Rations

[Michael McComas]

Re: Andersonville Soup

This recipe doesn't sound too bad, except for the part about using the brain. Our forebears didn't know about infectious prion disorders (and many would argue that the USDA knows little more). Calf tongue is still a delicacy, sold in the upscale supermarkets around here.

[Masked Battery]

Period Recipes.

I've got a reprint of an 1862 Army of the Potomac cook's manual, and have tried a number of the recipes in it. I did planked shad at Five Forks this year. There is a recipe in the book for Baked Beef Head, or something like that. If someone wants to bring a fresh beef head to an event, I'll cook it.

Yummy

[Spinster]

Re: Andersonville Soup

Mr. Sexton, here's another receipt....

From the American Frugal Housewife, 1833:

Calf's head should be cleansed with very great care; particularly the lights. The head, the heart, and the lights should boil full two hours; the liver should be boiled only one hour. It is better to leave the wind pipe on, for if it hangs out of the pot while the head is cooking, all the froth with escape through it. The brains, after being throughly washed, should be put in a little bag; with one pounded cracker, or as much crumbled bread, seasoned with sifted sage, and tied up and boiled one hour. After the brains are boiled, they should be well broken up with a knife, and peppered, salted, and buttered. They should be put on the table in a bowl by themselves. Boiling water, thickened with flour and water, with butter melted in it, is the proper sauce; some people love vinegar and pepper mixed with the melted butter; but all are not fond of it; and it is easy for each one to add it for themselves.

And the same book later tells that a roasted head is half done when the eyes fall out........

I've made souse, and eaten brains as well as a few other oddities- a little while living in China does broaden one's culinary tastes. I do think though that I'll speak to Papa about obtaining a fresh head next time we send our own cows to slaughter--at least I know where those cows have been and what they've been eating.....

[Tom Ezell]

Re: Andersonville Soup

From Porter Alexander's memors:

“Our only trouble generally was in getting enough to eat for our personal mess. Not that our appetites were particularly phenomenal for soldiers, but there had been some new regulations, which, under the guise of liberality, really oppressed us dreadfully from now to the very end of the War.

Following the custom of the old U.S. Army, for the first two years or thereabouts, of the war, officers were not given any rations, but were permitted to buy, at cost, from the commissary whatever they required. Provisions were now getting so scarce that this privilege could not be kept up, & became liable to abuse. In fact the full ration of meat had been nearly cut in half long before this period, & it was even further reduced afterward. So the Confederate Congress passed a law giving each officer a ration in kind, but taking away the privilege of purchasing any. But we had to have servants to care for our horses & to cook, &c., & no way was provided for us to feed them, except by dividing our own reduced rations with them. The result of this was that we were in a chronic state of doubly short rations, & obliged to supplement what we could draw from the commissary with something from somewhere. Our first recourse was to buying from citizens in the vicinity of the army, but that was a very poor reliance. Every officers’ mess which had servants was in the same fix, & the country was harried with darkeys out buying up everything to eat. And Confederate money was going down in value, so fast that the country people were getting more and more unwilling to sell anything for it at any price. Eventually our mess managed to scrape along by having boxes sent to us from the South; not with cakes or poultry or luxuries, but with good fat bacon & cow peas. Joe Haskell and I were fortunate in having parents living in a section remote from troops & camps & on their own plantations. After we got back to Virginia we received such boxes frequently, & they helped us wonderfully.

Then we struck upon another idea. When a commissary issued beef to a command the head was left as a perquisite to the soldier who acted as butcher, & we discovered that the butcher did not seem to value it highly. Possibly he had liver or some other perquisite he liked better. At any rate we rarely had any difficulty in cheating a butcher out of a whole beef’s head for a little old Confederate dollar. And when a beef’s head is skinned & chopped up & boiled all day, if one is in camp, or all night if he is on the march, it makes a camp kettle nearly full of one of the most delightful & richest stews in the world. And if any of it is left, by merely fishing out the big bones, all the meat jellies together solid when it is cold – much resembling a forced meat dish, which, in my younger days, we knew as “Pompey’s head,” & it at once becomes one of those open questions upon which a man can never make up his mind. Whether he likes it best hot for breakfast and supper, or cold & cut into slices & carried in the haversack for lunch along the road. But one thing about it seems to me strange enough to be recorded. I have never wanted any more since the war. All the other camp dishes which I enjoyed then are more than welcome when I come across them now. Pea soup, cornbread, & good sweet bacon, blackberry dumpling, &c. have never lost their charm. But I have never hankered for a beef’s head since the war although it was inferior to none of the others during it.”

– Porter Alexander, Fighting for the Confederacy, pp 340-341.

[Freeborn]

Re: Andersonville Soup

"I strongly urged the preparation of large quantities of soup made from the cow and calves heads, with the brains and tongues, to which a liberal soup of sweet potatoes and vegetables might have been most advantageously added. The materials existed in abundance for the preparation of soup in large quantities."

I can't go back 140+ years, however I can go back some 50 years to my childhood in rural South Carolina. I remember eating cow's brains. I'm fairly certain it was mixed with scrambled eggs. Unfortunately, or perhaps fortunately, I can't remember what it tasted like. Actually little was wasted on the farm. If you didn't eat it, wear it, or make brooms, you made soap out of it. :)

freeborn

[Michael Comer]

Re: Andersonville Soup

Calve's brains, rooster fries, mountain oysters, head cheese, souse, pig's feet. We ate it all at my house when I was a kid. While the older members of the family ate most anything, I drew the line at some of it but enjoyed brains on a regular basis, often by themselves without being mixed with eggs. Eating brains was not a matter of being hungry - we didn't want for anything and produced just about everything we consumed. I genuinely liked them but I wouldn't eat them now; the idea goes against my tastes which makes them not so desirable.

But foodways and tastes are very much a matter of environment I think. If you are brought up eating certain foods they taste fine to you. We don't like the idea of eating dog but it is done reguarly in SE Asia.

19th century folks used more of the animal than we often do. The old saying about nothing goes to waste on a pig in the South except the squeal was almost literal. I am sure that soup would sound pretty tasty to many people.

[Charles Heath]

Re: Andersonville Soup

Sometimes we debate "dinner" vs "lunch."

"Whether he likes it best hot for breakfast and supper, or cold & cut into slices & carried in the haversack for lunch along the road."

(Boldface added for emphasis)

Another example of the term "lunch," although it appears to be a post-war passage, it's still another coal in that long running debate fire. Thanks, Tom.

Charles Heath

[John E. Tobey]

Re: Knife, fork, spoon combinations

Jaron,

I think that combo sets were fairly common, assuming we are talking about Federal troops. They survive fairly regularly in ID'ed groupings of US soldier material, and even the soldiers themselves recorded their purchase and use. If memory serves me correctly, even our old friend Ira Petit in "Diary of a Dead Man" wrote about purchasing a combo set "for his pocket".

I've attached a photo of two of the most commonly seen original styles. The "spork" (a modern term -- hold yer fire) on the left is a partial set that came out of an original haversack. The set in the middle is the same thing with both of its parts. They are made from some ferrous material. The one on the right is a common specimen of the folding variety with a german silver or plated brass spoon on it.

Both types are being reproduced, I believe. The quality of the repros is another matter.

John Tobey

[CJDaley]

Re: Knife, fork, spoon combinations

I know in addition to a bunch being id'd to Federals, there are 4 in the basement of the Museum of the Confederacy that are id'd to Confederates.

[Tom Ezell]

Re: Knife, fork, spoon combinations

I know in addition to a bunch being id'd to Federals, there are 4 in the basement of the Museum of the Confederacy that are id'd to Confederates.

And, fwiw, General Sweeny's Museum up by Republic, MO has several examples of these, one being the combnation set used by MG Patrick Cleburne. Cleburne's set is similar to some of the reproductions offered save for having a smaller, three-tined fork and staghorn grips.

Tom

[Masked Battery]

Period Receipt

from the 1862 Manual For Army Cooking

BAKED BEEF HEAD.
(Without cooking utensils.)

Dig in the ground a hole of sufficient size and build a fire in it. After the fuel has burned to coals put in the head, neck downward. Cover it with green grass, coals, and earth. Build a good fire over the buried head and keep it burning for about six hours.
Unearth the head and remove the skin. A head treated in this way at night will be found cooked in the morning. The head of any animal may be cooked in this way.

[Since it says any animal head can be cooked like this, I been practisin' on toads in the back yard.]

[Masked Battery]

Desiccated Potatoes-- what the Army wanted

The following comes from the "Proposals" section of the New York Times 12/26/1864. The typos were present in the original text.

ARMY SUPPLIES.
Office Of Assistant
Commissary-General Of Subsistence
No.4 State-St., New-York, Dec. 22, 1864.
Sealed proposals (in triplicate) will be received by the undersigned until 4 o'clock P.M. on THURSDAY, the 29th instant, for furnishing for issue to the United States Army, DESICCATED POTATOES for six months, at the rate of one hundred thousand pounds per month, first delivery to be completed Jan. 20, 1865.
The desiccated potatoes must be manufactured exclusively from sound potatoes of the best varities, and without admixture of any other ingredients, to be in all particulars sound and free from sourness or flavor. to be ground to the fineness of coarse meal, and packed in air-tight tin or zinc boxes, containing sixty pounds net, these to be packed in strong, well-made and strapped wooden boxes, two in each, with sunken and battened ends, like sample packages to be seen at this office.
Proposers will state where their manufactories are located, and will briefly describe their method of granulating and desiccation, stating also the average time required for the several processes of manufacture. The deliveries are to be made monthly, and free of expense to the United States, at the Subsistence Storehouse, No.4 State-street, New-York, or at such other points in the City of New-York as may be designated by the proper authority.
Each proposer is required to furnish a sample of no less than three hundred and sixty pounds of his own manufacture, packed as above.

.......{Following the above are paragraphs detailing how proposers are required to obtain $10,000 bonds, etc., which I have omitted.].......

H. F. CLARKE
Colonel, A.D.C. and C.S.

[jaron_hudgins]

Re: Knife, fork, spoon combinations

Many thanks to all of you for your help. I greatly appreciate it. I just wanted to make sure that it was a common item before making a purchase.
Jaron Hudgins

[BrianHicks]

Slab Bacon... the Price per pound there of.

While wandering through the local Farmers Market today, I found a vendor with Slab Bacon for sale.

These were in approx. slabs of 10 lbs each. If you purchase the full slab, he sales it for $2.68 a lb.

If you need him to cut the slab into smaller portions, he sales it at @2.88 a lb.

Having never purchased slab bacon before, are these good prices?

Knowing that the Bacon will keep for a season or two, I'm just curious if it would be worth stocking up on a slab or two.

[10nycav]

Re: Desiccated Potatoes-- what the Army wanted

The following on dessicated vegetables comes from The Indian War of 1864, by Eugene Ware, Chapter XXVII., (November 10, 1864). Note that it also refers to packing dessicated vegetables in tins. It also has an exact description of what vegetables were used.

Ken Morris
10th Regt of Cavalry NYSV.

"We never had any fresh vegetables at Julesburg; they could not be got to us. But there were issued to us what were called "desiccated vegetables." In the true pronunciation of the word the second syllable is long, but it was called by the boys as if it were dessy-kated, with accent on the third syllable. It was made of onions, cabbages, beets, turnips, carrots and peppers, steamed, pressed and dried. They were almost in the form of leaves pressed together. They were pressed, after they were dry, into cakes twelve inches square, and an inch thick. They were pressed so hard that they weighed about as much as wood, and came sealed up in tin cans about a foot square. They were intended to be put into the soups, and were largely used by us for that purpose. They were very nutritious, and it was convenient, when we went on scouts, for the boys to break off a piece and put it in a saddle-pocket. The boys would nibble at it as they were riding along; it was a kind of leguminous bread, and they ate about as much of it dry as they did by putting it into soups. But we had been so long without vegetables that indications of scurvy began to make themselves noticeable."