A little help.

[Justin Runyon]

I'm working on translating a drink recipe for modern weights and measures. All of it is pretty cut and dry but one ingredient. First you should know the following.

It's all liquid except for the mystery ingredient.
It's all alcohol except for the mystery ingredient.
It's total ending volume is only about a half a gallon.
It's publication date is '63

So here you go, it calls for a half of a loaf of sugar.

So, is a loaf a standardized unit at the time (all my looking came up with nothing). If not, what would the average Joe on the street in 1863, while reading this recipe, consider a loaf to be?

[Army30th]

Re: A little help.

Justin,

IF you believe the internet, here's what I found. Sugarloaf is cylinder shaped and made in a mold. Most common in Europe and Germany, imported from the Caribbean and Brazil.


"...households bought their white sugar in tall, conical loaves, from which pieces were broken off with special iron sugar-cutters. Shaped something like very large heavy pliers with sharp blades attached to the cutting sides, these cutters had to be strong and tough, because the loaves were large, about 14 inches in diameter at the base, and 3 feet high [15th century]...In those days, sugar was used with great care, and one loaf lasted a long time. The weight would probably have been about 30 lb. Later, the weight of a loaf varied from 5 lb to 35 lb, according to the moulds used by any one refinery. A common size was 14 lb, but the finest sugar from Madeira came in small loaves of only 3 or 4 lb in weight...Up till late Victorian times household sugar remained very little changed and sugar loaves were still common and continued so until well into the twentieth century..."
"English Bread and Yeast Cookery", Elizabeth David [Penguin:Middlesex] 1977 (p. 139)

[Vuhginyuh]

Re: A little help.

I'm no help as usual, but I have a pair of nippers if you need them.

[Justin Runyon]

Re: A little help.

William

I found that same reference, but common sense dictates that your likley not putting 18 pounds of sugar into a less than a gallon of liquid and still drinking it. Even going on the small end of that reference seems extreme.

[Dale Beasley]

Re: A little help.

It all sounds like the ingredients of a "Drudge Punch" that is mixed together at a "Dinning-In".

[LibertyHallVols]

Re: A little help.

I've had a number of period drink recipes and several were quite sweet... I mean REALLY sweet!! (yick) However, even this seems extreme.

I would recommend "sweetening to taste", knowing that the original recipe may have been quite sweet, though the original amount of suger may be a mystery.

Also...
Boozie needs to post on this thread, just for the pure irony of it!

[swamp two]

Re: A little help.

I also think a sugar loaf was made of sugar with the molasses still in it. Brown Sugar instead of white.

[boozie]

Re: A little help.

No dice, I looked in my GG-Grandmothers 1888 "Websters Encyclopedia" which has recipes and how to measure wells, hay, corncribs, liquids, & etc. I found no use of the measurement loaf in 1888. Must have been out of style by then or else the measurment system was made a little more practical for folks batching.

[Hank Trent]

Re: A little help.

From Virginia Mescher's post in this thread http://www.authentic-campaigner.com/...ead.php?t=5979

I've seen sugar cones in museums that were about 11 inches high with a base diameter 4 1/2 inches and weighed about 4 to 5 pounds. In researching store ledgers, the whole sugar cones sold weighed between 11 to 13 pounds but I don't have size for those cones.

Hank Trent
hanktrent@voyager.net

[Becky Morgan]

Re: A little help.

Well, taking the 3-lb.measurement as a minimum, a pound and a half. My cold-addled brain doesn't trust the math involved, but it might be about three cups. That would be more syrupy than Kool-Aid. Half a pound would make sense, if we can determine that sugar came in cones that small.

[1stMaine]

Re: A little help.

Comrade,

I found this which might be of interest:

http://www.pbm.com/pipermail/hist-brewing/2002/006850.html

Read the comment at the bottom.......

respects,

[Hank Trent]

Re: A little help.

I found this which might be of interest:

http://www.pbm.com/pipermail/hist-brewing/2002/006850.html

Read the comment at the bottom.......

Umm... which comment? That modern Mexican sugar loaves are "exactly" like typical period sugar loaves? That's just dead wrong. All the pillonchio loaves resemble are pillonchio loaves, which folks have only been able to document to Mexico itself, during the Civil War period. In the U.S., brown sugar typically came in barrels, not loaves. All cane sugar loaves in the U.S. were white, as far as anyone can document, and the problem is that they did vary in size, though I'd guess most were larger than the Mexican loaves. (Maple sugar may be another matter.)

If that's not the comment, sorry for the tangent. :) Or if there's new documentation of small brown sugar loaves in the U.S. in the 1860s, I'm all ears.

Hank Trent
hanktrent@voyager.net

[Drygoods]

Re: A little help.

Mr. Runyon,

My guess is what they call for in that mixture is about a half a cup of sugar. This guess is my own judgement, bascially because my husband mixes all sorts of period drinks, and is close to what I would use from a cone sugar. Locally, I buy my white cone sugar imported from Europe, and it's good stuff too. Try this link: (click the english translation)

http://www.nordzucker.de/

I will say that it's the closest in size to an antique sugar mold that we've found, tastes good too. If you can't find it, I'll mail you some. You will want to re-wrap it in blue paper so that it looks period correct.:D

Has anyone done a study as to the variety of sizes of sugar molds, commercial and home use?

[Hank Trent]

Re: A little help.

Has anyone done a study as to the variety of sizes of sugar molds, commercial and home use?

Did you check up the thread in post #9?

The following description seems to fit with what Virginia Mescher said, talking about three sizes, small (which might be her 4-5 lb., 11" size), the 10-lb size, and the large 20-30 lb. size.

Loaf sugar is put up in large lumps called "lumps," weighing twenty or thirty pounds each, and in small sugar loaves, with which every one is familiar. But there is a loaf of intermediate size, weighing about ten pounds, and these loaves are called "titlers." (Notes And Queries, Feb. 4, 1871)

Here's an image of an antique loaf in England, which stands 25" high. I'd guess this would be one of the larger loaves in the 10 lb. range. http://home.clara.net/mawer/loaf.html

Actually, another way to approach this would be for Justin to post the whole recipe including the name of the drink, and see what other period examples of recipes for the same drink we can find. That might give us a range of typical sugar quantities for this particular drink, in measures other than loaves, and thus give an idea of what might be a reasonable amount.

Hank Trent
hanktrent@voyager.net

[Drygoods]

Re: A little help.

Mr. Trent,

The size is interesting. My husband and I found a wooden carved cone mold which was roughly a 10-12 inches deep and filled 5 cones in length, (basically was to set 5 cones of sugar at one time.) I wonder now if it isn't a cone mold for sugar? Were all molds made of tin like the illustration? Perhaps I've just not seen enough of them, certainly I've never found one 20-30pounds.