Food - Overview
Part of a nation's history lies in what people eat. Artifacts at the Museum document the history of food in the United States from farm machinery to diet fads.
More than 1,300 pieces of stoneware and earthenware show how Americans have stored, prepared, and served food for centuries. Ovens, cookie cutters, kettles, aprons, and ice-cream-making machines are part of the collections, along with home canning jars and winemaking equipment. More than 1,000 objects recently came to the Museum when author and cooking show host Julia Child donated her entire kitchen, from appliances to cookbooks.
Advertising and business records of several food companies—such as Hills Brothers Coffee, Pepsi Cola, and Campbell's Soup—represent the commercial side of the subject
"Food - Overview" showing 2024 items.
Page 70 of 203
Block Pan for Freezing Fish
- Description
- This shallow, metal pan was used for freezing processed fish aboard the factory trawler Alaska Ocean. Operating in the North Pacific and the Bering Sea, the Alaska Ocean is one vessel in the fleet that catches and processes pollock, hake, and whiting.
- In the factory the fish are gutted and filleted by German-made filleting machines, which can be calibrated to remove the bones and skin according to a customer’s preference. Onboard engineers adjust the angles of the knives within a quarter of a millimeter to provide a product with a small amount of fat, or no fat at all, depending on the customer’s specifications.
- After the initial filleting, workers in the factory load pans like this with fish fillets, fish roe, or minced fish. A conveyor belt carries the filled pans to other workers who load them into plate freezers. After about two hours, when the freezing is complete, the pans are unloaded from the freezer, and the blocks of frozen fish are removed and packed for shipment. The packed blocks of product are stacked in the ship’s large freezer hold until they can be offloaded ashore.
- The Alaska Ocean carries two sizes of pans, a block pan like this and a slightly larger size for surimi, a type of fish paste used in making imitation crabmeat. The vessel carries a total of 2800 pans, 1400 of each size. The factory has 16 plate freezers aboard, 8 for single pans and 8 for doubles. A single-pan plate freezer can hold 102 surimi pans and 119 block pans at a time.
- The wax lining in this pan facilitates removing the frozen product. This one is marked “M” for mince, a ground fish product used in making fish sticks and fish fingers.
- date made
- 2000-2005
- Associated Date
- 2007
- ID Number
- 2007.0178.29
- catalog number
- 2007.0178.29
- accession number
- 2007.0178
- Data Source
- National Museum of American History, Kenneth E. Behring Center
Ship Model, Catcher-Processor Alaska Ocean
- Description
- This scale model of the fishing vessel Alaska Ocean was custom-built for the Smithsonian by Erik A. R. Ronnberg Jr., at his shop in Rockport, Massachusetts. The starboard hull is cut away to reveal the factory where workers process tons of fish into blocks of frozen fillets, minced fish, and surimi (used in making imitation crab meat and other food products). The cutaway also shows the laboratory where fish products are tested, the freezer hold, a stateroom, and the galley. On the weather (top) deck, the model features all of the deck machinery, the trawling equipment, and the vessel’s rigging. A net full of fish is shown being emptied into one of the bins on the factory floor below.
- Ronnberg spent about 27 months building the model, and estimates he spent 5,500 hours getting every detail right. While he built the wooden hull according to design drawings provided by naval architect Guido Perla of Seattle, he had to make his own drawings and patterns to craft the machinery and equipment, most of which are cast in metal. Ronnberg used cheesecloth and tulle to make the net and spent untold hours fashioning the chafing gear out of acrylic yarn, which he knotted in bunches before separating the strands by hand.
- He studied photographs and films of the actual vessel at sea, and made detailed figures of people dressed in appropriate working gear in the factory, on the deck, in the fish hold, in the galley, and on the bridge. The model is populated with 125 figures, 1,200 individual fish, and several masses of fish in the cod end of the net. Everything on the model is painted by hand. The scale is 3/16th inch = 1 foot.
- The Alaska Ocean itself is a 376-foot-long vessel in the Seattle-based catcher-processor fleet. Workers catch, process, package, and freeze groundfish—mostly pollock and Pacific whiting—in the Bering Sea and in the waters off the coast of the Pacific Northwest. The vessel can harvest about 325 metric tons of fish per day and can freeze over 250,000 pounds of fish product daily.
- The idea to build the Alaska Ocean began in the late 1980s. Jeff Hendricks, a fisherman from Anacortes, Washington, who owned and operated a fleet of boats in partnership with a Japanese company, decided to “Americanize” his operations. This was in advance of the American Fisheries Act of 1998, which sought to increase American ownership in the fleet by requiring that vessels be American-built, owned, and operated. Although Hendricks sought bids from several American shipyards for his new venture, there were none at the time that could handle the scope of the vessel he envisioned. Eventually, he worked with a shipbuilder in Norway to expand and rebuild an American oil supply vessel. The Alaska Ocean arrived in Anacortes in the summer of 1990 and began fishing that fall with a largely local crew. It remains in the fleet and, as of 2008, is owned and operated by Glacier Fish Company.
- Because catcher-processors are so efficient, their operations are highly regulated to prevent overfishing. A harvest quota is determined by the National Marine Fisheries Service and members of the Pollock Conservation Cooperative, a group of catcher-processors including the Alaska Ocean, divide up the quota amongst themselves. This self-regulating measure ends what is often called the "race for fish," and results in more careful, less wasteful fishing.
- Independent scientific observers also travel aboard every vessel in the fleet, monitoring the trawling and empyting operations. They record all by-catch, the term for fish caught in the net other than the target species. There are hard limits on allowable by-catch for certain species, and because the data are computed, reported, and shared for the fleet as a whole, individual vessels are motivated to monitor the by-catch and make adjustments.
- date made
- 2009
- ID Number
- 2009.0080.01
- accession number
- 2009.0080
- catalog number
- 2009.0080.01
- Data Source
- National Museum of American History, Kenneth E. Behring Center
Scrimshaw Ivory Jagging Wheel
- Description
- Pie crimpers or jagging wheels are among the most common scrimshaw items carved by American 19th century whalemen. They were useful, as well as decorative kitchen implements. The fluted wheel was used to cut dough or seal the top of a pie crust to the sides before baking.
- This example’s shaft is in the form of a snake or sea serpent, with a tongue in the shape of a three-tine fork. The fork was used to decorate or poke holes in the upper pie crust to vent the steam created by baking.
- date made
- 19th century
- Associated Date
- 19th century
- ID Number
- DL*388597
- catalog number
- 388597
- accession number
- 182022
- Data Source
- National Museum of American History, Kenneth E. Behring Center
Scrimshaw Whale Bone Food Chopper
- Description
- Simply carved and without any engraving, this food chopper, or mincer, was made in two pieces from a sperm whale’s jawbone. Its blunted, curved blade was used to chop soft foods such as bread dough, fruits, sausage, and animal fats. This example was donated by former Secretary of the Institution Spencer F. Baird (1823–1887) to the Smithsonian, where it became one of the earliest objects in the maritime collections.
- date made
- 1800s
- purchased
- 1876-11-30
- ID Number
- AG*024909
- catalog number
- 24909
- accession number
- 2009.0157
- Data Source
- National Museum of American History, Kenneth E. Behring Center
- No Image Available
The Original Mexicans [page from cookbook]
- Summary
- Pp. 2-3, "The original families", women in market and church architecture
- Date
- 1972
- advertiser
- Heublein Inc
- Local number
- 040396108.tif (AC Scan No.)
- Data Source
- Archives Center - NMAH
- No Image Available
The Original Mexicans [page from cookbook]
- Summary
- "The original drinks,"alcoholic drinks with fruit, p. 5
- Date
- 1972
- advertiser
- Heublein Inc
- Local number
- 040396109.tif (AC Scan No.)
- Data Source
- Archives Center - NMAH
- No Image Available
The Original Mexicans [page from product cookbook]
- Summary
- "The original appetizers", assorted appetizers (riblets, olives, dip) and wine
- Date
- 1972
- advertiser
- Heublein Inc
- Local number
- 040396110.tif (AC Scan No.)
- Data Source
- Archives Center - NMAH
- No Image Available
The Original Mexicans [page from product cookbook]
- Summary
- "The original soups", chilled tomato soup and assorted vegatables, page 13
- Date
- 1972
- advertiser
- Heublein Inc
- Local number
- 040396111.tif (AC Scan No.)
- Data Source
- Archives Center - NMAH
- No Image Available
The Original Mexicans [illustration from product cookbook]
- Summary
- "The original salads", various salads with dressing, p. 17
- Date
- 1972
- advertiser
- Heublein Inc
- Local number
- 040396101.tif (AC Scan No.)
- Data Source
- Archives Center - NMAH
- No Image Available
The Original Mexicans [illustration from product cookbook]
- Summary
- "The original main dishes", rice with meat, chicken with orange, wine, p. 22
- Date
- 1972
- advertiser
- Heublein Inc
- Local number
- 040396102.tif (AC Scan No.)
- Data Source
- Archives Center - NMAH