th century, and the compilation of a cookbook shows the ways in which women were beginning to organize and act both within their traditional roles and outside of traditional expectations. The recipes are presented exactly as written in 1894, and may not conform to current nutritional or food preparation standards. Try at your own risk.
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Links in this article:
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The House of Thorburn vs.The Great Ruta Baga of Botley!

The Great Ruta Baga of Botley came to light in the following article from The American Florist, The American Farmer of 1869 goes into some detail about GRBB.  To be kind, the man seems to have been a nut case. An eccentric and prolific writer and champion of the rutabaga he was  convicted of libel on both sides of the Atlantic! He did believe his "ruta bagas" were the perfect crop though.
1906.  An English gentleman named Wm. Corbett was the Great Ruta Baga of Botley. He seems to have been an enemy of of the Thorburns.

I was  delighted when I found the issue of the Florist containing this history of the Thorburns. The thought of having to compile it wasn't making me glow with excitement,  yet they are such an important family in the history of the seed trade I felt I wanted to see the big picture.  Thank goodness IT'S BEEN DONE!

1818 Catalog of Wm. Prince: Just Plain Convolvulus (plus a treat)

William Prince published this catalog in 1818.   Working with his son by this date, he mentions you can pick up a catalog at the son's, Wm. R's, South Street establishment.

To make remembering who is who even more difficult, the senior Prince was the son of yet another William who was an economic botanist and horticulturist.

Their fields were in Flushing, New York.

I am featuring this to illustrate the style of older catalogs in general.  Buyers had to know what they wanted.  There was absolutely no attempt to seduce you with lush illustrations and horticulturally titillating descriptions.  You either knew what a "Convolvolos sagittafolius" was, or you didn't!  (Spelling was a more casual affair back then as well.)







Click here to view these full size PDF of the catalog and a sheet of a handwritten list by a buyer/dreamer.

I was curious to see what the buyer was checking off.












Here is your reward :-)  There is a fantastic book to download from Google Books,

The ladies' flower-garden of ornamental annuals by Mrs. Loudon

"Make Der Face Open, Fido" and A Seed's Sinister Secret

This delightful photo contains both charming children and a plant capable of poisoning the town's water supply!

While I am exaggerating a little, that lovely foliage plant to the right is the castor oil plant which contains ricin in all its parts.

The beans are especially laden with the poison. While one could die from eating 4 to 8 of them whole, and one could extract concentrated ricin, neither is likely due to the nasty effects of just a little of the poison, and the complication of the distillation process.  The Wikipedia page is very interesting overview of the plant.




Much more likely in the time of this photo would be a dosing of these little children with castor oil as a laxative!

Want to read the whole story? :-)

Also, "castor oil is an effective motor lubricant and has been used in internal combustion engines, including those of World War I airplanes, some racing cars and some model airplanes. It does not mix with petroleum products. It has been largely replaced by synthetic oils that are more stable and less toxic".





















This page is good if you are a gearhead!

A Tad More from the Three Misses from Minneapolis

Harking back to the 1/7/14 post Three Misses from Minneapolis, today's post is a full newspaper page that contains ads from all three seedswomen - Lippincott, Prior and White. Reading the whole page lets you travel back in time to 1906...a time when folks made their own lawn rollers it seems! 
 Do we roll lawns anymore?  I don't have a lawn, having decided to weed the grass out of my moss quite a few years ago.



A large size page is here.



When I did the first "3 Miss" postings I could not find much on Miss Jessie Prior.  Using newspapers I have started to find out more about her perhaps...and I am not sure she was really the mover and shaker in her company. I read that companies pretended to be women owned because women were perceived as more honest, careful and possibly cheaper sources of good seeds.
More on that later if it is interesting enough to mention.

A Selection of Shaker Images Relating to Seeds and One Good Link

Today's entry is not on the Thorburn family and their seed company!  It has been a busy week at school with after school events so until the weekend I am taking a break and posting a few things I have accumulated.  (I am so happy for two of my students who were chosen to represent  the school and the town in a PTA sponsored program, Reflections, at an event  last night at Cheney Hall! One will go on to the state level.)

A Selection of Shaker Images Relating to Seeds
 and One Good Link

“In the year 1790, Believers in this place had a Little Family garden occupying about two acres of land. Joseph Turner worked it and began to raise a few kinds of seeds to sell. Previous to this it was not customary in this part of the country for people to raise garden seeds for sale. When any neighbor lacked seeds, another would give him what he wanted and did not think of asking pay, more than they would for a bucket of water.” (WRHS Collection, n.d.) 

Read or download this PDF:  Hands to Work, Hearts to God: The Story of the Shaker Seed Industry.

Published by HortTechnology, Oct./Dec. 1993.  

The Emigrant's Informant, Or, A Guide to Upper Canada mentions...

The Farmer's Monthly Visitor - Volumes 1-2 -1839- Page 100

I wonder who designed this box above.  The printer or a Shaker?

The colorful boxes look so un-Shakerish, except from the perspective of being good displays that do their job well.

I find the printing on this one (above) really cool.  I like the upside down packet title.  Makes sense as people often put things down topsy turvy after looking.  Also unexpected is the fact it was printed after the packet was constructed.

Odds & Ends

I did not know HortTechnology .  Glad to have bumped into it!  - "HortTechnology serves as the primary outreach publication of the American Society for Horticultural Science. Its mission is to provide science-based information to professional horticulturists, practitioners, and educators; promote and encourage an interchange of ideas among scientists, educators, and professionals working in horticulture; and provide an opportunity for peer review of practical horticultural information."

Reproduction Shaker seed boxes from a company called Shaker Workshops. 

First Seedsman in New York City (Part 4)

                                                                                                                                          Grant Thorburn saw a need for seed but had no clue where to get it!                                                                                                         As luck would have it, the plant grower who supplied the plants for Thorburn's shop planned to grow seed on his farm for the next year. Plus, if Thorburn promised to buy his seed next year, he would sell Thorburn his stock of seed he had on hand which he had earlier planned to sell in the market.  A deal was struck on the 17th of September, 1805.  The first seed store in New York City was born.

He was right! The seed sales were brisk and he sold out quickly...which left him in the position of being seedless and clueless as to where one bought more.  He was as naive as they come it seems about the trade in seeds and anything else in the horticultural world.

If you read any of Grant Thorburn's books you get the impression he was an upbeat and nice man who people liked.  Over and over again, when he was in trouble or in need, people came to his aid.   

Read below, in his own words, what happened after he sold out!  The dude was lucky.

Odds & Ends

Malcolm & Co. was a good company to have found. They were well respected and were often mentioned as the the source of this or that cool new plant.  These references are from a later date than the catalog mentioned by Thorburn.

 Towards the end of this ad, Mr. Malcolm gives a testimonial to its efficacy :-)