I LOVE Books - The Older, The Better

...I also like to eat...so, when you combine eating and books...you cannot beat an OLD Cookbook!! Sometime in the past, I picked up "1821 Sesqui - Samplings 1971" 150 Years of Cooking in Indianapolis at an auction (another favorite pasttime). I thought some of you would enjoy reading some excerpts from this well written book, so I'll be sharing them on Mondays.

"The saga of a city, indeed the history of man, can be rather accurately documented by taking note of the food that was eaten over the years. Starting with culinary samplings of the people who inhabited the untamed wilderness of Indianapolis 150 years ago, we will follow this chronicle to modern times." (This book was published in 1971)

In this day and age of car pools, TV dinners, punching time clocks and doing civic duty, it is hard for today's mobile woman to comprehend the "simple" life our pioneer women not only endured but endowed. The recipes of early settlers were simple and unsophistiated, with a lot of "a pin" of this and "a lump" of that. Today, although there is no specific cooking style indigenous to our region, the imaginative and excellent home-cooking of Indianapolis enjoys a fine reputation throughout the country. The phrase, "Hoosier Hospitality" expresses the happy combination of superior cooking skills and the genuine warm-heartedness of our people."

1820 FALL CREEK settlement, the hunters called it. It was just a sprinkling of cabins which settlers were beginning to build that spring of 1820, along the forested banks where Fall Creek joined White River. Settlers like George Pogue and the McCormick brothers, John, James and Samuel, and the others who arrived shortly after them. They came, and stopped, and stayed because of the game, the fertile land, the water. And it wasn't until a June meeting of special state assembly commissioners in John McCormick's cabin that the settlers discovered they'd picked the site of the future capital as their home. The next year, 1821, after much heated debate, the area was officially named Indianapolis.

McCormick Johnny Hoecakes
1 cup corn meal
1 egg, beaten
1/2 cup flour
1 tablespoon molasses
1 1/2 teaspoons baking powder
Lukewarm water
1/4 teaspoon salt

Sift together corn meal, flour, baking powder and salt. Stir in egg, molasses and enough water (approximately 1 cup) to make a thin batter. Pour into a greased 8-inch square pan. Bake at 350 degrees for 20 minutes. Cut into pieces and serve with butter and honey.

John Frederick Smith
Great-Grandson of
Samuel McCormick

Pogue Corn Dodgers

1 cup corn meal
1 tablespoon butter or bacon drippings
1 teaspoon salt
1 cup boiling water
1 1/2 teaspoons sugar

Mix all ingredients except water. Pour water over this mixture and beat until well blended. Dip hand in cold water, take a handful of batter and drop onto a greased cookie sheet or griddle. Bake in a 400 egree oven about 8 minutes or on top of stove.

Ivan Pogue
Great-great-great grandson
of George Pogue