“The Gaddy women were laboring too, bringing in grapes and berries, beans and tomatoes by the pail and bushel. They canned and dried and sugared down the procession of largess that moved through the kitchen. There was more milk than the dairy would buy and Maria would skim the surplus for cream, send Ellen to trade the butter she churned. It was dirt cheap in this season. The remaining thin milk was thrown to squealing young pigs in wood troughs, foul-smelling in the reek of heat. Milk would sour swiftly, spots of yellow-green milkstone forming on the sides of pails. Ellen was directed to scrape it clean with a knife. Cheeses were made, some to cure amber and hard, hanging in the smokehouse, others to be stirred daily in stone crocks until the white curd turned yellow, the strong odor left, and it became bland. There was an abundance of cottage cheese with clabber cream and chopped green onions stirred in, or a seasoning of herbs that grew by the houseside. Maria had a lavish hand when it came to seasoning.”
A cook of roughly the same moment, setting down the same dish.
1121. INGREDIENTS.--1 quart of white haricot beans, 4 middling-sized onions, 1/4 pint of good brown gravy, pepper and salt to taste, a little flour. _Mode_.--Peel and mince the onions not too finely, and fry them in butter of a light brown colour; dredge over them a little flour, and add the gravy and a seasoning of pepper and salt. Have ready a pint of haricot beans well boiled and drained; put them with the onions and gravy, mix all well together, and serve very hot. _Time_.--From 2 to 2-1/2 hours to boil the beans; 5 minutes to fry the onions. _Average cost_, 4d. per quart. _Sufficient_ for 4 or 5 persons. _Seasonable_ in winter.
Sources: The passage is from Helga Sandburg, The wheel of earth, free to read in full at Project Gutenberg. The recipe is from Beeton, The Book of Household Management of 1861, also free in full. Both are in the public domain in the United States. The binding above is ours — forest cloth, cheese stamp.