We now have a freezer

We have a freezer....
Now i am sure you are wondering how we have a freezer  while we are living as close to the year 1865 as possible and do not use hydro. Well let me tell you. My beautiful husband has converted a window in the cold room into a freezer box. He took out the window glass and boxed the frame in. He covered the outside end with fine wire mess and screening to keep critters out. On the inside or inside of the cold room he added a door to his box and voilla we now have a freezer.It will of course be temporary , winter only but it will be wonderful to use for the time we can. Mother nature will provide us with the necessary cold free of charge , no hydro. So we can safely say...we now have a freezer,

Part 3 Cooking up the offal...kidney

Kidney....According to Mrs Beeton veal kidney is much more tender and much more preferred than cow. All of her many recipes for this organ gives instruction to remove the core after slicing .This is easy to do . Although I rarely if ever remove the core I will have to do that and see what the difference is . Kidneys are lovely stewed slowly . I do mine, stewing slowly with beef and a variety of vegetables and spices.Heavy on the mushrooms. I also generally add a cup or two of red wine to this stew. After everything is beautifully tender I drain the meat and   thicken  the drippings, I add this back to the meat and put all into a baking dish.Cover with a puff pastry and serve as a beef steak and kidney pie, What do you do with kidneys??

Part two cooking up the offal.......liver

Mrs Beeton's book of household management written in 1865 describes liver as "often used for frying, As it is  very lean it is often cooked with some of the inside fat or crow or with bacon"
Served as an entrée.
But I have also found recipes for liver pate especially chicken liver pate.
Liver can be eaten from any beast,cow/calf, chicken ,sheep,or pig.The tenderest is of course calves liver.
We still fry liver today but have learned to add other ingredients to perhaps liven the taste. I cook mine very quickly dredged in flour and fried in butter. I marry this with a creamed bacon,mushroom,onion white wine sauce.
Anyone have liver recipes they would like to share??
M 

Waste nothing.Cooking up the offal.... Sweetbreads

I had a lovely visit in London this afternoon, in a beautiful home with wonderfully progressive people making a difference in the world. They were Rotarians boxing cookies to give to people in the city..Wonderful way to spend the afternoon.

As usual talk turned to food. Why is it that always happens?
We discussed sweetbreads which is one of my favourite foods if cooked correctly. Hard to find today because in my opinion we have forgotten the rules of "waste nothing"
Sweetbreads are described as either  Heart sweetbreads or throat sweetbreads which comes from the thymus.
Mrs Beeton's book of household management written in 1865 describes sweetbreads as a delicacy ,sold at fancy prices.Cooked in variety of ways and served as an entrée.
Sweetbreads come from cows.Either calf's or full grown. They also come from lambs . Naturally calf and lamb sweetbreads are much more tender and require less cooking . Whereas beef sweetbreads need to be cooked longer and slower.Often in stages.Sweetbreads are boiled gently or braised.Cooled and peeled and finished according to your recipe.
Anyone wishing a few varieties of period sweetbread recipes please ask and I will be happy to post.
This is a wonderful food and it is a shame that these parts are being turned into animal feed because we have forgotten their loveliness as an entrée.

Cutters/sleighs

Hi everyone 
We finally have our cutters/sleighs. They are beautiful and I will take photos tomorrow and post them for you to see. It is wonderful to have such beautiful pieces of history . You wonder who owned them and where they travelled in them.

Letter writing

This is a piece I posted to our facebook page regarding letter writing

Letter writing in the year 1865 was used much the same as we use computers today. or perhaps even the telephone.The postal services were very good and in most cities thousands of letters travelled daily. There were couriers, and if you were "well heeled" you would have your own courier. I have letters dating back to the 1700's Anyone having the opportunity to read old letters will be thrilled at the detail they contain. You can tell if they have travelled long distances or have only travelled a few blocks by their content. You will be thrilled by the gentle manners expressed even on paper during the time period. Letters flowed with conversation. Generally starting off very formally regardless the sender or the receiver. Occasionally there will be codes and it is fun trying to figure what they are meaning. I love the conversation found in letters gently written , I love the peace in writing and the thought it provokes. I have a few friends who hare my love of writing with dip pen and ink and we letter write on a regular basis. It is calming and genteel. Try it sometime. Listen to the pen and the noise it makes on the paper. Listen as you dip your pen nib and tap the excess ink off. Listen to your mind thinking about your words...it is a whole different experience indeed.
Anyone wishing to join our letter exchange is more than welcome.
I will continue this tomorrow.Pain is making me sleepy today.

Thank you to Circa Antiques owner Doug Long

Well everyone wonderful news.
We have the dress hoops.
 They are fantastic and light as a feather. I will examine them better in the full day light . Before I tell you the other items we found I have to encourage you to visit the antique shop in Watford Ontario.The shop is called Circa Antiques. Owned by Doug Long. Who is obviously in this business because he loves history.He is knowledgeable about everything he has in his shop . Has unusual items such as a food pusher used by babies to learn how to push food onto their spoons. Wonderful piece. Plus Doug has a steady stream of Bob Dylan playing , making you wanting to never leave lest you miss a song. So please visit his shop. We purchased some spiels, a bed warmer complete with screw cork, a hat brush for Kens top hat, many tools. Such fun looking around. Oh and the loveliest game table usable on both sides . I can hardly wait to have guests over to play parlour games, I also cannot wait to show my sewing friends these hoops. A piece of history one rarely sees.
And to add next week we will be picking up our cutters. I will be sure to post pictures of them. Now all we need are the horses to pull them. see you soon.
Margaret and Ken