Peas Porridge

 What you’ll need: 

• 1 quart green peas
• 1 quart water
• 1 bundle dried mint
• A pinch of salt
• Ground pepper to taste
• Walnut size ball of butter (about 2 T)
• 2 Tbsp. flour
• 2 quarts milk

 Here’s how: 

1. Pick a quart of green peas, and put them into a quart of water with a bundle of dried mint and a little salt.
2. Let them boil until the peas are quite tender, then put in some ground pepper, along with a piece of butter as big as a walnut rolled in flour.
3. Stir it all together and let it boil a few minutes.
4. Add 2 quarts of milk.
5. Let it boil for 15 minutes.
6. Remove the mint bundle and serve. 

Watch them cook this historic recipe.

Did you know: In August 1789, Pennsylvania Sen. William Maclay listed in his diary the foods the Washingtons served in New York at a dinner the senator attended.

“It was a great dinner,” he wrote. “First was soup [followed by] Fish, roasted & boiled meats Gammon Fowls &ca.” [fn, WM, pp. 136-137]

Watch the historians at Mount Vernon who opened the doors — and the outdoor kitchen — to welcome three of our Grateful American™ Kids, AJ, Avery, and Callie. They prepared two dishes the Washington’s and their guests would have enjoyed: curry of catfish and peas porridge. These students from Longfellow Middle School in Fairfax County, VA, were our reporters for the day as they were guided through a Revolutionary cooking lesson by Deborah Colburn, the interpretive programs supervisor at Mount Vernon, and her colleague, interpreter Sara Marie Massee.

Recipe from: The Art of Cookery made Plain and Easy by Hannah Glasse, 5^th edition p.79