The haunting of Old Lousiville
Living in Old Louisville, the third largest preservation area in the United States, was a new experience for me.
At the time I moved there the neighborhood was still in transition, with a lot of rehabbing going on. Unfortunately the streets were not always clean and there were a lot of unsavory characters lurking about.
I had been living there for around five years when I discovered that, besides the unsavory characters you could see, I was surrounded by some you couldn’t see. Evidently, there were ghosts peering from many of the gardens and leaning against the mansion gates on every block. They sat on the steps of the Christian Science Church just three blocks from me and sobbed each night from the windows of the houses down the street from me. Seems as though they were everywhere.
I never saw hide nor hair of any of them…never heard them sobbing, but believe me, I wouldn’t admit it. Not with all my guests asking me with anticipation if my house was haunted and looking disappointed when I answered no. We have hundreds of visitors here all year round clamoring to book Ghost Tours in hopes of see a wisp or two floating around a corner. I honestly tried to believe, but never had much luck with it. I’m too much of a realist.
Old Louisville has beautiful tree-lined streets with turn of the century mansions built in seven major kinds of architecture. They are decorated with gargoyles, chameleons, serpents, swans, turrets, and towers and enhanced with a variety of wrought-iron fences, hand-carved doors, and stained-glass windows. There are also hidden balconies, secluded courtyards, and secret passageways. All of this dark and spooky ornamemtation sets the scene for our ghostly reputation. The many ghost legends and the historical acoutrements make Old Louisville one of the most interesting areas in Kentucky.
Come and take a Ghost Tour and you’ll hear about the young girl with black hair, who died 90 years ago, but haunts the neighborhood to this day as she waits for her betrothed on the steps of the First Church of Christ Science, only three blocks from my house. You might even see her. Let me know if you do.
A few blocks the other way, the “phantom of Brook Street”, a young girl attacked and murdered by two vagrants in a home where she worked, still comes to work daily. Other ghosts, like the Widow Hoag and the Iceboy supposedly can be seen from time to time lurking in the shadows. I’ve never seen any of them, but a few of my guests swear that they have…probably just wishful thinking.
A former high school five blocks to the north of me is haunted by students who insist on coming back every year. A gray shingled building on Sixth Street has a fascinating and eerie history and odd occurrences since the 1940s still exist to this day. Also, in the ’40s, a royal wedding took place at South Fourth Street mansion in which a local girl, married one of the richest men in the British Isles. Evidently, he died soon after they were married. and her her sad spirit still visits yearly, weeping for her lost love. And, then there’s the Conrad Caldwell museum, only a few blocks west of me, where visitors have experienced uncanny sensations when they wander off from the group, and the ghosts of Floral Terrace who constantly whisper secrets as you walk by.
So there you have it. This is where I lived…in a 4028 square foot Victorian Italianate mansion among the dense gardens of the spookiest neighborhood in the county.
More recipes
Sweet Potato Shoestrings
recipe by Karina’Kitchen
Sweet Potato Shoestrings
We bake our shoestring potatoes instead of deep-frying them because after a certain age your tummy starts to protest too much fat. But don’t worry. These fries are still crispy and delicious (compliments of Karina’s Kitchen).
Ingredients
1 sweet potato per person
Light olive oil or organic canola oil, as needed
ground cumin,
thyme,
black pepper,
red pepper,
cinnamon*
For serving:Sea saltChampagne or rice vinegar
Instructions
Preheat the oven to 450 degrees.
Peel the sweet potatoes and cut them into long thin shoestrings. Toss them into a bowl and drizzle with light olive oil; stirring lightly to coat.Generously season them.
My seasoning mix is equal shakes of: cumin, thyme and black pepper; and a little bit of hot red pepper and cinnamon.
Throw them on a baking sheet. Spread evenly- in one layer, if possible.Bake in the upper portion of your oven for about 20 to 30 minutes- until they are tender and sizzling and crispy around the edges.
Season with sea salt immediately. (Adding salt after they roast keeps them crisper.) Serve with a sprinkle of champagne vinegar (at the table) or scarf them down plain.
Delicious Gluten-Free Muffins
1 C. Authentic Foods Pancake & Baking Mix*
1/2 C sugar
1 TBL sugar
1/8 tsp Xanthan gum (optional)
1/8 tsp allspice
1 tsp cinnamon
1/2 tsp baking powder
2 TBL corn or canola oil
1/2 tsp lemon juice
1 egg or 2 egg whites
1/4 C cream
2 TBL water
1/2 C. raisins and/or nuts
paper muffin cups
Preheat oven to 375 degrees.
place paper muffin cups into muffin
tin, spray with baking oil, & set aside.
In a medium bowl, mix together first 7 ingredients. In a small bowl, beat together remaining wet ingredients. Add to dry ingredients, and stil until smooth. Add raisins and/or nuts. Divide batter into 6 muffin cups andBake at 375 degrees for 20 minutes. Muffins should be golden.Muffins are done when a toothpick inserted in centercomes out clean.
* may substitute any reputable gluten-free baking mix
Agents, query letters, and publishing
Check out this site: “Make Yourself Irresistable: http://www.larsen-pomada.com/lp/pages.cfm?ID=12
and this video:
Tales From an Innkeeper’s Crypt
“I am writing a memoir about the 16 years I was an Innkeeper in Louisville, Kentucky. It documents how, without any business experience and very little start up money, I created a successful business on my own with sheer determination. It includes how I learned to negotiate with contractors, maintenance men, and the city, and how I dealt with and related to hundreds of guests, twenty five different house-keepers and assistants, and gourmet breakfasts. Selected stories about guests are presented along with many of my favorite recipes and knowledge about food and diet, as is information about Kentucky.”
Despite never having been in business and knowing nothing about bed and breakfasts, Nancy Hinchliff a retired school teacher moves to Louisville, Kentucky, buys a turn of the century mansion, and turns it into a charming Victorian Inn. Admittedly asocial, she struggles with learning to chat, placate, and pamper her guests. Her culinary skills get her though morning gourmet breakfasts as she develops hundreds of recipes and helps write and edit a cookbook for the Bed and breakfast Association of Kentucky. She has an uncanny way of handling contractors, housekeepers, and “high maintainance” guests with wit and humor. Hinchliff gives an in-depth and honest look at what it’s like to be an Innkeeper while keeping your sanity. Her tenacity comes through loud and strong as her personal journey takes her to virtual and emotional places she’s never been before.
Ms Hinchliff has been collecting stories about her guests, her Inn, and Kentucky for years. She began posting them on a couple of blogs she created when she started blogging in 2008. The feedback was very positive. Many people encouraged her to put her stories into a memoir. She had several writer read through her pages and they all had good things to say about it and encouraged her to try to have it published. And so, since her life as an Innkeeper will be coming to a close soon, she’s decided to do just that, partly to see if she could publish and partly to have something to give to her family. Having read many memoirs and not having seen anotherthat had included recipes along with the memoir text except for May Angelou’s Halleluia, the Welcome Table, she truly believes she has something unique.
Other than a coffee table cookbook collaborated on for the Bed and Breakfast Association of Kentucky for which she won their president’s Award for writing and editing, 2009, she have not published any other books, but has been writing journal articles and creative non-fiction for many years, as well as newpaper articles, newsletters and several blogs for local businesses and organizations. She is presently writing for Examiner.com. Eye on Living, Pink Magazine, and Hub pages on the Internet.
Kentucky’s Appalachia
“…So many lies have been written about us, the mountain people, that folks from other states have formed an image of a gun-totin’, tabaccer –spittin , whiskey drinkin’, barefooted, foolish hillbilly who never existed except in the minds of people who have written such things as The Beverly Hillbillies…No matter what we do, we can’t make folks believe we are any different…we have been disgraced in the e yes of the outside world.” , from What My Heart Wants To Tell by Verna Mae Slone, Lexington, Kentucky 1978.
Early Appalachia
The Appalachian Mountains stretch from Belle Isle in Canada to Cheaha Mountain in the U.S. state of Alabama. The cultural region of Appalachia typically refers only to the central and southern portions of the range. As of 2005, the region was home to approximately 23 million people. Along with Scotch-Irish immigrants, early European populations of Germans and English settlers trickled into Western Pennsylvania, Northwestern Virginia, and Western Maryland.
With the discovery of the Cumberland Gap in 1750 and the end of the French and Indian War in 1763, settlers moved deeper into the mountains of upper Eastern Tennessee, Northwestern North Carolina, Upstate South Carolina, and Central Kentucky. Between 1790 and 1840, a series of treaties with the Cherokee and other Native American tribes opened up lands in North Georgia, Northeast Alabama, the Tennessee Valley, the Cumberland Plateau regions, and the highlands along what is now the Tennessee-North Carolina border.
A typical depiction of an Appalachian pioneer involves a hunter wearing a coonskin cap and buckskin clothing, and sporting a long rifle and shoulder-strapped powder horn. Perhaps no single figure symbolizes the Appalachian pioneer more than Daniel Boone (1734-1820). Like Boone, Appalachian pioneers moved into areas largely separated from “civilization” by high mountain ridges, and had to fend for themselves against the elements. As many of these early settlers were living illegally on Native American lands, attacks from Native American tribes were a continuous threat until the 1800s.
As early as the 18th century, Appalachia, then known as the “back country”, began to distinguish itself from its wealthier lowland and coastal neighbors to the east. Frontiersmen often bickered with lowland and tidewater “elites” over taxes, sometimes to the point of armed revolts. Taxation was a threat to the abundant Moon shining that went on in the area. Small-scale whiskey production was part of the Appalachian culture and predates the federal taxation of alcoholic beverages. For farmers in remote parts of the country, it was a way to turn their corn into cash when grain prices were down. The imposition of a tax on whiskey was considered an unwanted federal intervention and Appalachian farmers ignored the tax and finally refused to pay it, leading to what became known as the Whiskey Rebellion. The Department of the Treasury sent special agents, referred to as “revenuers” up into the mountains to prosecute unlawful distilling.
.
Mountain People
The Appalachian people have always been a rugged, hard-working and self-sufficient people able to adjust to the unforgiving life in the mountains. They have managed to build an abundant farming community, utilizing local plants and herbs to create unique and delicious dishes and folk medicines. Early Appalachian farmers grew both crops introduced from their native Europe, such as sweet potatoes, as well as crops native to North America such as corn and squash.
Tobacco was long an important cash crop in Southern Appalachia, especially since the land is ill-suited for cash crops such as cotton. Apples have been grown in the region since the late 18th-century, their cultivation being aided by the presence of thermal belts in the region’s mountain valleys. Hogs, which could free range in the region’s abundant forests, were the most popular livestock among early Appalachian farmers.
The early settlers brought cattle and sheep to the region, which would typically graze in highland meadows known as balds during the growing season when bottom lands were needed for crops. Cattle, mainly the Hereford, Angus, and Charolais breeds, are now the region’s chief livestock. They have taken advantage of the abundant anthracite and timber in the area by becoming skilled coal miners and lumberers. And they have engaged in a variety of successful manufacturing and tourism enterprises. This is a group of intelligent, creative and resourceful people who, despite their obvious abilities have not been able to keep up with the rest of the nation, and have been plagued with unfair criticism and ridicule.
Moonshine
Simply put, “moonshine” is untaxed liquor. Americans have always had an infatuation with this untaxed backwoods brewed corn concoction.
After fighting a war to free themselves from British oppressive taxes, Americans weren’t pleased when they were told they would have to pay an excise tax on whiskey and spirits. Scots-Irish immigrants, armed with the knowledge of making whiskey, were among the first to move into the remote areas of the East Tennessee mountains to produce their product by the light of the moon.
At that time, the people living in the Appalachian mountain territory of East Tennessee, as well as Southern Kentucky and Western North Carolina, had acquired something of a national reputation for persistently defying internal revenue laws. When prohibition was instated in 1920, it was the best thing to happen to moonshiners. Suddenly, “legal alcohol” was not to be found. The demand for moonshine rose so fast that producers began making it from sugar, as well as other cheap ingredients to increase their production and profit. During prohibition, blockade runners became legendary by outrunning lawmen with faster, more modern automobiles.
This ultimately led to the southern creation of stock car racing, which eventually would spawn the internationally watched NASCAR Racing. Robert Mitchum and others help secure the legend of “running” moonshine in the 1958 movie Thunder Road. A young Jeff Bridges tore up the stock car circuit as The Last American Hero in 1973. Bridges’ character, an impressive/aggressive race car driver “learned about cars running whiskey in the Carolina hills.”
The adrenaline of transporting mass amounts of illegal alcohol was later captured in Smokey and the Bandit and the list continues. And more recently in the movie Life, Eddie Murphy and Martin Lawrence portray two New York City men caught up in a brutal murder while picking up a truck load of moonshine in Mississippi.
Lumbering, Coal mining, and Education
In the late 19th century, the post-Civil War Industrial Revolution and the expansion of the nation’s railroads brought a soaring demand for coal, and mining operations expanded rapidly across Appalachia. Hundreds of thousands of workers poured into the region from across the United States and from overseas, essentially overhauling the cultural makeup of Eastern Kentucky, West Virginia, and Western Pennsylvania.
Both lumbering and coal mining industries flourished during this time, bringing with them jobs, decent wages, and amenities, which lured Appalachian workers. But, by the 1960s, it was evident that they had not taken advantage of the long term benefits that both industries brought.
Lumbering
Despite abundant natural resources and an inexhaustible supply of timber and anthracite, the area continued to lag behind the rest of the country in terms of prosperity. Poor roads, lack of railroads, and inaccessibility prevented large scale logging. Eventually logging companies were forced to move elsewhere.
Coal mining
Coal mining afforded a good living for most of the residents; although the industry can be blamed for the many injuries, deaths, and health problems of the workers. After World War II, innovation in mechanization and competition for oil and natural gas led to a decline in mining operations. Coal mining continues to be important in some regions of the mountains. Mining corporations gained considerable influence in state and municipal governments, especially as they often owned the entire towns in which the miners lived.
Education
Education, in Appalachia, has also lagged behind the rest of the country, mostly due to funding problems. But, traditionally, most residents have engaged in farming and have not seen the necessity for formal education. In fact, when families were planting or harvesting, children, who did go to school, were kept home to help with the farm work. However; after mandatory education laws went into effect, more school were established and more children attended them.
The making of a myth
Since its recognition as a distinctive region in the late 19th century, Appalachia has been a source of enduring myths and distortions regarding the isolation, temperament, and behavior of its inhabitants. Early 20th-century writers focused on sensationalistic aspects of the region’s culture, such as moon shining and clan feuding, and often portrayed the region’s inhabitants as uneducated and prone to impulsive acts of violence. Sociological studies in the 1960s and 1970s helped to deconstruct these stereotypes, although popular media continued to perpetuate the image of Appalachia as a culturally backward region into the 21st century.
The late 19th and early 20th centuries also saw the development of various regional stereotypes. Attempts by President Rutherford B. Hayes to enforce the whiskey tax in the late 1870s led to an explosion in violence between Appalachian “moonshiners” and federal “revenuers” that lasted through the Prohibition period in the 1920s. The breakdown of authority and law enforcement during the Civil War may have contributed to an increase in clan feuding, which by the 1880s was reported to be a problem across most of Kentucky’s Cumberland region as well as Carter County in Tennessee, Carroll County in Virginia, and Mingo and Logan counties in West Virginia.
Regional writers from this period such as Mary Noailles Murfree and Horace Kephart liked to focus on such sensational aspects of mountain culture, leading readers outside the region to believe they were more widespread than in reality. In an 1899 article in Atlantic , Berea president William G. Frost attempted to redefine the inhabitants of Appalachia as “noble mountaineers”— relics of the nation’s pioneer period whose isolation had left them unaffected by modern times.
The 1990s saw the continued stereotyping Appalachia and its people. Declining living standards, and global economic restructuring produced anxiety, insecurity and anger resulting in the projection of these emotions on to innocent people. Mountain people seem to have become acceptable targets for hostility, projection, disparagement, scape-goating, and contempt. “These mountain people are different”, says the mayor of North Carolina, “You get up there in those mountains…you find people who don’t believe in law and order….you get up there and cause trouble and they’ll kill you. They’re just a different grade of people”
Stereotyping continued
Unfortunately, they could not seem to escape these stereotypes. A Rock and Ice writer recently related his rock climbing experiences up in the mountains. “We drove by clumps of locals who eyed us with smoldering hostility.” Referring to them as “the cast of Deliverance” and “…the sorriest looking dudes I’ve ever seen…”, he expressed fear over not being able to see his buddy’s truck in the rear view mirror.
The New York Times magazine published an article recently that stated that red neck jokes, that target racist and bad reactionaries, have become very popular on chat rooms and on line forums. In addition an icon of an outhouse was published in a soft ware program as representing the state of West Virginia. These people have no way of fighting back, as most of them don’t have computers.
Performances continue to be held as part of summer festivals re-enacting the feud between the Hatfields and the McCoys, and many Ma and Pa restaurants, motels and businesses display hillbilly and redneck signs and icons to attract attention. Hillbilly Days, a 3-day yearly event, brings more than 100,000 visitors to a small Appalachian town where they dress up and act like comic book characters of mountaineers. Mass media is any better when it comes to reinforcing the stereotype. TV is still repeating the Beverly Hillbillies and the Dukes of Hazzard. All of this, of course, is to make money. But there is definitely a target audience that gets a kick out of attending these events and watching these programs on a regular basis. Hollywood is equally guilty by producing a bevy of such films, 400 silent movies, exploiting Appalachian feuds and Moonshine making.
Academia has portrayed the stereotype in every way possible. David Hacket Fischer focused on one particular group, from Northern Britain universalizing their characteristics unfairly. There been a one-sided look at this population by many scholars, which is generally degrading
Even in the Art world we can see examples of degrading images portrayed as typical of the population in Appalachia. Shelby Lee Adams has published portraits of a retired coal miner missing an eye, an adult midget wearing diapers, a hog killing, a shirtless man with several gunshot wounds.
Urban Appalachians are people from Appalachia who are living in metropolitan areas outside the Appalachian region. Mechanization of coal mining during the 1950s and 1960s was the major source of unemployment in central Appalachia. Many migration streams covered relatively short distances, with West Virginians moving to Cleveland and other cities in eastern and central Ohio, and eastern Kentuckians moving to Cincinnati and southwest Ohio in search of jobs. More distant cities like Detroit and Chicago attracted migrants from many states. Enclaves of Appalachian culture can still be found in some of these communities.
Kentucky Traditions
*Recipe: Wilted Bibb lettuce salad
Imagine life before refrigeration. It really wasn’t that long ago that folks were putting up fruits and vegetables from their gardens in jars and slaughtering livestock they raised themselves and preserving it so it would last through the winter.
My house was built in 1882. It has an unfinished cellar that sits on bricks which sit on dirt. It’s quite cool most of the time. Down there in the cool, dark cellar is where the canned goods and meats were stored in the 19th century. There was a smokehouse out back where meats were cooked and preserved.
One of the most important methods of preserving meats was developed by the early pioneers and called “curing”. This method, applied to hogs, produced the bacon and ham which comprisied a large part of their diets.
A ham is the rear leg of a hog. It was, and still is, preserved by salting, sugaring, smoking or drying or a combination of all of these. From medieval times, salt was mixed with saltpeter and other ingredients; such as, sugar, honey or juniper berries to carry out the preserving process.
Two methods developed: wet (or brine) curing and dry curing. In the first, ingredients were mixed with boiling water to form a pickling brine. In the second, the ingredients were rubbed into the meat several times over a period of several hours.
The following is a method for curing ham found in an old 1875 Bluegrass Cookbook
How To Cure A Ham (by Colonel William Rhodes Davis, Lexington, Kentucky)
” Kill your hogs when the wind is from the northwest. The night before you salt the meat, make a strong solution of red peppers and 2 tablespoons of saltpeter for every two gallons of water. Pour this over the salt. Then salt the meat lightly to let the blood run off.
Pack the meat in salt and let it lie packed in salt for three days. Overhaul meat and put one teaspoon of saltpeter on the flesh side and rub well. Then rub with molasses mixed with more salt. Pack closed for 10 days.
Overhaul again, rubbing each piece. Wash in warm water. While wet, roll in hickory ashes. Pack again and hang for three weeks from the time the hog was killed. Smoke with green hickory and tie up in cotton bags, in February.”
Smokehouses
For those of you might like to try drying or smoking cured meats, using the method described above, you will need a smokehouse. You can build a smokehouse of cinder block or use an old refrigerator, then construct a separate underground (or lower) fire pit. The finished smoke house is quite versatile and will enable you to smoke hams and bacon as well as drying meats.
They require far less wood than outdoor drying racks, and take less of your time and energy to use. While a small refrigerator would seem too small to dry much meat at one time, it can be operated 24 hours a day (No carrying in the racks at night!) and thus can dry meat in about one third of the time required for outdoor drying.
Kentucky’s Love Affair with salad
The Kentucky tradition of salads goes back to Elizabethan, England. In The English Hous-wife (1615), the author alludes to “…the young buds and knots of all mannerof wholesome herbs at their first springing…as mint, lettuce, violets and marigolds, spinach, and many others mixed together served up to the table with vinegar, sallet oyle and sugar.” He suggests also that the cook boil the greens, such as spinach until they are “…exceedingly soft and tender as pap” and then seasoned with currants or small pieces of toast and vinegar sweetened with a little sugar.
Poke is an indigenous mountain green dating back to the days of the indians. They and the early settlers relied on Poke and Sassafras tea to hone up the body in the spring, after a long winter. Health depended on the herbs from the land, rather than on pharmaceutical houses. In addition to its medicinal properties, Poke was a valuable sourse of food for the pioneers. It is a very common Appalachian dish and is often served with eggs. It required no cultivation and the mountain men and boys were free to hunt and fish, while the women and children gathered a natutral Poke crop.
After gathering the Poke, the dead grass and dry leaves were removed and the women began cooking in the kitchen.They filled a large pan with enough water to boil the Poke they had gathered. They would then lower it into the water and boil it for about three minutes. Today with the invention of refrigeration, the cooked greens are refrigerated, frozen or used. Some cooks serve them with salt, pepper and bacon bits. Others simmer them with salt pork and onions or fry them in bacon grease.
Harlan, Kentucky is home to the annual Poke Sallet festival. It offers Bluegrass music, a choo choo train, and a homecoming pageant. During the four day event, various groups sell Poke Sallet. The last festival advertised as follows
Think you make the best poke sallet in Harlan County? Want to pit yourself against Kentucky’s finest poke sallet cooks? Want to know what poke sallet is? Then attend the Poke Sallet Festival in Harlan, Kentucky. The festival begins the first Thursday in June and continues through Sunday. The poke sallet cooking contest is held every year. What happens at the Poke Sallet Festival besides cooking poke sallet? Plenty! (see below)
- There’ll be a cornhole toss
- a poke sallet jail where you can have your boss arrested and put in jail for 15 minutes
- mountain storytelling
- the Miss Harlan County Homecoming Pageant
- lots of gospel and Christian music
- a home run derby, car and bike shows
Bibb Lettuce
Another Kentucky favorite is Bibb lettuce. John B. Bibb was born in Prince Edward County, Virginai in 17 89. He soon moved with his family to Russelville, Kentucky. Later, in 1845, he moved to Frankfort and built Gray Gables, which still stands at the corner of Wapping Street and Watson Court.
He wasn’t interested in the social life of the city or in a career in public life. Instead he embarked on adventures in his lovely garden that rolled down to the Kentucky River. There, he evolved the salad head that bears his name. In his eighties, he began givinf lettuce plants to friends and neighbors. Otherwise this wonderful lettuce might have been lost forever. Bibb lettuce is now available throughout the world.
Recipe: Wilted Bibb Lettuce Salad
6 slices of bacon
1/4 cup of vinegar
1/4 teaspoon of salt
1 teaspoon of sugar
1/8 teaspoon of pepper
1/4 lb. of Bibb lettuce
Warm a large bowl by filling it with very hot water.
Fry bacon, remove from pan and set aside to crisp.
Break bacon into small bits.
Pour water out of bowl and dry it.
Put cut lettuce into the bowl
Add salt, sugar and pepper to hot bacon grease
and pour over lettuce immediately.
Cover bowl and let lettuce wilt for 5 minutes.
Uncover and sprinkle with vinegar and bacon bits.
Not by bread alone
Historically, around the early 1500s, the first pies, probably on the European continent, were called “coffins” or “coffyns”. They were savory meat pies with tall crusts which were sealed on the top and bottom. Open crust pies were called “traps”. These pies held assorted meats and sauces and were baked like a modern casserole with no pan.
The origins of pie can actually be traced to the ancient Egyptians, who incorporated nuts, honey and fruits into bread dough. However, according to most food historians, pie pastry actually originated with the Greeks. At that time they were made of a flour and water paste which was wrapped around meat to seal in the juices. The Romans took home Greek recipes and developed their own pies, cakes and cake-like puddings. The pie craze then spread throughout Europe, via the Roman roads, every country adapting them to their own customs and foods. English women were baking pies long before the settlers came to America, but by the 1700s American pioneer women often served pies with every meal.
Samuel Clemens, who used the pseudonym Mark Twain, loved pie and often ate Huckleberry pie baked by his life-long housekeeper, Katy Leary. After a trip to Europe, where he developed a strong dislike for European food, he complained that “…it has been many months…since I have had a nourishing meal…” He ironically devised a recipe for “English Pie”. His tongue-in-cheek recipe, hinting at the awfulness if these pies, follows:
“…Take a sufficiency of water and flour and construct a bullet-proof dough. Work this into the form of a disk, with edges turned up some three fourths of an inch. Toughen and kiln-dry for a couple days in a mild but unvarying temperature. Construct a cover for this “formidable creation”, in the same way and of the same material. Filled with stewed dried apples. Aggravate with cloves, lemon peel and citron, and add two portions of New Orleans sugar. Then solder on the lid and sit in a safe place until it petrifies. Serve cold at breakfast and invite you enemies.”
Traditional Kentucky Pie
Many of the pies which became associated with Kentucky, came from the Shakers of the Amish in Indiana. Two very popular ones are the Sugar Cream Pie and the Shaker Lemon Pie. Another is Vinegar Pie.
The Sugar Cream Pie was a simple, basic, “desperation” pie made with ingredients that were always nearby or on-hand at the farm. When making this pie “finger-stirring” in the unbaked crust was necessary, so as not to whip the cream before baking.
Only three ingredients go into Shaker Lemon Pie : lemon slices (peel and all), sugar, and eggs. The filling is more like marmalade. Where did the Shakers get the lemons? It is said that they traveled in boats to New Orleans to sell their wares and returned with cash and lemons.
This is a very tart lemon pie which uses whole lemons, rind and all, inside the pie. They are first sliced very thin, then macerated overnight, four lemons to two cups of sugar. The key to this pie is slicing the lemons very thin.
When lemons are not in season, pioneer women baked pies with vinegar, which substituted for lemon juice. They were custardy and still had a fruit-like flavor from the vinegar. Vinegar Pie remained popular in regency England, throughout the nineteenth century, even after English settlers brought it to America.
Recipes
Sugar Cream Pie
Ingredients
pastry for one 9-inch pie crust
3/4 cups sugar
5 tablespoons all-purpose flour
2 1/2 cups heavy whipping cream
1 teaspoon vanilla
whole nutmeg
Instructions
pre-heat oven to 450 degrees and prepare the pie pastry. Place sugar and flour in the unbaked pie shell. Add whipping cream and mix well, using you fingers to slowly mix the liquid ingredients. Add vanilla and continue stirring. Grate nutmeg over the top. Bake 10 minutes at 450 degrees. Reduce heat to 350 and continue baking, approximately one hour. Do not over bake. Remove from oven. The pie will appear runny, but sets when it cools. If the pie doesn’t set, get out some spoons and enjoy it anyhow
Vinegar Pie
Ingredients
1 nine-inch pastry crust
4 eggs
1 1/2 cups sugar
2 tablespoons melted butter
1/2 cider vinegar
Instruction
Heat oven to 350 degrees. In a blender or large mixing bowl, mix together eggs, butter, sugar and vanilla. Pour into pie shell. Bake about 50 minutes until firm. Let cool. Top with whipped cream.
Shaker lemon Pie (late 18th century)
Ingredients
2 nine inch pastry crusts
2 medium sized lemons
2 cups sugar
4 eggs
Instructions
Slice two lemons paper thin.Take out seeds and macerate the slices in two cups of sugar overnight. Stir the mixture now and then so that the sugar dissolves into a fragrant syrup. The next day, prepare pastry for a nine inch two crust pie. Beat four eggs well, then mix them with the syrup and lemon slices. Pour the mix into the bottom crust and cover with the top crust. Bake at 450 degrees for fifteen minutes, then reduce heat to 375. Bake an additional 20-25 minutes, or until knife inserted into pie comes out clean.
Right out of the Barrel
Nothing says Kentucky like Bourbon
An act of congress in 1964 declared Bourbon to be “America’s Native Spirit” and its official distilled spirit. Most bourbons are distilled in Kentucky and it is widely believed that only Kentucky whiskey can be called Bourbon. Kentucky produces 95% of the world’s bourbon, and to be called bourbon, it must be made in the US, contain at least 51% corn mash, and be distilled at 160 proof , then at 124 proof, then be put into charred white oak barrels for aging. The aging process takes 2 years. The resulting whisky is caramel in color with the flavor of vanilla and fruit. No other state can use the name Bourbon, even if it is made with sour mash, as the Kentuckians make it.
How it all began
Around 1780, early Scotch and Irish settlers and their descendants brought their whiskey making skills to America. Many of them settled in Kentucky and became farmers. They soon set about growing crops for their subsistence. Since corn was a native crop, it was grown abundantly in Kentucky, at that time. After a while, these frontier farmers began distilling their surplus corn and producing a new kind of whiskey. Distilling is the process of removing the alcohol from the corn mash by by heating it and capturing the vapor, which contains alcohol and flavor. According to legend, a Baptist preacher of Scottish heritage, who had come to Kentucky in 1786, aged his whiskey in barrels that had been charred on the inside. This whiskey had a better, smoother taste, along with a distinctive amber color.
One of the three original counties in Kentucky was Bourbon County, established in 1785 when Kentucky was still a part of Virginia. Bourbon was named after Bourbon County, where it was first distilled in 1789. Farmers soon began shipping it from the port on the Ohio River in Bourbon County, down the Mississippi River to New Orleans in Oak barrels, used as shipping containers. The whiskey aged during shipment and its flavor was mellowed by the oak wood. This Bourbon County corn whisky grew in popularity, and by the early 1800s, corn whiskey, produced in other parts of central Kentucky, came to be known as Bourbon whiskey.
A group of distillers became legendary in the area: “Jacob Beam brought his family from Maryland in the late 1780s and started his first distillery in Washington County. Dr. James Crow (Old Crow), arrived in Kentucky in 1823 from Scotland, developed the process of making Bourbon known as the “sour mash method” in 1835. Basil Hayden began distilling whiskey in Kentucky as early as 1796. T. W. Samuels turned his family’s Nelson County farm into a distillery in 1844. Elijah Pepper set up a still near Frankfort in 1778. A grand-nephew of President Zachary Taylor, Col. Edmund H. Taylor, Jr., who began his career in 1867, pioneered the “Bottled in Bond Act” which was passed by Congress in 1897.” (taken from Buffalo Trace Distillery historical notes).
The Bourbon Trail: Kentucky’s modern distilleriesKnown as the Bourbon Trail, a 60 mile corridor winds though some of the most beautiful rolling hills of Kentucky. Along this corridor are situated Seven of America’s oldest and finest distilleries woven into a landscape of horse farms, racetracks, and a golfcourse designed by Jack Nicklaus.
The seven distilleries are: Maker’s Mark, Heaven Hill, Buffalo Trace, Wild Turkey, Four roses, Jim Beam, and Woodford Reserve. If you take a tour down the trail, each distillery will take you though the entire bourbon making process, including tasting. At every distillery, you will find a bar, eatery and gift shop.
At Maker’s Mark, as each bottle of bourbon is purchased, it is dunked into a tub of hot wax to encase the bottle cap in it’s well-known red seal. This is the last stage before boxing. Just before you leave, you will be treated to a glass of their finest bourbon and taught a little about tasting. As the visitors gather at the bar to taste, the bourbon tour guide will often be heard saying ” It’s okay to choke on the first sip. But you gotta smile after the second.”
Mint Juleps
Kentucky takes pride in its traditional Mint Julep, made with Kentucky Bourbon. It is always made with fresh mint, bourbon and plenty of crushed or shaved ice. It grew out of Kentucky traditions and the Kentucky Derby. But, ever since plantation days when gentlemen farmers started the day with a similar sweet and herbal drink made with rum or whisky, many other southern states also lay claim to the drink, including North Carolina and Virginia. I am not fond of Mint Juleps. I don’t drink, but even if I did, I wouldn’t drink them. However: I do know how to make them and, if you’ld like to try one, here’s a good recipe with a little history to boot.
Cooking with Bourbon
Today, Bourbon is used in many recipes. It lends a flavor of vanilla, caramel, charcoal and a light wood taste and works well with both sweet and savory dishes. Similar to brandy in flavor, a good well-aged bourbon can replace brandy in most recipes. Traditionally used in desserts and candy, it’s also frequently used in barbecue sauces, marinade and many main dishes. Some popular uses are in the following dishes: candied yams, bourbon shrimp, bourbon barbecued chicken, beef, or pork, grilled orange/bourbon salmon, apple/bourbon baked ham, various sauces and marinades, sweet potato pie, chocolate/nut pie, coffee/bourbon ice cream shakes, chocolate/bourbon cake, and chocolate candy bourbon balls. Recipes for these dishes and more can be found on the Internet. Beverage and food recipes, using Bourbon, can also be found at The Woodford Reserve Distillery site.
Does the alcohol cook out?
Whether alcohol remains in a finished dish after cooking, and how much, depends on the cooking method. When foods are cooked on high heat for a long period of time, such as soups and stews, the majority of the alcohol evaporates out. Pure alcohol boils at 173 degrees F., a lower temperature than water (212 degrees F.). So, you will find that recipes, which intend for some of the alcohol to remain, will have instructions to add the alcohol near the end of the cooking process so it will not boil out. Obviously, uncooked recipes will retain the majority of the alcohol.
If you are worried about serving a dish cooked with alcohol to a child, alcohol is a naturally-occurring substance in many foods, particularly fruits with a high sugar content such as very ripe apples. The amount used in a recipe is usually very minimal and is spread out over a large volume of food, comparatively-speaking. It is a personal decision, of course, still, it is a good idea for those on anti-abuse medication for alcohol problems to avoid foods cooked with alcohol.
Bourbon Fudge Cake
Bourbon and Kentucky go together like ham and eggs. Until I moved to Louisville, I had no idea there were so many uses for Bourbon besides drinking it. And when I opened my bed and breakfast here and started doing a lot of cooking, breakfast and otherwise, I soon learned that the heady stuff added great flavor to just about everything from Sweet Potatoes to Chocolate Nut Pie…from pork roast, chicken, and Apple Crisp to Kentucky famous Mint Juleps.
A Mint Julep would not be a Mint Julep with the Bourbon. And make no mistake, the kind of Bourbon you use makes a difference too. On the Bourbon Trail, a route which identifies the various Bourbon distilleries throughout Kentucky, visitors get to taste all the different varieties so that they can pick out the one they like the best. In addition, they are taken on a tour though each distillery to see how Bourbon in made and learn about the interesting history.
The various foods enhanced by the flavor of Bourbon are too many to list here. Recipes can be found in many cookbooks and on line. If you’ve never tried it, you have a treat in store for you. I remember the first time I tasted Bourbon sloshed heavily over a fresh fish steak. I was still living in Chicago and was visiting a friend who happened to be a pretty heavy drinker. Not only did he drink the stuff, but he poured it over just about every thing he prepared to eat. He was a wonderful cook, so I trusted him when he told me this was going to be the best fish I ever ate. He was right, of course.
After that, I added Bourbon to my list of condiments and herbs that, added to plain old food, would definitely enhance it and bring out its flavor. Up to that time, I had flavored my cooking mostly with wine, herbs and spices. But now, my pallet had been changed forever. Below is a wonderful Chocolate cake, complete with Kentucky Bourbon. Try it, you’ll love it!
Ingredients for Bourbon Fudge Cake
2 teaspoons cocoa
1 3/4 cups water
2 teaspoons instant espresso
1/4 cup bourbon
5 ounces unsweetened chocolate, chopped
2 sticks unsalted butter, cut into small pieces and softened
2 cups sugar
2 cups all-purpose flour
1 teaspoon baking soda
Dash of salt
2 large eggs, at room temperature
1 teaspoon vanilla extract
Instructions
Preheat oven to 325°F. Grease and flour a large bundt pan (10 cup capacity), or two 8- or 9-inch loaf pans. Melt chocolate in microwave oven. Let cool. Combine instant espresso and cocoa powder in a measuring cup and add enough boiling water to come up to the 1 cup measuring line. Mix until powders dissolve. Stir in whiskey and salt. let cool. Beat softened butter until fluffy (2-3 minutes on high). Add sugar and beat until well combined. Add the eggs one at a time, beating well between each addition.
Beat in the vanilla extract, baking soda and melted chocolate, scraping down sides of bowl with a rubber spatula. With the mixer on the lowest speed, beat in a third of the whiskey espresso cocoa mixture. When liquid is absorbed, beat in 1 cup flour. Repeat alternating with whiskey mixture. Pour batter into prepared pan and smooth top. Bake aproximately 1 hour 10 minutes for Bundt pan (loaf pans will take less time. Check for doneness with toothpick after 55 minutes). Turn cake out onto a rack and let sit at least 15 moinutes. Unmold and sprinkle warm cake with more whiskey. Let cool. Sprinkle powdered sugar over the cake before serving.
author: Operatic Divas and Naked Irishmen (memoir)
musings from a would be writer 