What, you say, is Hangtown Fry? “A mess of fried eggs, fried oysters, and bacon.” Because it was so expensive, ordering that breakfast meant that you’d struck it rich in the goldrush.

Because she covered so much territory, this is really more of an overview of the topic of food in the century of pioneer America. The country is covered in five succinct sections; at the end of each is a sampling of recipes. Because her chapters are descriptive of the contents, I share them here:

I Beyond the Southern Mountains
Pot Luck on the Kentucky Frontier
The Flowering of the Lower Mississippi Valley
The Creole Cookery of Louisiana
The Slave and Indian Communities of the South

II Across the Old Northwest to the Great Plains
Pioneer Routes to the Old Northwest
Settlers and Immigrants on the New Frontier
Meat-and-Potatoes Eating in German Ohio
The Appleseed Trail to Dutch Michigan
Swiss, Cornish, and Scandinavian Settlers in Wisconsin
Buffalo Hunters and Sodbusters of the Great Plains

III Along the Santa Fe Trail to the Southwest
Indian Foods of the American Southwest
The Culinary Gifts of the Spanish
Oklahoma Chuckwagon Days

IV Over the Rockies to the Far West
Mountain Men and Oregon Homesteaders
On the Trail of California Gold
The Chinese in San Francisco
Mediterranean Gardeners in Southern California’

V Pioneers in the Cities Back East
French Elegance in the Jefferson White House
Boston: Refuge from the Potato Famine
New York City as a Jewish Haven

An answer to a “why” from the title: Chinese immigrants continued to prepare their food for cooking in the same fashion as in their homeland – meats and vegetables finely cut and cooked quickly – even though there was no longer a scarcity of fuel.

It really is quite an interesting book, and apt to garner a higher rating the more I think on it. Recommended to those interested in aspects of American history. ( )

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This is a fun book to read as well as to cook from. We used it a lot in studying the history of California. There are not a lot of recipes in it. ( )