Culinary Archeology II: How to make a kick-ass cup of coffee

MUSEUM OF BROOKLYN ART AND CULTURE, January 13, 2009--About four years ago I acquired a volume, perhaps the only remaining copy in the world, entitled "Choice Recipes from Experienced Housewives: A Cook Book." Numbering 104 pages, this 1883 work was put together by a group of ladies belonging to a Brooklyn, New York literary society who had tired of being hit up for donations by street beggars. They resolved to stop this "evil" by establishing  the "Industrial Restaurant," a place where the destitute could work for a meal and a place to stay, along with some of the other rudimentary advantages society has to offer, such as a bath and a shave. The year was 1878.

Cookbook frontispiece

"Two small rooms and a wood shed were engaged; wood was purchased by the chord for men to saw; and sewing, scrubbing, and braiding of rags for rugs were provided for women and children to do," the ladies tell us in a brief history. "Substantial meals of baked beans, meat stew, bread and coffee, were furnished for five cents per meal, or for work done on the premises."

The society women also imposed a voluntary levy of five cents a week upon area residents, while encouraging them to donate "broken" food, clothing, and other materials. They eventually moved their budding social service program to more spacious quarters.

"A reading room was opened, lodgings at ten cents per night were provided for men, evening classes were held for boys in reading, writing and arithmetic, and a more thorough visitation of the poor was carried on," we are told.

They moved once again in 1882 to a new location where they planned to offer expanded programs for women. "Numbers of women did not know how to patch, darn, or do plain sewing, to say nothing of making clothing for themselves and their families, or teaching their daughters at home," they wrote. "Here we purpose, if we are blest with the means, to teach washing, cooking, sewing and cutting, dish washing and scrubbing, to women and girls; and printing, shoemaking and carpentering, to boys, besides providing a day nursery and kindergarten for children."

They had already racked up an impressive record. During the winters of 1878 through 1881, they served 29,000 meals, all within an expenditure of $3,528.80. Mind you, that is the rough equivalent of $144,980.75 in today's "dollars."

Then, there came an appeal to the public.

"In order to carry on this work of remedying the great evil of street begging, helping the poor to help themselves, and teaching them how to do it, we need not only the waste of your houses and your money, but yourselves. Will you not help us?"

Up to this point, the government had not yet played a role in this exclusively private enterprise, organized for the benefit of society and not for the turning of a profit. In 1884, the ladies' entrepreneurial venture was incorporated under the name of The Industrial Restaurant and Training School Association. It was essentially a woman-run organization, not a single man being given the honor of sitting on the association's governing board.

What finally happened to this institution? We are told by a commentator, writing in 1891, that "it did an extensive and a worthy work for about ten years, when the bureau of charities took up this branch and relieved the industrial women of their burden."

So much for this wonderfully-run private-sector experiment in social welfare.

We are bequeathed, in our present age, due to the wonderful invention of the printing press in the 15th Century, a record of the fabulous recipes of the women of the Industrial Restaurant, formerly of the Literary Society. Among these are instructions for brewing coffee, a tradition that has held firm in American homes through revolutions, wars, presidential administrations, social upheavals and economic downturns. We present this recipe in all its grandeur, and shall attempt, I believe with great success, to reproduce it.

Buy coffee in the roasted kernel if you cannot take the trouble to roast it; have your own small coffee mill and grind the amount needed for each meal just before using it; mix three tablespoonfuls of ground coffee with a little cold water and a well beaten egg, pour in one pint of boiling water, and let it boil two minutes. Use condensed milk in the cups.

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