Next Monday, May 19th is the next Virtual Lecture: “A PERFECT FRENZY” with Andrew Lawler. Most of us know about the battles at Lexington and Concord, which took place 250 years ago this spring, but Andrew has a fascinating new tale that occurred at the same time, only in Virginia. His latest book is the first to detail the remarkable alliance formed between the colony’s royal governor, Lord Dunmore, and the enslaved Africans owned by its patriots. Dunmore freed and armed those in bondage to fight for King George III, sparking a bloody clash between Black soldiers and white militia, with each side claiming to fight in the name of liberty. The crisis left one of America’s largest ports in ruins and pushed Virginia’s patriots to back separation from Britain. This broke the deadlock at the Continental Congress in Philadelphia and led to the signing of the Declaration of Independence on July 4, 1776. Mark your calendar and be sure to tune in next week for this virtual lecture! More info at: https://themayflowersociety.org/history/lecture-series/ #TheMayflowerSociety #VirtualLecture #APerfectFrenzy (fb)

Fricassee is a hybrid cooking method that usually starts by boiling or poaching a meat, then finishing it off in a gravy-like sauce. While today we might thicken a sauce with flour, 17th-century fricassees were often thickened by the addition of egg yolks. This version of a fricassee is based on recipes from a Dutch cookbook, De Verstandige Kock (The Sensible Cook), originally published in 1667. The original recipe calls for the use of Verjus, which is a sour juice pressed from unripe grapes, but you can easily swap it for vinegar, lemon juice or white wine. As fricassees appear in both English and Dutch cookbooks of the time, it’s easy to imagine it as a cooking method familiar to the Pilgrims. To see the full recipe, please visit: https://themayflowersociety.org/cooking-like-a-pilgrim/#fricassee #CookingLikeAPilgrim #CookingVideo #Fricassee (fb)