Discover New England Living History!

Keeping Food
Fresh
Till Spring in the 1830s
It’s a beautiful spring day in May, in the year 2017. You’re a little hungry, so you
go to the refrigerator for a snack. Maybe you open up a kitchen cabinet and grab
some crackers or pretzels. Want an apple? No problem! We have apples all year long in 2017!

Unlike today, people in the 1830s didn’t have a lot of food in the springtime. But why would that be?
In May, there are leaves on the trees, blossoms on the flowers, and seeds sprouting in the gardens.
Still, late spring could be a very hard time for New Englanders in the early 1800s! People called late
May and early June the “six weeks of want.” This means that the food that they saved from fall all
through the winter started to run low.

You may ask “what does that mean to save the food through
the winter?” Well, let’s think about it. Today, most of us buy
our food at grocery stores. In the 1830s, people could buy
some things at the store. Still, many people lived on farms and
grew their own food. They grew fruits, herbs, vegetables, and
grains throughout the summer and fall. Gardens were not just
providing food for the summer, though! The food that farmers
grew would be their food for the whole year! People in the
1830s did not have refrigerators like we do today. How did they keep their vegetables, meat,
and dairy good all winter long?

One way people preserved their food was by using something called a root cellar. Root cellars are storage places that are usually
located in the cellar--underneath a house. Vegetables like carrots, potatoes, and beets are kept there. Some vegetables are hung from
the ceiling. Other vegetables are stored in boxes filled with sand. The sand helps keep the moisture level high and prevents the food
from going bad. People in the 1830s worried about their vegetables freezing, which could be a disaster. They would insulate the cellar
with hay and hope for lots of snow. Even during the summer, the root cellar stays around 50 to 55 degrees! If you visit the Freeman
farmhouse during the summer, ask if you can see the root cellar!

Another way people saved their food over the winter was by salting it. Lots of foods
can be salted, but especially meat. New Englanders in the 1830s ate beef, mutton
(sheep), and lots of pork. Most farmers in the 1830s would harvest meat in November
or December. Since the weather is very cold, they might store the meat in barrels
packed with snow. This meant they could have fresh meat for supper. If they did not
keep the meat this way, people would rub the meat with lots of salt, molasses, and
something called saltpeter. The meat was stored in barrels for a long time. You could
also put meat in a brine, kind of like a pickle. This would keep meat good for 18 months!
Salted pork was a very common food to find on your table in the 1830s. By the spring,
do you think you would be tired of eating salt pork all the time?

There were other ways to preserve food that people used in the
1830s. Meats and fish were sometimes smoked for days or weeks in a
smokehouse. This meat would last a long time, too! Fruits mixed with sugar
became jams and jellies. Some vegetables like parsnips and leeks stayed in
the ground over the winter since they tasted better in the springtime. People
dried apples into rings and made cider to keep apples from going bad. In the
spring, cows produce a lot of milk. Women in the 1830s made lots of butter
and cheese from this milk during the spring and summer!

By the 1830s, stores like the Asa Knight Store carried exciting ingredients
like spices, sugar, tea, and lemons. Transportation allowed people in New
England to get foods from different parts of the country (and world!) that
they could not grow in their own gardens. Still, each fall, they had to plan
ahead. People in the early 1800s had to make sure they had enough food
to last their families through the winter and into the spring. After eating the
same foods for months, farm families in the 1830s must have been very
excited to get planting again!

CCSS.ELA-LITERACY.RI.3.2-3, 7; 4.2-3; 5.2, 8; 6.1, 7 nieonline.com/courantnie