Cooking Camp Day 1

Aug 21

I arrived at 8:45 to set up. The pond had turned into a lake. We were going to make orange chicken. I didn’t want the teens tromping through all that water to wash their hands. Additionally, the water was in the spot where I normally set up the hot plates. Water plus hot plate seemed like a bad idea.

I consulted with Jessica, and we decided to move Day 2’s menu to Day 1. Italian inspired foods instead of Asian. I was grateful to have Jessica to talk to. While I can think on my feet, I don’t do well when there’s such a monumental shift. We got the room set up (and Jessica made a valiant effort to mop) and I collected my teens.

This year’s group were all in the 12 to 13 range, save for one very mature nine year old. They were a quieter group than the year before, and it took some time for them to warm up. Still, they were all lovely. A big joy in teaching this camp is knowing these kids wanted to be here. Getting up at 10 AM during summer vacation? C’mon.

Each teen received a booklet with the week’s recipes and space to write down their thoughts. They were very confused when I explained that Day 1 was actually Day 2, and they remained confused about these changes throughout the week. Me too, kids, me too.

We made one dish and a drink and started another dish.

Macrows/Makerouns, c. 1390

This is a medieval version of macaroni and cheese. We had actually made it the previous summer, including making noodles from scratch. That did not work out well; the noodles were gummy. Last year, the teens had been enchanted by the microwave, so I wanted to incorporate one microwave recipe per day. I thought, aha, we’ll make pasta in the microwave.

Because of the puddle, I had nowhere to set up the microwave after the hot plate and toaster oven had been plugged in. We just cooked our egg noodles in a pot, like plebs.

The original recipe is spare: “Take chese and grate it, and butter imelte, cast bynethen and abouven as losyns [lasagna]; and serue forth.” The recipe explains how to plate the dish, but not what kind of cheese to use. I looked up common medieval cheeses and purchased a variety from the store: various cheddars, brie, mozzarella, gorgonzola. After cooking the noodles, I let the teens fix their own plates: a layer of butter, a layer of cheese, a layer of pasta, repeat.

In The Discovery of Pasta, Luca Cesari explains that pasta cooking times were very different in the past. One fifteenth century chef recommended cooking vermicelli for an hour and macaroni for two. Cookbooks from the mid-1800s suggest 20 to 45 minutes. The cooked pasta should be mushy and falling apart. Cesari writes, “[E]ven al dente pasta is a recent concept that spread out of southern Italy.”

I wondered if microwaving the pasta would give it that mushy consistency. I definitely thought it would be interesting to cook the noodles in a more historic way. But I was too frazzled by then to try one more experiment, so I cooked the noodles as directed.

The teens loved slicing the cheese, in part because I think teens have a natural affinity for knives and mayhem. They ate almost all of the cheese I had purchased, and we had several more cheesy recipes to go. Overall, they liked the dish a lot. I’ve seen other versions that incorporate cinnamon or nutmeg, and I had debated about adding those but decided not to get too weird. I’m glad the kids could have an enjoyable meal on Day 1.

“What’s the difference between the blue pitcher and the white pitcher?” they asked. “One is blue and one is white,” I explained.

Lemonade or Orangeade, 1863

Having now made this recipe, my best guess is that it’s called such because people called the drink by both names. I found this recipe by Pierre Blot on FoodTimeline.org in the “Pink Lemonade” section. But the flavor is orange. I found a copy of Blot’s book online at the Library of Congress, hoping for some additional illumination, but alas. [Image 24]

The recipe instructs you to put sugar and orange or lemon rind in water and let sit for half an hour. I couldn’t find preserved rind (which I also needed for another recipe) and I didn’t want to peel the oranges until it was time to use them. I grabbed the cheese graters and had the teens gather around me. I explained what zesting is and why one does it, and asked them to zest oranges for me. I bought several pounds of oranges, so there was enough for each student to zest at least one. They zested into a large metal bowl that we then added to the pot containing water and sugar.

The teens were dubious at first. Despite their love for cheese and cheese slicing, they were unsure about using the grater. The oranges were awkward to hold.

But then the room started to smell good. Really good. They zested and zested until the entire bag of oranges were white. We had to zest oranges throughout the week and it was one of their favorite activities. We left the zest, sugar, and water to sit and moved on to other endeavors.

The mixture was ready to be strained while the teens were eating their macaroni and cheese. Jessica valiantly juiced about 10 oranges, adding it to the strained mixture. I wish the timing had worked out so that the kids could see what it’s like to juice an orange. I like my conveniences, but I think it’s important to realize why we have those conveniences. In addition to the oranges, we added a little bit of lemon juice. I suppose one could have made it the opposite way, juicing lemons and adding just a little bit of orange. We poured the mixture over ice and all had a drink.

It was really good! Very refreshing. It wasn’t very sweet; the ratios were such that it was more of a flavored water than an -ade. Most of the teens asked if they could add more sugar or lemon juice to their drink, which I let them do. It kept well and we finished it the next day. I definitely recommend this recipe as is.

Pizza, 1947

I had originally shied away from pizza, worrying that it would be too complicated to make, if we made the dough from scratch. This recipe was actually a last-minute edition to the menu. But once I read it, I was charmed.

In Red Sauce, Ian Macallen traces the history of Italian food in America. Pizza, of course, is an ancient food: flat bread with toppings. Pizza as we think of it was first developed in the 1800s and took off in America in the first part of the twentieth century. It was cheap, tasty, and portable. Even so, it didn’t catch on immediately everywhere. Macallen mentions an article from a 1947 issue of Good Housekeeping. Under the heading “It’s Tomato Time!” is a recipe for pizza (“pronounced peet-za” it helpfully explains). The dough is a simple affair, yeast, flour, water, salt, shortening. The sauce consists of tomatoes, garlic, and either oregano or thyme (not both!!!!!).

Making the dough was the first thing we did this day. We talked about yeast and letting it bubble. We discussed why people might use shortening instead of other fats. I offered them a taste, and a few teens gave it a try. We mixed the dough by hand, then I divided it into twelve balls, so that each teen could make their own. I showed them how to knead and they took it very seriously.

As they kneaded, I realized I was in the middle of a math story problem: the dough needed to rise until doubled (an hour at least), then we needed to dress the pizzas and bake them for 25 to 30 minutes. I had just one toaster oven, so we could make, at most, two at a time. Fuck.

We had to wrap them up and put them in the fridge, with the promise to make a few the following day. This pizza recipe was their favorite of the entire week; we only cooked two pizzas on Day 2, but they kept asking if we could make the rest, and we wound up making them on Day 5.

On Day 2, which was originally supposed to be “Italian Inspired” day, I pulled out the dough the minute I got in. An hour later, when class started, I had the students make the sauce. Not surprisingly, they liked smushing the tomatoes. I needed four cloves of garlic for the week and accidentally bought four bulbs (there was a sale!) so we definitely minced more garlic than they would have used in 1947. We already had oregano in the pantry, so that went on our pizza.

Similar to the macrows/macarouns, this pizza is a layered dish: olive oil, cheese, sauce, cheese. The teens were pumped for more cheese. We cooked just two, and returned the rest of the dough to the fridge (undressed). One student asked why it takes so long to cook? A frozen pizza takes 15 minutes? Which led to a productive conversation about processed foods.

It was pretty good. This is another recipe I’d recommend, maybe with a few more spices, but otherwise make as is.