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Vegetable Chowder
2 SLICES BACON, DICED I CUP CHOPPED STRING BEANS OR GREEN PEAS I OR 2 CUPS TOMATOES 1/2 CUP CHOPPED ONIONS I CUP DICED POTATOES 1/4 CUP CHOPPED CELERY 1/2 CUP CHOPPED PIMIENTO 3 PINTS WATER SALT AND PEPPER Fry bacon crisp and brown, add vegetables, either chopped or cut in small pieces, add water, cook slowly until vegetables are tender, then season with salt and pepper. Turnips, any of the cabbage family, lima beans or okra may be substituted for any of the above. Bouillon cubes dissolved in the water make a richer chowder.
A camp chowder built on bacon fat and water rather than milk, which is why it holds up over a fire and why it wants aggressive seasoning at the end.
- The liquidThree pints is 6 cups, or 1.4 litres. That is a generous amount for roughly 4 cups of vegetables, so expect a thin, brothy chowder rather than a thick one. Reduce to 4 cups of water if you want something closer to a stew.
- Bacon quantityTwo slices may not give much fat by modern standards. Use three or four thin slices, and do not drain the fat -- it is the only enrichment in the pot.
- PimientoCanned pimiento was sold in small jars and was a common pantry item of the period. A roasted red pepper, peeled and chopped, is the closest substitute; half a cup is roughly one large pepper.
- Tomatoes"1 or 2 cups tomatoes" may be canned tomatoes with their juice or fresh. If you use canned, count that liquid as part of your total and hold back some water accordingly.
- TimingPotatoes and celery want 15-20 minutes at a bare simmer. Add string beans or peas in the last 5-8 minutes rather than at the start, or they will go grey and collapse.
- Bouillon cubesThe suggestion is sound, but cubes carry a lot of salt. Use one cube per pint at most and season with salt only at the very end.
- SubstitutionsOkra will thicken the broth noticeably; turnip needs the full simmer, so add it with the potatoes, while cabbage cooks quickly and is better added late.
- YieldAbout 2 quarts, enough for four as a main course with bread or six as a first course.
Chowder in American cookbooks of this period splits into two broad camps: the milk-thickened New England kind and the tomato-and-water kind associated with Manhattan and with camp cooking, where fresh milk was hard to keep. This one belongs to the second camp, and its open-ended list of substitutions -- turnips, cabbage, lima beans, okra -- suggests what it was for: a pot you could fill with whatever the garden or the nearest store yielded, bound together by bacon fat and long simmering. The presence of canned pimiento and bouillon cubes points to a period when both were ordinary shelf goods.