Author and food historian Paula Marcoux shares the splendors of the Heritage Harvest Festival at Monticello and garden-to-fire cooking in a presidential kitchen.![]() |
Photo © Eleanor Gould. Used with permission. |
How could this not be a mind-blowing honor for a hands-on food historian — to cook in the actual kitchen of “the Great House” of Jefferson’s mountaintop home? Arriving with a sheaf of recipes from Mary Randolph’s 1824 publication, The Virginia Housewife, I checked off my workshop shopping list while touring the famous and spectacular Monticello garden with three expert gardeners. Together we selected from among dozens of heirloom varieties, harvesting the tomatoes, okra, lima beans, onions, cucumbers, squashes, and corn called for in the historic recipes. With the guidance of master gardener Pat Brodowski, this Yankee girl got to observe peanuts growing for the first time, and to learn what “gourd-seeded corn” looks like on the stalk.
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Photo © Eleanor Gould. Used with permission. |
The Heritage Harvest Festival and its celebration of America’s food roots gives those of us lucky enough to attend a literal taste of what makes our country’s food culture distinct. Although it is a tremendous honor, you don’t have to be a presenter to experience most of what blew me away last year. Anyone at the festival can tour the garden with an expert, meet an archaeologist and learn about their fantastic work, and chat with extraordinary thinkers and doers of all stripes. Last year I encountered seed revolutionary Glenn Roberts of Anson Mills, fellow Storey author and tomato fiend Craig LeHoullier, fifth-generation Virginia orchardist and cider-maven Tom Burford, and the charming and astute father of Virginia wine-making, Gabriele Rausse. I can’t wait to see what this year has to offer, and once again to feel the groundswell of passion for learning and doing that imbues the festival, in a place with as complex and rich a history as can be found in this country.
Hope to see you there.
Paula Marcoux is the author of Cooking with Fire. She is a food historian who lives in Plymouth, Massachusetts, and has worked professionally as a cook, an archaeologist, and a bread-oven builder. She is the food editor of Edible South Shore magazine, writes on food history topics for popular and academic audiences, and consults with museums, film producers, and publishers. She also gives regular workshops on natural leavening, historic baking, and wood-fired cooking. Find more from Paula on her website.
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