Recipes older than Confederation: Lessons from a 160-year-old cookbook

A recipe book that is older than Confederation still has a few things to teach the modern audience.

CatharineParrTraill'sThe Female Emigrant's Guide,first published in 1855, is a dense and witty collection of guidelines onhow to make bush tea cakes, flavour black squirrel,and survive in the Upper Canada's backwoods.

At that time, making food meant getting your hands dirty.

"Quite a lot of information in here is how to adapt to a rougher, more difficult and labour-intensive discipline," NathalieCooke, co-editor of a new annotated version of the book and associate dean attheMcGill University Library, told CBC Radio Montreal'sAll in a Weekend.

ParrTraillwas especially impressed with the selection of sweet cakes available fora customary tea-table, dubbing Canada "a land of cakes."

From genteel to an 'up and doing' lifestyle

Having settled in what's now the Peterborough, Ont.,area from agricultural England in 1832,Parr Trailltalks about everything from bread fermentation, soap-making to, of course, the stillness and silence of Canadian winters.

In their introduction, Cooke and co-editor Fiona Lucas describe Parr Traill as very practical, eager, and a great stateswoman. Despite the harsh climate, she lived for 97 years.

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In a way, the 550-page cookbook was born out of Parr Traill's daily challenges to adapt to a new environment. One of them was leaving behind the traditional family mindset and genteel ways.

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"Much more than in Britain, the women had to take a hand in tasks that would be normally considered the men's tasks," Cooke said.

"The separate sphere philosophy really had to break down in the backwoods."

Thatis partially why Parr Traill'sbookoften reads like a word of caution to those considering a move to Canada.

"It's better to be up and doing," she advises her contemporaries.

Exchange with Indigenous neighbours

Parr Traill was eagerto begin a new life in Victorian-era Canada, but she also respected her Anishinabek neighbours.

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Sheincorporated many of the Indigenous ways into her cooking, using ingredients such as cranberries, masquinong, and wild rice.

One of her favourites was something that had yet to come a Canadian staple a candy called maple sweeties, made with maple syrup, butter and flour.

As Parr Traill watched her Indigenous neighbours sugar off, she became thrilled with finding a readily available sweetener, otherwise a rare treat.

"The efficient way of making maple syrup is actually collaboration between the settlers and the Indigenous population," Cookeexplained.

Local produce first

Cooke and Lucas's biggest contributions to the 2017 edition is a 220-page glossary, outlining for contemporary readers the ingredients that are considered unhealthy today and those that are hard to come by.

But while some recipes get modernized, it's herappetite for fresh greens that will resonate with contemporary food lovers.

"She's very big on local produce,"Cookeadded.

"It's very much in keeping with the way we think ofhealthyeating, through eating locally."

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