Civil War Recipes: Tea Cakes, Hardtack, Camp Potatoes

Of course no book club is complete without food, and what better way to add flavor to your experience than to sample some of the foods eaten by characters in the novel? Below you’ll find recipes for Civil War foods enjoyed by characters in Wedded to War. Some of these have been modernized so you can try them at home, and some are taken straight from cookbooks published during the Civil War.

1. Charlotte Waverly’s Tea Time

Sighing, Charlotte reached for the Blue Willow teacup on the walnut table next to her, and breathed in the fragrance of orange and cloves. She picked up the New York Times and froze. Without taking her eyes off the paper, she rattled the cup back on its saucer. ~Wedded to War

Ingredients:

5 cups flour
1 tsp. baking soda
1/2 tsp. ground nutmeg
1 cup butter
1 cup buttermilk
2 large eggs
2 cups sugar

Heat the oven to 375 F. Grease the cookie sheets with butter. Combine flour, soda, and nutmeg together in a large mixing bowl. Cut in the butter with a fork or pastry blender until the mixture looks like coarse crumbs. In a medium bowl, stir together 1 Cup milk, 2 eggs, and sugar. Pour into dry ingredients. Stir well. Wash hands and lightly coat your fingertips with butter. Shape the dough into 1 inch round bowls. Place the balls on baking sheets. Dip a fork in flour and use it to flatten the balls in a criss/cross pattern like you might do for peanut butter cookies. Bake 10-12 minutes or until golden brown. Makes 5 dozen. *Recipe courtesy of Total Gettysburg

2. Dr. Caleb Lansing’s Hardtack

Wiping his glistening forehead with the back of his hand, Caleb looked through the haze of smoke at the rest of the camp. The men sat on the ground or overturned barrels, unwrapping small bundles of hardtack from their haversacks. He pulled out his own, placed it on a flat rock, and rammed a Sharp rifle butt onto it, breaking it into pieces. ~Wedded to War

Ingredients:
butter for greasing the baking pan
5 cups all-purpose flour
1 TB baking powder
1 TB salt
1 2/3 cups water

Preheat the oven to 450 F. Grease the baking sheet. In a medium sized bowl, combine flour, baking powder, salt, and water. Stir the mixture with a wooden spoon. With freshly washed hands, squeeze the flour mixture with your fingers, this will be a very stiff dough. Flatten the dough to about 1/2 inch into a large rectangle. Using a knife, lightly trace lines into the dough to divide the pieces into 3 X 3″ square pieces. Use a toothpick to prick holes across the entire surface in neat rows 3/4 of an inch apart. Be sure the holes go all the way through the dough to the baking sheet. Bake the dough about 25 minutes or until lightly browned. Allow to cool 10 minutes. Remove the hardtack from the baking sheet with a metal spatula. Makes about 9 hard crackers. *Recipe courtesy of Total Gettysburg

3. Matthew O’Flannery’s Camp Potatoes

We don’t get to see Matthew eating his camp potatoes with his fellow soldiers in New York’s 69th regiment in the novel, but as an Irishman, you can bet he was eating these as a welcome break from hardtack whenever potatoes were available. This recipe is a simple one, from Camp Fires and Camp Cooking, or Culinary Hints for the Soldier, by Capt. James M. Sanderson (1862):

“Cut the vegetable into thin slices and throw them into cold water for half an hour; then put them into fat hissing hot and fry them until they acquire a golden hue. Some persons cut them only into quarters, but they are not near so crisp and nice.”