6 Foods Mark Twain Loved That Can Still Be Found

6 Foods Mark Twain Loved That Can Still Be Found
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In yesterday's post, I listed a number of foods that have vanished from America's tables since Mark Twain included them on a long fantasy menu written while traveling around Europe. The foods on today's list come from a more hopeful category--those Twain enjoyed that can still be found and savored today.

6 Foods Mark Twain Loved That Can Still Be Found
Maple Syrup(01 of06)
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Maple syrup remains, fundamentally, a wild food. The trees take some forty years to grow large enough to tap without damage, far too long to be practical as plantings in most cases. The majority of sap—and therefore syrup—comes from wild trees. And, as the sad story of the American chestnut show us, the thriving of a single species in our forests should never be taken for granted. Maple syrup remains a sustainable, historic, culturally significant, and utterly delicious North American food.(Photo from Flickr: My Lil' Rotten)
Cranberries(02 of06)
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Until 1816, when one Henry Hall noticed that sand blown from his Cape Cod saltworks over nearby cranberry vines actually strengthened the plants, all cranberries were wild. In fact, many of the most frequently cultivated varieties, like Howes and Early Blacks, are those selected from wild bogs during the 1840s and 1850s. These heirloom varieties are similar to the first cultivated cranberries, as well as those still harvested wild by the Aquinnah Wampanoag tribe on Martha’s Vineyard during their annual Cranberry Day celebration. (Photo from Flickr: AndWat)
Raccoon(03 of06)
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If you’re like me, you have plenty of raccoons in your backyard; if you’re like me, you’ve never considered eating them. But raccoon were once available at New York markets, and were enjoyed throughout the American South. They were especially important to African-American slaves, who were able to hunt and trap raccoon, possum, and other nocturnal game during available nighttime hours. Today, they’re sometimes enjoyed as a regional specialty; at an annual supper, the people of Gillett, Arkansas serve 600 pounds of raccoon to 1000 guests in the high school gym (in a town of only 800). But raccoon and similar game have mostly vanished from American tables, in this instance more because of choice than scarcity.
Garden Produce: Radishes, string beans, pumpkins, green corn, asparagus, early rose potatoes…(04 of06)
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Twain’s memories of the meals on his uncle’s Missouri prairie farm included a fabulous array of produce. “Butter-beans,” he wrote, “string-beans, tomatoes, peas, Irish potatoes, sweet potatoes…watermelons, muskmelons, cantaloupes—all fresh from the garden,” and included many more on his fantasy menu. Every time a gardener plants an heirloom vegetable—or, better yet, saves seeds to plant again, and to pass on to others—the American landscape recovers some small measure of the fresh, vibrant, diverse flavor that has always marked the best of the country’s food. (Photo from Flickr: thebittenword.com)
Canvasback Ducks(05 of06)
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Roasted canvasback ducks were once considered a classic American dish, often paired with terrapin soup. In those days, Americans could distinguish between mallard and canvasback ducks much as we do today between salmon and tuna. Of course, market hunting for canvasbacks is no longer feasible (or legal). But Ducks Unlimited remains the nations largest wetland-preservation group, deeply involved with preserving the potholes that sustain canvasbacks as their former haunts in the Chesapeake diminish. The long-term rebound of canvasback and other ducks shows how modest, well-regulated hunting can lead to more people becoming invested in the long-term preservation of a species.(Photo from chestofbooks.com)
Wild Turkeys(06 of06)
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The current abundance of wild turkeys in many parts of the United States represents a genuine recovery. It wasn’t long after Twain included “roast wild turkey” close to domestic “roast turkey, Thanksgiving style” on his menu that the former nearly disappeared from New England. Today, Eastern wild turkeys number more than 5 million, and are once again regularly hunted and eaten within their range. (Photo from Flickr: qmnonic)

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