Plain Southern Eating: From the Reminiscences of A.L. Tommie Bass, Herbalist - Hardcover

Hardcover

ISBN 10: 0822308282 ISBN 13: 9780822308287

Publisher: Duke Univ Pr, 1988

Synopsis

"Folks didn't eat out in the old days like they do now." Tommie Bass of Alabama, justly famed throughout the South as herbalist, plantsman, and practitioner of the old ways at their best, here shares with us what was and still is good eating. The Bass household bill of fare in the southern Appalachians in the first half of this century held no beaten biscuits or syllabub. "We ate cornbread three times a day." Supper was often warmed-over dinner or simply cornbread and buttermilk. Bass tells how his mother made vinegar, how to keep molasses from being bitter, how to make a "pretty little skillet of cornbread." More than reflections on food and its preparation, this book is a seasoned blend of community life of another day, popular beliefs and superstitions, and practical advice on health matter, including his famous recipe for "Bass Quick Rub" salve. He recounts planting by the signs, foraging with his mother for shepherd's purse and highland cress, tracking bees to the hive, fishing in the Coosa River, sitting up until midnight to "get one of them hot rolls with butter!" Tommie Bass's wry stories, recollections, and recipes have been collected here for those who have either had the pleasure of seeing him in person (as, for example, on the Alabama segment of the Turner Network's "Portrait of America") or those who have not yet had that pleasure and suffer from that lack. Tommie Bass lives and works near Centre, Alabama. John Crellin holds degrees in pharmacy, medicine, and the history of science. he is the author of Medical Ceramics, Glass and British Pharmacy 1600-1900, and Medical Care in Pioneer Illinois. he is an associate professor in the Medical History Program at Duke University.

Edition details

• Publisher: Duke Univ Pr
• Publication date: 1988
• Language: English
• ISBN 10: 0822308282
• ISBN 13: 9780822308287
• Binding: Hardcover
• Edition number: 1
• Number of pages: 117
• Editor: Crellin John