Thomas Jefferson's Creme Brulee

by Thomas J. Craughwell

  In 1794 Jefferson hired Robert Bailey to design Monticello’s gardens and assigned Wormley Hughes, one of his most trusted slaves, to be Bailey’s assistant. By 1806 Hughes was principal gardener. He tended the seedlings in the nursery, planted the flowers, manured the soil and tended the vegetable garden, and installed the new plants Jefferson sent from Washington. Jefferson routinely sent instructions to his overseer about what gardening or landscaping work Wormley must do: “He must plant the Pitch pine in the woods along the new road leading from the house to the river, on both sides of the road.”9 Years later, Ellen Coolidge would recall watching her grandfather and Wormley lay out the flower gardens, Wormley armed with a hoe and a shovel and Jefferson with a measuring line to ensure the geometric precision of the beds.10

  In an era before chemical pesticides, insects could cause serious damage to plants both cultivated and wild. That is exactly what happened to the Monticello garden in 1793, and Martha Jefferson Randolph had to report the unhappy news to her father. Ever the seeker of scientific solutions, he wrote back: “We will try this winter to cover our garden with a heavy coating of manure. When earth is rich it bids defiance to droughts, yields in abundance, and of the best quality. I suspect that the insects which have harassed you have been encouraged by the feebleness of your plants; and that has been produced by the lean state of the soil.”11

  Jefferson could be very enthusiastic about a particular variety of fruit or vegetable. He once declared that the Marseille fig was “incomparably the finest fig I have ever seen,” and on another occasion he praised the flowering acacia as “the most delicious flowering shrub in the world.”12 Peter J. Hatch, director of the gardens and grounds at Monticello, believes it is likely that Jefferson’s favorite vegetable was the English or spring pea: three of the twenty-four squares in his extensive garden were devoted exclusively to peas, and over the years he experimented with twenty-three varieties.13 Some of these Jefferson acquired from Bernard McMahon of Philadelphia, a botanist and arguably America’s best-informed nurseryman. His 648-page book The American Gardener’s Calendar, with its step-by-step instructions on how to plant and care for just about every vegetable and flower available in the United States, became Jefferson’s horticultural bible. Jefferson thought so highly of the man that when Lewis and Clark returned from the Louisiana Territory with more than 170 plant specimens, he chose McMahon to catalogue them.14

  Given its temperate climate and rich soil, Virginia was home to many serious gardeners and farmers. There was a local custom at the time to hold a friendly competition: whoever was first to harvest English peas had to throw a pea dinner for fellow gardeners. Jefferson was a frequent competitor, and the presence in his garden of the Hotspur variety of spring peas—renowned for its quick growth—suggests that he wanted to win. Usually, a neighbor named Divers was victor of the pea-growing contest; only once was Jefferson’s crop the first to come in, but he kept the news quiet. When his family wanted to announce his success, he asked them not to. “Say nothing about it,” he instructed, “it will be more agreeable to our friend [Divers] to think that he never fails.”15

  If English peas were Jefferson’s favorite vegetable, the runner-up was probably lettuce. Étienne Lemaire, Jefferson’s maître d’hôtel during the years when he was president, kept meticulous records of his purchases in the markets of Washington and Georgetown. In 1806, Lemaire bought lettuce ninety times. At Monticello, Jefferson grew eight varieties, each of which had a different planting and harvesting date; in this way, he could have fresh lettuce from summer into early winter. One of his relatives, Mary Randolph, tells us that slaves picked lettuce early in the morning, then plunged the leaves into a cold-water bath to keep them fresh until dinner, which was usually served at four in the afternoon. She also included the salad dressing recipe made at Monticello: oil, white or tarragon vinegar, sliced hard-boiled eggs, salt, powdered sugar, and mustard, garnished with sliced scallions.16 Rarely was the oil for Jefferson’s salad dressing made from olives—importing it from Europe was expensive. Jefferson felt the loss keenly, for he had once extolled the olive as “the richest gift of heaven.” As a substitute, he made oil from sesame seeds. He liked the flavor and even purchased his own press so that he could continue to make it at Monticello.

  Jefferson’s love of vegetables encompassed several other plants as well. He was one of the first Virginians to grow and eat tomatoes, or “tomatas,” as he called them. Most Americans thought the tomato was poisonous (and, indeed, it is a member of the deadly nightshade family, though its low toxicity levels pose no risk to humans), and so it was an astonishing event when, in 1806, Jefferson served them to guests at the President’s House.17 Cabbage was another favorite vegetable of Jefferson’s; Lemaire records fifty-one purchases in 1806 alone. At Monticello, Jefferson not only raised his own cabbage—eighteen varieties in all—he also bought some from his slaves. Closely related to cabbage is sea kale, which was also grown at Monticello; Jefferson found a variety that was perennial, thus eliminating the expense of purchasing seedlings every year.18 In 1812 Jefferson became the first gardener in his neighborhood to plant the hot Texas bird pepper, which his cooks used to spice up sauces. And he must have been fond of asparagus, too. Although he devoted only one square in his garden to the vegetable, he tended it with special care, mulching the plot with tobacco leaves and fertilizing it with manure. His Garden Book includes entries for twenty-two years that record the date on which the first plate of asparagus was brought to his table.19

  AFRICAN DISHES ON

  MONTICELLO’S TABLE

  The ships that carried kidnapped Africans to America’s shores also brought along indigenous crops. Before setting out from Africa’s west coast, ship captains purchased local provisions to feed their enslaved passengers confined in the hold. One French slave trader, John Barbot, advised that “a ship that takes in 500 slaves, must provide above 100,000 yams,” which works out to two hundred yams per person. Among other common African starches, nuts, vegetables, and fruits that supplied the slave ships were black-eyed peas, peanuts, okra, watermelon, millet, sorghum, and sesame.1 Eventually, seeds from this African produce made their way into American gardens. At Monticello, okra, black-eyed peas, and peanuts grew in Jefferson’s thousand-foot-long garden; his field slaves grew watermelons in their own plots. (Jefferson called peanuts “peendars” or “pindars,” from mpinda, the Congo word for the legume.)

  Every week, each adult slave at Monticello received a ration, which consisted of a peck of cornmeal, a half pound of pork or pickled beef, and four salted fish. On special occasions, such as Christmas, Jefferson would give his slaves a little whiskey. From time to time, if he had an excess of milk or peas or potatoes, he would distribute these items to his slaves, too.2 It was a monotonous diet, which the slaves supplemented with foods they raised themselves. Every slave cabin at Monticello had its own garden and a run for chickens. Many slaves hunted or fished, and the children collected nuts and berries in the woods. Whatever surplus they produced, the slaves carried to the house. The Monticello household accounts books reveal that the Jefferson women routinely purchased eggs, chickens, cabbages, watermelons, cucumbers, and other produce from their slaves. After a successful fishing, hunting, or trapping expedition, slave men and boys sold what they didn’t need to the Jeffersons. With the money from these sales, the slaves purchased extra clothes, tea, coffee, and other small luxuries from shops in Charlottesville.3

  All the chefs at Monticello were slaves—James Hemings and Peter Hemings, then Edith Fossett, followed by her son Peter Fossett. Although they were trained in the preparation of French cuisine as well as familiar plantation fare, they also served the types of dishes they made for themselves. In Jefferson’s Garden Book we find annotations indicating when he dined on watermelon or when a dish of black-eyed peas was served at his table.4 The peas may have been prepared in the classic manner, boiled with greens and slices of salt pork. It is also possible that Jefferson ate that Southern staple tr
ansplanted from West Africa: hoppin’ john, black-eyed peas cooked with rice.5

  Pages from the Monticello household accounts book, 1808. Jefferson’s granddaughter Anne Cary Randolph recorded some of the items purchased from enslaved members of the Monticello estate. (Courtesy Library of Congress, Manuscript Division, Thomas Jefferson Papers)

  One of Jefferson’s granddaughters, Virginia Randolph, copied as many Monticello recipes as she could find. These include French recipes handed down from either James Hemings, Honoré Julien, or Étienne Lemaire, as well as recipes that came from the slaves, such as gumbo. There are two Monticello recipes for gumbo (its African names are ngombo or, perhaps, kingombo), a type of stew that originated in Africa.6 The first calls for equal amounts of okra and tomatoes, peeled and chopped and then sautéed with onions. In another pot, meat is fried in butter. The recipe states that “any kind of meat [may be used], but veal or chicken is best.” Once the vegetables are soft and the meat is fried to a golden brown, everything is placed in a soup pot to stew for fifteen minutes. The second recipe calls for the addition of sassafras leaves, which brought another culinary influence to Jefferson’s table: enslaved Africans taught the Indian tribes of the Southeast how to make gumbo, and the Indians put their own spin on it by adding sassafras.7

  There are also recipes for two varieties of okra soup. The simplest one calls for okra, lima beans, tomatoes, and the meat of any available fowl. To thicken the soup, the cook is directed to “put in a lump of butter as big as an egg, rolled in flour.” The other, more complicated recipe insists on using only young okra. “If good, they snap,” the recipe reads, “if they bend, they are too old.” The okra is cooked with corn, lima beans, tomatoes, and a beef shin. All the ingredients simmer together for five hours. The cook knows the soup is done when the meat “is boiled to rags and quits the bone.”8

  Deep-frying chicken is believed to be an African technique that was introduced to America. It has become an American classic, one that is especially associated with the South. At Monticello, fried chicken was served with fried disks of cornmeal mush and a cream gravy.9

  The gardens at Monticello also grew sesame. Jefferson tells us the seeds were tossed in a salad, added to soup, cooked with greens, or baked in bread.10 The seeds were also pressed to make sesame oil as a substitute for pricey imported olive oil.

  Of course, the chefs at Monticello were not producing all this food alone. It took a small army of household servants to prepare the meals. Young boys such as Israel Gillette brought in coal and firewood, drew water, and carried in frozen blocks from the ice house. They also peeled and chopped vegetables and turned the crank on the ice-cream machine. Men butchered the raw meat, and then the most skilled among them carved it when it was ready to be served. The chef’s female assistants tended the soups and stews, the roasting meat, and the simmering vegetables. More complicated preparations, such as sauces and desserts, were left to the chef or were performed under the chef’s close supervision.

  Of course, there were many more tasks outside the kitchen as well. Women churned cream into butter, brewed beer, and made cider. A Monticello slave named Ursula crafted what Jefferson considered to be the best cider in the neighborhood, reporting that, in cider-making, she “unites trust and skill to do it.” Men salted and smoked the meat.11 Even when sick, the slaves were involved in food preparation. When a slave named Nace fell ill, Jefferson gave instructions that he should be “entirely kept from labour until he recovers,” remaining in his cabin where he could shell corn.12

  A SELECTION OF

  THOMAS JEFFERSON’S AND

  JAMES HEMINGS’S RECIPES

  None of the original cookbooks from Monticello have survived, and only a handful of recipes written by Thomas Jefferson or James Hemings exist. There were many more, transcribed by Jefferson’s granddaughter Virginia Randolph Trist (1801–1882). Her original recipes (including those for crème brûlée reproduced on the back cover and the snow eggs mentioned below) were modernized by Marie Kimball in 1938 and appear in the collection titled Thomas Jefferson’s Cook Book. It is likely that other recipes from Monticello appear in the 1824 cookbook The Virginia Housewife by Mary Randolph (1762–1828), Patsy Jefferson’s sister-in-law. The following pages present undated recipes recorded by Thomas Jefferson as well as a nineteenth-century transcription of a recipe that Virginia Trist attributed to “James, cook at Monticello.” Bon appétit!

  Ever the farmer, Jefferson sought access to a year-round supply of fresh produce from his estate. In this recipe for preserving French green beans, or haricots verts, for winter, he advises: “Let your snaps be green but their moisture dried out a little.” (Courtesy Library of Congress, Manuscript Division, Thomas Jefferson Papers)

  Several recipes written by Thomas Jefferson are in a mixture of French and English. The macaron recipe contains a helpful hint about baking temperature: “You prove the proper heat of the oven by holding in it a bit of white paper. If it burns, it will burn your macarons, if it just browns the paper[,] it is exact.” (Courtesy Library of Congress, Manuscript Division, Thomas Jefferson Papers)

  Ice cream was a delicacy often served to guests at Monticello. Jefferson’s is the earliest known American recipe for the frozen treat. In it, he calls for the use of a sabotiere, a bucket-like freezer for making ices. (Courtesy Library of Congress, Manuscript Division, Thomas Jefferson Papers)

  Undated recipes for “biscuit de Savoye” (small cakes), “blanc manger,” and “wine jellies.” Clearly, Jefferson was a fan of desserts as well as of sweetening meat dishes with sugared jellies. (Courtesy Library of Congress, Manuscript Division, Thomas Jefferson Papers)

  Jefferson wrote his recipe for “nouilles à maccaroni,” or macaroni noodles, on the reverse of his detailed drawing of a pasta maker. (Recipe transcription and image of press are on this page and this page.) (Courtesy Library of Congress, Manuscript Division, Thomas Jefferson Papers)

  As recorded by Jefferson, Adrien Petit, his maître d’hôtel in Paris and Philadelphia, prepared coffee in this manner:

  On one measure of the coffee ground into meal pour three measures of boiling water.

  boil on hot ashes lined with coal till the meal disappears from the top, when it will be precipitated.

  pour it three times through a flannel strainer.

  it will yield 2 1/3 measures of clear coffee.

  an ounce of coffee meal makes 1 1/2 cup of clear coffee in this way.

  the flannel must be rinsed out in hot or cold water for every making.

  This recipe, attributed to “James [Hemings], cook at Monticello,” was recorded by Jefferson’s granddaughter Virginia. It contains directions for making “snow eggs,” a type of custard, followed by a recipe for chocolate cream. (Trist Family Papers, 1818-1916, Accession #5385-f Special Collections, University of Virginia Library, Charlottesville, Va.)

  CHRONOLOGY

  1743 Thomas Jefferson is born on April 13 at Shadwell Plantation in Albemarle County, Virginia, the son of Peter Jefferson and Jane Randolph Jefferson. Six years earlier his father had acquired the 200-acre plantation in exchange for a large bowl of punch.

  1760–62 Thomas Jefferson enrolls in the College of William and Mary in Williamsburg, Virginia.

  1762 Jefferson studies law under George Wythe, a distinguished jurist who became Jefferson’s mentor and one of his most trusted friends. Wythe also introduces Jefferson to wine, including Madeira and claret, two of the most popular types in 18th-century America.

  1764 On his 21st birthday, Jefferson takes control of his inheritance. (His father had died in 1757.)

  1765 James Hemings is born to Elizabeth (Betty) Hemings, a slave, and John Wayles, her master.

  1768 Jefferson is elected to the House of Burgesses, colonial Virginia’s legislature. He also begins clearing the mountaintop at Monticello, leveling it for the plantation house he plans to build there.

  1770 Shadwell burns to the ground. Jefferson moves to Monticello and takes up residence in a smal
l outbuilding known as the South Pavilion.

  1772 On January 1, Jefferson marries Martha Wayles Skelton, a 22-year-old widow. On September 27, Martha gives birth to a daughter, also named Martha, who is called Patsy.

  1773 Death of John Wayles, Martha’s father, on May 28. Jefferson inherits 11,000 acres and 135 slaves (including Wayles’s concubine, Betty Hemings, and the six children he had with her). Jefferson also becomes responsible for his late father-in-law’s debts, which total £4,000.

  1774 Jefferson publishes A Summary View of the Rights of British America, which lists the injustices George III and his government have inflicted on the American colonies.

  1775 Jefferson is elected a delegate to the Continental Congress in Philadelphia.

  1776 On July 4, the Continental Congress adopts Jefferson’s Declaration of Independence, which declares that “all men are created equal” and asserts “that these united colonies are, and of right ought to be free and independent states.”

  1777 Jefferson writes the “Virginia Statute on Religious Freedom.”

  1778 On August 1 Martha Jefferson gives birth to Mary, whom the family calls Polly.

  1779–1781 Jefferson serves as governor of Virginia. Toward the end of his term, a British army invades Virginia and sends a detachment to arrest Jefferson at Monticello; he and his family escape as the British are riding up the mountain. For the rest of his life, Jefferson’s enemies characterize his escape as cowardice.

  1782 On May 8 Martha Jefferson gives birth to Lucy Elizabeth. Martha dies on September 6. Jefferson slips into a period of profound grief and depression.

  1784 Congress sends Jefferson to France as a commissioner and minister. He takes along his eldest child, Pasty, and sends his younger daughters, Polly and Lucy, to live with his in-laws. He also takes James Hemings to study French cuisine in Paris. James begins taking cooking lessons from Combeaux, a caterer.