The Hocken Blog

Stirring up the stacks #4: A “delicious cake from better times”

Stirring up the stacks #2: The parfait on the blackboard

Stirring up the stacks #1: Variety salad in tomato aspic

Stirring up the stacks #10: celebrity Sister O’Regan’s carrot salad

Wednesday, April 13th, 2022 | Hocken Collections | No Comments

Post cooked up by Jen Anderson, Collections Assistant – Publications

People who work with heritage material often find themselves compelled to demonstrate its relevance to contemporary society. Some connections are obvious, and some require a little more lateral thinking. Initially I intended to justify this carrot-themed post via the Easter bunny, but having tasted the results of my carrot salad attempt, I realise that it more readily fits Lenten themes of mortification and repentance.

The recipe I tried comes from : Celebrities’ choice cook book : a unique collection of recipes from N.Z. celebrities / [compiled by the Canterbury/West Coast Region of the N.Z. Red Cross Society].

Vegetables, fruit, textiles and earthenware: the enticing cover of
‘Celebrities’ choice cook book : a unique collection of recipes from N.Z. celebrities’.

This book was published in 1991, but being a compilation of tried-and-true favourite recipes, it is a veritable time capsule from the pantheon of NZ’s illustrious. Ever wanted to try Geoffrey Palmer’s chili con carne? How about Judith Kirk’s fish bake? I was tempted by The Wizard’s microwave chocolate self-saucing pudding, but in the end there was only one possible recipe.

Deep breath.

Carrot salad.

Now, I’ve always had a troubled relationship with cooked carrots. This is the legacy of childhood memories of carrot disks in casserole, the brimming-with-flavour carrots and white sauce, and – horror of horrors – mashed carrot and parsnip [a.k.a. rainbow vegetable]. Normally a carrot salad would bypass the cooking, but this recipe is a little different. It starts out reasonably; carrots, green pepper, onion, salt. It is in the second column of ingredients that you really start questioning the life choices that led you to this point.

1kg carrots

1 green pepper

1 onion

1 (450g) tin tomato soup

1 cup sugar

½ cup cooking oil

½ cup vinegar

Pepper and salt

Instructions follow:

Cut carrots in rings and cook.

Chop the green pepper and onion and cook in tomato soup, sugar, oil and vinegar.

When cooked mix in the cooked carrots.

The recipe for the inimitable carrot salad

I’m not much of a chef, but looking at the recipe you’d think it wasn’t complex. What could possibly go wrong? I don’t know what I did, but my creation would not elicit the rapturous community response received by the author, Sister Pauline M. O’Regan.

“This salad is a great favourite of our Community, and one or other of us invariably brings it to pot-luck meals and barbeques in summer. People always ask for the recipe. It’s a great feeling.”

I trust Sister Pauline O’Regan implicitly. She sounds like an extraordinary person who did a lot of good for her communities while authoring some very well -regarded books. Going by this photograph on Te Ara, she also knew how to host a successful casual outdoor gathering. Surely the problem was not the recipe, but my execution.

Look at what I made. Empty your mind and just look at it.

The pièce de résistance

I tried some fancy plating, but it was irredeemable.

The salad, plated. Enough said.

I was left with a catering sized supply of cooked carrot salad which, under COVID restrictions, could not be shared with my delightful colleagues.

The thick layer of oil wasn’t even the worst of it. Nor was the tooth-aching amount of sugar. No, it was the sheer ratio of dressing to carrot. Believe me, I boiled 450 g of tomato soup and vinegar mix ferociously in an attempt to reduce it. The kitchen was filled with a vinegar-tinged miasma. The capsicum had lost structural integrity and the onion was slimy yet the mixture defied attempts at evaporation. Eventually I gave up and added the carrot (cooked al dente, although I know the original 70s version would have been for 30 minutes or until done).

The sound when I stirred it haunts me to this day. I don’t know how to describe it. Loose wallpaper paste? Creamed corn with clumps? Whatever it was, it was eldritch. This looked and smelled like something that, if consumed, should be done so in private mortification while crying. Dear reader, I tried a tentative forkfull and was hit by sugary carrot overlaid with vinegar and an oily finish. It was Not Nice.

In a Hail Mary I tried following the recipe recommendation: “This salad is best prepared the day before use and kept in the fridge (it will keep in the fridge for several days).” The flavour may have infused overnight, but it certainly didn’t improve. Perhaps it is best described as entrenching. I left the salad in the fridge for several days and I can verify that it is a very low theft risk because no-one else in the household touched it.

I don’t doubt that this recipe can be executed well. I’ve talked with people who remember it fondly from their BBQ and salad days. Tell me, dear readers, how did I mess it up so catastrophically? Can someone explain how to cook this properly? Maybe a 450g tin of soup is inclusive of tin weight, so I measured out too much? Should I have chosen a better vinegar? Was the pepper and salt quantity lacking? Does anyone have any advice for attempt #2, the one where I make colleagues eat and review it? Tell me about your success stories. Or do you have a more entry-level carrot salad recipe to suggest?

What else have we cooked up?

Stirring up the stacks #9: two for the price of one! Macaroni soup and ginger pudding

Stirring up the stacks #8: Xmas Cake Recipe Recommended by “Buckhams”

Stirring up the stacks #4: A “delicious cake from better times”

Stirring up the stacks #2 The parfait on the blackboard

Stirring up the stacks #1 Variety salad in tomato aspic

Stirring up the stacks #9: two for the price of one! Macaroni soup and ginger pudding

Sunday, October 10th, 2021 | Hocken Collections | No Comments

Post cooked up by Eilish McHugh-Smith, Collections Assistant – Publications

Our recent return to Covid alert level 4 prompted Hocken Staff to fish through their camera rolls and personal bookshelves in search of historical culinary delights to tantalise their bubble’s taste buds. In the preceding weeks, I had been on a mission to find a selection of the most peculiar and delicious sounding recipes within our cookbook collection, so had an array of delights to choose from.

One of my favourite finds is a well-loved copy of New Zealand women’s household guide: containing recipes and general hints, dating from 1934 or 1935.[1] This was published by the Women’s Division of the New Zealand Farmers’ Union, an organisation established in 1925 by the wives of members of the Farmers’ Union to help combat the isolating nature of farm life, advocate for the needs of rural women and children, and of course, provide support to the Farmers’ Union.[2] As part of this the Women’s Division also emphasised and advocated for enhanced home science education, which appears to have been a motivating factor behind this book and its other iterations, some of which the Hocken is fortunate to hold.[3]

Notable recipes within the 1934/1935 edition include milk soup (containing a mere 5 ingredients: milk, onions, vermicelli, salt and pepper), mock whitebait (potato flavoured with anchovy sauce), stewed lettuce, a Marmite omelette, gingerbread cookies and currant buns.[4] However, with week one of lockdown over my bubble was craving comfort food. This led me to the recipes for macaroni soup and ginger pudding, akin to modern day macaroni cheese and a ginger cake- surely these would satisfy.

The macaroni soup recipe [New Zealand women’s household guide: containing recipes and general hints] ([Wellington]: Women’s Division of the New Zealand Farmers’ Union (Inc.), [1934-1935?]), p.12.

The ginger pudding recipe [New Zealand women’s household guide: containing recipes and general hints] ([Wellington]: Women’s Division of the New Zealand Farmers’ Union (Inc.), [1934-1935?]), p.187.

So, I broke down the recipes into step-by-step instructions, converted the measurements into metric and estimated some of the grey areas (noted in square brackets).

First up was the batter of the Ginger Pudding:

Ginger Pudding

Ingredients

3 eggs
1 cup sugar

½ cup (115 grams) of butter or dripping
3 cups of flour
1 tablespoon of ginger
1 cup milk
1 teaspoon soda
2 teaspoons of cream of tartar

Method

Mix all ingredients together
Bake in a flat dish for ¾ of an hour [Assumed a similar temperature to most cakes (160 degrees Celsius in a fan bake oven)]
Original recipe included the note: “What is left from dinner makes a nice plain cake for afternoon tea if a little chocolate icing is put on top”

Interestingly, the resulting mixture was more akin to dough than a typical modern-day cake batter, as the mix was so dry, I struggled properly combine the flour. I also decided to use a large cake pan rather than a small flat dish, out of fear of the mess an overflow would make. Upon baking I found this meant the pudding was still liquid in the centre after 45 minutes and required a further 20 minutes to cook fully. However, as the cake doubled in size, I was relieved to have made the right dish decision.

The batter as it was combined, the batter in the tin, and the final product.

Meanwhile, preparations for the soup began:

Macaroni soup

Ingredients:

1 pound (454 grams) broken up macaroni [I used spiral pasta as macaroni was out of stock]
Salted water [I assumed this would be enough to cover the macaroni by about a couple of centimetres]
Sufficient stock [I used about 2 cups of chicken stock]
½ pint (284 millilitres) of milk or cream [I assumed that this was referring to an imperial pint]
5oz (142 grams) grated cheese

Method

Break up macaroni and boil in salted water until tender
Remove half the macaroni from the pot and hold aside
Continue boiling the remainder in to pot until it turns to pulp
Add stock, milk or cream, cheese and return the held-aside macaroni to the pot
Warm without boiling and serve with toast

This was relatively smooth sailing, aside from the requirement to boil half the pasta to a pulp. With an image of wallpaper paste like gloop in my head I set about boiling it for an hour and a half, by which point the pasta remained relatively intact but swollen. With stomachs growling and one bubble member telling me it “looks pulpy to me”, I made the decision to carry on with the remaining steps.

The ‘pulpy’ pasta after one and a half hours of boiling.

All plated up: the final products

A close-up to show the soup’s true soupiness.

First up for the taste test was the Macaroni Soup, which received comments such as: “rather flavourless”, “kind of like those quick pasta packet things” and “this is just pasta in salty water”. It was awarded an average rating of 2.5/10 from our bubble, with the consensus being that the wateriness was its biggest shortfall. Personally, I found its indescribable texture a bit challenging and could not find a discernible flavour to it. However, everyone finished their bowl, so it was certainly edible.

In contrast, the Ginger Pudding received slightly more favourable comments like “would be nice with custard”, “better than dinner” and “a lot like steam pudding”. However, its dry stodginess and a desire for a stronger ginger flavour were certainly noted. Overall, it received an average rating of 5/10, but 24 hours later remained untouched on the kitchen bench. Interestingly, the remaining pasta was snaffled before I ate lunch the following day, but I suspect some extra goodies were added to boost its flavour.

Overall, the meal was edible and filling, with the bonuses of being budget friendly and simple to prepare. These would likely have been key considerations for the Women’s Division in their mission to advance home science education for rural women. However, macaroni would likely have been more expensive than today, as it was not until 1941 that The Timaru Milling Company became the first company in New Zealand licensed to produce pasta under the brand name “Diamond” and not until the 1970s and 1980s that pasta became common place on New Zealand dinner tables.[5] Nevertheless, today pasta in all its forms holds a dear place as a staple comfort food in the hearts of many Kiwis, including my bubble’s.

[1] [New Zealand women’s household guide: containing recipes and general hints] ([Wellington]: Women’s Division of the New Zealand Farmers’ Union (Inc.), [1934-1935?]).

[2] Rosemarie Smith, ‘Rural Women New Zealand’, New Zealand History, www.nzhistory.govt.nz; accessed 24 August 2021.

[3] Rosemarie Smith, ‘Rural Women New Zealand’, New Zealand History, www.nzhistory.govt.nz; accessed 24 August 2021.

[4] [New Zealand women’s household guide: containing recipes and general hints] ([Wellington]: Women’s Division of the New Zealand Farmers’ Union (Inc.), [1934-1935?]), pp. 6,17,93,103,232.

[5] Sarah Wilcox, ‘Story: Food and beverage manufacturing – Changing technology and tastes’, Te Ara – the Encyclopaedia of New Zealand; www.teara.govt.nz; accessed 27 August 2021; ‘About us’, Diamond, www.diamondmeals.co.nz; accessed 26 August 2021.

References

‘About us’, Diamond, www.diamondmeals.co.nz; accessed 26 August 2021.

[New Zealand women’s household guide: containing recipes and general hints] ([Wellington]: Women’s Division of the New Zealand Farmers’ Union (Inc.), [1934-1935?]).

Smith, Rosemarie, ‘Rural Women New Zealand’, New Zealand History, www.nzhistory.govt.nz; accessed 24 August 2021.

Wilcox, Sarah, ‘Story: Food and beverage manufacturing – Changing technology and tastes’, Te Ara – the Encyclopaedia of New Zealand; www.teara.govt.nz; accessed 27 August 2021.

What else have we cooked up?

Stirring up the stacks #8: Xmas Cake Recipe Recommended by “Buckhams”

Stirring up the stacks #4: A “delicious cake from better times”

Stirring up the stacks #2 The parfait on the blackboard

Stirring up the stacks #1 Variety salad in tomato aspic

Stirring up the stacks #8: Xmas Cake Recipe Recommended by “Buckhams”

Image

Post cooked up by Katherine Milburn, Liaison Librarian and Curator of Ephemera

For many people Christmas is a time of long-honoured traditions. At the Hocken this means the decorating of our Christmas tree in the foyer on the 1^st of December. It seemed the perfect date to bring in the latest contribution to Stirring up the Stacks, especially one that celebrates the festive season and advertised itself as a “proven recipe”.

Xmas Cake Recipe Recommended by “Buckhams”. Buckhams Cordials, [Queenstown], 1967. Ephemera Collection, Hocken Collections, Uare Taoka o Hākena, University of Otago.

In the Hocken’s Ephemera Collection is a Christmas cake recipe leaflet from Buckhams Cordials that wishes readers a “Merry Xmas 1967”. On the reverse is a photograph of a well-stocked fridge of “Chilled Buckhams Cordials” where we can spot a variety of flavours on the labels including Still Orange, Frostee Orange, Cola Kist, and Jamaica Dry Pale Ginger Ale. Sadly, none of these labels are currently represented in the ephemera collection, but we would gladly welcome their addition if anyone has a collection they would like to pass on.

Buckhams Cordials was a Queenstown company that was established in 1870 as the Wakatip Brewery by William Lovell Davis and Thomas Surman. Their partnership dissolved in 1873, and the brewery and cordial factory continued to be run by Davis until 1880, when he left to take up mining with his brother James. James Read was granted the brewery’s lease and ran the business until his death in 1888. His wife Alice then continued the business until 1901 when management was taken over by Charles Davis, son of William Lovell Davis. In 1908 William Lovell Davis died and the brewery was purchased by his daughter Mrs H.C. Buckham. In November 1915 the brewery side of the business was closed to avoid charges from new beer duty regulations, and the company continued as a cordial manufacturer under Buckham family management. It was eventually sold in 1969 by Jim Buckham to R. Powley and Co. Ltd of Dunedin.

The Christmas cake recipe requires the overnight soaking of mixed fruit in a seven ounce bottle of Buckhams Ginger Ale. This was easily substituted for a modern supermarket brand, but it obviously remains unclear what difference this made to the eventual flavour. Perhaps for today’s bakers, the most unusual ingredient is one tablespoon of glycerine. An internet search revealed it is used to keep cakes moist and icing soft, and a bottle was eventually tracked down in a local health food store.

Mixed fruit soaked in ginger ale; freshly baked cake

The cake was made following the standard instructions but the recipe lacked any directions about decoration. I decided to make a royal icing that also incorporated glycerine (using a Mary Berry recipe), since I now possess a bottle to be used up! This cake is not suitable for the dietary requirements of all Hocken staff as it contains ten ounces of butter and six eggs, so I also baked a vegan version. This involved the swapping of ordinary flour for self-raising flour, besides the exclusion of butter and eggs, and a lemon juice/icing sugar glaze for decoration.

The decorated cake and the vegan version

Staff feedback was positive with most enjoying the cake’s taste and texture, and the royal icing in favour of the more common almond icing. One person rated both cakes a very generous 20 out of 20, and it was gratifying to hear another admit “I don’t really like fruit Christmas cakes, but this is an exception – lovely”. However, as my own Christmas tradition is to make my Christmas cake on Labour Day and feed it weekly with rum to ensure a moist texture and delicious flavour, I would have to concur with the staff member who suggested that this cake “possibly needs to age more?” The texture may have been improved by the addition of more than just the prescribed tablespoon of glycerine. I also would have preferred an increased ratio of spices, with the possible addition of ginger since, as one Hocken staff member noted, the flavour from the ginger ale did not come through.

It is always interesting to learn more about our early business and food history. The ephemera collection includes numerous examples of local advertising that also illustrate the perpetuation of our cultural traditions.

Sources

Leckie, Frank G. Otago’s Breweries Past & Present. Dunedin, Otago Heritage Books, 1997.

“Queenstown Identity Dies” Otago Daily Times, 13 July 1988, page 13.

What else have we cooked up?

Stirring up the stacks #4: A “delicious cake from better times”

Stirring up the stacks #2 The parfait on the blackboard

Stirring up the stacks #1 Variety salad in tomato aspic

Stirring up the Stacks number 7: Virginia Pudding

Thursday, April 30th, 2020 | Anna Blackman | No Comments

Post researched and written by Gini Jory, Hocken General Assistant

When I came across this recipe late last year in the Cyclopedia of valuable receipts: a treasure-house of useful knowledge for the every-day wants of life, by Henry B. Scammell (what a mouthful!) that one of my colleagues had on his desk, I knew I had to give it a go. For some background, my full name is Virginia, and I’ve always had a bit of a problem with it. As a child people always said it in an American accent which I hated, and I never knew anyone else with the same name who wasn’t about 30 years older than me, so it always felt a bit weird. Finding a pudding with my name out of the blue brought up lots of nostalgic memories of searching for notebooks, mugs, key rings and piggy banks desperately looking for one with my name on it. Of course, I was never successful, whereas my sister Emily found her name every. single. time. Secretly, I was quite bitter about this fact.

But now it is finally my time! I have a whole pudding, and that’s much better than a key ring.
Or, at least, I hope it is.

At first look, this recipe has a few issues. Firstly, the whole thing is one tiny paragraph, nothing like recipes in cookbooks these days. And the whole thing is pretty vague on a lot of key points. No temperatures are given; the texture or consistency of the desired outcome is never mentioned, and I don’t know about you, but that frothy raw egg white sauce doesn’t sound great. It also sounds pretty flavourless.

Here is the recipe, split into ingredients and method and with some more modern metric measurements:

Virginia Pudding

Ingredients:
5 eggs (reserve 3 whites for sauce)
1 pt (472 ml) milk
1 gill (142 ml) cream; or 1 oz (28g) butter
3 Tb flour
6 Tb sugar

Method:
Mix all ingredients bar three whites and sugar. Bake for ½ an hour.
Beat egg whites to a froth with sugar. Pour over the pudding just before it is eaten.
Flavour to taste; serve cold.

I originally turned to google to see if I could find anything similar, to get a better idea of what I should be making here. It was rather unhelpful however- plenty of results for Virginia apple pudding, Virginia bread pudding, and even a Virginia chicken pudding. Eventually though, I found a transcription of Housekeeping in Old Virginia, by Marion Cabell Tyree from Project Gutenberg which has a slight variation of the same recipe:

“Virginia Pudding.

Scald one quart of milk. Pour it on three tablespoonfuls of sifted flour. Add the yolks of five eggs, the whites of two, and the grated rind of one lemon. Bake twenty minutes.

Sauce.—The whites of three eggs, beaten to a stiff froth, a full cup of sugar, then a wine-glass of wine and the juice of a lemon. Pour over the pudding just as you send it to the table.—Miss E. S.”

As you can see, the sauce on this one is a bit fancier (and sweeter), and there is some lemon for flavour in the pudding. But there’s still no temperature and no hint as to what this pudding should turn out like.

This was the way practically all recipe books were written at the time, as there were no oven thermometers, no exact way of measuring ingredient weights, and a lot of the methodology was assumed, as the books were mostly used by cooks who knew what they were doing, and didn’t want to waste time writing down recipes. A fun history fact, but not a lot of help to try and translate this recipe into 21^st century-speak!

With not a lot to go on, I decided to just get in and give it a go. I had looked up similar looking puddings, like the Chess pie and transparent pudding, which have similar ingredients and origins, so I thought I was probably looking for something that resembled a pumpkin pie, sans crust.

I decided to add a splash of vanilla for a bit of flavour, and I opted to use the cream over the butter.

Having mixed all the pudding ingredients together, it was decidedly wet! Into the oven it went for half an hour, at 180 degrees Celsius, which is what most things I bake seem to be cooked at.

First attempt mixture before baking

First attempt mixture during baking

I had decided I wasn’t super keen to eat this cold, so decided to crack on with the sauce while the pudding cooked. This was… a mistake.

When I took the pudding out, it was still very soft. It had a skin on top but was extremely wobbly. Not thinking this was what I was aiming for, I put it back in for about another 20-30 minutes. I should have held off on the sauce, as the egg whites went very stiff during this time. Because I wasn’t sure about the raw side of it, I put the egg white/meringue mix on top of the pudding and put it back in the oven to make it like a meringue topped pie. If it hadn’t gotten so stiff I could have made it look much nicer, but it was very hard to spread.

First attempt mix after baking

First attempt with addition of meringue baked

First impressions: Egg with meringue on top.

It had a definite quiche like texture, and was still very bland despite the vanilla. the only flavour came from the “sauce” which was nice and sweet. In all honestly, I was disappointed this was the dessert I shared a name with.

First attempt end result

I had been meaning to give it another go to share with my workmates, but due to the Covid-19 lockdown I am currently unable to. However, this did give me another idea- so, I emailed round the recipe and asked everyone what they thought it would taste like, and if it was something they would want to try.

Here are some responses:

“Yes I would definitely like to try this. Maybe with some poached fruit?”

“What is a gill of cream?” (I had never heard of this measurement before either!)

“Anything sweet and comforting looks good to me.”

“I’m intrigued, there isn’t as much sugar as I would have expected for the meringue and there isn’t any vanilla. Perhaps it will taste like a pavlova except not as sweet? Looks yum.”

“I think it would be super bland, no flavour at all! Definitely would try it though as there’s nothing gross going on but would be nice with some berries on the side or something.”

“The pudding looks amazing and sounds perfect for a cool Autumn evening! But the recipe makes it seem like it might be a bit bland as there is nothing to give it much flavour e.g. vanilla or lemon.”

“Reading the recipe the bottom bit is an unsweetened batter pudding, like a Dutch Baby or a Yorkshire pudding, and then it is topped with meringue. Personally I think it might be a bit bland to my 21^st century palate and I’d be craving some fruit with it. But back in the day it would have been sweet, filling and easy to digest. And also made from the kinds of ingredients readily available to the home cook. Lockdown food?”

“I’m always a sucker for meringue !!! (and a lot of eggs !)”

One of my colleagues suggested it sounded a bit like a Queen pudding, minus the breadcrumbs and jam. I had a quick google of this, and now that I saw something similar and a properly explained method, I decided to give it another go with my bubble buddies over Easter weekend. This time I did things a bit differently:

I beat the egg mixture, and took the instruction to “flavour to taste” very liberally, adding about 1/3 a cup of sugar and a teaspoon of vanilla to this as well.
I heated the milk and butter (had no cream this time round) on the stove, not letting it boil. Sifted in the flour, mixed and then slowly poured it into the egg mixture in small batches while beating to combine. This resulted in a much puffier mixture than my previous attempt, and I had more mixture, so had to put the extra in a mini ramekin. Popped it into the oven at 160 degrees, slightly lower this time. After 30 minutes I took it out and left to cool on the bench.

Attempt 2 uncooked mixture

Attempt 2 cooked mixture

When we were ready for dessert, I whipped up the egg whites with the sugar, and piped it on top of the pudding. Popped it in the oven on grill for about 5-10 minutes, until the meringue was slightly browned on top. We had it with some boysenberry ice cream, and it was much nicer this time round! More of a baked custard consistency, which I think is probably more what this pudding should be like. I think it would definitely be nice with some poached fruit or a berry compote. I definitely wouldn’t call this my new favourite pudding, but I’m glad I gave it another go and got a better result.

Attempt 2 meringue piped

Attempt 2 final result

Now this is more of a fun weird thing to share my name with, and I’m ok with that.

References:

Scammel, Henry B, c. 1897. Cyclopedia of valuable receipts : a treasure-house of useful knowledge for the every-day wants of life. St. Auckland, N.Z. : Wm. Gribble.

Viet, Helen Zoe, 2017, Smithsonian Magazine. The Making of the Modern American Recipe. Visited 8/4/2020. < https://www.smithsonianmag.com/history/making-modern-american-recipe-180964940/>

Mcdaniel, Melissa, originally by Tyree, Marion Cabell. Housekeeping in Old Virginia. Visited 8/4/2020. < https://www.gutenberg.org/files/42450/42450-h/42450-h.htm#Page_365>

What else have we cooked up?

Stirring up the stacks #4: A “delicious cake from better times”

Stirring up the stacks #2 The parfait on the blackboard

Stirring up the stacks #1 Variety salad in tomato aspic

Miscreant Mollusks: A look into the relationship between Bluff Oysters and Typhoid Fever with reference to the Muttonbirding Industry.

Wednesday, January 22nd, 2020 | Anna Blackman | No Comments

The second of our series from Practising History (HIST 353) students, this is Shinay Singh’s response to an Otago Preventive Medicine dissertation. An invaluable primary source of New Zealand medical and social history, the Preventive Medicine dissertation collection comprises more than three thousand public health projects written by fifth-year medical students from the 1920s to the late 1970s. Topics range from studies on current health issues, such as asthma, to health surveys of various occupational groups and of New Zealand towns and Maori. Permission is required to access the dissertations. An index to the dissertations is available.

Typhoid fever was and still is a serious illness for anyone to contract. In 1932 two fifth year medical students, L.P. Clark and R.J. McGill, conducted a public health survey of the Bluff township looking at the sanitary standards of industries associated with Bluff, specifically the oyster industry.

In 1929 news articles of six cases of typhoid fever outbreaks in Christchurch were suggested to link back to the consumption of Bluff oysters. The Bluff oyster industry was about to go international with refrigerated live and canned oysters. This potentially serious health risk, therefore, needed to be examined more closely.

Public Response

Strong denial was the response to the accusation that the source of the outbreak lay in the consumption of Bluff oysters. An Invercargill man called it all ‘bunkum’, that it was the housewives who “often keep them a week and expect them to remain good.”^[1] The fact that the oysters were “kept in good salt-water”^[2] at the wharves in Bluff Harbour was used to suggest they were healthy. Professor Hardman and Professor Boyce had done research into disease and oysters in 1899 and found that oysters could carry bacteria for up to 10 days. The lifespan of the bacteria could apparently be inhibited by pouring salt-water over them or storing them in pure water.^[3] The fact that sewage contaminated the Harbour may have increased the likelihood of contamination.

Oyster Harvesting

The oyster season occurred from February 1st to September 30th. The students Clark and McGill were able to go on board the ‘Wetere’ oyster boat to observe the oyster harvesting process. An average of 80 sacks were yielded a day with each sack containing about 70 dozen oysters. The oysters were dredged up from the Foveaux Strait oyster beds and piled onto the deck of the boat. Clark and McGill noted the men standing all over the pile of oysters as a potential contamination point. The oysters were then brought back to Bluff Harbour and stored below the wharves in a pile for transportation to the local cannery or to buyers who wanted fresh oysters.

Oyster boat with fishermen standing on pile of oysters. ODT Collection. Hocken Collections Uare Taoka o Hakena, University of Otago, Dunedin, https://hocken.recollect.co.nz/nodes/view/11281.

Canning Process

Oysters were brought in from the wharf on carts to the cannery. They were opened by employees, then sent to be washed in a kauri tub. They were then canned in half pound tins that held around 18 oysters per tin. In the tin they were sent through a hot box with steam pipes that both sterilised, and partially cooked the oysters. The tins were stored in an incubation room at 38°C. Clark and McGill noted that this was the most sanitary way of shipping oysters. Any water contamination was prevented by the high heat of the hot box steam pipes.

Muttonbirding

Muttonbird harvesting was and still is restricted to Māori who have claims to the industry. The season began on March 18th of every year and everyone must be off the islands by the end of May. Oyster boats took them to the Muttonbird Islands to harvest. In exchange for this, the captains of the oyster boats received a kit of muttonbirds. Each kit could hold about 3 dozen muttonbirds. They packed the birds into kits, inside these kits were kelp bags. The oils of the birds filled the bag, acting as a preservative. Clark and McGill were highly suspicious of contamination, but there was no evidence that anyone had been contaminated by muttonbirds. Thousands of muttonbirds were collected in the season. The kits were sent around New Zealand in cheese wagons to go to shops or individuals for sale.

Materials used in packing kits of mutton birds for marketing: kelp blades blown up to form bags, protecting the kits when full, 1927. Hocken Collections Uare Taoka o Hakena, University of Otago, Dunedin, https://hocken.recollect.co.nz/nodes/view/16790.

Medical Students Findings

Clark and McGill found that sewage was being disposed of into Bluff Harbour at low tide. The high tide took the sewage by the flood tide to the Foveaux Strait oyster beds. Oysters are filter feeders and so they would consume the small particles of faeces and those who ate the oysters raw were at risk of getting infected with disease as this was how it was spread. The sewage of Bluff residents coming from the flood tide created a volatile combination that could potentially have allowed for the spread of typhoid.

Bluff Harbour. Hocken Collections Uare Taoka o Hakena, University of Otago, Dunedin, https://hocken.recollect.co.nz/nodes/view/2155.

Medical Students Suggestions

Clark and McGill suggested holding the sewage for 13 days until diseased bacteria died. They also suggested heating the sewage to 65°C to sterilise it. They argued for some sort of sewage treatment before being released into the ocean. Diseases could survive in salt-water for 11-25 days. By treating the sewage this could be reduced to 3-5 days. Bacteria could survive in unsterilised seawater for 3 weeks and could survive in an oyster for 5-6 days.

The students suggested a water carrying system that would go to a pumping station located in the Ocean Beach neighbourhood to remove the town sewage. Then it could be pumped into Foveaux Strait well away from the Harbour. It wouldn’t be until the mid-1960s that Bluff would have a sewage pumping system that would do just as Clark and McGill suggested.^[4] And it was much later, in the 1990s, that the sewage being released was treated.^[5]

The Oyster Industry Today

There are higher sanitary standards in the Bluff oyster industry today. It is now the oysters themselves that are at risk of disease. Bonamia exitiosa is a waterborne parasite that was found in the Foveaux Strait in 1986. Between 1986 and 1992, 89% of the oyster population was killed.^[6] The population was closed off in 1993 to let them repopulate and was opened again in 1996.^[7] Since 2016 Bonamia infection levels have been low and oyster populations have been recovering with close monitoring by the Ministry of Fisheries.^[8]

^[1] “All Bunkum”, Evening Post, 17 October 1929.

^[2] Ibid.

^[3] “Oysters and Disease”, Evening Star, 3 June 1899.

^[4] “Sewage treatment and disposal”. Invercargill City Council, accessed 3 August 2019, https://icc.govt.nz/infrastructure/sewage-treatment-and-disposal/.

^[5] Ibid.

^[6] H.J. Cranfield, A. Dunn, I. J. Doonan, K.P. Michael, “Bonamia exitiosa epizootic in Ostrea chilensis from Foveaux Strait, southern New Zealand between 1986 and 1992”, Journal of Marine Science 62, no.1 (2005): 3.

^[7] K. P. Michael, J. Forman, D. Hulston, D. Fu, “The status of infection by bonamia (Bonamia exitiosa) in Foveaux Strait oysters (Ostrea chilensis), changes in the distributions and densities of recruit, pre-recruit, and small oysters in February 2010, and projections of disease mortality,” New Zealand Fisheries Assessment Report 2011/5, (2011): 5.

^[8] K.P. Michael, J. Bilewitch, J. Forman, D. Hulston, J. Sutherland, G. Moss, K. Large, “A survey of the Foveaux Strait oyster (Ostrea chilensis) population (OYU 5) in commercial fishery areas and the status of Bonamia (Bonamia exitiosa) in February 2018,” New Zealand Fisheries Assessment Report 2019/02, (2019): 2.

Bibliography

“All Bunkum”. Evening Post. 17 October 1929.

Clark, L.P. and McGill, R.J. “A public health survey of the Bluff with special reference to the Oyster industry” (5th Year Medical Diss. The University of Otago. 1932).

Conn, Ailsa. “The Importance of Norovirus and Cadmium in Shellfish and Implications to Human Health”. (MA. Thes. University of Canterbury, 2010).

Cranfield, H.J. Dunn, A. Doonan, I. J. Michael,K.P. “Bonamia exitiosa epizootic in Ostrea chilensis from Foveaux Strait, southern New Zealand between 1986 and 1992”. Journal of Marine Science 62, no.1 (2005) 3-13.

“Oysters and Disease”. Evening Star. 3 June 1899.

“Sewage treatment and disposal”. Invercargill City Council. Accessed 3 August 2019. https://icc.govt.nz/infrastructure/sewage-treatment-and-disposal/.

Michael, K.P. Bilewitch, J. Forman, J. Hulston, D. Sutherland, J. Moss, G. Large, K.

“A survey of the Foveaux Strait oyster (Ostrea chilensis) population (OYU 5) in commercial fishery areas and the status of Bonamia (Bonamia exitiosa) in February 2018,” New Zealand Fisheries Assessment Report 2019/02, (2019).

Michael, K. P. Forman, J. Hulston, D. Fu, D. “The status of infection by bonamia (Bonamia exitiosa) in Foveaux Strait oysters (Ostrea chilensis), changes in the distributions and densities of recruit, pre-recruit, and small oysters in February 2010, and projections of disease mortality.” New Zealand Fisheries Assessment Report 2011/5. (2011).

Images

Oyster boat, ODT Collection. Hocken Library, University of Otago, Dunedin,

https://hocken.recollect.co.nz/nodes/view/11281.

Oyster boats, Bluff, Southland, 1935. Alexander Turnbull Library, Wellington, New

Zealand, https://natlib.govt.nz/records/30657435.

Materials used in packing kits of mutton birds for Marketing: Kelp leaves blown up to

form bags, protecting the kits when full, 1927. Hocken Library, University of Otago, Dunedin, https://hocken.recollect.co.nz/nodes/view/16790.

Bluff Harbour. Hocken Library, University of Otago, Dunedin, https://hocken.recollect.co.nz/nodes/view/2155.

Stirring up the stacks #6 – pumpkin pie

Thursday, November 28th, 2019 | Hocken Collections | No Comments

Post cooked up by Andrew Lorey, Collections Assistant (Researcher Services)

I faced a daunting challenge as I started thinking about what to cook for my contribution to the Hocken Collections ‘Stirring Up the Stacks’ series. Over the last year my colleagues have fermented sauerkraut from scratch, deciphered German-language cooking notes, recreated 1960s party starters, provided a perfectly prepared peach parfait, and concocted lovely jelly-stabilised variety salads for vegans and omnivores alike.

I would describe myself as an unskilled cook at even the best of times, and as such, I struggled to think of a dish that I could contribute to a morning tea or lunchtime without subjecting my workmates to bland tastes and unpalatable textures. As you might expect, I ended up thinking about the types of foods that I enjoy, and particularly the types of dishes that my parents and grandparents cooked when I was a child growing up in America.

Figure 1 – Two Hocken Collections cookbooks offering recipes of ‘American Dishes for New Zealand’.1, 2

Different Cultures and Different Cuisines

It is an indisputable fact that all of us have our own personal favourite foods, whether they come in the form of hāngī, vegetarian dishes featuring perfectly cooked tofu or after-dinner treats like ginger nuts and vanilla ice cream. But food plays a much more important role in our lives than simply providing us with nutritional nourishment and energy. I think Emma Johnson captures the multi-dimensional importance of food in her introduction to Kai and culture: Food stories from Aotearoa:

Food is a confluence of things: a web of weather systems; the lay of the land; stories of arrival, trade, economics and politics; histories and empires; domestic and urban practices. It is all connected and culminates in each of us. All of these systems, stories and politics become deeply personal, as food becomes part of us.³ (emphasis added)

In an increasingly global world, it may come as no surprise that people are consuming increasingly global foods. Recent census statistics published by Stats NZ Tatauranga Aotearoa show that 27.4 per cent of the people residing in New Zealand during the 2018 Census were born outside of the country⁴, and it follows that most New Zealand immigrants have transported their home countries’ cuisines along with them. When reflecting upon my own identity as an immigrant, I realised that it would be interesting to search for cookbooks at the Hocken Collections that provide instructions for dishes that may not traditionally be associated with New Zealand.

Figure 2 – This adaptation of a figure published by Stats NZ Tatauranga Aotearoa illustrates the proportions of New Zealand immigrants as reported during the 2018 Census.5

I am pleased to say that I did not have any trouble finding cookbooks related to the immigrant experience here at the Hocken Collections. Interestingly, I found a series of cookbooks published by Wellington’s Price Milburn publishing house between the late 1950s and early 1970s that provided recipes from a wide variety of international cuisines. The two American recipe books shown in Figure 1 come from this Price Milburn series, but the publisher also included volumes dedicated to Chinese, Turkish, French and South East Asian dishes.

Figure 3 – Wellington-based publishing house Price Milburn published a series of cookbooks catering to international tastes between the late 1950s and early 1970s.6, 7, 8, 9

Although it is uncertain whether actual New Zealand immigrants were involved with the creation of this Price Milburn series or whether the recipes were put together by New Zealanders who were simply interested in international cuisines, it is clear that an appreciation of international flavours and food literature has persisted in the decades following the Price Milburn publications. For example, recent books like Lift the Lid of the Cumin Jar¹⁰, Me’a Kai: The Food and Flavours of the South Pacific¹¹ and “Dinner at my place”: The great Refugee and Migrant cook book¹² celebrate and explore the many layers of meaning that exist within the flavours of immigrant experience.

Bringing together dishes from countries as diverse as Rwanda, Chile, Sweden, Vietnam and Vanuatu, books such as these showcase the many vibrant culinary cultures that exist both inside and outside New Zealand while also telling the stories of particular people from particular places. As Therese O’Connell states in her introduction to Lift the Lid of the Cumin Jar, “food, the preparation and sharing of it, consistently plays a fundamental role in each of the cultures we encounter.” It was precisely this fondness for sharing that led me to prepare a dish that pays homage to the culturally American cuisine that I grew up with – the not-too-savoury and not-too-sweet pumpkin pie.

As American as… Pumpkin Pie?

Pumpkin pie is a popular American dessert during autumn, particularly during the months of November and December, when many people observe holidays like Thanksgiving (the fourth Thursday of November) and Christmas. During my recipe search, I consulted three separate cookbooks that included recipes for pumpkin pie in a quest to discover the finest list of ingredients and the most fool-proof instructions. Although one of the recipes came from a ‘foods demonstration’ undertaken by the University of Otago Department of University Extension¹³, I ultimately decided to use a recipe for ‘Hot Pumpkin Pie’ that appeared in one of the Price Milburn booklets shown in Figure 1.

Figure 4 – American recipes for Thanksgiving, including the instructions used for the ‘Hot Pumpkin Pie’ eaten recently at the Hocken Collections.

Hot Pumpkin Pie

8 oz [227 g] flour
2 oz [57 g] butter
2 oz [57 g] lard
½ teaspoon salt
cold water
1½ cups [368 g] mashed cooked pumpkin
2 eggs
6 oz [170 g] brown sugar
¼ teaspoon grated nutmeg
½ teaspoon cinnamon
½ teaspoon ground ginger
1 cup [237 ml] milk
1 teaspoon grated lemon rind

METHOD:—Sift flour with salt and rub in butter and lard. Cut in just sufficient cold water to bind to a stiff paste. Turn out and roll and line a pie plate with one inch overlapping. Turn overlapping edge under. Prick the bottom and bake for ten minutes in a fairly hot oven, then fill and return to bake for a further three-quarters of an hour in a more moderate oven, until the filling is set and browned. To make the filling, steam pumpkin until tender and sieve enough to make 1½ cups puree. Beat in eggs, brown sugar, spices, and milk. Turn into pie shell and dust with additional nutmeg.

As you can see, the recipe provides instructions for making both the pie crust (using the first five ingredients) and the filling (using the final eight ingredients). The instructions do, however leave some things open for interpretation when it comes to the quantity of cold water necessary to create the perfect crust and the cooking temperatures that should be used in the oven (I could not locate settings for ‘fairly hot’ or ‘more moderate’ on my oven at home…). Where possible, I have calculated metric conversions for the ingredients and included those above.

Although the recipe does not explain this portion of pumpkin pie preparations, I began my cooking by washing my pumpkins under cool water, slicing them in half, scooping out the seeds and roasting them for about 60 minutes at 170˚C. To decide whether they were ready to be sieved, drained and pureed, I tried to pierce their rinds with the tines of a fork.

Waiting for your pumpkins to soften in the oven provides ample time to make the pie crust, although I must confess that I had saved some pre-made shortcrust in the freezer for this occasion. If you have a tried-and-tested family recipe for pie crusts, then you should feel free to use that too!

After pre-baking your pie crust if you wish (see the recipe method above) and creating your pumpkin mash puree, then the rest of the recipe is quite straightforward. Just beat in eggs, brown sugar, milk and spices (I doubled the suggested amounts of nutmeg, cinnamon and ginger), fill up your pie crust with this mixture and then cook for about 60 minutes (or until a knife inserted into the centre comes out clean) at 175˚C.

Figure 5 – One of the two pumpkin pies cooked as part of this instalment of ‘Stirring Up the Stacks’.

Reactions from colleagues about the pumpkin pies that I prepared were generally favourable, although several comments did remark that sweet pumpkin dishes remain somewhat foreign to the New Zealand palate:

“Transcendent”
“Delicious! A lovely blend of spices”
“Texture was a fluffy dream!!”
“Is it a main? Is it dessert? Could be both. All day eating.”
“I still find the concept of pumpkin as a sweet dish hard to wrap my head around, but this pumpkin pie was delicious!”
“Best pumpkin pie!”
“Yum!”

It seems fitting that this blog post has been published only shortly after Thanksgiving, and I hope that many of you who read it decide to give this recipe a try!

Figure 6 – I think one of my colleagues put it best when she said, “Yum!”.

[1] Elizabeth Messenger’s American Dishes for New Zealand (1962). Wellington: Price Milburn & Company Limited.
[2] American Dishes for New Zealand (n.d.). Wellington: Price Milburn & Company Limited.
[3] Johnson, Emma (2017). Kai and culture: Food stories from Aotearoa. Christchurch: Freerange Press.
[4] Stats NZ Tatauranga Aotearoa (2019). 2018 Census totals by topic – national highlights. https://www.stats.govt.nz/information-releases/2018-census-totals-by-topic-national-highlights[5] Stats NZ Tatauranga Aotearoa (2019). New Zealand as a village of 100 people. https://www.stats.govt.nz/infographics/new-zealand-as-a-village-of-100-people-2018-census-data[6] 50 Chinese Dishes you can make (1958). Wellington: Price Milburn & Company Limited.
[7] Harris, Patricia (n.d.). Fit for a Sultan: Turkish Food for Other Kitchens. Wellington: Price Milburn & Company Limited.
[8] French Dishes for New Zealand (n.d.). Wellington: Price Milburn & Company Limited.
[9] Heuer, Berys (n.d.). South East Asian Dishes for New Zealand. Wellington: Price Milburn & Company Limited
[10] Reid, Robyn (1999). Lift the Lid of the Cumin Jar: refugees and immigrants talk about their lives and food. Wellington: Wellington ESOL Home Tutor Service Inc.
[11] Oliver, Robert (2010). Me’a Kai: The Food and Flavours of the South Pacific. Auckland: Random House New Zealand.
[12] Refugee and Migrant Service (1998). “Dinner at my place”: The great Refugee and Migrant cook book. Lower Hutt, N.Z.: Refugee & Migrant Service.
[13] University of Otago Department of University Extension (n.d.). Ideas from Overseas American Food. Foods Demonstration. Dunedin: University of Otago.

What else have we cooked up?

Stirring up the stacks #5: – sauerkraut roll

Stirring up the stacks #4: a “delicious cake from better times”

Stirring up the stacks #2 The parfait on the blackboard

Stirring up the stacks #1 Variety salad in tomato aspic

Stirring up the stacks #5 – sauerkraut roll

Wednesday, October 30th, 2019 | Hocken Collections | No Comments

Post cooked up by Alex Scahill, Collections Assistant, Publications

I came up with this idea upon spotting a recent children’s book by Gavin Bishop, Cook’s cook: the cook who cooked for Captain Cook, appear on the new arrivals shelf at the Hocken. What caught my eye was that the cook in question, John Thompson, only had one hand. What a challenge it must have been for Thompson, attempting to prepare meals for dozens of men, on a ship being rolled around by the merciless ocean, using 18th century technology and ingredients that often did not store well or were opportunistically harvested along the way, many of which most of us would turn our noses up at today (anyone keen for penguin, seal or turtle?). Actually, I think that’d make for a great contemporary cooking show. Let’s chuck Gordon Ramsay into a cramped little box that pitches and rolls around like a ride at an amusement park, and make him cook haute cuisine for dozens of amused onlookers using an assortment of random (and questionably fresh) ingredients using nothing but a woodfire oven… with one hand tied behind his back. I’d watch that!

Cook’s cook: the cook who cooked for Captain Cook. Hocken G246.C7 BH57 2018

What attracted me to cooking something in the realm of what may have been served on board these voyages was that at the time I spied this book I was also (temporarily) one handed, having recently broken my elbow. So I endeavoured (insert cheesy dad joke grin) to become a one handed cook myself and see if the food served aboard the ships was really as bad as it sounds. Admittedly, extended preparation time of my dish, combined with a rather unfortunate mishap which set me back a few weeks (keep reading), meant that by the time it actually came to serve my dish to my colleagues my elbow was fully healed.

So what type of fare was typical on board Cook’s voyages to New Zealand? Cook set out with provisions for a two year voyage, unsure of where and when they may have the opportunity to resupply with fresh water and food. Eighteenth century sailors were a hardy bunch, and there was little room for fussiness when it came to food. Eat what you were served or perish.

Provisions list from Cook’s journal for July 1772 for the Resolution and Adventure (total 201 men). Burkhardt et al. 1978. Hocken VC370 .BY47 1978

While Cook had loaded his vessels with a variety of livestock, this was primarily for leaving behind on islands they encountered during the voyage, and generally only those animals which did not survive the voyage were consumed on board. What meat was available for consumption was usually subjected to heavy salting in order to prevent the meat from spoiling, thus extending the shelf life for long trips. Other protein came primarily from what birds or sea creatures could be caught along the way. The same was said for produce, with unknown plants harvested for food from islands along the way. Consumption of some poisonous species in the South Pacific resulted in the deaths of a pig and a pet parakeet, although no sailors suffered the same fate (Burkhardt et al. 1978: 132).

However, due to the large number of Hocken staff who are vegetarian or vegan, I wanted to prepare a dish which would cater for as many of our staff as possible, so I opted to use two of the absolute staples from Cook’s galleys: bread and sauerkraut. The third major staple on board these voyages was booze, which was consumed regularly in lieu of fresh clean water, although I decided that serving beer at work during morning tea was perhaps unwise.

Sailors and Sauerkraut. Hocken VC370 .BY47 1978

In the stacks I found a book called Sailors and Sauerkraut (Burkhardt et al. 1978). The authors of this volume scoured the journals of Cook, Banks and others for references about the food and beverages which were consumed during their voyages to New Zealand, and subsequently produced a recipe book inspired by those references. I chose to recreate their recipe for Sauerkraut Roll.

This was perhaps a little ambitious considering I’d never even tasted, let alone tried to make sauerkraut before. The recipe seemed straightforward enough. Just cabbage and brine. But it does take several weeks to ferment. My first batch appeared to be going well and after a while began to take on the characteristic sauerkraut smell of ‘sweet farts’ (I’m really making this sound appealing!).

Enter catastrophe. After several weeks of waiting it came time to have a taste test. As I moved my container to the kitchen bench for tasting my clumsiness got the better of me and I ended up with my entire batch of sauerkraut pasted across the kitchen floor. So I started again.

Once the sauerkraut was ready it was time to prepare the rest of the dish for morning tea. I opted to double the following recipe.

The sauerkraut is ready

FOR THE ROLL

¾ cup whole wheat flour
2½ cups all-purpose flour
yeast, sugar, salt, water
1 cup lukewarm milk

Mix the yeast with the lukewarm milk and add the flour. Knead dough until it is smooth and elastic, then put in a warm place to rise until double in volume. Roll out the dough to a size large enough to wrap around the filling.

FILLING

500g sauerkraut
4 tablespoons oil
cracked pepper
5 large onions
2 cups croutons

Wash the sauerkraut under running water and drain. Fry one of the onions in a little oil until golden and then add the sauerkraut and pepper. Cook over a medium heat for a while. While the sauerkraut is cooking slice the remaining onions into rings and fry in oil until golden. Also prepare croutons.

Spread half the onions and croutons on the dough and cover with a layer of sauerkraut. Repeat. Carefully roll everything up, sealing the ends of the roll so that nothing will leak out during cooking.

Adding the filling

All rolled up (like a “sauerkraut calzone” according to my feedback)

To make it look a little less rustic (debatable) I prepared some caramelised onion as a garnish.

On the morning of serving I arrived at work with the rolls raw, gave them a quick glaze with olive oil, garnished with the caramelised onion and popped it in the oven first at 220˚C for 10mins, and then at 180˚C for a further 30mins until nice and golden.

Looks delicious!

They came out looking much better than I’d anticipated, but the real test would come down to taste. My personal opinion was that it tasted fine, but certainly better than expected. I just don’t think sauerkraut is really my thing. The following are a selection of comments left in the anonymous comments box during tasting:

“visually appealing, which was surprising”

“this was so nice it gives me a false impression of what ships meals were like”

“…would definitely be great with a beer”

“Delicious! What were the sailors complaining about?”

“smells divine!”

and my personal favourite:

“tasty, and the perfect meal to prevent shipboard romance on long trips”

Overall, certainly a reasonable tasting novelty which provoked some decent discussion, but given the effort I think it’s fair to say I won’t be attempting this one again any time soon.

References:

Beaglehole, J. C. (ed.) 1955-1974. The journals of Captain James Cook on his voyages of discovery. Cambridge: published for the Hakluyt Society at the University Press.
Bishop, G. 2018. Cook’s cook : the cook who cooked for Captain Cook. Wellington: Gecko Press.
Burkhardt, B., McLean, B. A., and Kochanek, D. 1978. Sailors & sauerkraut, or, Recipes from Paradise, or, Making do with what you have : a reading cook book with extracts from the journals of William Anderson, Joseph Banks, James Cook, Thomas Edgar, Alexander Home, James King, David Samwell and recipes interpolated therein. British Columbia: Gray’s Publishing.

What else have we cooked up?

Stirring up the stacks #4: a “delicious cake from better times”

Stirring up the stacks #2 The parfait on the blackboard

Stirring up the stacks #1 Variety salad in tomato aspic

Stirring up the stacks #4 – a “delicious cake from better times”

Sunday, May 19th, 2019 | Hocken Collections | 2 Comments

Post cooked up by Ali Clarke, Collections Assistant, Archives

When we started this challenge of testing recipes we had found in the Hocken stacks, I immediately thought of the archives of scientists Franz and Marianne Bielschowsky, whose lives took several unexpected paths. Marianne’s recipe books – some handwritten, some full of clippings and some published – are mostly in German, so that added to the challenge! My German language skills are pretty basic, but with the help of a good dictionary and a fluent German speaker I was able to figure out the technical instructions in my chosen recipe.

The cover of Marianne Bielschowsky’s book, ‘Ein Bilder-Koch-Buch’ (an illustrated cook book), compiled c.1946, MS-1493/027, Bielschowsky papers.

My attention was grabbed by Marianne Bielschowsky’s handwritten heading “Leckere Kuchen aus besseren Zeiten!” for some printed recipes she pasted into one of her recipe clippings books. This translates as “Delicious cakes from better times!” That has a poignancy which reflects the times – the clippings book was probably compiled about 1946, when she was living in England. A cake like this, featuring butter, sugar and 6 eggs, would have been beyond the capacity of most people during rationing – when an adult’s weekly rations were 2oz of butter, 8oz of sugar and 1 egg. No doubt this distinctly German recipe also served as a reminder of a happy childhood there.

Recipe for Frankfurter Kranz, pasted into ‘Ein Bilder-Koch-Buch’, MS-1493/027, Bielschowsky papers.

I’ve written about the Bielschowskys previously, in a post about the Spanish Civil War for the University of Otago 150 years history blog. Franz Bielschowsky (1902-1965), the son of a distinguished German neurologist, was dismissed from his position as a medical researcher in Dusseldorf early in 1933 because he was Jewish, and fled to Amsterdam. In 1934 he relocated to Madrid, where he became a lecturer in the medical faculty; in 1935 he was appointed director of the biochemistry department of the new Institute for Experimental Medicine at the Central University of Madrid.

Marianne Bielschowsky, photographed in Brussels, 1939. MS-1493/036, Bielschowsky papers.

Marianne Angermann (1904-1977), a German biochemist who had worked with Franz Bielschowsky in Dusseldorf, joined him at the Institute in Madrid late in 1935; they were to marry in 1937. Angermann was born in Dresden. She was not Jewish herself, and her family appears to have been in comfortable circumstances; her father was at one time the Burgermeister (Mayor) of a small town. She studied in Koln (Cologne), Bonn and Freiburg im Breisgau, where she obtained her PhD. Marianne described herself and her parents as ‘Antifaschisten’ – opposed to fascism.

Angermann and Bielschowsky refused offers to leave Spain when the civil war began there in 1936, but as the siege of Madrid lengthened, research became impossible. Franz joined the republican medical service and worked at a military hospital in Madrid. They fled Spain early in 1939, as Franco’s forces prepared to enter the capital. They were now refugees for a second time, and as war took over Europe they ended up in England. Both worked at the University of Sheffield until 1948, when they arrived in Otago, where Franz had been appointed director of the cancer research laboratory; Marianne worked alongside him. She was especially known for her development of various special strains of mice, used worldwide for medical research.

My first attempt at the cake was a hit with my family.

An English translation of Marianne Bielschowsky’s recipe:

Frankfurt Wreath

For the cake:

4 eggs

200g sugar

100g potato flour

100g wheat flour

1 tsp baking powder

1 packet vanilla sugar (I substituted 2 tsp vanilla essence)

Whip the egg whites until stiff (“like snow”). Mix together the egg yolks, sugar and vanilla. Add to egg whites alternately with the sifted flours and baking powder to make a soft dough. Beat well. Bake for 1 hour in a greased and floured ring tin. When the wreath is cold, cut it through twice [making 3 layers]. Fill with the following cream, then spread cream over the outside and sprinkle with the almonds.

For the cream:

2 eggs

100g sugar

3 heaped tbsp flour

½ litre skimmed milk

125g butter

toasted chopped almonds

Mix the eggs, 3 tbsp of the sugar, the flour and milk together well [in a pot]. Heat, stirring constantly, until it comes to the boil. Remove from heat and continue stirring until it is cold. Mix the remaining sugar and softened butter together and stir into the custard mixture.

Hints

I couldn’t find potato flour in my usual supermarkets, but it is available in health food stores and Asian grocery stores.

No oven temperature is given – I found it took just 30-40 minutes in a moderate oven (180°C).

I made the cake twice. I wasn’t entirely satisfied with the consistency of the cake in my first test run, so I changed the method a little on my second try. Instead of adding the yolks/sugar/vanilla to the egg whites, I slowly folded the whipped egg whites into the well beaten yolks/sugar/vanilla mixture, then added the flours/baking powder – this worked better and made a lovely light sponge.

The cream was more successful on my first attempt – it curdled slightly on my second go when I added the butter/sugar. I recommend making sure the butter/sugar mixture is really well creamed, and cold, before stirring it into the cold custard.

The secret to any custard is stirring to prevent lumps – I use a hand whisk to stir the entire time it is cooking. This recipe recommends stirring while it cools as well – I put the pot into a sink of cold water to speed that process.

I used whole almonds I had chopped into big chunks, then toasted in the oven for 5 or 10 minutes.

The second attempt disappeared quickly from the Hocken staffroom!

Results

This cake was a big hit with the tasters both times I made it! It isn’t strongly flavoured, but the contrast in textures between the fluffy cake, smooth cream and crunchy almonds is delicious, as many commented. There was universal approval from the Hocken staff: “those ‘better times’ must have been amazing”, suggested one. The delicious custard/nuts made it “quite different to most of my modern cake experiences”, wrote one reviewer, with others also noting its distinctly Germanic style. A warning – it’s messy to eat, as one reviewer pointed out!

I searched online for modern versions of this recipe – the English-language versions, such as this one translate the name as Frankfurt Crown Cake. They add jam to the filling between the layers, coat the almonds in caramel, and include cherries and other fancy decorations so the cake resembles a jewelled crown. They also use packets of vanilla pudding instead of making the custard from scratch! The older version I tried is less extravagant, but still delicious, and I encourage you to try it at home. We don’t know if Marianne Bielschowsky made this cake once she had settled in Dunedin, but in any case it has been a pleasure to make it as a tribute to her.

What else have we cooked up?