1755 Scrambled Eggs - Quarter Pound of Butter? - 18th Century Cooking

Welcome to 18th century cooking I'm  your host Jon Townsend and today we're   digging into the 18th century origins of  scrambled eggs this one ought to be fun   thanks for joining us today as we savor the  flavors and the aromas of the 18th century.   It's another cold January day here in Indiana  and we're here by the roaring fire and I've been   thinking about how I how I generally research for  doing an 18th century recipe and really I there's   several different things I look for and one of the  main things though is does our modern food that we   eat today where does it connect with history where  does it go with 200 years ago 300 years ago and   one of the one of the main ways we look at that  it even if the recipe is almost the same one of   the things that's really really different is the  environment that you have to cook in and today's   episode is well it's very connected with that  topic because we're doing something that I mean   you you might cook every day for breakfast or you  can go to any diner and get it scrambled eggs but   how do you make them when you've got this roaring  fire and a bunch of coals the recipe might be very   very similar but how we cook it definitely has  to have some changes to it. So if you go digging   in the 18th century cookbooks and you look for  scrambled eggs you turn to the back of the index   and look it up you're never gonna find it it's not  there because it's not called scrambled eggs in   the 18th century buttered eggs is what you want to  dig for now I had a choice of a half a dozen eight   or ten different buttered egg recipes to choose  from but I'm gonna read this one maybe you'll see   why I chose this particular one this is out of the  " A New and Easy Method of Cookery" by Elizabeth   Cleland this is 1775 this particular cookbook  leans toward the northern English cooking or   Scottish cooking this one was actually printed in  Edinburgh let's see "To Butter Eggs" "take eight   eggs put them in a stew pan after they are well  beaten with a little salt and nutmeg right and put   them to a quarter of a pound of sweet butter,  a spoonful of sweet cream, keep them stirring   all the time they are on the fire from the bottom  of the pan, then put them on toasted bread when   they are thick". Perfect scrambled eggs recipe of  course it's got the wonderful addition of an 18th   century cookbook and they they put a nutmeg in it  and yet I guess the thing that really pops out to   me is I'm not sure about the order of how these  things go in and of course it's got a massive   quantity of butter so this has got to be good  so let's get started on this I've got some bread   already toasting. So let's cover these ingredients  there aren't very many we need some eggs I'm gonna   make a half recipe of this cuz I don't need that  many scrambled eggs so four nice eggs we need a   little bit of salt obviously some some nutmeg I'm  gonna go ahead and add pepper most of the other   recipes did include pepper at least at the end  and then we just need the butter and the cream   and then at the very end we'll need the toasts  so not very many ingredients, let's get started. So now comes the the challenging part of cooking  this obviously if you're in a modern kitchen   you've got these dials and controls that you  can just get the right amount of heat and if   you ever done scrambled eggs you can't cook them  fast that's a bad thing and in this circumstance   we have to figure out how to cook these slow  in a lot of 18th century recipes they actually   talk about this part because it is challenging  we're gonna we're going to some of the some of   the recipes talk about cooking you would these  eggs over a chafing dish so a little little jar   of like coals right so we're gonna bring some  coals out of the main fire so it's not as hot we   have a little bit more control we're gonna use  our spider pan it's got some nice distance off   the fire and really our choice for heat control is  distance away from the fire so it even talks about   having this not too close to the fire moving  it away from the fire so we're gonna have some   coals down underneath if this gets too hot I can  knock the coals down or I can push them out of the   way so here's our egg mixture it's already ready  to go in but it can be confusing about how this   recipe works you have to use other recipes to  help interpret what this one is like it says to   put the eggs into the pan and then it says to beat  them well but it means beat them well and then put   them in the pan so we don't obviously we don't  want to beat them right in the pan necessarily   and the butter some recipes seem to imply that  you melt the butter and put it in the mixture and   other ones say no the butter goes in cold then it  just goes in along with the eggs and it melts at   the same time so that's what we're gonna use even  though this particular recipe doesn't mention that   that's how we're gonna do it and the cream just  kind of goes in at the same time I would normally   just whisk it straight in that's not how the  recipe does so let's do it just like the recipe. These smell wonderful they're on this  wonderful toast we're right here by   the fire and one of the great things I love  about this particular recipe is here we are   in this primitive cabin and in so many of the  resources that you read about people living in   a cabin like this you find out that they have  very few utensils and the bread is the perfect   utensil in this case it's actually made to  pick right up eat off of it you don't need   a fork you don't need a spoon you don't need  anything to eat these eggs let's try them out. The texture is perfect on these eggs and one of  the really really interesting things when I was   thinking about this usually when I make scrambled  eggs I use I put I put cheese in there because it   you know kind of thickens it up and does this  tastes just like they've got cheese in them but   they don't just amazing flavor and of course it  had so much wonderful butter in there to bring   that flavor in and it didn't stick in the pan at  all even a pan like that I was using that is not   a nonstick pan let me tell you eggs came right  out of that pan so easy and it tastes so good.   So in this one it's all about that slow cooking  you get this incredible texture you don't want   that brown stuff that happens at the bottom  of the pan and and the recipe said you know   be careful of that now there is one recipe  that's a little bit later on that actually   talks about coming over the top of these when  they're finished and warming them up with a   salamander actually it says "brown them" I don't  think he actually means that I think he means to   make sure they're nice and warm such a wonderful  recipe and we see scrambled eggs 250 years ago   almost exactly like we make today except of  course that wonderful addition of nutmeg and   love the comparison between the two I can't  recommend this recipe enough to try these out   if you specially if you can do it open over and  open fire like this if you're looking for another   episode that's similar to this one make sure to  check out this wonderful Welsh rabbit recipe.

Channel: Townsends

Views: 3,542,888

Keywords: townsends, jas townsend and son, reenacting, history, 18th century, 19th century, jon townsend, 18th century cooking

Id: tQWETcw-E74

Length: 9min 8sec (548 seconds)

Published: Mon Jan 27 2020

Reddit Comments

[u/ElectricMoose]

This man has such an uplifting an interesting channel, I love his outlook and attention to detail

[u/You_too]

I expected 1755 eggs to be cooked into one massive scrambled egg dish. I'm sorely disappointed.

[u/marcusfelinus]

These videos are like crack for me

[u/urandom123]

A quarter pound of butter?!

That's not scrambled eggs at the end. That's egg flavored butter.

[u/lauranaps]

Bread is the perfect utensil

[u/[deleted]]

This guy is probably one of the most endearing people I’ve ever seen on YouTube lol.

[u/WhereverUGoThereUR]

Anyone tried the Nutmeg? Wondering if it'd be a good taste.

[u/guiltyas-sin]

This reminds me of a service call I had once (I am an electrician):

I get a call that an elderly woman lost a kitchen circuit. As I am dutifully tracing the issue, my client starts whipping up a nice breakfast for herself of 3 fried eggs, drowning in butter (yum), bacon and toast, (also slathered with butter).

No big deal, yeah? Well, over the course of my troubleshooting call, I learn my client, easily in her 70's, just got home earlier that day...after having a heart attack a few days prior.

I was absolutely gobbed, and it was all I could do to maintain myself.

[u/Opspin]

14g of butter per egg, look at Gordon Ramsay’s scrambled eggs fairly sure he uses more.