Recipe: Spider Cornbread

I found an old recipe for "Spider Cornbread" when I was looking for vintage recipes for the blog.  No the recipe doesn't call for mashed spiders or cobwebs, instead spider was an old fashioned name for a skillet/frying pan, usually made of cast iron.  Ok so it's skillet cornbread is what we're getting at.  This recipe comes from a 1920 book for teaching young girls how to be proper homemakers. 

Update 9/15/23 - I know sugar in cornbread is a divisive thing in the south as is flour.  Flour was used in the original recipe to help combat Pellagra a Niacin deficiency, I have included an option using only fine grind cornmeal and omitting the flour.  You can choose to omit the sugar but it helps balance out the flavor and its nowhere near the sugar content of the sweet cake like cornbread you find in stores.  

The Baltimore Harley's Sandwich Shop Burger

      I won't go through the history of the Harley's Sandwich Shop chain as I have it all laid out in the tuna salad article, just suffice it to say that Harley's was THE fast food chain in Baltimore long before Gino's and McDonald's.  Harley's restaurants were open all night and so were a favorite of the night shift crowd and police officers.  These burgers were always simmering in Harley's secret sauce ready to be served to hungry customers.

Southern Cucumber Salad Relish

In the vintage era a relish was any kind of side item with a sour or sour sweet taste.  This term usually applied to pickles, chutney, piccalilli, etc.  We have changed the meaning in the modern era to mean chopped pickles added to hot dogs or various salads.  It was not uncommon to have a dill pickle with dinner as such practices were thought to aid in digestion which has some foundation in fact if the pickles are lacto fermented.  In this case I am sharing a family recipe for Cucumber Salad, a dish most often served with pork but I eat it with just about anything (ok not ice cream).  It's simple to make and tastes better the day after it's made so the flavors can meld together.  The last time I made it I stuck with organic cucumbers and it just tasted divine.  You don't need to use any special vinegar with it, just plain white vinegar will do fine.

Edited 04/17/2024: I revisited making this recipe after a long time and found some tweaks were needed so here is the updated recipe.

1950's "Church" Banana Bread

I admit I always hated banana bread with a passion.  The dense, door stop quality, pudding consistency breads of my youth were just over the top with banana flavor and nothing else.  Coupled with an evil tendency to flare up my heartburn I soon shied away from banana bread for good.  You can imagine my discomfiture the other day when my wife said "Let's make banana bread".  "Yeah sure, I'll make it but you can eat it, I hate the stuff."  So as with anything else my wife suggests to eat I immediately spring into action with a search for a vintage recipe.  The only problem is there is no vintage recipe for banana bread.

The Only Bread Recipe You'll Ever Need

Back in the old days, home cooks didn't trouble themselves trying to make artisan breads.  Sure you can spend a fortune on pans, rising baskets, flours, enhancers, etc trying to bake loaves like the professional bakeries put out but I have to ask why?  Most artisan breads are entirely unsuited to the one thing we will most be doing with them, making sandwiches.  I have many vintage cookbooks in my collection now and while here and there you encounter a recipe for French bread, noticeably absent are the ciabatta breads, sourdoughs, challah  breads and other loaves that are outside of the purvue of most home bakers.  Instead is a more practical approach meant to be frugal not topple you off the fiscal cliff in a unforgiving quest for the proper crumb size.

Little Tavern Sliders Recipe

     There are many places that sell sliders, or little burgers usually steamed on a griddle and sold in multiples.  White Castle, Crystal and even Burger King with their burger shots but in Baltimore you had 2 locations that advertised for you to "Buy them by the sackful," Little Tavern and White Tower.  Both of these chains were found in the Baltimore - Washington area and their flavor was quite different from the Northeast's White Castle chain.  Opened in 1927 in Louisville, Ky, Little Tavern eventually made their way over to Baltimore opening 13 locations.  Their menu was simple, sliders, drinks and a tasty coffee served in a heavy mug.

U Boat Food Project: The End

     This is I regret to say the end of this project.  With the deepening crisis of COVID-19 and the economic uncertainty that is being created I need to focus on my own affairs and bring my cooking back to having more flexibility.  I also want to preserve what canned goods I have in case things get really bad rather than run though them with this diet.

     It has been an interesting look into history while doing this.  I cannot say I was happy with the food, some things were just weird to my taste but others are going to become a more regular part of my rotation.  One thing I can say is that after doing this 3 weeks I feel the lack of fresh vegetables.  I usually eat alot of salads and I feel the lack of them not being a part of my diet.  So it has been fun while it lasted.  I will write a couple of cleanup articles and share a couple of recipes I found I liked in the next couple of days.  I will still be around and I have some plans to do some vintage recipes again so stay tuned.

U Boat Food Project Days 11 & 12

     This post catches me up to the present day and with it we have a special meal, sauerbraten.  Sauerbraten was used to use up the last of the fresh beef which by this time would have been starting to go sour even under refrigeration.  Vinegar has long been used as means of hiding the flavor of beef that is a bit off and while the Romans were preserving meat in red wine over 2000 years ago, the probable origins of this dish go back to the time of Charlemagne.  It was the meal the sailors on U Boats most looked forward to and it marked the end of the fresh food on the voyage, for after this canned food was relied on for the meals.  I used a Rhineland version of the recipe where the sauce is finished off with some honey, currants and cranberries.

U Boat Food Project: Days 9 & 10

     So I got a little behind these last few days, my apologies, life comes at you fast and I was busy with some personal issues.  I made lunch the last 4 days but I did not follow the menu for dinner because I was clearing up leftovers in the fridge from these rather large lunches and one day I skipped dinner entirely because I wasn't in the mood emotionally.

Gluten Free Pork Schitzel and Jager Gravy Recipe

     A week or so before the madness started with COVID-19, I was diagnosed as being celiac.  It certainly answered alot of health questions I have had kicking around in my brain all my life so I immediately cut gluten from my life forever.  It's been a strange transition but I feel better because of making the change.  Needless to say, I have had to make a change to the U Boat recipes that I am doing for this project and this schnitzel is one of them.  I found some chickpea crumbs for breading at Sprouts and I thought that would make an excellent final coating for the schnitzel while keeping it crisp.

U Boat Food Project: Day 8

     Well this first week of this historical project is in the books so to speak.  I shot a video on my youtube channel where I explain my thoughts and feelings after the first week of this menu, you can check it out below.  Today was the last day of fresh milk and cream, from here on out it is evaporated or condensed milk and the recipes will reflect this change.  This will also be the last week of fresh meat.  I had to draw a line somewhere and say they could not have reasonably had fresh meat after this point.  In various anecdotes I have found about food on board U Boats, it was said the men looked forward to sauerbraten day the most but it was bittersweet as it was also the last day they would see fresh meat.  This makes sense as meat lasts about 5 days in the refrigerator before going bad and if you were to load out the ship with frozen beef you could extend it by 3-4 days thawing time but by the 12th day, any beef was getting slimy so you had to hide this with vinegar.  Don't worry though, I'm using fresh beef for the recipe later this week as although I am historically accurate, I don't need to invite disaster while the hospitals are full of sick people.

U Boat Recipes: Roasted vegetables and Apples

     Sorry for using the same photo for 2 recipes but I wasn't sure if I was going to include the roasted vegetable recipe.  I't been some time since I was writing on this blog and I have to get back into the groove so to speak.  This recipe shows the flexibility of the menu as it is written.  The original document simply said: "Rissoles, mixed vegetables, potatoes, fruit", and I thought to myself, "why can't I just combine them all and make life easier for me?  I am rather happy with the result which is why I decided to share it.

U Boat Recipes: Frikadellen or German Meatballs

     Every country around the world has their own version of meatballs, it's an interesting societal phenomenon that was even mentioned in the old Babylon 5 sci fi series.  The German version is rather easy utilizing ingredients that were readily available on a u boat. 

U Boat Food Project: Day 7

     Today was another one of those days when errand running takes over and you're stuck doing something long past when you thought you would be done.  This is also where the flexibility of the menu begins to shine as well.  Just like with wednesday, I was able to simply switch lunch with supper today to provide myself with an easier meal when we arrived home.  The Frikadellen were very good as I let them crisp up just a bit too much.  For the vegetables the original menu simply said "mixed vegetables, potatoes and fruit" so rather than making separate dishes I just mixed them together and did a roast vegetable and apple dish.

U Boat Food Project: Day 6

     Today is a lighter day of cooking since we have sausage, cabbage and potatoes for lunch.  Since I skipped supper on wednesday and moved the supper from that day to yesterday's supper we missed out on Thuringian potato salad yesterday.  Not to worry though as potatoes are on the menu today and since how they were cooked was left up to the discretion of the cook, I can just make it today with lunch.

U Boat Recipes: Bavarian Potato Salad

     We are all familiar with German potato salad that has a dressing made of mustard and bacon fat and is served hot but in Germany many variations on this theme exist.  Germans still prefer their potato salad hot, but in this variation the bacon is omitted and the dressing is thinned out with some vegetable stock.  Traditionally this is served with real vienna sausages which are best represented by Hoffmann's Brand Hot Dogs here in the states.

U Boat Food Project: Day 5

    This morning is a continuation of last night since every place is closing early because of COVID 19.  I was up at 5am and out the door by 6 so I could finish getting the stuff for my girlfriend's home office.  So breakfast was coffee and I just stayed hungry until lunch.  I t was a very good lunch though.  It's hard to find a German pot roast recipe that isn't sauerbraten but this one comes from the writer's grandmother who emigrated from Bavaria.  The meat was very tender and the sauce created by the cooking is amazing.

The U Boat Food Project: Day 4

     I apologize for me lateness in posting this but day 4 was a very wild day.  My girlfriend was dumped unceremoniously into working from home so I had to go store hopping to try to find a lan cord to set up a home office for her in the spare bedroom.  Needless to so I skipped dinner as by the time I had rigged up a temporary solution it was past my usual bedtime let alone dinner time.  Of course on a U Boat things like this would have happened as well.  Nobody was eating while an attack was underway.

U Boat Food Project Day 3

     Day 3 of the U Boat Menu brings us with a couple of very nice meals, especially supper which is a specialty of the city of Hamburg and also a favorite treat of mine.  My Polish grandmother was fond of making the Polish version of herring salad with lots of sour cream and so I acquired a taste for it as a teenager.  My girlfriend was not impressed and although she is quite adventurous with food she gave the herring salad a hard pass.  Not to worry, I cooked her the other steak from lunch with the potato and broccoli and she was appeased.

U Boat Recipes: Herring Salad

     This is a dish that definitely has an acquired taste due to the use of soused or wine pickled herring.  My Polish grandmother made the Polish variant of this dish when I was a teenager so I grew fond of it although it's not something I make often.  It wasn't until I started the research into this project that I was introduced to the German version of herring salad and I have to say I like it.  There are only 2 types of wine pickled herring that I see locally, Aldi and Vita and I prefer the Vita because it comes in a small container compared to what Aldi carries.  If you can find this item then the rest of the ingredients are easy.