Chop Suey (1886), Ice Cream Sandwich (1900) and more

Bapopik at AOL.COM Bapopik at AOL.COM
Wed Nov 27 01:54:03 UTC 2002


OFF-SITE, MISSING, NOT-ON-SHELF BOOKS

MISSING
   Mida's Trademark Bureau CONFECTIONERY TRADE-MARKS (1907?) is missing from
the Library of Congress.  It would have been nice to use for early candy
names, possibly including "jelly bean."  I have to see who else has it.

MISSING
   Carlton Fredericks' EAT, LIVE AND BE MERRY (1951) is missing from the
NYPL.  I searched through the catlogs of the Queens PL, Brooklyn PL, NYU,
Columbia, and the Philadelphia Free Library.  No one has it.  I'll look for
it in the LOC when I go there again.  "Junk food" was possibly coined in this
book.  Fredericks had a very influential radio program on nutrition.

OFF-SITE
   The George Freeman book on beans (1912) came in, and it does NOT have
"pinto beans."  It cites a book on beans published by the Cornell School of
Agriculture.  The NYPL has that, but of course, that's off-site, too.

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HOAGIE, SUB, HERO, TORPEDO SANDWICH

   Howard Robboy is/was a student at Temple University and then a professor
at Trenton State College.  I've discussed him before.  A very good article
about him is in the WASHINGTON POST, 4 August 1977, Pg. E10:

_Please Pass the Subs--Er, Hoagies, Er...
(...)
   Submarine, he found, is the most popular name for the sandwich, followed
by hoagie, poor boy and grinder.  In some cities they go by more than one
name, such as Philadelphia, where one finds both hoagies and submarines.
Other names are torpedo (Reno, San ANtonio, San Diego), Italian sandwich
(Louisville, Reading, Allentown), here (New York City and Newark), rocket
(Cheyenne and Cincinnati), bomber in Buffalo, mufalatta in New Orleans, Cuban
sandwich in Miami, wedgie in Weschester County, N. Y. and slame in Berkeley.
Norristown is the only place it is referred to as a zeppelin, and Madison the
only place one finds it as a garibaldi.

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CHOP SUEY

   From the WASHINGTON POST, 25 July 1886, pg. 5:

_NEW YORK'S CHINA-TOWN._
_A DINNER IN MONG SING WAH'S RESTAURANT._
_Not Altogether an Affair of Dogs and Rats--The Joss of the Kitchen--How to
Order a Chinese Dinner--Tea in Oriental Style._
Special Correspondce of THE POST.
(...)
   "Chow-chop-suey, chop-seow, laonraan, san-sui-goy, no-ma-das," blibly
ordered my friend...
   Chow-chop suey was the first dish we attacked.  It is a toothsome stew,
composed of bean sprouts, chicken's gizzards and livers, calfe's tripe,
chagou fish, dried and imported from China, pork, chicken and various other
ingredients which I was unable to make out.  Notwithstanding its mysterious
nature, it is very good and has formed the basis of many a good Chinese
dinner I have since eaten.  Chopseow is perfumed roast pork.  The pork is
roasted and then hung in the smoke of various aromatic herbs which gives it a
most delicious flavor.  It is cut into small pieces, as indeed is everything
at a Chinese restaurant, that it may be readily handled with chopsticks.  No
bread is served at a Chinese dinner, but its place is taken by boiled rice,
or fan, as it is called in Chinese.  A couple of bowls of rice is lanoke-an,
the F being dropped when the number is prefixed, and such rice, white, light,
snowy; each grain thoroughly cooked yet separate.  Fish is delightfully
cooked,  baked in a sort of brown sauce , and masquerades under the name of
sau-sui-goy.  The only condiment is seow, a sort of Celestial cousin to
Worcestershire sauce, and, in fact, its probable original.  The evolution of
Worcestershire sauce was somewhat as follows: Seow was taken from China to
Indiawhere hot spices were added to tickle the palates and livers of the
English East Indians, who relished Chili sauce, army powder and red pepper.
There it was known as soy.  From the East Indies to England, where it was
still more spiced and flavored and patriotically called Worcestershire sauce.
 But the average Chinaman uses but little flavoring in his food, he prefers
the natural taste.  The whole dinner was washed down with many cups of
tung-ia, as tea is called, and small cups of no-ma-deo, of Chinese whisky,
which is distilled from rice and poured over figs and prunes, giving it a
sweet, fruity flavor, more like a cordial than our notion of whisky,.
No-ma-deo is served in comical little china teapots, and is a most insidious
fluid.  You drinks it from little cups holding about a tablespoonful, and it
seems so mild and sweet that the intoxicating result comes over your senses
like a thunderclap.
(...)

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FORTUNE CAKES

   The California State Library has an index to the San Francisco newspapers,
from 1904.  It isn't very good.  I used the microfiche copy in the LOC.
   From the SAN FRANCISCO CHRONICLE, 5 October 1942, Pg. 10, col. 3:

_Fortune Cakes: A Threat to a Noble Art_
(...)  The wisecrack has invaded the folded-up "fortune cookies" that are
served with tea in the chop suey houses.  (...)
   It developed first that all the rice cakes and fortune cookies sold in San
Francisco are baked by Kay Heung and Company on Beckett Street.  (The "and"
is a delightful touch, for "Kay Heung" means "Extraordinary Fragrance.")
This firm is owned by five partners, including Charles and Harry Hoo Soo.
Charles supervises the baking and Haryy does the literary work, but he is no
longer in evidence on Beckett Street because he is now employed as an
electrician at the Moore Shipyard. (...)
   Mr. Soo Hoo has been literary adviser to Kay Heung and Company since it
was founded in 1933, and in that time has placed some 100 mottoes in
cvirculation. (...)
   Mr. Soo Hoo tells me, incidentally, that fortune cookies are unknown in
China, where only the flat variety of rice cake is consumed.  The folded kind
with the motto inside was invented in this city about 20 years ago.

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KEY LIME PIE

   28 May 1939, WASHINGTON POST, pg. TT2:
   Frank Markey, recently returned from Florida, went on a hunt for turtle
steak, lime pie and conch chowder in Manhattan.  He reports no success, and
says he'll have to take me south to prove the merits of these delicacies.

   14 January 1940, WASHINGTON POST, pg. A7:
_Key West, Unique Resort City_
(...)   Key West has also an unusual menu to whet the appetite--turtle
steaks, black bean soup and delicious lime pie, are epicurean pleasures not
to be overlooked.

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SURF AND TURF

   I checked the archives.  Is 1970 the earliest I posted?
   From the WASHINGTON POST, 29 May 1968, pg. C8 ad:

for elegant dining
we feature
our original
surf and turf
nightly
resv. 337-0900
_STUFT_
_SHIRT_
in the GEORGETOWN MANOR
1075 Thos. Jefferson St.

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TRICK OR TREAT

   From a letter sent to the WASHINGTON POST, 21 November 1948, pg. S11:

   Regarding the question of N. L. on "trick or treat": I lived in Washington
from 1817-1938 and since then, in Arlington.  Previously, I had lived in some
20 other towns and cities and I never saw nor heard of the begging practice
until about 1936.

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ICE CREAM SANDWICH

   25 July 1900, WASHINGTON POST, pg. 4:
_HOT WEATHER ENTERPRISE._
_Devices of Street Merchants and Others to Attract Patronage._
>From the New York Tribune.
(Previously posted--ed.)

   19 August 1900, WASHINGTON POST, pg. 15:
>From the New York Telegraph.
   The ice cream sandwich is a new hot weather luxury which is rapidly coming
into downtow favor.
   An enterprising hokey-pokey vendor, whose daily station is in John street,
is the projector, and his push cart is constantly surrounded by a jostling,
sweltering crowd of patrons, representing all social conditions, from banker
down to bootblack and newsboy.
   The inventor takes a graham wafer, deftly plasters it with ice cream,
claps another wafer on top, and there is your ice cream sandwich.
   The cost is trifling, ranging from 2 to 3 cents, according to the size and
thickness of the thing.  But the man is simply coining money, where he eked
out a meager revenue before.  He has simply tickled the public's fancy for
something new.

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SUNDAE

   11 August 1907, WASHINGTON POST, pg. E7:
_THE SEDUCTIVE SUNDAE._
_None of the Soda Fountain Men Can Tell How the Name Originated._
>From the New York Tribune.
(Previously posted--ed.)

   16 August 1908, WASHINGTON POST, pg. M1:
_THE ORIGIN OF "SUNDAE."
(Kansas City Journal)
(Also previously posted--ed.)

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WASHINGTON POST FOOD MISC.

HUISH PUPPY--The first hit is the late date of 24 March 1938, pg. X13.  The
article describesthe WPA's new book, U. S. ONE, which is "both a history and
a culinary lesson."  American regional food is described in five paragraphs
here.  Did DARE and OED and Andy Smith all use this book, or should I begin
citing from it?

DANISH PASTRY--A Bellevue Farms Lunch Co. ad for "Danish Pastries" is 23
December 1919, pg. 3.

ICE CREAM CONE--The first citation is a rather late 23 June 1906, pg. 8.

SALT WATER TAFFY--OED has 1894.  From 22 April 1894, pg. 20:  "The first
booth where we paused was the one at which salt water taffy was sold.

TAILGATE PICNIC--The first hit is the rather late 20 June 1962, pg. D4.
"Olive Meat Loaf for Tail-Gate Bunwiches," 8 July 1965, pg. E10, is possibly
of interest.

HOT STOVE LEAGUE--Tons of hits, including two regular columns using this in
the title.  However, the first hit of 12 March 1920, pg. 8, doesn't beat the
1912 that Paul Dickson's BASEBALL DICTIONARY received from David Shulman.



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