9 recipes
17th-Century Recipes
17th-century recipes from three moments: the Plymouth harvest feast of 1621, the Dutch herring fleet in the war of 1665, and buccaneers at Guam in 1686.
Our 17th-century recipes sit around three moments, two at sea and one on the Massachusetts shore. In 1621 one letter from Plymouth describes the harvest feast: wildfowl from a day’s shooting, and five deer brought in by Massasoit’s men. What Was Really Eaten at the 1621 Harvest Feast? starts from what that letter names and sets apart what was added later.
In 1665 the Dutch navy needed seamen, and the herring fleet is said to have been kept at home. A painting of about 1667 to 1670 cheers its return, and the catch records tell more, in What Happened to the Dutch Herring Fishery in the War of 1665? The herring recipes, grilled with brown butter, stewed with onion or baked in a pie, come from London books printed before the war.
In 1686 buccaneers crossing the Pacific reached Guam. Islanders baked breadfruit and brought it out to them hot each day; they also got hogs fed on coconuts, and muskmelons and watermelons, and took rice and salt pork for the next leg at sea: What Did Buccaneers Eat When They Reached Guam in 1686? The breadfruit and coconut recipes follow William Dampier’s account of the voyage, printed in London in 1697.
What Was Really Eaten at the 1621 Harvest Feast?
Roast Venison with Vinegar Sauce (1623)
Roast venison with vinegar sauce after Gervase Markham’s book of 1623: the meat studded with cloves, larded with pork fat and served on a sweet-sour sauce of vinegar, crumbs and its own juices.
Roast Wild Duck with Mustard Sauce (1623)
Roast wild duck with mustard sauce: mallard with Gervase Markham’s “most generall sauce” for wild fowl, mustard and vinegar (1623), likely the kind of bird the Plymouth fowlers shot.
Nasaump, Cornmeal Pottage
Coarse corn simmered soft with berries and crushed nuts: the corn pottage Roger Williams recorded as nasàump in 1643, after Plimoth Patuxet’s modern recipe.
What Happened to the Dutch Herring Fishery in the War of 1665?
Grilled Herring with Brown Butter and Capers (1653)
Grilled fresh herring under butter browned with parsley and young onions, a drop of vinegar and capers, from La Varenne’s The French Cook of 1653.
Stewed Salt Herring with Onion (1653)
Salt herring soaked overnight, cut in pieces and simmered with onion and butter, the second way with salted herrings in La Varenne’s The French Cook of 1653.
Herring Pie with Pears and Dates (1623)
Gervase Markham’s 1623 herring pie: soaked salt herring chopped with pear, dried fruit, sugar and cinnamon, baked in pastry and finished with claret.
What Did Buccaneers Eat When They Reached Guam in 1686?
Baked Breadfruit (1697)
Baked breadfruit as William Dampier saw it made on Guam in 1686: a whole green fruit baked until the rind blackens, then scraped and sliced like bread.
Coconut Milk Pork Broth (1697)
A coconut milk pork broth after William Dampier’s 1697 account of meat boiled in coconut milk: pork simmered gently in milk pressed from freshly grated coconut.
Rice with Coconut Milk (1697)
Rice with coconut milk, which William Dampier wrote in 1697 that English seamen ate at sea in place of rice-milk: boiled rice finished in milk pressed from fresh coconut.