Open Fire Cooking

The Moody Crewe, our pirate living history group, planned an open fire cooking, but of course our crazy spring weather foiled our plan. If anyone is curious about the size of the fire pit our host can tell you it holds 43 gallons of water because that's how much he bailed out after the rainstorm. Sunday's weather was just right, and even though everyone was making different dishes with different cooking times everything was ready in perfect time.

The menu consisted of: liver pudding cooked inside a sheep stomach, Brunswick stew, "A fine hash of Beef at Little Expense", a French loaf of bread cooked in a cast iron Dutch oven in the coals, home churned butter, two "passenger pigeons" stuffed with tangerine and hung to roast over the fire, and boiled beef with potatoes and sauerkraut.

As the only vegetarian in the group I choose to make "A Ragout of French Beans with a Farce" from The Art of English Cookery by Richard Briggs, 1788. A little out of our time period, but at least it used vegetables (green beans and carrots).And for my favorite part of the meal, dessert, I made syllabub. The consensus was it was delicious - but too much cream and not enough booze...

We all produced quite the spread for a Sunday dinner and had a great time, too.