More of the French

I *really* need to decorate my hat and W needs to revive his. Otherwise we're not looking too bad.

Easy as pie

I picked out a pie plate at Kohkohmah this weekend and made my first ever pie over the fire in a dutch oven Saturday evening. For a last minute, "I needed something to keep me busy in camp" project it worked out pretty well. I'm going to have to do this more often.



The filling was just chopped apples, a bit of grated cone sugar and a pinch of nutmeg. The top crust turned out to be a combo of fresh churned butter, pancake batter and a bit of water. I cut the butter into the pancake mix like you would for a standard pie crust then used water and more mix to kneed it out. I didn't have a rolling pin (since I left my black kitchen box behind in effort to "compact") and had to press the dough into shape by hand. I was a little worried about the crust myself but it turned out ok. Alright, I cooked it without coals on the top first to make sure that the apples got cooked and the crust didn't burn. Then there weren't enough coals for the top. Thankfully J came to my rescue by stoking the fire and dumping more coals top to brown the crust. Next time I'll know more about what I'm doing and won't need the extra help.

In all honesty though, I'd only seen about a 10 second clip of a reenactor making a pie in a dutch oven on the Mannered Mob video.



I had no idea what I was doing really. I totally winged this project. The fact that it turned out not only edible but rather tasty, even mostly cold the next morning, was just beginners luck. Next time around will be the real test of if I know what I'm doing.

Let's hope no one gets food poisoning from my cooking attempts!

Another update

I'm falling behind again as always. So just a quick photo of Mssr. W & I cooling off back at my house after a wonderful day playing music at the Frenchman's Frolic. Pardon the terrible photo. Focus is not one of J's strong points when it comes to the camera.



While I know that the short gown style that I'm wearing there isn't "right", it was significantly cooler than anything else I own. Plus, it's more fitted and proper looking. In comparison to the majority of the ladies in their frontier clothes of drawstring skirts and men's shirts, I was a darned proper "lady" for once. I'm also wearing a brand new pinner apron. I like the style & this one stayed clean (sans one little spot first thing in the day). It's designated as my "clean" apron from now on. You really don't want to see the state of the working apron after a few events over the fire!!

I do think it's funny that I had to piece the short gown out of two shades of blue linen. After all "piecing is an 18th century practice". The lighter is left over from the lining on my 1710 hunting coat, the dark from a pair of lounge pants I made J many years ago. To add to the piecing I made one of the side gores out of the dark, even though I could have easily squeezed it out of the lighter. It really does make it look that much more like I pieced because of wear/need, not because "I'm making this 12 hours before an event and the store is closed" (which is the truth actually)