One of My Favorite Youtube channels and Sites - Jas. Townsend & Sons.

Dear Folks,

From time to time I like to share my favorite books, sites and recipes which inspired me.

As a gardener, cook (real foodie), author and lecturer on growing edibles in the desert southwest (or any USDA 9b+ area) and using all the bounty, searching for new or innovative recipes and foods is simply my passion.

Frankly when the world get's a little too chaotic or even hateful, I dive into something new for the garden or some new way to use what I grew or cook with or a new-to-me food.

Jas. Townsend  & Sons, is a family owned business, which employs about 30 people, that focuses on recreating the 18th Century (1700s era of the Revolutionary War times) with clothing, cooking utensils (they make their own pottery along with most of the items they sell on their site), supplies and other equipment.

Jon who narrates the videos is the son of the founder and his work is engaging and informative.

One of the very best reasons for looking at old recipes is the very basic fact, they used what was available to them, from their gardens, from what grew wild and what they created with sometimes limited resources.

Don't have a baking dish?  Make one out of flour and water!

Don't have an oven to bake in?  Make one out of dirt and water!

Youtube channel  (The specific link I put here is for 18th Century Fried Chicken!)  If you have a love old fashioned recipes and concepts, I encourage you to subscribe to their channel.

An interesting note about the 18th Century Fried Chicken recipe is the use of "verjus" aka "verjuice" which is the tart pressed juice of unripe green grapes.  I love researching ancient / old recipes and find some intriguing ingredients, not generally known or used in modern times.

Verjus is one of them.  I learned about this acidic vinegar option when reading about 15th Century Renaissance cooking.

In modern times we tend to focus on lemon juice or vinegar for the acid in recipes when there are options like verjus or even Seville Oranges.  In the desert southwest you know Seville Oranges for their American common name "Sour Orange".  Keep these two options in mind when recipes call for vinegar, you may find a new loved ingredient.

Back to Jas. Townsend & Sons.  There channel of cooking and recreating videos is getting quite large and everyone of them is interesting.  How to make a coffin (not what you think) -- it was a standing pie crust - very, very thick and was used in place of baking dishes, literally.  How to make a small earthen oven.  How to dry beef for carrying into the field.

Many of the videos are about how our soldiers survived while out in the wild and fighting for our Independence.

With our 4th Of July Independence Celebration, why not look into one or more recipes from the era and add them to your celebration table.


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