Blue Ridge Country March/April 2021 - 18

COUNTRY ROADS

BEVERLY HERITAGE CENTER'S

FOOD FARE
The West Virginia center's exhibit presents a
history of mountain foodways.

hat makes local cuisine so
special is the number of
sources from which people
in the southern Appalachians learned
to cook. The Beverly Heritage Center in
Beverly, West Virginia, captures many
of those, including family traditions of
the frontier age, the despair of the Civil
War, and from " new " technologies now
a century old. A few highlights, as documented in the center's Appalachian
Foodways exhibit:
* The frontier years likely saw the advent of salt rising, which is similar to a
sourdough, and uses a wild, safe-to-eat
bacteria that grows in hot temperatures.
* Hardships of the Civil War included a shortage of coffee, which led to a
brewed beverage imitating the taste from
whatever was on hand, including chickory. Gingerbread, also considered a luxury,
was sold with beer in the streets of Bev-

Beverly Heritage Center is made up of four buildings in Beverly, West Virginia.

erly in the antebellum period.
* With the coming of the railroad and
refrigeration, more foods were more accessible to everyday families. New recipes like icebox cookies were developed
around the 1920s. Gelatin desserts-once
something only for elite households-
now became a common fixture.
* While serving as an AmeriCorps
Member with the Appalachian Forest National Heritage Area, Jennifer Bravener
interviewed several people about local
traditions of food and cooking in West
Virginia. One of her starting points was
" Beverly's Favorite Recipes, " a cookbook
compiled by the women of the town's
Presbyterian Church, originally printed
in 1950, with an updated version in 1988.
The end result of Bravener's work is
the exhibit at the Beverly Heritage Center
documenting the history of culinary culture in the region.

This Black Walnut Cake recipe, dating to the Civil War era, is from the book:
4 cups black walnuts
2 cups sugar
4 cups flour
1/3 lb. butter
1 ½ lb. raisins
6 eggs, beaten separately
1 tsp. baking powder
1 sherbet glass grape juice
1 nutmeg, grated
Mix as fruit cake, adding floured fruit and
stiffly beaten egg whites last. Bake 3 hours in
a very slow oven.
The Beverly Heritage Center is at 4
Court Street, Beverly, WV 26253. 304-6377424; beverlyheritagecenter.org.
-CHRIS MIELKE, EXECUTIVE DIRECTOR,
BEVERLY HERITAGE CENTER

West Virginia's New River Gorge Takes on
National Park Status

The New River's great paddling miles will have added
status under their new national park designation.

BLUERIDGECOUNTRY.COM

ne of the region's most spectacular and most treasured river areas
took on new status and new protections early this year, when West
Virginia's New River Gorge National River was upgraded to park-and-preserve as part of the January Congressional stimulus package.
The central attraction of the Gorge is 53 miles of free-flowing New River,
flanked by 1,000-foot cliffs in some areas in a 7,021-acre park that is already
home to a visitor center and many trails. The new designation will result in
more than 65,000 additional acres being designated a national preserve.
New River becomes the nation's 63rd national park, moving up from
being one of just four national rivers. The New River becomes one of only
five national park-national preserve combinations in the park service, with
the other four all being in Alaska.
For more information as changes are implemented: nps.gov/neri
-KR

http://www.beverlyheritagecenter.org http://www.nps.gov/neri http://www.BLUERIDGECOUNTRY.COM

Blue Ridge Country March/April 2021

Table of Contents for the Digital Edition of Blue Ridge Country March/April 2021