Browsing the Cookbook Collection: Selections from Three

THE QUESTION OF BOUILLABAISSE: R.W. Apple Jr. was a legendary international correspondent for The New York Times, and he was fond of food. So he wrote a book, "Far Flung and Well Fed," published in 2009, in which are collected his stories taking us on a tour of many of the restaurants he visited. Stops include the fancy and the back alley eateries of North and South America, the United Kingdom and Ireland, Europe, and Asia and Australia. Much attention is devoted to bouillabaisse, to which Apple affords a full chapter including a recipe. He comments: "Controversy clings to bouillabaisse like barnacles to a ship. Is it a soup? Perhaps not, because the broth and the solids are eaten separately. Is it a stew? Perhaps not, because a stew by definition is cooked very slowly, and bouillabaisse must be boiled furiously to achieve an amalgamation of olive oil with water and wine. It is best described as a fish boil ..."

   Here is Apple's recipe.

PINEAPPLE BEEF STEW? Although Grandma was a stickler for convention, I think she might have tried this one. I found it in a 1985 cookbook put together by the PTA of Mabel Rush elementary school in Newberg OR. It is an interesting recipe that is both basic and unique, including brown sugar and pineapple chunks, no potatoes. It calls for a cup each of carrots, onion and tomato sauce. A pound and half of stew meat browned in cooking oil. A quarter cup of vinegar, same of brown sugar, 4t cornstarch added to 1/2 cup water. One tablespoon Worcestershire. After all has thickened add 20 oz. can of pineapple, heat through and serve.

A FAMOUS OYSTER STEW: What America Eats by Clementine Paddleford is a classic cookbook from the 1960s that starts in New England and traverses the whole country, region by region, offering anecdotes along the way as well as local recipes. She spent 12 years compiling the book.

   One of Paddleford’s stops that I found interesting was the Grand Central Station Oyster Bar in New York City, responsible for the consumption of some 25,000 oysters per day in season. Near as popular as oysters on the half shell, Paddleford says, was the stew. She modifies a recipe for home consumption:

   Oyster Stew:

   28 oysters, 6T butter, 2t Worcestershire sauce, ½ t celery salt, ½ t paprika, 1 cup oyster liquor, 1 cup milk, 1 cup light cream, salt to taste. Pick over the oysters for shell bits, melt 4T butter in a saucepan, add Worcestershire, celery salt and paprika, then oysters, bring to a simmer, add liquor, bring to a boil, add milk and cream, give a few stirs, return almost to boil, put in bowls, add a dot of butter.

Legendary Author Mark Twain Favored Southern Cooking

Mark Twain dearly loved New Orleans cuisine, dating to his river boat captain days. But he may never have sampled Cajun, the country style half of "Cajun Creole," which would include many one-pot stews. That is according to Andrew Beahrs in his book, "Twain's Feasts."
   In Twain's day, the Cajuns, exiles from Canada, resided far from the cities, their wondrous culinary concoctions little known beyond the sloughs and bayous.
   Creole, on the other hand, is the food of the city, according to Beahrs. The tendency is toward a more delicate, African-influenced cuisine, though it does feature gumbos. Creole "was what Mark Twain ate while in town."
 

A Visit to Old Salem & the Days of Pigtail Stew

At the hearth in Old Salem

Grandparents on both sides endured hard times and lived by a motto: “Waste not, want not.” But I wonder if they ever filled their bellies with pigtail stew? If so, they never mentioned it. Pigtail stew was unknown to me until I encountered it in North Carolina and Old Salem Cookery, a collection of commentary and recipes that I very much enjoyed reading.

   Old Salem is a historic district of Winston-Salem, NC, where museums and restorations preserve links to the founding Moravians, a Protestant sect established long ago in the Czech Republic. Moravian missionaries apparently liked what they found in North Carolina and sent a “Y’all come!” message back home, encouraging settlers.

   But back to pigtail stew. “We grew up on foods now called soul foods because they were the foods available to keep body and soul together,” according to the