HELP! 1860's Kitchen supplies

keljonma

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Gail Borden

In the middle 1840s he began inventing. He is supposed to have experimented with large-scale refrigeration as a means of preventing yellow fever and with a terraqueous machine, a sort of prairie schooner that would go on land or water.

In 1849 he perfected a meat biscuit, made of dehydrated meat compounded with flour, which he tried to market on a worldwide scale in partnership with Ashbel Smith. Although this project left him deeply in debt, for seven years Borden struggled to sell meat biscuits. For this purpose he moved to New York in 1851 to be nearer trade centers.

In 1853 he sought a patent on a process for condensing milk in vacuum, but it was 1856 before he received American and British patents. He then dropped the meat biscuit to devote himself to condensing milk. He opened a factory in Connecticut in 1856 but failed, then tried and failed again in 1857. Through Jeremiah Milbank, a New York financier, he received new backing and opened another factory in Connecticut in 1858.

When the Civil War brought intensified demand for condensed milk, sales grew so much that Borden's success was assured. He opened another factory in Connecticut, two in New York, and one in Illinois and licensed other concerns in Pennsylvania and Maine.

He also invented processes for condensing various fruit juices, for extract of beef, and for coffee.

After the Civil War he established a meat-packing plant at Borden, Texas, twelve miles west of Columbus.
 

Blackbird

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Do we need a 'Favorite 1800's Inventors' thread?

I figured I could just type out what was on the game. I haven't played that in years. Turns out its #2 not 4, but whatever.

I think it said that 'date' was 1848, but you'd probably have to do some reasearch to make sure some of these things were around then, I have no idea how acurate the game is.
I included food and medicines also because some can go for either, but I have no idea what some of the stuff is.
I didn't type whether it was jars, bags, what oz either because I don't think its that important, but here you are, just how it had it listed pretty much:

Medicine:
Aloe Vera
Alum
Ammonia
Borax
Brandy
Calomel
Camomile
Camphor
Capsicum
Castor oil
Dandelion
Dovers Powder
Duffys Elixir
Epsom salts
Hydrogen Peroxide
Iodine
Ipecac
Isopropyl alcohol
James Fever Powder
Laudanum
Lecithin
Linseed oil
Magnesia
Olive oil
Peppermint
Quinine
Sarsaparilla
Sassafras
Spearmint
Sulfur
Turpentine
Whiskey
Witch Hazel

Spices:
Allspice
Anise
Basil
Cinnamon
Cloves
Ginger
Horseradish
Mustard
Nutmeg
Pepper
Rosemary
Sage
Salt
Sugar

Food:
Bacon
Biscuits
Butter
pounds of candy
Sardines
Celery
Cheese
Coffee beans
Cornmeal
Crackers
Dried beans
Dried bread
Dried fruit
Dried vegetables
Flour
Garlic
Ham
Honey
slabs of lard
Licorice
Maple syrup
Molasses
Onions
Pemmican
Pickles
Potatoes
Preserved potatoes
jars of preserves
Rhubarb
Rice
Saleratus
Salt Pork
 

EweSheep

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Wow, that is quite a list and THANKS! At least I can supply it in my camp box with those things and with that saleratus, I dont think I can find it but maybe I can rename the baking powder with that name ( I would have to write somewhere on the bottle that it is baking powder instead of baking soda LOL).

some of the herbs and flowers I can grow them in my garden and harvest them to make some samples for the public to see.

Oh did they have rolling pins back in those days or was it a straight round pole similar to the Mexicans used to roll out their lovely tortillas?

Yep I got buscuit cutters and hardtack recipes, and might have to buy more of those glass bottles with corks. I can find those in garage sales, take out the plastic stoppers and replace them with corks....easy! ;)

Got Borax LOL the washing kind! I bet they are good for rubbing on mosquito bites!

Dandelion????? the leaves or flower or both?

Horehound herb popular then???? I love horehound drops for my sore or dry throat. It helps!

What people dont like is sardines...I LOVE THEM! with mustard sauce, please!

Oh pork and beans were available back then.

The company, Pioneer Brand, was available in the 1850s but I am certain ONLY rich folks have that premade mix.

Of course we will portray as middle class and lower class but not poor like our "boys" are. From what they had in their haversack, they had hardtack, fatback, jerky and beans and coffee. Red eye gravy is common among the soldiers. As for us, farbies as we can be, we will eat like our grandparents would have eaten!

I love my cherry pies but I dont think cherry was popular back then, it was apple pie and apple crisps that are on the list. It would be a challenge to make homemade pie crust since I never made them but made plenty of crisps.

Well I only have Quaker's oatmeal so I will stuff them in the bags. Yes I am making those bags by hand in different sizes but no more than two lbs because of the weight restriction on my camp box.

Hubby is making my camp box and once he gets it finished, I will take pictures of it along with all the fun things to put in it. Once at the event, I will display some of the common food that our boys eat and what my family in the upper lower class would eat. Fine china is not common but I love blue willow tea sets for our ladies tea party.

Enamelware I found out, it came out much later than the CW time. So finding solid colored enamelware is not easy or being outbidded so much on Ebay or cost so much is a challenge! We have plenty of three prong forks, some spoons and one good CW dinner knife along with those enamelware and metal (stainless steel) cups. Got only one enamelware bowl.

I know at tea time, they didnt have tea bags but I can use my favorite Lady's Earl Grey tea, open the bags and put them in a special strainer and let it steep in the tea pot.

I forgot about molasses! Okay I will leave the white sugar at home and use the raw brown sugar I found at Krogers, the organic kind! Tasted the same as white sugar LOL!

Now I am still surfing the net for some label patterns and some Watkins tin cans. I would need to copy them off the source and print them out for my canned goods to show them off what they looked like. It would be neat!

Oh good thing that they had potato chips! I will have to get that kind of kettle fried chips instead of Lay's which we liked alot but for one weekend is not going to hurt us. Hide the Cheetos LOL!

Boy am I going to be busy!!!! I just had a tear in rotator cuff in my shoulder and this is so easy for me to try to find those stuff or try to get some of the stuff and it is going to be pretty enjoyable! Had the injections today and feeeeling reaaaaallllly good! But doc told me to rest it for a bit before going to therapy.

Keep it up girls, I am loving it!
 

Aidenbaby

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On the oats, I probably don't need to say this, make sure it's "old-fashioned" and not minute or instant.
 

FarmerDenise

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I'm sure those "slabs of lard" didn't come in a plastic bucket either. You might need to get that at a butcher or use salt pork. When I was young my mother used to get "bacon", which was mostly the fat part still attached to the skin. She would cut slices off of this, sometimes she would chop it up real fine for soup and such. After frying this, the remaining fat would be more like the lard we buy today. But my mother used this strip of bacon fat the same way we use oil, butter or margerine today. Any left over rendered fat was saved to be used on our sandwiches instead of butter.
The "Little House in the Prairie" books are in a slightly later time frame, but it might still give you some good ideas. They even have a cookbook.
 

keljonma

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I love my cherry pies but I dont think cherry was popular back then, it was apple pie and apple crisps that are on the list. It would be a challenge to make homemade pie crust since I never made them but made plenty of crisps.
Popular or not, if you had cherry trees on your property, you would have been eating cherries. Also, grapes and berries.

My great-grandmother was born in southern Ohio in 1870 and she left a number of fruit pie recipes that were said to be traditional family fare.
 

big brown horse

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On rolling pins... my mother has had an antique shop since I was a child. For the last 30 years she has also been an antique show promoter and we (sisters and dad) all worked for her 4 times a year during the shows. We also helped her in the shop. She specialized in American heritage antiques and folk art. I never saw a mexican style of rolling pin. The rolling pins (and there were always tons of them big and small) were mostly wooden with handles.

Hope this helps!
 

EweSheep

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Ok I didnt know for sure since I know the Mexicans have their own rolling pins but they didnt have handles on them. So rolling pins with handles were used back then but are they free moving or you have to move the handles to "push" the roll back and forth. I have seen both kinds, solid ones and moveable ones.

As for the salt pork, I can not display them during the warm weather because of flies issues. I can buy a half pound sample of the fattest bacon or end pieces of bacon and throw it out at the end of the display time.

I know kids love to play "seek" games to get all the stuff they can find all over the park for items on the list and all of us reeanctors will have to sign it to prove we have those items or wearing those items. At the end of the game at the end of the day, the kids get prizes. I never did find out what the prizes were!

Did they keep the herbs whole or ground up? I know whole herbs and spices would keep longer than ground ones.
 

big brown horse

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I'm calling my Ma right now...

She says both versions. The solid ones are more rustic and would probably be for the less refined families.
 

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