My goal is to discover what I can about the food culture of colonial South Carolina. As someone who eats everyday, I think about food a lot. My Southern family has given me a hearty appreciation of comfort foods like fried chicken, beans and rice, fried green tomatoes, and the like. It will be really interesting to discover how the original colonial South Carolinians ate, how they prepared their foods, and how they adapted their European diets to the food available to them in the colony.
I am going to look through the recipe books (nee receipt books) of Eliza Lucas Pinckney and her daughter Harriott Pinckney Horry. Although they are both representations of the upper class of Carolina, there are footnotes in Harriott’s book that explain a few customs particular to the affluent. Looking at the changes over a generation will also be very interesting.
Eliza Lucas Pinckney
Eliza’s book is simply known as the “Eliza Pinckney receipt book” and was completed in 1756. The Society has it in manuscript form, call number 43/2178. The manuscript was a blank bound notebook that Eliza filled out with recipes for food and medicines; she often included who provided the recipe. Eliza’s handwriting is hard to decipher, but luckily for me, someone has already gone through the trouble of transcribing it.
Harriot’s book is a published edition of her recipe book, titled A Colonial Plantation Cookbook: The Receipt Book of Harriot Pinckney. This 1984 edition has an introduction and footnotes (to provide some historical background to her recipes) by editor Richard J. Hooker. It was published by the University of South Carolina Press. Harriot originally finished her book in 1770 (go Cougars!). The call number is 641.5 .H67 C65 1984.
I hope that as I look over these books I will learn about the diets and preferences of early South Carolinians. What kind of foods did they eat often? What foods disappeared from their European diets? What illnesses did they contract and how did they treat them? Also, if y’all are lucky, I might bring in an authentic dessert for our exam…
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