At the end of September, Nalini and I gave a presentation at Washington Crossing State Park.
The invitation to speak was from The Historic Foodways Society of the Delaware Valley (HFSDV), a group of individuals and institutions dedicated to the promotion and understanding of food and its place and contributions in history.
As we all know, butter got a bad rap in recent years, but it’s making a come-back. The invention of margarine and it’s gradual displacement of butter actually goes all the way back to the time of Napoleon in France. There was a butter shortage, and the French developed the technology to convert liquid fat to solid fat, which eventually lad us to margarine and hydrogenated fats like Crisco.
In addition to speaking, we had a hands-on demonstration and butter and ghee tasting. Nalini used local Pennsylvania cream and showed everyone how to churn it into butter using a glass Universal Churn from the UK. We tasted the butter on local sourdough bread. Nalini then took that same butter and showed the class how to make ghee. People really appreciated the process, as some had never heard how ghee was made!
We tasted a variety of butter that’s currently in the market, as well as our homemade ghees.
Nalini and I really loved speaking to people who had such a great appreciation for food and history! We sent everyone home with an antique milk cap as a souvenir.
~ Sandeep
