“Endangered Treasures”: Saving Our Culinary History

“Endangered Treasures”: Saving Our Culinary History, 4/13/07

For a lifelong Chicagoan and food enthusiast, it’s a genuine tingle to hold an actual menu from Briggs House, a Chicago hotel restaurant, dated January 1, 1859. Looking at the yellowing bill of fare opens a window onto the eating habits of an era.



The Chicago History Museum has archived several hundred menus starting from the middle of the 19th century, when you could still tuck into such relatively unfamiliar menu selections as loin of bear, quail pie and snipe. To generate funds needed to digitize this slowly deteriorating record of Chicago culinary history, an event entitled “Endangered Treasures” will be held in Roosevelt University's restored dining room of Louis Sullivan's Auditorium Hotel this Friday, 4/13/07 at 6:00 PM. Presenters at this event include Bruce Kraig, Professor Emeritus in History and Humanities at Roosevelt University, and Rick Bayless, who will reflect on developments in Chicago’s culinary history.

According to Kraig, there were no free-standing restaurants in Chicago until the late 19th century. Many of the earliest menus at the Chicago History Museum are from eating establishments located within hotels. Kraig explains that these early menus “follow a 17th century French model, going back to La Varenne, starting with something like oysters or terrapin soup, then moving on to fish, meat and dessert.” You can see the French influence in Briggs House dishes such as Westphalia Hams with Champagne Jelly Parisienne Style and Bread of Goose Fat Liver a la Richelieu (a dish our current foie gras ban would outlaw – a concept that would have seemed even more ludicrous to 19th century diners than it is now).



Many European wines were also on offer at this mid-century Chicago hotel, including French bottles from the great vineyards like Chateau Margaux and St. Emilion. Kraig explains that this Euro-style of eating was popularized in the United States at New York places like Delmonico’s, and the French cooking tradition spread from the Big Apple to Chicago, along with French-trained chefs.

As the old Chicago menus make clear, early Chicago dining establishments looked to France for guidance, but the Chicago dining experience has been modified by successive waves of immigration from countries like Germany, Italy and Poland. Bayless explains that “One of the reasons I chose to open a regional Mexican restaurant in Chicago is because of the ethnic diversity of this town, and how this diversity has affected the availability of foodstuffs as well as the respect of Chicagoans for other cultures.”

Although there are currently no menus from Mexican restaurants in the collection of the Chicago History Museum, Bayless did discover that, in the years before Topolobampo and Frontera, small mom and pop taquerias were offering the kind of authentic Mexican cuisine that is not common even in cities such as Los Angeles. “Our city’s food scene has changed a lot in the last 20 years,” Bayless remarked, “and we’re going to see many big changes in the next 40 years.” Perhaps forward-thinking culinary historians will begin saving menus from Chicago Mexican restaurants to chart the evolution of this vibrant culinary tradition in our town.

At this Friday’s event, there will be a reception serving selected items from classic Chicago menus – here is a partial listing of this retro bill of fare, along with the names of dining establishments where these dishes were served:

• Terrapin Soup (Palmer House Hotel)
• Oyster Patties (Foster House)
• Planked White Fish (Rector’s Oyster House)
• Venison Pies (Briggs Hotel)
• Frog’s Legs (Congress Hotel)
• Curry of Young Lamb with Rice Pilaf (The Pump Room)
• Boneless Turkey Wings (The Auditorium Hotel)
• Rumaki (Trader Vic’s)
• Hoppel-Poppel (Red Star Inn)
• Turkey Pot Pies (Toffanetti’s at Greyhound Terminal)

The “Endangered Treasures” event starts this Friday, April 13, 6:00 PM at 430 S. Michigan. Email tgribbins@hqtrs.com to get tickets ($100 – but remember, you’ll get to meet Kraig and Bayless, and there’s the big dinner and it’s all partially tax-deductible because proceeds go to save the old menus).

Right before this event, at 5:00 PM at the Chicago Hilton, 720 S. Michigan, there will be a free Cookbook Expo that’s open to the public. More than 60 cookbook authors will be there to talk about and autograph their work. You can reserve a space by emailing IACPCookbookExpo@hqtrs.com

HI,

See you tomorrow!

Regards,