The First Thanksgiving Feast: Salt Pork, Garbanzo Beans, and Tortoise?

[This post originally appeared on November 27, 2013.]

Tradition--and most history books--teach that the first Thanksgiving feast was held in Plymouth Colony, Massachusetts, in November of 1621, when Protestant Pilgrims invited their Wampanoag neighbors to share a meal of wildfowl, corn and venison. However, the true "first Thanksgiving" may well have taken place fifty-six years earlier in St. Augustine, Florida.

In 1565, King Philip of Spain sent Pedro Menéndez de Avilés (1519-1574), a Spanish admiral, to destroy a colony of French Huguenots that had established itself in Florida in territory claimed by Spain. On August 28, the Feast of St. Augustine of Hippo, Menéndez and his men landed near the native Timucua village of Seloy and founded the settlement of St. Augustine. Shortly after, they commemorated their safe passage by celebrating Mass--considered by many to be the first Catholic Mass celebrated on American soil--and invited their Timucuan neighbors to a meal of Thanksgiving.

As the meal took place shortly after the Spaniards' arrival, it would have been comprised of dishes produced from the remaining provisions brought from Spain. The most likely candidate was a stew called cocido, made of garbanzo beans and salt pork flavored with garlic, which would have been served with hardtack biscuits and red wine. The Timucua probably contributed dishes made of corn, venison, and tortoise, staples of their diet.

The battle over the "first Thanksgiving" is in all likelihood a moot point, for as historian Michael Gannon points out, other Europeans in pre-Mayflower days would have marked their arrival with prayers of thanksgiving and perhaps even meals with their Native American neighbors. Gannon does emphasize, however, that the thanksgiving at St. Augustine was the first to take place at a permanent European settlement on the American continent. Sorry, Pilgrims!

In any case, I wish you a happy holiday marked by a spirit of genuine thanksgiving for all the blessings we share!

Source: 
Horowitz, Tony. A Voyage Long and Strange: Rediscovering the New World (Picador, 2008).

CLAWS OF THE CAT Cover Reveal Tour

Ready for a mystery? Here's the clue:

Did you guess tea? Tea is the second clue in the cover reveal tour for CLAWS OF THE CAT, Susan Spann's debut Shinobi Mystery novel, coming from St. Martin's/Minotaur Books on July 16, 2013. A teahouse features prominently in this novel, set in sixteenth century Kyoto, Japan:

When a samurai is brutally murdered in a Kyoto teahouse, master ninja Hiro Hattori has just three days to find the killer before the dea man's vengeful son kills both the beautiful geisha accused of the crime and Father Mateo, the Jesuit priest that Hiro has pledged his own life to protect. The investigation plunges Hiro and Father Mateo into the dangerous waters of Kyoto's floating world, where they quickly learn that everyone from an elusive teahouse owner to the dead man's dishonored brother has a motive to keep the samurai's death a mystery.

Susan tells me tea came to Japan from China during the eighth century, but initially the beverage was a luxury item consumed mostly by priests and nobles. A monk named Eisai, who founded the Zen school of Buddhism, returned from a trip to China during the twelfth century with another tea-related custom: making tea from powdered leaves rather than steeping the tea leaf whole, which gives the tea a rich green color and stronger flavor. The introduction of powdered tea led to the development of the now-famous Japanese tea ceremony, which involves the ritualistic preparation and consumption of powdered matcha tea.

During the Muromachi period (1533-1573), tea's popularity increased substantially. People of all social classes enjoyed the beverage, and the wealthy often gathered for "tea drinking parties" where they passed cups of tea around the room and tried to guess the name, type and location of each variety sampled. Teahouses rose in popularity, and one of the geisha's many talents was proper preparation of tea for her male patrons.

Fascinating facts all woven into the rich setting and enthralling plot of CLAWS OF THE CAT!

Susan is revealing the cover of CLAWS OF THE CAT over three days. The first bit appeared yesterday at Tammy Salyer's blog; the third piece will appear tomorrow on Heather Webb's. On Friday, Susan is hosting a contest on her own blog: leave a comment on the cover reveal and contest post between the time it appears on Friday morning and midnight Friday night for a chance to win a $20 Barnes & Noble gift card!

Now off to brew a nice cup of tea...

CLAWS OF THE CAT is available for pre-order at Barnes & Noble,  Amazon.com,  Powell's Books  and booksellers near you.

A Spoonful of Sugar

When you inspected your child's bag of Halloween sweets, did you find any comfits? Marzipan? Torrone? What about a pennet or some candied lemon rind?

Such were the treats your child might have received on All Soul's Day in Renaissance times.

During the sixteenth century, the sugar industry boomed.  Portuguese and Spanish entrepreneurs planted cane fields and built state-of-the-art refineries in the Caribbean and South America. Sugar flooded onto the European market at a stable price. Though still a luxury item, sugar's ready availability allowed creative cooks to develop it into new and novel treats. Some of the more common ones were:

• comfits: seeds, spices and nuts coated in sugar. Best-selling varieties included combinations of aniseed, coriander, cinnamon, pine-nuts, pistachios, and hazelnuts. Comfits were manufactured by placing the nuts and spices in a pan and repeatedly coating them with sugar syrup. Each layer had to dry before the next layer was applied; sometimes the comfits were hardened in a stove between coatings.
• marzipan (or marchpane): a malleable candy dough made from almond paste, confectioner's sugar and rosewater. Marzipan could be sculpted, painted, and trimmed with gold leaf. Nuns often created and sold marzipan fruits and vegetables to support their convents. As a teen, Leonardo da Vinci sculpted figures from marzipan and presented them to the Prince of Milan, whose guests gobbled them up with little appreciation for their artistry. Da Vinci also made marzipan models of cities and military fortifications for Lorenzo de Medici.
• torrone: a nougat candy made from egg white, honey, sugar and nuts. Layered torrone, challenging and time-consuming to create, became a delicacy of Italian courts.
• pennets: twisted sticks of pulled sugar mixed with starch and sweet almond oil.
• candied fruit peel: the chopped rind of citrus fruit preserved in sugar.

photo: Editor at Large

In accord with classical teaching, Renaissance healers considered sugar to have medicinal value--it tempered the powerful and often harmful strength of spices and brought them into fuller humoral balance within the body. Most medicines contained sugar, and, being a medicine itself, sugar was sold in various forms and grades at apothecary shops. Apothecaries sold sweet treats as well as plain sugar. Specific treats were prescribed for various ailments: patients with sore throats could suck on chips of damascene sugar, while those with upset stomachs might find relief by eating pennets. To regain their strength after childbirth, women benefited immensely from a healthy intake of marzipan and comfits.

Too bad the reputation of sugar has plummeted in eyes of today's medical community. Imagine feeding your child--or yourself--candy bars and gummy bears without a twinge of guilt!

Now go sneak that Hershey's Kiss from your child's goodie bag. I promise I won't tell!

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Sources:
Encyclopedia of Kitchen History by Mary Snodgrass (Routledge 2004)
Making and Marketing Medicine in Renaissance Florence by James               Shaw and Evelyn S. Welch (Rodopi 2011)
Sweets: A History of Candy by Tim Richardson (Bloomsbury 2002)

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Read other posts on the topic of "Candy" by members of my writing group:  Marci Jefferson and Susan Spann.

Images of Early Modern Life

It's About Time is a wonderful art history blog that clusters images and essays around social, cultural, and academic themes. The author often features posts on sixteenth century themes (Women--Reading and publishing books, Fashion--Furs for warmth, Families, Marketing and cooking, among others) as well as about specific women (Catherine de Medici, Elenora di Toledo). A recent post explored the Renaissance fashion of sporting zibellini, animal pelts with jeweled heads! The site is marvelous for the quality and quantity of the works reproduced. Start to browse and you'll quickly lose track of time.

Pasta and Pearly Whites

Check out the blog of translator and editor Lucinda Barrett, A World of Words, for very interesting posts about Renaissance art and life. "Making up the Renaissance! How beauty was perceived and achieved in the Renaissance" summarizes a workshop held this past March in Edinburgh on the topic of Renaissance cosmetics. Be sure to follow the link to Jill Burke's website Making Up the Renaissance for information on Renaissance cosmetics and photos of an actual "Renaissance Makeover"! "On the subject of pasta...and Sir Hugh Plat (1552-1611)" describes the development of extruding machines and one man's advocacy of pasta as a way to solve provisioning problems for the Royal Navy. Thanks to Lucinda for some great reading!

Royal Treatment

Tradition holds that Catherine de Medici introduced the fork to France; could it be that François I introduced yoghurt? From an article in yesterday's Guardian on the history of the curdled delight:

photo credit

"[I]t took a long time for yoghurt to become a staple. In 1542, François I lay mopish and squitty with diarrhoea, depression or both. The French king heard that his ally Suleyman the Magnificent in Constantinople had a remarkable Jewish doctor who reportedly cured anything with a miracle tonic made from the milk of his sheep. François sent for the medic, who trudged across Europe with his flock over several weeks to reach Paris. A course of sheep's yoghurt was prescribed, and the king was cured. All the sheep died, sadly, and the doctor headed home despite François pleading for him to stay."

What, the milk from French sheep wouldn't cut it? In any case, the good doctor's journey gives new meaning to the term "house call"!

An Egg-ceptional Easter

Although eggs do serve as a powerful symbol of new life and resurrection, the custom of decorating eggs at Easter has a more mundane, though quite interesting, origin. As eggs were a forbidden food during the forty days of Lenten fasting, eggs laid during these weeks either had to be hatched or kept for eating after Easter. To preserve the eggs, people dipped them in mutton fat or wax and decorated to make them more attractive. Poor people dyed their eggs red; noblemen gilded theirs or adorned them with their coats of arms. Plates of decorated eggs were brought to the parish priest on Easter morning. The priest sprinkled them with holy water and blessed them with a specific egg-blessing, thus releasing the worshippers from their Lenten privations. The decorated eggs were then given as gifts. Baskets of painted eggs were presented to the King of France after high Mass on Easter Sunday; he would distribute the eggs to his courtiers. Henry VIII once received a Paschal egg in a silver filigree box from the Pope. The largest egg laid in the vicinity of the palace during Holy Week was wrapped with a single red ribbon and presented to the king. The groups of youths would go from door to door in towns and villages singing and collecting eggs from their generous neighbors. They would use some of the eggs for rolling games and tosses; out of the rest they would make huge omelets which they would share to celebrate the end of the fast. 

Hmm, an omelet is sounding pretty good right now. . . race you to the kitchen!

Best wishes for a happy and blessed Easter.

(Sources: A History of Food, M. Toussaint-Samat and A. Bell; The Antiquarian Magazine and Bibliographer, E. Walford; The Gift in Sixteenth Century France, Natalie Zemon Davis)

Brains in a Bowl

A while back, the New York Times ran an interesting travel article on Lyon which contained some interesting factoids about the silk industry. It appears one of Lyon's gastronomical specialties is cervelle de canut, "silkworker's brain," a dish of fromage blanc studded with spices. Hmmm. I imagine it tastes better than it sounds. I'd gladly mosey over to Lyon to find out.                                                                                                                                                         

Sixteenth-Century Take-Out

Believe it or not, prepared food was readily available in the sixteenth-century towns. Vendors called rôtisseurs sold all kinds of prepared meals and even arranged dinner parties for wealthy patrons. Partridges, capons and hares, already larded and roasted, cost less than fresh ones from the market. People in general ate little bread and fruit but large quantities of meat. A well-off bourgeois might sit down to a meal featuring five or six different kinds served with a variety of sauces and stuffings. Pastries (meat cooked in dough) were a favorite dish. With such demand, the rôtisseurs' enormous ovens never cooled.

Anyone for a pork chop to go?