Garden to Table - Home-Made Lemon Wine

John Greenwood (American artist, 1727-1792) Sea Captains Carousing, 1758.  Detail

Old-Time Recipes for Home Made Wines Cordials & Liqueurs 1909 by Helen S. Wright

LEMON WINE
Take six large lemons, pare off the rind, and squeeze out the juice; steep the rind in the juice, and put to it one quart of brandy. Let it stand in an earthen pot close stopped three days, then squeeze six more, and mix with two quarts of water, and as much sugar as will sweeten the whole. Boil the water, lemons, and sugar together, letting it stand till it is cool; then add one quart of white wine, and the other lemon and brandy, and mix them together, and run it through a flannel bag into some vessel. Let it stand three months and bottle it off; cork your bottles very well, and keep it cool. It will be fit to drink in a month or six weeks.

Old-Time Recipes for Home Made Wines is a cookbook for those who want to make their own wines & liqueurs from available ingredients, including fruits, flowers, vegetables, & shrubs from local gardens, farms, & orchards. It includes ingredients & instructions for making & fermenting spirits, from wine & ale to sherry, brandy, cordials, & even beer. 

Colonial Era Cookbooks

1615, New Booke of Cookerie, John Murrell (London) 

1798, American Cookery, Amelia Simmons (Hartford, CT)

1803, Frugal Housewife, Susannah Carter (New York, NY)

1807, A New System of Domestic Cookery, Maria Eliza Rundell (Boston, MA)

1808, New England Cookery, Lucy Emerson (Montpelier, VT)

Helpful Secondary Sources

America's Founding Food: The Story of New England Cooking/Keith Stavely and Kathleen Fitzgerald Chapel Hill : University of North Carolina Press, 2004.

Colonial Kitchens, Their Furnishings, and Their Gardens/Frances Phipps Hawthorn; 1972

Early American Beverages/John Hull Brown   Rutland, Vt., C. E. Tuttle Co 1996 

Early American Herb Recipes/Alice Cooke Brown  ABC-CLIO  Westport, United States

Food in Colonial and Federal America/Sandra L. Oliver

Home Life in Colonial Days/Alice Morse Earle (Chapter VII: Meat and Drink) New York : Macmillan Co., ©1926.

A Revolution in Eating: How the Quest for Food Shaped America/James E. McWilliams New York : Columbia University Press, 2005.

Garden to Table - Home-Made Hops Beer

John Greenwood (American artist, 1727-1792) Sea Captains Carousing, 1758.  Detail

Old-Time Recipes for Home Made Wines Cordials & Liqueurs 1909 by Helen S. Wright

HOPS BEER
Turn five quarts of water on six ounces of hops; boil three hours. Strain off the liquor; turn on four quarts more of water, and twelve spoonfuls of ginger, and boil the hops three hours longer. Strain and mix it with the other liquor, and stir in two quarts of molasses. Brown, very dry, one-half pound of bread, and put in, — rusked bread is best. Pound it fine, and brown it in a pot, like coffee. After cooling to be about luke-warm, add one pint of new yeast that is free from salt. Keep the beer covered, in a temperate situation, till fermentation has ceased, which is known by the settling of the froth; then turn it into a keg or bottles, and keep it in a cool place.

Old-Time Recipes for Home Made Wines is a cookbook for those who want to make their own wines & liqueurs from available ingredients, including fruits, flowers, vegetables, & shrubs from local gardens, farms, & orchards. It includes ingredients & instructions for making & fermenting spirits, from wine & ale to sherry, brandy, cordials, & even beer. 

Colonial Era Cookbooks

1615, New Booke of Cookerie, John Murrell (London) 

1798, American Cookery, Amelia Simmons (Hartford, CT)

1803, Frugal Housewife, Susannah Carter (New York, NY)

1807, A New System of Domestic Cookery, Maria Eliza Rundell (Boston, MA)

1808, New England Cookery, Lucy Emerson (Montpelier, VT)

Helpful Secondary Sources

America's Founding Food: The Story of New England Cooking/Keith Stavely and Kathleen Fitzgerald Chapel Hill : University of North Carolina Press, 2004.

Colonial Kitchens, Their Furnishings, and Their Gardens/Frances Phipps Hawthorn; 1972

Early American Beverages/John Hull Brown   Rutland, Vt., C. E. Tuttle Co 1996 

Early American Herb Recipes/Alice Cooke Brown  ABC-CLIO  Westport, United States

Food in Colonial and Federal America/Sandra L. Oliver

Home Life in Colonial Days/Alice Morse Earle (Chapter VII: Meat and Drink) New York : Macmillan Co., ©1926.

A Revolution in Eating: How the Quest for Food Shaped America/James E. McWilliams New York : Columbia University Press, 2005.

Garden Design - 1625 Francis Bacon's Essay on Gardens

Francis Bacon, (1561-1626), English philosopher, statesman, scientist, lawyer, jurist, & author, wrote of gardens in his 1625 Essayes or Counsels, Civill and Morall in the appropriately titled essay Of Gardens. Bacon had inherited his father's estate at Gorhambury in Hertfordshire in 1602. He gardened there & his notes outlining a scheme to make a four-acre water garden still exist in the British Museum. His essay on gardens coincided with the new North American settlements along the Atlantic coast.

Frans Pourbus the younger (1569–1622) Portrait of Francis Bacon 1617

God Almighty first planted a Garden; and, indeed, it is the purest of human pleasures; it is the greatest refreshment to the spirits of man; without which buildings and palaces are but gross handy-works: and a man shall ever see, that, when ages grow to civility and elegancy, men come to build stately, sooner than to garden finely; as if gardening were the greater perfection.

Gardens by the Season

I do hold it in the royal ordering of Gardens, there ought to be Gardens for all the months in the year, in which, severally, things of beauty may be then in season.

For December, and January, and the latter part of November, you must take such things as are green all winter: Holly, Ivy, Bays, Juniper, Cypress-trees, Yew, Pineapple-trees; Fir-trees, Rosemary, Lavender; Periwinkle, the white, the purple, and the blue; Germander, Flags, Orange-trees, Lemon-trees, and Myrtles, if they be stoved; and Sweet Marjoram, warm set.

There followeth, for the latter part of January and February, the Mezereon-tree, which then blossoms: Crocus Vernus, both the yellow and the gray; Primroses, Anemones, the early Tulip, the Hyacinthus Orientalis, Chamairis Fritellaria.

For March, there come Violets, especially the single blue, which are the earliest; the yellow Daffodil, the Daisy, the Almond-tree in blossom, the Peach-tree in blossom, the Cornelian-tree in blossom, Sweet-Briar.

In April follow the double white Violet, the Wallflower, the Stock-Gffliflower, the Cowslip, Flower-de-Luces and Lilies of all natures; Rosemary-flowers, the Tulip, the double Peony, the pale Daffodil, the French Honeysuckle, the Cheery-tree in blossom, the Damascene' and Plum-trees in blossom, the White Thom in leaf, the Lilac-tree.

In May and June come Pinks of all sorts, specially the Blush-Pink; Roses of all kinds, except the Musk, which comes later; Honeysuckles, Strawberries, Bugloss, Columbine, the French Marygold, Flos Africanus, Cherry-tree in fruit, Ribes, Figs in fruit, Rasps, Vine-flocvers, Lavender in flowers, the sweet Satyrian, with the white flower; Herba Muscaria, Lilium, Convallium, the Apple-tree in blossom.

In July come Gillyflowers of all varieties, Musk Roses, the Lime-tree in blossom, early Pears, and Plums in fruit, Genitings, Codlins.

In August come Plums of all sorts in fruit, Pears, Apricots, Barberries, Filberts, Musk-Melons, Monks-hoods, of all colours.

In September come Grapes, Apples, Poppies of all colours, Peaches, Melocotones, Nectarines, Cornelians, Wardens, Quinces.

In October, and the beginning of November, come Services, Medlars, Bullaces, Roses cut or removed to come late, Hollyoaks, and such like.

These particulars are for the climate of London; but my meaning is perceived, that you may have ver perpetuum, as the place affords.

Scents

And because the breath of flowers is far sweeter in the air (where it comes and goes, like the warbling of music), than in the hand, therefore nothing is more fit for that delight, than to know what be the flowers and plants that do best perfume the air.

Roses, damask and red, are fast' flowers of their smells; so that you may walk by a whole row of them, and find nothing of their sweetness; yea, though it be in a morning's dew.

Bays, likewise, yield no smell as they grow, Rosemary little, nor Sweet Marjoram; that which, above all others, yields the sweetest smell in the air, is the Violet, especially the white double Violet, which comes twice a year, about the middle of April, and about Bartholomew-tide.

Next to that is the Musk-Rose; then the Strawberry leaves dying, with a most excellent cordial smell; then the flower of the Vines, it is a little dust like the dust of a Bent, which grows upon the cluster in the first coming forth; then Sweet-Briar, then Wallflowers, which are very delightful to be set under a Parlour or lower chamber window; then Pinks and Gillyflowers, specially the matted Pink and Clove Gillyflower; then the flowers of the Lime-tree; then the Honeysuckles, so they be somewhat afar off.

Of Bean-flowers I speak not, because they are field-flowers; but those which perfume the air most delightfully, not passed by as the rest, but being trodden upon and crushed, are three; that is, Burnet, Wild Thyme, and Water-Mints; therefore you are to set whole alleys of them, to have the pleasure when you walk or tread.

Layout

For Gardens (speaking of those which are indeed prince-like, as we have done of Buildings), the contents ought not well to be under thirty acres of ground, and to be divided into three parts; a Green in the entrance, a Heath, or Desert, in the going forth, and the main Garden in the midst, besides alleys on both sides; and I like well, that four acres of ground be assigned to the Green, six to the Heath, four and four to either side, and twelve to the main Garden.

The Green hath two pleasures: the one, because nothing is more pleasant to the eye than green grass kept finely shorn; the other, because it will give you a fair alley in the midst, by which you may go in front upon a stately hedge, which is to enclose the garden: but because the alley will be long, and in great heat of the year, or day, you ought not to buy the shade in the Garden by going in the sun through the Green; therefore you are, of either side the Green, to plant a covert alley, upon carpenter's work, about twelve foot in height, by which you may go in shade into the Garden.

Knots

As for the making of knots, or figures, with divers coloured earths, that they may lie under the windows of the house on that side which the Garden stands, they be but toys; you may see as good sights many times in tarts.

Hedges

The Garden is best to be square, encompassed on all the four sides with a stately arched hedge; the arches to be upon pillars of carpenter's work, of some ten foot high, and six foot broad, and the spaces between of the same dimension with the breadth of the arch.

Over the arches let there be an entire hedge of some four foot high, framed also upon carpenter's work; and upon the upper hedge, over every arch, a little turret, with a belly enough to receive a cage of birds: and over every space between the arches some other little figure, with broad plates of round coloured glass gilt, for the sun to play upon: but this hedge I intend to be raised upon a bank, not steep, but gently slope, of some six foot, set all with flowers.

Also I understand, that this square of the Garden should not be the whole breadth of the ground, but to leave on either side ground enough for diversity of side alleys, unto which the two covert alleys of the Green may deliver you; but there must be no alleys with hedges at either end of this great enclosure; not at the hither ends for letting your prospect upon this fair hedge from the Green; nor at the farther end, for letting your prospect from the hedge through the arches upon the Heath.

Topiary

For the ordering of the ground within the great hedge, I leave it to variety of device; advising, nevertheless, that whatsoever form you cast it into first, it be not too bushy, or full of work; wherein I, for my part, do not like images cut out in Juniper or other garden stuff; they be for children.

Little low hedges, round like welts, with some pretty pyramids, I like well; and in some places fair column, upon frames of carpenter's work.

I would also have the alleys spacious and fair. You may have closet alleys upon the side grounds, but none in the main garden.

Mount

I wish also, in the very middle, a fair mount, with three ascents and alleys enough for four to walk abreast; which I would have to be perfect circles, without any bulwarks or embossments; and the whole mount to be thirty foot high; and some fine banqueting house with some chimneys neatly cast, and without too much glass.

Fountains

For Fountains, they are a great beauty and refreshment; but Pools mar all, and make the Garden unwholesome, and full of flies and frogs. Fountains I intend to be of two natures; the one that sprinkleth or spouteth water: the other a fair receipt of water, of some thirty or forty foot square, but without fish, or slime, or mud.

For the first, the ornaments of images, gilt or of marble, which are in use, do well: but the main matter is so to convey the water, as it never stay, either in the bowls or in the cistern: that the water be never by rest discoloured, green, or red, or the like, or gather any mossiness or putrefaction; besides that, it is to be cleansed every day by the hand: also some steps up to it, and some fine pavement about it doth well.

As for the other kind of Fountain, which we may call a bathing-pool, it may admit much curiosity and beauty, wherewith we will not trouble ourselves: as, that the bottom be finely paved, and with images; the sides likewise; and withal embellished with coloured glass, and such things of lustre; encompassed also with fine rails of low statues: but the main point is the same which we mentioned in the former kind of Fountain; which is, that the water be in perpetual motion, fed by a water higher than the pool, and delivered into it by fair spouts, and then discharged away underground, by some equality of bores, that it stay little; and for fine devices, of arching water without spilling, and making it rise in several forms (of feathers, drinking-glasses, canopies, and the like), they be pretty things to look on, but nothing to health and sweetness.

Heath

For the Heath, which was the third part of our plot, I wish it to be framed as much as may be to a natural wildness. Trees I would have none in it, but some thickets made only of Sweet-Briar and Honeysuckle, and some Wild Vine amongst; and the ground set with Violets, Strawberries, and Primroses; for these are sweet and prosper in the shade; and these to be in the Heath here and there, not in any order.

I like also little heaps, in the nature of mole-hills (such as are in wild Heaths), to be set, some with Wild Thyme, some with Pinks, some with Germander, that gives a good flower to the eye; some with Periwinkle, some with Violets; some with Strawberries, some with Cowslips, some with Daisies, some with Red Roses, some with Lilium Convallium, some with Sweet-Williams red, some with Bear's-Foot, and the like low flowers, being withal sweet and sightly; part of which heaps to be with standards of little bushes pricked upon their top, and part without: the standards to be Roses, Juniper, Holly, Barberries (but here and there because of the smell of their blossom), Red Currants, Gooseberries, Rosemary Bays, Sweet-Briar, and such like: but these standards to be kept with cutting, that they grow not out of course.

Alleys

For the side grounds, you are to fill them with variety of alleys, private, to give a full shade; some of them, wheresoever the sun be. You are to frame some of them likewise for shelter, that when the wind blows sharp, you may walk as in a gallery: and those alleys must be likewise hedged at both ends, to keep out the wind; and these closer alleys must be ever finely graveled, and no grass, because of going wet.

In many of these alleys, likewise, you are to set fruit-trees of all sorts, as well upon the walls as in ranges; and this should be generally observed, that the borders wherein you plant your fruit-trees be fair, and large, and low, and not steep; and set with fine flowers, but thin and sparingly, lest they deceive the trees.

At the end of both the side grounds I would have a mount of some pretty height, leaving the wall of the enclosure breast-high, to look abroad into the fields.

Main Garden

For the main Garden I do not deny but there should be some fair alleys ranged on both sides, with fruit-trees, and some pretty tufts of fruit-trees and arbours with seats, set in some decent order; but these to be by no means set too thick, but to leave the main Garden so as it be not close, but the air open and free.

For as for shade, I would have you rest upon the alleys of the side grounds, there to walk, if you be disposed, in the heat of the year or day; but to make account that the main Garden is for the more temperate parts of the year, and in the heat of summer for the morning and the evening or overcast days.

Aviaries

For Aviaries, I like them not, except they be of that largeness as they may be turfed, and have living plants and bushes set in them; that the birds may have more scope and natural nestling, and that no foulness appear in the floor of the aviary.

Conclusion

So I have made a platform of a princely Garden, partly by precept, partly by drawing; not a model, but some general lines of it; and in this I have spared for no cost: but it is nothing for great princes, that for the most part, taking advice with workmen, with no less cost set their things together, and sometimes add statues and such things, for state and magnificence, but nothing to the true pleasure of a Garden.

Text as originally written-

GOD Almighty first planted a garden. And indeed it is the purest of human pleasures. It is the greatest refreshment to the spirits of man; without which, buildings and palaces are but gross handiworks; and a man shall ever see, that when ages grow to civility and elegancy, men come to build stately sooner than to garden finely; as if gardening were the greater perfection. I do hold it, in the royal ordering of gardens, there ought to be gardens, for all the months in the year; in which severally things of beauty may be then in season. For December, and January, and the latter part of November, you must take such things as are green all winter: holly; ivy; bays; juniper; cypress-trees; yew; pine-apple-trees; fir-trees; rosemary; lavender; periwinkle, the white, the purple, and the blue; germander; flags; orangetrees; lemon-trees; and myrtles, if they be stoved; and sweet marjoram, warm set. There followeth, for the latter part of January and February, the mezereon-tree, which then blossoms; crocus vernus, both the yellow and the grey; primroses, anemones; the early tulippa; hyacinthus orientalis; chamairis; fritellaria. For March, there come violets, specially the single blue, which are the earliest; the yellow daffodil; the daisy; the almond-tree in blossom; the peach-tree in blossom; the cornelian-tree in blossom; sweet-briar. In April follow the double white violet; the wallflower; the stock-gilliflower; the cowslip; flowerdelices, and lilies of all natures; rosemary-flowers; the tulippa; the double peony; the pale daffodil; the French honeysuckle; the cherry-tree in blossom; the damson and plum-trees in blossom; the white thorn in leaf; the lilac-tree. In May and June come pinks of all sorts, specially the blushpink; roses of all kinds, except the musk, which comes later; honeysuckles; strawberries; bugloss; columbine; the French marigold, flos Africanus; cherry-tree in fruit; ribes; figs in fruit; rasps; vineflowers; lavender in flowers; the sweet satyrian, with the white flower; herba muscaria; lilium convallium; the apple-tree in blossom. In July come gilliflowers of all varieties; musk-roses; the lime-tree in blossom; early pears and plums in fruit; jennetings, codlins. In August come plums of all sorts in fruit; pears; apricocks; berberries; filberds; musk-melons; monks-hoods, of all colors. In September come grapes; apples; poppies of all colors; peaches; melocotones; nectarines; cornelians; wardens; quinces. In October and the beginning of November come services; medlars; bullaces; roses cut or removed to come late; hollyhocks; and such like. These particulars are for the climate of London; but my meaning is perceived, that you may have ver perpetuum, as the place affords.

And because the breath of flowers is far sweeter in the air (where it comes and goes like the warbling of music) than in the hand, therefore nothing is more fit for that delight, than to know what be the flowers and plants that do best perfume the air. Roses, damask and red, are fast flowers of their smells; so that you may walk by a whole row of them, and find nothing of their sweetness; yea though it be in a morning’s dew. Bays likewise yield no smell as they grow. Rosemary little; nor sweet marjoram. That which above all others yields the sweetest smell in the air is the violet, specially the white double violet, which comes twice a year; about the middle of April, and about Bartholomew-tide. Next to that is the musk-rose. Then the strawberry-leaves dying, which yield a most excellent cordial smell. Then the flower of vines; it is a little dust, like the dust of a bent, which grows upon the cluster in the first coming forth. Then sweet-briar. Then wall-flowers, which are very delightful to be set under a parlor or lower chamber window. Then pinks and gilliflowers, especially the matted pink and clove gilliflower. Then the flowers of the lime-tree. Then the honeysuckles, so they be somewhat afar off. Of beanflowers I speak not, because they are field flowers. But those which perfume the air most delightfully, not passed by as the rest, but being trodden upon and crushed, are three; that is, burnet, wildthyme, and watermints. Therefore you are to set whole alleys of them, to have the pleasure when you walk or tread.

For gardens (speaking of those which are indeed princelike, as we have done of buildings), the contents ought not well to be under thirty acres of ground; and to be divided into three parts; a green in the entrance; a heath or desert in the going forth; and the main garden in the midst; besides alleys on both sides. And I like well that four acres of ground be assigned to the green; six to the heath; four and four to either side; and twelve to the main garden. The green hath two pleasures: the one, because nothing is more pleasant to the eye than green grass kept finely shorn; the other, because it will give you a fair alley in the midst, by which you may go in front upon a stately hedge, which is to enclose the garden. But because the alley will be long, and, in great heat of the year or day, you ought not to buy the shade in the garden, by going in the sun through the green, therefore you are, of either side the green, to plant a covert alley upon carpenter’s work, about twelve foot in height, by which you may go in shade into the garden. As for the making of knots or figures, with divers colored earths, that they may lie under the windows of the house on that side which the garden stands, they be but toys; you may see as good sights, many times, in tarts. The garden is best to be square, encompassed on all the four sides with a stately arched hedge. The arches to be upon pillars of carpenter’s work, of some ten foot high, and six foot broad; and the spaces between of the same dimension with the breadth of the arch. Over the arches let there be an entire hedge of some four foot high, framed also upon carpenter’s work; and upon the upper hedge, over every arch, a little turret, with a belly, enough to receive a cage of birds: and over every space between the arches some other little figure, with broad plates of round colored glass gilt, for the sun to play upon. But this hedge I intend to be raised upon a bank, not steep, but gently slope, of some six foot, set all with flowers. Also I understand, that this square of the garden, should not be the whole breadth of the ground, but to leave on either side, ground enough for diversity of side alleys; unto which the two covert alleys of the green, may deliver you. But there must be no alleys with hedges, at either end of this great enclosure; not at the hither end, for letting your prospect upon this fair hedge from the green; nor at the further end, for letting your prospect from the hedge, through the arches upon the heath.

For the ordering of the ground, within the great hedge, I leave it to variety of device; advising nevertheless, that whatsoever form you cast it into, first, it be not too busy, or full of work. Wherein I, for my part, do not like images cut out in juniper or other garden stuff; they be for children. Little low hedges, round, like welts, with some pretty pyramids, I like well; and in some places, fair columns upon frames of carpenter’s work. I would also have the alleys, spacious and fair. You may have closer alleys, upon the side grounds, but none in the main garden. I wish also, in the very middle, a fair mount, with three ascents, and alleys, enough for four to walk abreast; which I would have to be perfect circles, without any bulwarks or embossments; and the whole mount to be thirty foot high; and some fine banqueting-house, with some chimneys neatly cast, and without too much glass.

For fountains, they are a great beauty and refreshment; but pools mar all, and make the garden unwholesome, and full of flies and frogs. Fountains I intend to be of two natures: the one that sprinkleth or spouteth water; the other a fair receipt of water, of some thirty or forty foot square, but without fish, or slime, or mud. For the first, the ornaments of images gilt, or of marble, which are in use, do well: but the main matter is so to convey the water, as it never stay, either in the bowls or in the cistern; that the water be never by rest discolored, green or red or the like; or gather any mossiness or putrefaction. Besides that, it is to be cleansed every day by the hand. Also some steps up to it, and some fine pavement about it, doth well. As for the other kind of fountain, which we may call a bathing pool, it may admit much curiosity and beauty; wherewith we will not trouble ourselves: as, that the bottom be finely paved, and with images; the sides likewise; and withal embellished with colored glass, and such things of lustre; encompassed also with fine rails of low statuas. But the main point is the same which we mentioned in the former kind of fountain; which is, that the water be in perpetual motion, fed by a water higher than the pool, and delivered into it by fair spouts, and then discharged away under ground, by some equality of bores, that it stay little. And for fine devices, of arching water without spilling, and making it rise in several forms (of feathers, drinking glasses, canopies, and the like), they be pretty things to look on, but nothing to health and sweetness.

For the heath, which was the third part of our plot, I wish it to be framed, as much as may be, to a natural wildness. Trees I would have none in it, but some thickets made only of sweet-briar and honeysuckle, and some wild vine amongst; and the ground set with violets, strawberries, and primroses. For these are sweet, and prosper in the shade. And these to be in the heath, here and there, not in any order. I like also little heaps, in the nature of mole-hills (such as are in wild heaths), to be set, some with wild thyme; some with pinks; some with germander, that gives a good flower to the eye; some with periwinkle; some with violets; some with strawberries; some with cowslips; some with daisies; some with red roses; some with lilium convallium; some with sweet-williams red; some with bear’s-foot: and the like low flowers, being withal sweet and sightly. Part of which heaps, are to be with standards of little bushes pricked upon their top, and part without. The standards to be roses; juniper; holly; berberries (but here and there, because of the smell of their blossoms); red currants; gooseberries; rosemary; bays; sweetbriar; and such like. But these standards to be kept with cutting, that they grow not out of course.

For the side grounds, you are to fill them with variety of alleys, private, to give a full shade, some of them, wheresoever the sun be. You are to frame some of them, likewise, for shelter, that when the wind blows sharp you may walk as in a gallery. And those alleys must be likewise hedged at both ends, to keep out the wind; and these closer alleys must be ever finely gravelled, and no grass, because of going wet. In many of these alleys, likewise, you are to set fruit-trees of all sorts; as well upon the walls, as in ranges. And this would be generally observed, that the borders wherein you plant your fruit-trees, be fair and large, and low, and not steep; and set with fine flowers, but thin and sparingly, lest they deceive the trees. At the end of both the side grounds, I would have a mount of some pretty height, leaving the wall of the enclosure breast high, to look abroad into the fields.

For the main garden, I do not deny, but there should be some fair alleys ranged on both sides, with fruit-trees; and some pretty tufts of fruittrees, and arbors with seats, set in some decent order; but these to be by no means set too thick; but to leave the main garden so as it be not close, but the air open and free. For as for shade, I would have you rest upon the alleys of the side grounds, there to walk, if you be disposed, in the heat of the year or day; but to make account, that the main garden is for the more temperate parts of the year; and in the heat of summer, for the morning and the evening, or overcast days.

For aviaries, I like them not, except they be of that largeness as they may be turfed, and have living plants and bushes set in them; that the birds may have more scope, and natural nesting, and that no foulness appear in the floor of the aviary. So I have made a platform of a princely garden, partly by precept, partly by drawing, not a model, but some general lines of it; and in this I have spared for no cost. But it is nothing for great princes, that for the most part taking advice with workmen, with no less cost set their things together; and sometimes add statuas and such things for state and magnificence, but nothing to the true pleasure of a garden.

Garden to Table - Home-Made English Champagne or a Fine Currant Wine

John Greenwood (American artist, 1727-1792) Sea Captains Carousing, 1758.  Detail

Old-Time Recipes for Home Made Wines Cordials & Liqueurs 1909 by Helen S. Wright

ENGLISH CHAMPAGNE OR A FINE CURRANT WINE
Take to three gallons of water nine pounds of Lisbon sugar; boil the water and sugar one-half hour, skim it clean. Then have one gallon of currants picked, but not bruised. Pour the liquor boiling hot over them, and when cold, work it with one-half pint of balm two days; then pour it through a flannel or sieve; then put it into a barrel fit for it, with one-half ounce of isinglass well bruised. When it has done working, stop it close for a month. Then bottle it, and in every bottle put a very small lump of double refined sugar. This is excellent wine, and has a beautiful color.

Old-Time Recipes for Home Made Wines is a cookbook for those who want to make their own wines & liqueurs from available ingredients, including fruits, flowers, vegetables, & shrubs from local gardens, farms, & orchards. It includes ingredients & instructions for making & fermenting spirits, from wine & ale to sherry, brandy, cordials, & even beer. 

Colonial Era Cookbooks

1615, New Booke of Cookerie, John Murrell (London) 

1798, American Cookery, Amelia Simmons (Hartford, CT)

1803, Frugal Housewife, Susannah Carter (New York, NY)

1807, A New System of Domestic Cookery, Maria Eliza Rundell (Boston, MA)

1808, New England Cookery, Lucy Emerson (Montpelier, VT)

Helpful Secondary Sources

America's Founding Food: The Story of New England Cooking/Keith Stavely and Kathleen Fitzgerald Chapel Hill : University of North Carolina Press, 2004.

Colonial Kitchens, Their Furnishings, and Their Gardens/Frances Phipps Hawthorn; 1972

Early American Beverages/John Hull Brown   Rutland, Vt., C. E. Tuttle Co 1996 

Early American Herb Recipes/Alice Cooke Brown  ABC-CLIO  Westport, United States

Food in Colonial and Federal America/Sandra L. Oliver

Home Life in Colonial Days/Alice Morse Earle (Chapter VII: Meat and Drink) New York : Macmillan Co., ©1926.

A Revolution in Eating: How the Quest for Food Shaped America/James E. McWilliams New York : Columbia University Press, 2005.

Garden Design - Family in Pennsylvania Farm & Landscape

Attributed to Jacob Maentel (1778-1863) Family Portrait: Mary Ann and John Michael Kitzmiller and Children, Littlestown, Adams County, PA. Mary Ann (1792-1858) and John Michael Kitzmiller (1782-1849) with their children: Eli George (1815-1899), Honoria Elizabeth (1816-1894), Zebulon John (1819-1884) and Louisa Maria Christiana (1833-1922), painted outdoors before a farm and lush landscape. The figure of the youngest child is cut-out and applied. Mary Ann holds a note with the inscription, "When this you see Remember Me Lest I should be forgotten, When I am dead and under foot and trodden. Mary Ann Kitzmiller, their mother."

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Garden to Table - Home-Made Blackberry Wine

John Greenwood (American artist, 1727-1792) Sea Captains Carousing, 1758.  Detail

Old-Time Recipes for Home Made Wines Cordials & Liqueurs 1909 by Helen S. Wright

BLACKBERRY WINE
Bruise the berries well with the hands. To one gallon of fruit, add one-half gallon of water, and let stand overnight. Strain and measure, and to each gallon of juice add two and one-half pounds of sugar. Put in cask and let ferment. Tack thin muslin over top, and when fermentation stops, pour into jugs or kegs. Wine keeps best in kegs.

BLACKBERRY WINE (other methods of making)
1. Having procured berries that are fully ripe, put them into a tub or pan with a tap to it, and pour upon them as much boiling water as will just cover them. As soon as the heat will permit the hand to be put into the vessel, bruise them well till all the berries are broken. Then let them stand covered till the berries begin to rise toward the top, which they usually do in three or four days. Then draw off the clear liquor into another vessel, and add to every ten quarts of this liquor four pounds of sugar. Stir it well, and let it stand to work a week or ten days; then filter it through a flannel jelly-bag into a cask. Take now four ounces of isinglass and lay it to steep for twelve hours in one pint of blackberry juice. The next morning boil it over a slow fire for one-half hour with one quart or three pints more juice, and pour it into the cask. When cool, rouse it well, and leave it to settle for a few days, then rack it off into a clean cask, and bung it down.

The following is said to be an excellent recipe for the manufacture of a superior wine from blackberries: Measure your berries, and bruise them; to every gallon, add one quart of boiling water. Let the mixture stand twenty-four hours, stirring occasionally; then strain off the liquor into a cask, to every gallon adding two pounds of sugar. Cork tight and let stand till the following October, and you will have wine ready for use, without any further straining or boiling, that will make lips smack, as they never smacked under similar influence before.  Gather when ripe, on a dry day. Put into a vessel, with the head out, and a tap fitted near the bottom; pour on them boiling water to cover them. Mash the berries with your hands, and let them stand covered till the pulp rises to the top and forms a crust, in three or four days. Then draw off the fluid into another vessel, and to every gallon add one pound of sugar. Mix well, and put into a cask, to work for a week or ten days, and throw off any remaining lees, keeping the cask well filled, particularly at the commencement. When the working has ceased, bung it down; after six to twelve months, it may be bottled.

Old-Time Recipes for Home Made Wines is a cookbook for those who want to make their own wines & liqueurs from available ingredients, including fruits, flowers, vegetables, & shrubs from local gardens, farms, & orchards. It includes ingredients & instructions for making & fermenting spirits, from wine & ale to sherry, brandy, cordials, & even beer. 

Colonial Era Cookbooks

1615, New Booke of Cookerie, John Murrell (London) 

1798, American Cookery, Amelia Simmons (Hartford, CT)

1803, Frugal Housewife, Susannah Carter (New York, NY)

1807, A New System of Domestic Cookery, Maria Eliza Rundell (Boston, MA)

1808, New England Cookery, Lucy Emerson (Montpelier, VT)

Helpful Secondary Sources

America's Founding Food: The Story of New England Cooking/Keith Stavely and Kathleen Fitzgerald Chapel Hill : University of North Carolina Press, 2004.

Colonial Kitchens, Their Furnishings, and Their Gardens/Frances Phipps Hawthorn; 1972

Early American Beverages/John Hull Brown   Rutland, Vt., C. E. Tuttle Co 1996 

Early American Herb Recipes/Alice Cooke Brown  ABC-CLIO  Westport, United States

Food in Colonial and Federal America/Sandra L. Oliver

Home Life in Colonial Days/Alice Morse Earle (Chapter VII: Meat and Drink) New York : Macmillan Co., ©1926.

A Revolution in Eating: How the Quest for Food Shaped America/James E. McWilliams New York : Columbia University Press, 2005.

Seeds & Plants - Jefferson's (1743-1824) Vines of Summer: Beauties & Beasts

Thomas Jefferson by Tadeusz Andrzej Bonawentura Kosciuszko (1746 - 1817)  

 Jefferson's Vines of Summer: Beauties and Beasts

Ask any of Monticello's gardeners and they will tell you that enough has been said about the Hyacinth Bean. From late summer through the first hard freeze their thick vines twine around the black locust arbor at the southwest corner of Jefferson's 1000-foot-long vegetable garden terrace. Festooned with glorious purple blossoms, it unabashedly beckons the strolling parade of visitors along Mulberry Row to shout again and again: "What's that purple flower?" Seed packets are often decimated at the Garden Shop long before this King of Vines retires for the season. Its popularity has spread quickly. Only a few years ago, it seems, this plant was virtually unheard of, but in this year alone I have seen it bedecking everything from the humblest back porch to the entry gates of the Governor's mansion in Atlanta. But, this story really isn't about the Hyacinth Bean.

Many other tender climbers also captured Thomas Jefferson's fancy. He found the Scarlet-runner Bean (Phaseolus coccineus) so beautiful that its function in the vegetable garden was primarily aesthetic. Likewise, he grew the trailing Nasturtium (Tropaeolum majus) both in the eighteenth-century fashion as a vegetable, and simply as an ornamental, as noted in his "Calendar of the bloom of flowers in 1782."

Even more intriguing is his reference to an obscure and peculiar plant, the Balsam Apple (Momordica balsamina). Although Jefferson himself once claimed he had no time for plants of "mere curiosity," it is difficult to avoid terms like unusual, strange, and even weird when describing this member of the cucumber family. Its very name, derived from mordeo, to bite, suggests something grisly about the gnawed appearance of its dried seed. Granted, Balsam Apple does possess certain beautiful qualities with its lobed, glossy-green leaves, delicate tendrils, and lovely, pale-yellow flowers. Once the warty, orbicular green fruits begin to appear, however, the vine soon enters the realm of the bizarre. Its curiousness continues as the skin of its fleshy fruits changes to lurid orange-red and finally bursts wildly, dispersing the sticky, even brighter-red seeds.

Balsam Apple is native to the African and Asian tropics where its fruits are not only eaten but also used medicinally. It was cultivated in Europe as early as 1542, as illustrated in De Historia Stirpium by Leonhard Fuchs of Basle, Switzerland. Gerard's Herbal included a lengthy account of its medicinal virtues, and as late as the mid-nineteenth century, American garden writers were proclaiming its healing properties when applied to fresh wounds.

In Bernard McMahon's American Gardener's Calendar, which Jefferson followed religiously, Balsam Apple is described as a tender annual flower of the "twining sort"; recommendation enough for Jefferson to sow it on April 18, 1810, with his larkspurs and poppies. Neither the source of the seed nor the fate of the vine is known, yet it seems significant that Jefferson recorded it during such a hectic period. Amid the zeal of his first year of retirement he was busy planting fruit and nut trees in his orchard, choice native tree seeds and grasses in his nursery, Sweet Acacias in his greenhouse, figs below the vegetable garden wall, sesame in the orchard, and upland rice along the meadow branch. He was likewise busy worrying about his mill flooding, his cisterns leaking, and that his apricot tree would freeze. And, as his impending financial ruin loomed nearer, he was worrying a lot about money. Reason enough, it seems, for the gentle diversion of exploding Balsam Apples.

Another tender scrambler to consider is the Cypress Vine (Ipomoea quamoclit). It was brought into cultivation from the New World tropics by 1629 -- that is, from the time of Gerard, who listed it as Convolvulus pennata or Quamoclit, and commonly as Winged Bindweed and Winged Windeweed. In a single season it can grow into a delicate, twenty-five foot tangle of finely cut leaves spangled with small, scarlet, star-shaped blossoms. A decidedly feminine plant in every aspect, it inspired Joseph Breck to exclaim in his 1851 Book of Flowers, "There is no annual climbing plant that exceeds the Cypress Vine, in elegance of foliage, gracefulness of habit, or loveliness of flowers."

Certainly, Jefferson was mindful of these graceful elements as he seemed always to be passing seeds along to one of his daughters. Those that he sent in a tin from Philadelphia to Patsy (Martha) in 1790 were sown the following spring "in boxes in the window," giving us a rare reference of a plant being grown indoors at Monticello. By 1807, Jefferson's granddaughter Anne Cary Randolph was eagerly pursuing seeds to plant at neighboring Edgehill. In a letter of January 22, 1808, she happily reported to "grandpapa" that " . . . on my way from the North Garden she [Mrs. Nicholas Lewis] told me she had saved some of the Cypress vine." Similar exchanges can be found in the letters of other Virginia ladies of this era. On April 4, 1800, Cornelia Lee asked of Sully Plantation, " . . . will you please look in my Secretary for and send down some of all the different kinds of Convolvulus that are there not forgetting to add . . . a little Quamoclit Seed if you have any to spare."

Like many members of the morning glory family, Cypress Vine re-seeds abundantly and one wonders why the Jefferson household so often had to reacquire it. Gerard, on the other hand, observed, "It is so tender a plant that it will not come to any perfection with us [in England], unlesse in extraordinary hot yeres. . . ." The vine's loving disciple from Boston, Joseph Breck, even described "forwarding" plants in hot-beds before setting them out after June 10th. Many early references also advised pouring boiling water over the seeds before planting.

Future climbers for the gardens at Monticello and for CHP may be gleaned from Bernard McMahon's lists, including Love-in-a-Puff (Cardiospermum halicacabum), which has already made its debut on the roundabout flower walk this past summer. Also aptly called Balloon Vine and Heart Seed, this whimsical vine bears inflated, papery pods enclosing hard, black seeds distinctly marked by a white, heart-shaped blotch.

Without question, however, the rightful heir to our regal Hyacinth Bean is the Snail Flower (Vigna caracalla). Despite its common name, Jefferson justly called it "The most beautiful bean in the world." Its seeds ripen slowly and, for the past two years, we have not succeeded in beating the first killing frosts. Any effort to preserve them will be justified for the reward of its blossoms' aroma alone, which is so deliciously seductive that, blindfolded at twenty feet, anyone would confuse it with Chinese Wisteria. And its beautiful spiraling flowers, so mollusk-like, so beastly, are indeed a most definite shade of purple.     By Monticello's Peggy Cornett, January 1994

All this research & images & much more is directly from the Monticello website - to begin exploring, just click the highlighted title above. 

Garden to Table - Home-Made Ginger Beer + a Ginger Wine

John Greenwood (American artist, 1727-1792) Sea Captains Carousing, 1758.  Detail

Old-Time Recipes for Home Made Wines Cordials & Liqueurs 1909 by Helen S. Wright

GINGER BEER
The proportions of this may vary. Loaf sugar is preferable to moist; some say a pound to a gallon, others a pound and a half. Some allow but half an ounce of ginger (sliced or bruised) to a gallon, others an ounce. A lemon to a gallon is the usual proportion, to which some add a quarter of an ounce or half an ounce of cream of tartar. The white of an egg to each gallon is useful for clarifying, but not absolutely necessary. Some people put a quarter of a pint of brandy to four gallons of beer by way of keeping it; half an ounce of hops boiled in it would answer the same purpose. Boil the sugar, and shaved rind of lemons; let it boil half an hour. Clear the lemons of the white pith and put them in the wine. When cool, stir in the yeast (two tablespoonfuls to a gallon), put it in the barrel without straining, and bung close. In a fortnight draw off and bottle. It will be ready for use in another fortnight, and will keep longer than ginger pop. If cream of tartar is used, pour the boiling liquor over it, but do not boil it.

GINGER BEER, NO. 2
Seven pounds crushed white sugar, eight gallons water, one-half cup of yeast, four ounces best powdered ginger, a few drops of essence of lemon, one-half teaspoonful essence of cloves. To the ginger pour one pint of boiling water and let it stand fifteen or twenty minutes. Dissolve the sugar in two quarts of warm water, pour both into a barrel half-filled with cold water, then add the essence and the yeast; let it stand one-half hour, then fill up with cold water. Let it ferment six to twelve hours and bottle.

GINGER WINE
Take four gallons of water, ten pounds of loaf sugar, one and one-quarter pounds of bruised ginger, one ounce of hops, the shaved rinds of five lemons or Seville oranges. Let these boil together for two hours, carefully skimming. Pour it, without straining, on to two pounds of raisins. When cool, put in the juice of the lemons or oranges; rinse the pulp in a pint or two of the wine, and strain it to the rest. Ferment it with yeast; mix one-half cup of solid yeast with a pint or two of the wine, and with that work the rest. Next day tun it, raisins, hops, ginger, and all together, and fill it up for a fortnight either with wine or with good new beer; then dissolve one ounce of isinglass in a little of the wine, and return it to the rest to fine it. A few days afterward bung it close. This wine will be in full perfection in six months. It may be bottled, but is apt to fly; and if made exactly by the above directions, and drawn from the cask, it will sparkle like champagne.

Old-Time Recipes for Home Made Wines is a cookbook for those who want to make their own wines & liqueurs from available ingredients, including fruits, flowers, vegetables, & shrubs from local gardens, farms, & orchards. It includes ingredients & instructions for making & fermenting spirits, from wine & ale to sherry, brandy, cordials, & even beer. 

Colonial Era Cookbooks

1615, New Booke of Cookerie, John Murrell (London) 

1798, American Cookery, Amelia Simmons (Hartford, CT)

1803, Frugal Housewife, Susannah Carter (New York, NY)

1807, A New System of Domestic Cookery, Maria Eliza Rundell (Boston, MA)

1808, New England Cookery, Lucy Emerson (Montpelier, VT)

Helpful Secondary Sources

America's Founding Food: The Story of New England Cooking/Keith Stavely and Kathleen Fitzgerald Chapel Hill : University of North Carolina Press, 2004.

Colonial Kitchens, Their Furnishings, and Their Gardens/Frances Phipps Hawthorn; 1972

Early American Beverages/John Hull Brown   Rutland, Vt., C. E. Tuttle Co 1996 

Early American Herb Recipes/Alice Cooke Brown  ABC-CLIO  Westport, United States

Food in Colonial and Federal America/Sandra L. Oliver

Home Life in Colonial Days/Alice Morse Earle (Chapter VII: Meat and Drink) New York : Macmillan Co., ©1926.

A Revolution in Eating: How the Quest for Food Shaped America/James E. McWilliams New York : Columbia University Press, 2005.

Garden to Table - Ben Franklin On Making Wine from Wild Grapes & Storing It in a Cellar (or under a couple of Blankets!)

Benjamin Franklin (1706-1790) c 1779 by Joseph-Siffred Duplessis (French 1725 -1802)

Because I would have every Man make Advantage of the Blessings of Providence, and few are acquainted with the Method of making Wine of the Grapes which grow wild in our Woods, I do here present them with a few easy Directions, drawn from some Years Experience, which, if they will follow, they may furnish themselves with a wholesome sprightly Claret, which will keep for several Years, and is not inferior to that which passeth for French Claret.

Begin to gather Grapes from the 10th of September (the ripest first) to the last of October, and having clear’d them of Spider webs, and dead Leaves, put them into a large Molosses- or Rum-Hogshead; after having washed it well, and knock’d one Head out, fix it upon the other Head, on a Stand, or Blocks in the Cellar, if you have any, if not, in the warmest Part of the House, about 2 Feet from the Ground; as the Grapes sink, put up more, for 3 or 4 Days; after which, get into the Hogshead bare-leg’d, and tread them down until the Juice works up about your Legs, which will be in less than half an Hour; then get out, and turn the Bottom ones up, and tread them again, a Quarter of an Hour; this will be sufficient to get out the good Juice; more pressing wou’d burst the unripe Fruit, and give it an ill Taste: This done, cover the Hogshead close with a thick Blanket, and if you have no Cellar, and the Weather proves Cold, with two.

In this Manner you must let it take its first Ferment, for 4 or 5 Days it will work furiously; when the Ferment abates, which you will know by its making less Noise, make a Spile-hole within six inches of the Bottom, and twice a Day draw some in a Glass. When it looks as clear as Rock-water, draw it off into a clean, rather than new Cask, proportioning it to the Contents of the Hogshead or Wine Vat; that is, if the Hogshead holds twenty Bushels of Grapes, Stems and all, the Cask must at least, hold 20 Gallons, for they will yield a Gallon per Bushel. Your Juice or Must† thus drawn from the Vat, proceed to the second Ferment.

You must reserve in Jugs or Bottles, 1 Gallon or 5 Quarts of the Must to every 20 Gallons you have to work; which you will use according to the following Directions. Place your Cask, which must be chock full, with the Bung up, and open twice every Day, Morning and Night; feed your Cask with the reserved Must; two Spoonfuls at a time will suffice, clearing the Bung after you feed it, with your Finger or a Spoon, of the Grape-Stones and other Filth which the Ferment will throw up; you must continue feeding it thus until Christmas, when you may bung it up, and it will be fit for Use or to be rack’d into clean Casks or Bottles, by February.

n.b. Gather the Grapes after the Dew is off, and in all dry Seasons.

Let not the Children come at the Must, it will scour them severely. If you make Wine for Sale, or to go beyond Sea, one quarter Part must be distill’d, and the Brandy put into the three Quarters remaining. One Bushel of Grapes, heap Measure, as you gather them from the Vine, will make at least a Gallon of Wine, if good, five Quarts.

These Directions are not design’d for those who are skill’d in making Wine, but for those who have hitherto had no Acquaintance with that Art.  Poor Richard, 1743. An Almanack For the Year of Christ 1743

“Poor Richard, 1743,” Founders Online, National Archives, https://founders.archives.gov/documents/Franklin/01-02-02-0089. [Original source: The Papers of Benjamin Franklin, vol. 2, January 1, 1735, through December 31, 1744, ed. Leonard W. Labaree. New Haven: Yale University Press, 1961, pp. 365–374.]

Poor Richard, 1743. An Almanack For the Year of Christ 1743,... By

Richard Saunders, Philom. Philadelphia: Printed and sold by B.

Franklin, at the New Printing-Office near the Market. (Yale University

Library) 

From The Papers of Benjamin Franklin, vol. 2, January 1,

1735, through December 31, 1744, ed. Leonard W. Labaree. New Haven:

Yale University Press, 1961, pp. 365–374

Garden Design - Outbuildings - Storage Cellars for Vegetable Roots, Fruits, & Alcohol

Root Cellars in Early America

A root cellar (American English) or an earth cellar (British English) is a structure, usually underground or built into the side of a hill allowing them to be at least partially underground, used for storage of vegetables, fruits, nuts, alcoholic drinks or other foods. The traditional focus was on root crops stored in an underground cellar. References to storage cellars in the British American colonial period were often for storage areas for home-made alcohol.

Root cellars were intended to keep food supplies at a steady cool temperatures & fairly constant humidity. Root cellars kept food from freezing during the winter & cool during the summer to prevent the spoiling & rotting of the roots, such as potatoes, onions, garlic, carrots, parsnips, turnips, etc. Typically vegetables were placed in the root cellar in the autumn after harvesting

There are several references to root cellars in early records in British colonial America. A cellar was a space used for storage, usually of roots as well as vegetables & fruits & drinks made from them over-winter, which could be located above ground, or partially submerged, or entirely submerged.  Most root cellars were part of a building, but some were constructed as detached storage areas sheltered with roofs.  These separate storage buildings were often called cellar houses. Sometimes spelled as celler, sellar, & seller in 17C & 18C references, they were also called storerooms and storehouses.

1643 in Surry County, Virginia a contract noted, "a framed house conteyning forty five foot in lengthy and twenty foot in breadth...and a cellar adjoining to it also of fifteen foot square."

1694 in York County, Virginia, an advertisement for "English framed dwelling house with a good cellar under it."

1708 The Boston News-Letter carried an ad for "a Convenient Dwelling House having a Cellar, Low Room, Chamber, and Garret."
                

1713 At St Peter's Parish in New Kent County, Virginia, the vestry ordered a new glebe house with "a seller three feet in the ground and three feet above."

May 30, 1715 In The Boston News-Letter, a Gentleman offered to sell "fine, bottl'd Sydar" (cider) from his "Sydar Cellar" for 3 pence per quart.
                

1718  Court records in Richmond County, Virginia, mentioned a plantation with "a cellar with a good roof over it."

1735 The South Carolina Gazette. January 11, 1735, advertised for sale, "good planting Land, containing 150 Acres...with a convenient Brick Dwelling-house 40 feet long & 30 wide, and good Cellars below."

1741 The South Carolina Gazette.  April 9, 1741, reported a storm during which, The Waters rose up to the Gate of Robert Lesly, Esq; and came into his Cellar and fill'd it, and carried the Liquors off their Stillings, and damnified all Things in it, and is still full of Water.

In 1743, Benjamin Franklin wrote in Poor Richard's Almanac about using cellars to store wine. "Begin to gather Grapes from the 10th of September (the ripest first) to the last of October, and having clear'd them of Spider webs, and dead Leaves, put them into a large Molosses- or Rum-Hogshead; after having washed it well, and knock'd one Head out, fix it upon the other Head, on a Stand, or Blocks in the Cellar."   

A description of the historic 3-acre serpentine, brick-walled gardens at Barboursville is provided in the book, Historic Gardens of Virginia, printed in 1923. Caroline Coleman Duke describes: The original garden covered nearly three acres, and was entirely surrounded by the serpentine wall of red brick…With Thomas Jefferson, James Madison, and other distinguished neighbors, the garden at Barboursville was not infrequently the scene of merriment; nor did they need the local moonshine to give snap and sparkle to these occasions, for the cellars near by were amply stocked with imported liquors, and mint flourished in every nook and cranny, so no guest ever left Barboursville without at least one sip of the favorite beverage of old Virginians.

1748 The South Carolina Gazette. July 25, 1748, noted, "A very good Shop on the Bay, a good Cellar , and a well furnish'd lodging Room, to be lett."

1763 The South Carolina Gazette. April 30, 1763, advertised for sale a "plantation on James-Island, lately belonging to William Henperson, situated on Wappoe-Creek, about four miles from Charles-Town, containing 263 acres...a good two story dwelling-house with piazzas and good dry cellars."

1766 The Virginia Gazette. August 22, 1766, advertised for sale in "Cumberland, County...636 acres, with... a large dwelling-house, with...a good cellar, and underpinned; a large kitchen, with two rooms... a large garden, with sundry kinds of medicinal roots and plants."

The Virginia Gazette. November, 13 1766, noted, "A SPECIOUS BRICK HOUSE, upwards of 50 feet in length, with 4 rooms below and 3 above, and a good cellar under the same in 3 apartments, together with a storehouse and counting room under the same roof... in the town of Smithfield."

The specific term "root cellar" does not come into common use until about 1767, when an ad in the The New-York Journal, or General Advertiser in March offered for sale a house on Corlear's Hook which had a "root cellar 22 feet by 11 feet, stoned up all around."   

 1768 The Pennsylvania Gazette. January 21, 1768, advertised for sale in "Allentown...a large commodious well finished dwelling house, with a kitchen and store, having extraordinary good cellars under them, a garden adjoining, with a variety of roots and flowers."

1782 The Pennsylvania Gazette. October 9, 1782, advertised in "Hartford Town, Maryland, an excellent brick dwelling house, accommodated with...excellent garden, abounding with useful roots and flowers. The house is large, and every way convenient, with cellars under the whole."

In October 28, 1771, The New-York Gazette; and the Weekly Mercury advertised a farm for sale on York Island on the Hudson River with about 300 apple trees and a good "root cellar."

On April 6, 1784, the New Brunswick, New Jersey, Political Intelligencer offered a farm with "a very excellent garden, well paled in, with a root cellar at the bottom."  

In 1797 New York City, The Minerva, & Mercantile Evening Advertiser advertised for rent on Broadway, "A Room suitable for an office...with an excellent, dry root cellar."

Annapolis, Maryland, silversmith and avid gardener William Faris (1728-1804) used pots to store his fragile plants away from the Annapolis winters, dutifully recording in his diary each year, “I moved the Potts into the seller for the Winter.”  Sometimes he euphemistically referred to his cellar as “the greenhouse.”

In the 1790s, Samuel Deane wrote in his New England Farmer of his method of preserving Winter apples, "I gather them about noon on the day of the full of the moon which happens in the latter part of September, or beginning of October. Then spread them in a chamber, or garret, where they lie till about the last of November. Then, at a time when the weather is dry, remove them into casks, or boxes, in the cellar, out of the way of the frosts; but I prefer a cool part of the cellar. With this management, I find I can keep them till the last of May, so well that not one in fifty will rot...In the Autumn of 1793, I packed apples in the shavings of pine, so that they scarcely touched one another. They kept well till some time in May following; though they were a sort which are mellow for eating in December. Dry sawdust might perhaps answer the end as well. Some barrel them up, and keep them through the Winter in upper rooms, covering them with blankets or mats, to prevent freezing. Dry places are best for them."

Root cellars were also mentioned often in Bernard M'Mahon's 1806 American Gardener's Calendar. published B. Graves, no. 40, North Fourth-Street, Philadelphia.  Following are M'Mahon's observations on the use of root cellars in the New Republic.

Broccoli. In the middle and eastern states, where the frost is too powerful, for the standing out of these plants during winter, on its approach, they must be taken up, and planted in earth up to their leaves, either in CELLARS, or under sheds, where they can be protected from wet and very rigorous frosts, and they will continue to produce their fine heads, during all the winter months ; which are equal to any cauliflowers. On the opening of spring, plant out the stalks of the purple kind, and they will produce abundance of the most delicious sprouts; the white, do not answer for that purpose. These plants even if hung up in a CELLAR, would shoot forth their flowers or heads, pretty much about their usual time. 1806 American Gardener's Calendar.

Asparagus...you may, on the approach of severe frosts, take up a sufficient quantity with as little injury to the roots as possible, which may be planted in sand or dry earth in a warm CELLAR, in the same man-, ner as directed for planting them in the frame, covering their crowns about an inch, observing not to croud the plants for fear of their becoming mouldy; and in mild weather ventilate the CELLAR as often as possible, to prevent any bad effect to the roots from stagnant air: but when it can be done, it will be much better to take up the plants out of their beds according as you want them. 1806 American Gardener's Calendar.

Wine
The different pressings being mixed as you think proper, should be immediately put into clean casks or hogsheads, placed in a warm room or dry CELLAR, and filled to within two inches of the bungholes, which should be covered with pieces of cloth, laid loosely on, to prevent dirt from falling into the liquor.
When the 1iquor is drawn into clean sweet casks, place them in the CELLAR, fill them up within an inch or two of the top, and lay a piece of leather with a small weight on it over each bung-hole that may yield to a second fermentation, which generally takes place. When the wine has sealed or ceased to ferment, bung the casks as close as possible, and the subsequent treatment is exactly the same as directed for white wines. A wine CELLAR should be dry, so deep under ground as that the temperature of it heat, may be nearly the same winter and summer: it should be at a distance from streets, highways, workshops, sewers and necessaries; if arched over, the better. 1806 American Gardener's Calendar.

Fruits
According as the fruits are gathered, carry them into the fruitery, or into some convenient dry, clean, apartment, and lay them carefully in heaps, each sort separate, for about ten days, or two weeks, in order that the watery juices may transpire; which will make them keep longer, and render them much better for eating, than if put up finally as soon as pulled.

When they have lain in heaps that time, wipe each fruit, one after another, with a clean, dry cloth, and if you have a very warm dry CELLAR, where frost is by no means likely to enter, nor the place subject to much dampness; lay them singly, upon shelves, coated with dry straw, and cover them with a layer'of the same.

Another method, and a very good one, is to be provided with a number of large earthen jars, and a quantity of moss, in a perfectly dry state; and when the fruits are wiped dry as befort directed, your jars being also dry, lay therein layer about of fruit and moss, till the jars are near full, then cover with a layer of moss.

Suffer them to remain in this state for eight or ten days, then examine a stratum or two at the top to sec if the moss and fruits are perfectly dry; and if you find them in a good condition, stop the jars up with good cork plugs, and cover them with some melted rosin to keep out air. The pears and apples to be used this way should be of the latest and best keeping kinds, and such as are not, generally, fit for use till February, March, or April.

After the jars are sealed as above, place them in a warm dry CELLAR or room on a bed of perfectly dry sand, at least one foot thick ; and about the middle of November, or sooner if there is any danger to be apprehended from frost, fill up between the jars with very dry sand, until it is a foot thick round and over them. Thus you may preserve pears in the greatest perfection, for eight, or nine months, and apples twelve.

Be particularly careful to examine every fruit as you wipe it, lest it is bruised, which would cause it soon to rot and communicate the infection, so that in a little time much injury might be sustained, in consequence of a trifling neglect in the first instance: but above all things, place your fruit whatever way they are put up, completely out of the reach of frost. 1806 American Gardener's Calendar.

Preserving Cabbages and Borecole, for Winter and Spring use.
Immediately previous to the setting in of hard frost, take up your cabbages and savoys, observing to do it in a dry day; turn their tops downward and let them remain so for a few hours, to drain off any water that may be lodged between the leaves; then make choice of a ridge of dry earth in a well sheltered warm exposure, and plant them down to their heads therein, close to one another, having previously taken off some of their loose hanging leaves. Immediately erect over them a low temporary shed, of any kind that will keep them perfectly free from wet, which is to be open at both ends, to admit a current of air in mild dry weather. These ends are to be closed with straw when the weather is very severe. In this situation your cabbages will keep in a high state of preservation till spring, for being kept perfectly free from wet as well as from the action of the sun, the frost will have little or no effect upon them. In such a place the heads may be cut off as wanted, and if frozen, soak them in spring, well, or pump water, for a few hours previous to their being cooked, which will dissolve the frost and extract any disagreeable taste occasioned thereby. 1806 American Gardener's Calendar.

Some plant their cabbages, after being taken up and drained as above, in airy or well ventillated CELLARS, in earth or sand up to their heads, where they will keep tolerably well, but in close, warm, or damp CELLARS, they soon decay.

Others make a trench in dry sandy ground, and place the cabbages therein, after being well drained and dry, and most of their outside loose green leaves pulled off, roots upward, the heads contiguous to, but not touching each other; they then cover them with the dryest earth or sand that can be conveniently procured, and form a ridge of earth over them like the roof of a house; some apply dry straw immediately'round the heads, but this is a bad practice, as the straw will soon become damp and mouldy, and will of course communicate the disorder to the cabbages.

Upon the whole the first-method is in my opinion the most preferable, as there is no way in which cabbages will keep better, if preserved from wet; and besides, they can be conveniently obtained, whenever they are wanted for use

The green and brown curled borecole being very hardy, will require but little protection; they may now be taken up and planted in a ridge tolerably close together, and during severe frost covered lightly with straw, this will preserve them sufficiently, and during winter the heads may be cut off as they are wanted for use; the stems if taken up and planted in rows, as early in March as the weather will admit, will produce abundance of the most delicious sprouts. In the southern states, and even in warm, soils and exposures in the middle states, borecole will stand the winter in open beds without any covering whatever.  1806 American Gardener's Calendar.

Cauliflowers and Broccoli
Your late cauliflowers, and broccoli, will now be producing their heads; therefore it will be necessary to break down some of the largest leaves over the flowers, to preserve them from the effects of sun, rain, and frost.

Italian Botanical Print

Such plants of either sort as are not likely to flower before the commencement of severe frost, should be taken up and planted as recommended in the first instance for cabbages, where if roellprotected from wet and frost, they will continue to produce fine flowers all winter. Or they may be planted in a dry warm CELLAR in the same manner as directed for cabbages, where they will also flower in winter; indeed I have had tolerable good flowers from strong plants. 1806 American Gardener's Calendar.

Preserving Turnips, Carrots, Parsneps, Beets, and Salsafy.
Previous to the commencement of severe frost, you should take up with as little injury as possible, the roots of your turneps, carrots, parsneps, beets, salsafy, scorzonera, Hamburg or large rooted parsley, skirrets, Jerusalem artichokes, lurnep-rooted celery, and a sufficiency of horse-radish for the winter consumption; cut off their tops and expose the roots for a few hours till sufficiently dry. On the surface of a very dry spot of ground in a well sheltered situation, lay a stratum of sand two inches thick, and on this a layer of roots of either sort, covering them with another layer of sand (the drier the better) and so continue layer about of sand and roots till all are laid in, giving the whole on every side a roof-like slope; then cover this heap or ridge all over with about two inches of sand, over which lay a good coat of drawn straw up and down as if thatching a house, in order to carry off wet and prevent its entering to the roots; then dig a wide trench round the heap and cover the straw with the earth so dug up, to a depth sufficient to preserve the roots effectually from frost. An opening may be made on the south side of this heap, and completely covered with bundles of straw so as to have access to the roots at all times, when wanted either for sale or use...All these roots may be preserved in like manner in a CELLAR; but in such a place they are subject to vegetate and become stringey earlier in spring. The only advantage of this method is, that in the CELLAR they may be had when wanted, more conveniently during winter, than out of the field or garden heaps. Note. All the above roots will preserve better in sand than in common earth, but when the former cannot be bad, the sandiest earth you can procure must be dispensed with.  1806 American Gardener's Calendar.

Celery, Endive, and Cardcons
Continue during the early part of this month to blanch your Celery, endive and cardoons, as directed in the preceding months; but when the severe frosts approach, they must be preserved therefrom, either in the following or some other more convenient and effectual manner.

Every third row of the celery may be suffered to stand where growing, opening a trench on each side of every standing row, within six or eight inches thereof, for the reception of the plants of the other two rows, which are to be carefully taken up with as little injury as possible either to their tops or roots, and planted in those new trenches, in the same order as they formerly stood. The whole being thus planted, three rows together, they are to be earthed up near the extremities of their leaves, and as soon as the frost becomes pretty keen, in a very dry day cover the whole with straw, and over this a good coat of earth.

When this plan is intended, the celery should in the first instance be planted in rows, east and west, so that when the whole is covered for winter use as above, the south side, especially if protected a little with straw, &c. may be easily opened to take out the plants when wanted for use.

Or if you have the convenience of a deep garden-frame, you may almost fill it with fresh sand, and then take up and plant therein, so close as nearly to touch one another, a quantity of your best and largest celery, and so deep as to be covered within five or six inches of their tops; place on yeur glasses, immediately, and suffer neither rain or water to reach the plants, except a very gentle shower, occasionally, in warm weather.

When severe frosts set in, lay dung, tan, leaves of trees, or other litter round the sides and ends of the frame, and cover the glasses with mats, be. sp as to keep out the frost. By this means you can have celery during winter in the greatest perfection and as convenient as you could desire.

Or celery may now be taken up when dry, well aired, and planted in sand in a dry CELLAR, in the same manner as directed for planting it in the frame; observing, in either case, to lay up the stalks and leave neat and close, and to do as little injury to either as possible.

The beds of celery which were planted as directed in page 433, should, in the early part of this month, be earthed up to within six or eight inches of the tops of the plants, tnd on the approach of hard frost, additionally earthed to the very extremities of their leaves; then lay a covering of dry sandy earth on the top of each bed, the whole iength, so as to give it a rounding; on this, place a coat of dry straw, drawn and laid on advantageously to cast off the wet, and of a sufficient thickness to effectually resist the frost; after which cut a trench round the bed to carry off and prevent any lodgement of water. Here you can have access to your celery, and it will continue in a high state of preservation during the whole winter and early spring months.

Endive may be preserved in a frame, or CELLAR, as directed for celery.

Cardoons may be preserved either in sand in a CELLAR, or by banking up a sufficiency of earth to them where they grow, and covering the tops, &c. with straw or long litter.

N. B. All the above work must be performed in dry weather and when the plants are perfectly free from wet, otherwise they will be very subject to rot.  1806 American Gardener's Calendar.

Other food supplies placed in the root cellar during winter included beets, jarred preserves & jams, winter squash, & cabbage. A cellar intended for potatoes was sometimes called a potato house.

Water, bread, butter, milk, & cream were sometimes stored in the root cellar. Before refrigeration, other items such as salad greens, fresh meat, & jam pies were sometimes placed in the root cellar early in the day to keep cool until they were needed for supper.

It is reported that crawlspaces, sheds, & attics have all been used successfully over the centuries for storage of certain crops. Even the space under a bed could store some crops (such as pumpkins) for several weeks. 

Author's Notes - At a Virginia apple orchard that we owned in the 1960-70s; we encountered separate cellars used for storing fruits, such as apples which can hasten the aging of other items stored in the same root cellar. Apparently Ben Franklin craved American apples while living in London. As well coining the phrase “An Apple a Day Keeps the Doctor Away,” Franklin consistently asked his wife Deborah to ship him barrels of apples while he lived abroad. In a letter from Franklin in London, to Deborah in Philadelphia he wrote: “Goodeys I now & then get a few; but roasting Apples seldom, I wish you had sent me some; & I wonder how you, that used to think of everything, came to forget it.  Newton Pippins would have been the most acceptable.” 

When we moved into an early 19C home with a springhouse in the Chesapeake, we learned that some dwellings with springhouses often used them for root cellar storage (as well as milk-house duty).