We were studying George Washington over PS Fall Break, which ended today, the kids went back. Left me with just my 3 yr old daughter, so we had time to get in the kitchen and bake some recipes we learned over the break. This was food Martha Washington used to cook for George. The basic ingredients were grits, cheese, salt, pepper, onions, and "greens" (a variety of greens could go here). I used spinach. You boil the grits like normal, then add the spices, chopped up onion, some cooked/drained sausage, cheese (I used cream cheese), and mix all this together and then pour into a baking dish, and bake at 400 for like 20 minutes. Then when its just browned on the top, let cool and use an inverted glass or cup to cut out these round slices. I cooked the spinach in the grease from the sausage, then drained it. Layed that on a plate. Topped the spinach with the grit pie, then top it all with browned bacon. A typical brunch at Mt Vernon was this, some coffee, and he took them along for when he was away from home for long stretches. (If you can imagine scarfing down a week old grit pie, but I suppose they store well). Its called a grit crockette (pronounced krow-kay). There is a funny visual, one of these things being used to play crockette. :lol: Anyways, I tried it for lunch today and my hubby was brave and ate it, and it was really good. Especially since today was a kind of chilly, rainy day. Love, Carolyn
Don't quote me on this, but I think "greens" traditionally means collard greens. Also, in one of our George Washington books, George Washington's Mother, it says that she used to bake gingerbread for all the local people.
That sounds interesting! I'm a vegetarian, so I'd have to substitute something for the sausage, but it's worth a try! Thanks!
If you are completely off of meat and dairy, you might use tofu in the place of the cream cheese. What are common meat substitutes? I am thinking that cashews sound good with this, but I am no gourmet! :lol: I am not technically a vegetarian, but could easily switch over if we didn't rely so heavily on venison throughout the year (whole family hunts for food). Hubby gets growly if I try to feed him too many meat-free meals.
At this point I am not vegan, so I do use dairy products, though in small quantities. My family actually LIKES tofu, so I add it to potato soup and my chicken (a vegetarian chicken called "FriChik") noodle soup. My 7-yo dd likes it when I cube it, cuz she likes to have a few cubes, sprinkle them with salt and gobble them down! Don't know many kids that would do that! Hee hee! There are quite a few meat substitutes available these days, which makes it fairly easy. Not sure how healthy all the substitutes are, but for me it's better than meat. I HAVE eaten meat in the past, but came to the conclusion to stop for health reasons. It wasn't that big of a change for me. I grew up mostly vegetarian---every now and then my dad would have to have a good steak or some fried chicken. But we always went out to eat to get the meat. The only meat my parents ever did at home was heating up all-beef hotdogs and making tuna fish sandwiches! So I have no clue how to cook with meat or make meatloaf or anything like that! Strange, I know. But I can pull together other ingredients (I use gluten in some recipes) and make some good dishes. My husband and I are now, with our family, like my family was growing up---no meat at home, but the kids get beef hotdogs or chicken or turkey sandwiches or something like that. So now you have an un-asked for history of eating in my family!
I heard somewhere that Martha Washington always kept like 3-4 hams pre-smoked in case anyone dropped by and she would just hand them out. I want a smokehouse so I can do this. :lol:
If you enjoy cooking with your history lessons you should try this website for a Food Timeline. It is so great. You can even ask them questions if you can't find something or want to know where a certain food originated. Shows a timeline of food along with recipes. They add to it occasionally also. The website is http://www.gti.net/moclib1/kid/food.html I have found so much amazing info here. The Food TImeline Sabrina
If you enjoy cooking with your history lessons you should try this website for a Food Timeline. It is so great. You can even ask them questions if you can't find something or want to know where a certain food originated. Shows a timeline of food along with recipes. They add to it occasionally also. The website is http://www.gti.net/moclib1/kid/food.html I have found so much amazing info here. The Food TImeline Sabrina
Sabrina, That sounds really cool! Can you check that site address? I couldn't get to it with the link that you gave. Thanks!
I don't know why it has moved. I did not see anything different about the address. I clicked on it and it said to " click HERE". I tried it and it worked. Could you try it again? I will also doublecheck. Sabrina
This is a very cool website. We were making Martha Washington cookies last Christmas and the kids wanted to know why they were called Martha Washington. I sent them the question and they researched it for me and emailed me over a couple of months. We never did determine why, but the topic was interesting. If you still can't get to it try the search and Its called the Food Timeline. Sabrina
This is a very cool website. We were making Martha Washington cookies last Christmas and the kids wanted to know why they were called Martha Washington. I sent them the question and they researched it for me and emailed me over a couple of months. We never did determine why, but the topic was interesting. If you still can't get to it try the search and Its called the Food Timeline. Sabrina
I went to Google and put in Food TImeline, and it came up with what I'm guessing is the right address. It looked pretty neat, but I didn't have time to explore it yet.
I hope this doesn't post twice, but checked out the food timeline site just now. The address is www.gti.net/mocolib/kid/food.html. Hope this helps. Kim R
