“Mrs. Flint, like many southern women, was totally deficient in energy. She had not strength to superintend her household affairs; but her nerves were so strong, that she could sit in her easy chair and see a woman whipped, till the blood trickled from every stroke of the lash. She was a member of the church; but partaking of the Lord’s supper did not seem to put her in a Christian frame of mind. If dinner was not served at the exact time on that particular Sunday, she would station herself in the kitchen, and wait till it was dished, and then spit in all the kettles and pans that had been used for cooking. She did this to prevent the cook and her children from eking out their meagre fare with the remains of the gravy and other scrapings. The slaves could get nothing to eat except what she chose to give them. Provisions were weighed out by the pound and ounce, three times a day. I can assure you she gave them no chance to eat wheat bread from her flour barrel. She knew how many biscuits a quart of flour would make, and exactly what size they ought to be.”
A cook of roughly the same moment, setting down the same dish.
Spread it on a tin or dish and colour it, without burning, in a gentle oven or before the fire in a Dutch or American oven: turn it often, or the edges will be too much browned before the middle is enough so. This, blended with butter, makes a convenient thickening for soups or gravies of which it is desirable to deepen the colour; and it requires less time and attention than the French _roux_ of page 10.
Sources: The passage is from Harriet A. (Harriet Ann) Jacobs, Incidents in the Life of a Slave Girl, Written by Herself, free to read in full at Project Gutenberg. The recipe is from Acton, Modern cookery for private families of 1845, also free in full. Both are in the public domain in the United States. The binding above is ours — slate cloth, sheaf stamp.