History books often represent the colonial era as a series of political events, legal proclamations, and battle dates. Yet it was also a time of intense cultural change for the early settlers, change that was often reflected in the foods they ate.

Johnny cake was a cornmeal bread substitute for the yeast-raised wheaten loaves New Englanders had known in Europe. Pennsylvania Dutch cooks "invented" a flour and molasses filled pie (Shoo-Fly Pie) for the harsh winter months when dried fruits, eggs and cream were in short supply. Lila Perl tells the fascinating stories of these and many other colorfully titled recipes, showing not only what the colonists of the Atlantic Coast region ate and why, but also the domestic surroundings and historical background in which they lived. Also included are thirteen authentic recipes that cooks will find as tasty today as when they were first prepared.

If the New World was, as William Bradford noted, "a hideous and desolate wilderness, full of wild beasts and wild men," it was also a land that tested the strength and adaptability of many cultures, American Indian, European, and African, and gave us many of our present day institutions, customs—and favorite dishes.

Complete with index

From the dust jacket