Not Just Cookbooks

Dad's German Dictionary

Not only cookbooks, but a dictionary or two have turned up in the family archives. My sister found Dad's old red German-English dictionary from his college days in one of her bookcases. This was a fortuitous find, since I am taking a short course in German this winter. My classmates found the old dictionary interesting, but pretty much unreadable, for reasons which are explained below.

The book was published in Chicago in 1938 by the Follett Publishing Company; it bears an inscription with Dad's signature, "Union College 1943." That must have been his senior year in college. Upon graduating  --  his class was graduated a few months early because the country was at war  --  he went to work immediately for the Sterling Winthrop Research Institute in Rensselaer, NY. With his degree in Chemistry, he was put to work helping develop and produce a synthetic anti-malaria medication for the soldiers who were fighting in the South Pacific.

But back to the dictionary: It is very difficult for us today to read the German words, since they are written in the old blackletter Gothic typeface known as Fraktur.

Dad's dictionary was printed at a transitional moment when the Fraktur script would soon be abandoned in Germany in 1941, in favor of a Latin typescript. It is believed that this changeover was carried out, "because the Third Reich wanted a form of writing which was more like the writing of the rest of the modern Western World." (1)

Mom's Dutch Dictionary

Dad's dictionary is not the only old one I have; I also have Mom's Cassell's Dutch-English/English-Dutch Dictionary. Published in 1967 by Funk & Wagnalls, it is not as old as Dad's, but the original copyright goes back to 1923. Mom purchased it in order to make sure she used the correct Dutch word when writing to her cousins in the Netherlands. Being the careful person she was, Mom covered the book in a colorful flowered wrapping paper when the dust jacket wore out from use. She was also very meticulous in the way she used to write her letters in English, and then, using the dictionary as needed, translate them and carefully re-write the letter in her impeccable Palmer Method handwriting before posting the letter or aerogram off to Holland.

My French Dictionary

Newer yet is my own Cassell's French-English Dictionary from my college days. My Petit Robert has gone missing, but Cassell's has turned up. This one is also published by Funk & Wagnalls, with a copyright date of 1962. My college years were somewhat later than that, but I can see that this old standby has suffered some wear and tear since then.

And so you can see that we have been a trilingual family.

     - Auf Wiedersehen!
     - Tot ziens!
     - A bientot!


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(1) Hensher, Philip. The Missing Ink. New York: Faber and Faber, Inc. 2012; page 100.

For more information about Fraktur, see the following Web page on the German language and type fonts at:  http://www.omniglot.com/writing/german.htm

A Daams Windmill

Daams Windmill in Vaassen

During my last trip to the Netherlands in 2011, I had an opportunity to visit Zaanse Schans, which is an open-air museum where one can visit a number of typical Dutch windmills. I have since learned that there is a Daams windmill in the town of Vaassen, in the province of Gelderland, that may have belonged at one time to an early forebear of Grandma Elizabeth Daams. We have no proof that it belonged to a family member, but according to information provided to me by a Daams relative, since Vaassen is only 27 kilometers from Stroe, Gelderland, where our early Daams ancestors came from, it is quite possible.

There are several categories of windmills, based on their structure. The Daams windmill is an octagonal smock mill. This type consists of a six- or eight-sided tower, topped by a cap that rotates to bring the sails into the wind. In English, it is called a smock mill, after the smocks worn by farmers in earlier times. In Dutch, it is called a stellingmolen; stelling indicating the scaffold or platform constructed around the tower so that the miller can adjust the sails and turn them into the wind.

This style of construction was developed for use in areas where obstacles such as trees or buildings obstructed the mill’s direct contact with the wind; it had to be tall enough for the wind to reach it, thus the addition of the platform for easier access to the wings and sails.

The Daams mill in Vaassen was built in 1870 for Derk Poll Jonker, who passed it on to his brother-in-law Herman Daams in 1883. It was first used to grind grain. During the early twentieth century, it changed hands several times, and in later years, as other sources of energy became more widely available, the mill fell out of use. Due to neglect, its condition eventually deteriorated to the point where the municipality considered demolishing it.

Fortunately for preservationists and dévotés of windmills, a group of local citizens came to the rescue. They formed a non-profit organization, and thanks to a fundraising campaign which resulted in donations from individuals and businesses, and eventually a government grant, the mill was restored in 1989. It opened to the public on National Windmill Day in 1990 (the second Saturday in May) and has become one of the nicest attractions in Vaassen. 

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Sources:

List of windmills in Gelderland: Wikipedia. http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_windmills_in_Gelderland ; accessed 3/16/ 2014

Molens in Nederland. C.P. Braaij; Kooiman Souvenirs & Gifts; Koog a/d Zaan, Netherlands.

Molendatabase entry (in Dutch):  http://www.molendatabase.nl/nederland/molen.php?nummer=277 ; accessed 3/16/2014. (With several photographs)

Smock mill: Wikipedia. http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Smock_mill ; accessed 2/9/2014.

Photo credit: Wikipedia - Creative Commons: Quistnix at nl.wikipedia

"Hearty Vegetables"

Years ago, when I was trying to learn a bit of Dutch, I signed off a short note to a relative in the Netherlands with the misspelled phrase, “Hartlijke groenten” instead of “groeten.” I’m sure he was quite amused by my wishing him “hearty vegetables” rather than “cordial greetings.”

Orthographic bloopers notwithstanding, I have found quite a few recipes for hearty vegetable dishes in Grandma VandenBergh’s old Dutchcookbook. This week I’d like to share a few that readers may recall from earlier posts.

Being a country in the northern hemisphere between 50 and 54 degrees north latitude, the climate of the Netherlands is conducive to growing root vegetables and tubers. The carrots and potatoes that constitute the traditional Dutch dish of hutspot or stampot are certainly hearty vegetables whether combined in a ragout or prepared and served on their own.

In EenvoudigeBerekende Recepten, author Martine Wittop Konig divides the chapter on vegetables into six categories. She notes that boiling is the most common way to cook vegetables, but in that case you should take care not to cook them longer than necessary (and don’t use too much water!), so that you can use the leftover water in a sauce for the vegetables. If you simmer the vegetables slowly, you can also use the leftover broth the next day as a base for making vegetable soup.

Wittoop Konig also suggests steaming vegetables in what she calls a “Vingerhoets’ stoompan,” literally a thimble steam pan. This method will also help preserve the vitamins and nutrients in the vegetables. Steaming is my preferred method; I use my “thimble steam pan” at least once a week.

Here then are some examples of each type of vegetable covered in the chapter on vegetables:

Legumes (peulvruchten)

This category includes brown beans, white beans, and split peas. I have used both brown and white beans to make soups from the Dutch cookbook. 

White Bean and Leek soup

Stalk and root vegetables (stengel- en worteldeelen)

These include carrots, beets, and asparagus. I've tried several recipes for carrots and Dutch-style white asparagus.

Worteltjes - Baby Carrots

Asperges - White asparagus

Cabbages (koolsoorten)

Who doesn't know American-style coleslaw, which is really Dutch kool sla, meaning "cabbage salad"? I've tried recipes for cauliflower (bloemkool) and Brussels sprouts (spruitjes).

Bloemkool au gratin - Cauliflower au gratin

Spruitjes - Brussels sprouts

Leafy green vegetables (bladgroenten)

These include spinach (spinazie)and endive (andijvie).

Potatoes and endive for stampot met andijvie

Young legumes (jonge peulvruchten)

Green beans fall into this category (snijboonen).

Snijbonen met aardappelen en rookworst

“Aromatic vegetables” (aromatische groenten)

This is the shortest section in the chapter on vegetables. Here we find a recipe for cucumber salad (komkommersla).  As you might imagine, this is a tasty and nourishing recipe for those of us trying to watch our weight.

Cucumber and egg salad

With such a variety of hearty and nourishing recipes, we have no excuse not to eat our veggies.

Eet smakelijk! Enjoy your meal, whatever vegetable you choose to prepare today.

The Spices They Used

Grandma Minnie's recipe for Molasses Drop Cake calls for a cup each of molasses, sugar, melted lard, hot water; also flour, baking soda, an egg, and "spices." What spices, specifically?

Similarly, her recipe for Applesauce Cake also calls for "spices."

When I open her spice cupboard, even all these years later, I still inhale the aroma of cinnamon, ginger, and cloves.

Here is a list of all the herbs and spices I found in the old kitchen cupboard, some still in glass jars with Minnie's handwritten labels:

- allspice
- anise seed
- cinnamon (whole stick and ground)
- caraway seed (also labeled "Kummel")
- cloves (whole and ground)
- cumin
- fennel seeds
- ginger
- mace (from Java)
- marjoram
- pepper
- savory
- sesame seeds
- tarragon
- thyme
- vanilla bean (from John Wagner & Sons, established 1847, "since the days of the clipper ships")

When I tried making the applesauce cake, I used 1/2 teaspoon cinnamon and 1/4 teaspoon allspice, but you can probably experiment with using either of those, with either ginger or cloves as well:

Grandma Minnie's Applesauce Cake

Although Dutch cuisine is often considered somewhat bland, quite a few of Grandma VandenBergh's recipes call for curry, nutmeg, mace, or cloves. These bring to mind the Spice Islands (now the Maluku Province of Indonesia), where the Dutch East India Company tried to impose a monopoly on the spice trade in the 17th century. The Dutch apple cake I learned to make from my mother is redolent with cinnamon, as are the oliebollen which are a traditional Dutch treat for New Year's:

Oliebollen

And when I have made Grandma VandenBergh's curry and bean soup on a chilly winter afternoon, the aroma warms the whole kitchen.

It is interesting to speculate whether my grandmothers ever shared recipes. I haven't found any evidence of that, but they did apparently like to use some of the same spices. Grandma Minnie's cuisine was influenced by the Palatine Germans who settled in the Mohawk Valley, but who knows, maybe some of her cake recipes with spices originating in the Spice Islands date back to Dutch traditions as well.

Curry Soup with Brown Beans

We are feeling a blast of cold air from the Arctic this week in Upstate New York, and snow is expected to fall again soon. So a warm bowl of homemade soup will be very welcome.

I have found two similar recipes for white and brown bean soup with curry in Grandma Vanden Bergh's 1920's cookbook, "Eenvoudige Berekende Recepten," and my husband seems to prefer the heartiness of the latter version. So here it is: 

Curry Soup with Brown Beans  (Kerrysoep van Bruine Boonen)

1/2 pound (250 grams) dried brown beans
2 quarts (2 liter) water
1 teaspoon (7 grams) salt
1 medium onion
1/2 to 1 tablespoon curry (depends on how spicy you like it!)
2 tablespoons (40 grams) butter or margarine

The recipe also calls for 30 grams (3 tablespoons) of whole wheat flour, but I found that I could omit this, since the soup became thick enough without this added thickening agent.

- Wash the beans and soak overnight in the water.
- The following day, cook the beans over low heat for 2 to 2 1/2 hours .
- Melt the butter in a frying pan; chop the onion and fry in the butter, along with the curry, until dark brown, but taking care not to burn the onion.
- Pour the onion mixture in with the simmering beans, and continue cooking for 15 more minutes.

- If you wish to have a smooth soup, pass the soup through a colander and pour into serving dish. Serve with croutons or a chunk of whole wheat bread.

Kerrysoep van bruine boonen

Eet smakelijk! Enjoy your meal!

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Dutch vocabulary

boter  =  butter
bruine boonen  =  brown beans
kerry  =  curry
tarwebloem  =  whole wheat flour
ui  =  onion
zout  =  salt

Albany's Union Station -- Then and Now

Earlier this month, I had the opportunity to attend the inauguration of Albany's 75th Mayor, the first female mayor in the 328 years since the city received its Charter from Governor Thomas Dongan in 1686.

Union Station, New Year's Day 2014

The ceremony took place at Kiernan Plaza, which is Albany's former Union Train Station, the same edifice through which my Vanden Bergh grandparents passed upon their arrival in Albany in 1911. This historic building, built at the turn of the 20th century, has now been purchased by the State University of New York at Albany's College of Nanoscale Science and Engineering, which intends to make it over into a technology innovation center.

At the ceremony, I sat next to an elderly gentleman who remembered embarking and debarking at the train station on trips to and from New York City many times in the 1940's and '50's. How ironic it is that an edifice built in the horse-and-buggy era is now the offices of the 21st century nanoscale engineering college.

My grandparents stepped out of the building into a cacophony of trolley cars and horse-drawn carriages that shared the cobble-stoned pavement with Mr. Ford's new horseless carriages. They clutched their baggage in one hand, and in the other a scrap of paper with the name and address of another Dutch family living in Albany's South End. Timidly approaching a policeman, they inquired of him in their broken English what trolley line would take them in that direction.

Ironically, most immigrants coming to Albany in the early 20th century were not Dutch, as were most of the city's earliest European residents. Subsequent waves of immigration to New York State's Capital District bore many Irish and Italian surnames, now reflected in the names of the Albany Common Council members sworn in on New Year's Day along with Mayor Kathy Sheehan.

Union Station - interior decorative element

The Beaux-Arts facade of the building has not changed much since its construction, nor have the fluted columns and decorative swags of the building's interior. But the clatter of horses' hoofs and the ring of trolley bells have given way to the clicking of computer keyboards, just as the sounds of the Dutch language gave way to the Irish brogue and lilting Italian accents of the forebears of today's Common Council.

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Read more about Grandma and Grandpa VandenBergh's arrival in Albany at Union Station at this earlier blog post: Arrival at Last 

For local coverage of the inauguration of the new Mayor and a bit about the history of the Union Station building, you may also find this article worth perusing: "The New Guard." (from a local weekly newspaper, "Metroland")

Scrubbing Day in s'Graveland

“It is Saturday  --  scrubbing day. [. . . ] Wooden-shod servants are splashing and mopping and soaking and rubbing every exterior surface, horizontal and perpendicular,” wrote John Higinbotham in the 1910 edition of Three Weeks in Holland and Belgium. The scene must have seemed quaint and picturesque to the foreign tourist upon his arrival in Rotterdam a hundred years ago. He continues, “Thrift, cleanliness and a high average of comfort seem to abound.”

The casual tourist taking notes for a travel book probably did not stop to ponder what lay behind the stereotypical image he painted of cleanliness, comfort and thrift. But if one knew where to look and what questions to ask, a more discerning traveler may have looked behind the scenes to discover what (or who) made this picture look so pleasant.

Hendrina and Elizabeth Daams ca. 1900

In fact, both of my grandparents and their families were members of the working class in turn-of-the-twentieth-century Netherlands, and their efforts, along with those of their siblings and acquaintances, helped contribute to the pleasant picture of comfort and cleanliness. In an earlier post, we learned how Grandma Elizabeth Daams and her sister Hendrina left school and went out to work as domestic servants in Loosdrecht after their father died. Elizabeth worked for several wealthy families for a period of ten years before being able to save enough money to emigrate to the United States when she and Barend Vanden Bergh married.

In the nearby town of s’Graveland, Grandpa Vanden Bergh’s brother Jacob worked in one of the many laundries or bleaching establishments, as well as at least one relative of Grandma Elizabeth’s, known as Tante Ger (“Aunt Gertie”). According to an undated booklet that my mother received from a cousin in the Netherlands (“Bleek, Bleeker, Bleekst,” by J.A. Hendriks, Jr.), as early as 1831 there were as many as 42 laundries in s’Graveland.

The name “s’Graveland” can be translated as “the Count’s Land,” and indeed in those early days, the social system resembled a feudal system. The village consisted of about ten large estates owned by members of the ruling class from Amsterdam, the “regenten.” This system was already in place in the seventeenth century, and continued until the 1920’s.

Living conditions of the working people were very difficult a hundred years ago. As noted by Mom’s cousin Jasper in the notebook he sent her, “Tante Ger” recounted how she had to work from five o'clock in the morning until ten or eleven o"clock at night, especially in the summer.

Country estate in s'Graveland ca. 1910

Another Vanden Bergh ancestor (my great-grandfather) worked as a gardener on one of the estates owned by the feudal gentry. There were at least twelve employees in the mansion and garden. In the summer, he also worked from 6:00 AM until 9:00 or sometimes 11:00 in the evening. The only time he had to cultivate his own garden, where the family grew potatoes and vegetables, was between 4:00 and 6:00 AM. Sometimes to earn a few extra cents, he would take over night watch duties from other people.

Of course, much has changed since those early days, with the mechanization of the laundry business as well as other labor-saving devices and improved working conditions due to the labor movement. Nowadays, most of us can pursue leisure activities while machines wash and dry our clothes.