Frontier America Trading Company

Our real specialty is the supply of cookware and accouterments for culinary excellence over an open fire.

To be really primitive, you need nothing but a sharp stick to cook the day's kill. In this age, 1. hunting is restricted; 2. best nutrition requires more complete meals; 3. appetizing meals can be produced with good equipment. At a minimum, you need a sharp knife, frying pan, bake oven, and coffee pot.

Up until the mid 19th century, cooking was performed on open fires. In colonial America, the cooking fire for your home was in a fireplace. By today's standards, these were huge; six or more feet wide, two to four feet deep, and four to six feet high. With prosperity a household would build a brick oven to one side and perhaps a drying or smoking chamber a floor above. Of course on the road or trail, cooking was done out in the open. Even in towns, outdoor cooking was common. It was too hot in the kitchen in summer and there was always the danger of fire. Rendering lard and tallow, soap making and laundry were naturally outdoor activities.

Bread is the stuff of life. Bread requires baking. The common appliance for baking is the bake oven, most often referred to as the "Dutch Oven". The characteristics of the Dutch Oven are a flat bottom cast iron utensil with three short legs and with a lid having a raised rim. These ovens are placed upon a bed of coals and additional coals are heaped upon the lid.

Enamelware was first produced in the late 1790's on saucepans. It did not however become widely available until after the Civil War. It is popularly tolerated at rendezvous. The smooth finish makes sanitation easy. 

Tin-plate was commonly used for many household items. Cook pots for use directly over the fire was not a common application. The solder used to hold them together and provide leak proof seams will not stand the heat. The most common cooking use was in pudding molds. Because of the lightweight, there was a use for small cook pots on the trail. As long as you keep water in them, they work fine. Today's examples are commonly referred to as Muckets or corn boilers.

Up until the turn of the 20th century, what we call a frying pan was referred to as a spider. Until the advent of the cook stove, most spiders had three legs and long handles for use over open coals. Often they were equipped with a lid that allowed them to double as a bake oven. Today these are rare items indeed. Cast iron because of its even heat distribution is king of the frying pans.

Wrought iron or stamped steel is the next best thing to cast iron. Lightweight, durable, and non-stick when seasoned, these frying pans are excellent camp utensils. You do need to be careful to manage the heat. 

The most common beverage, after plain water, was coffee. Tea was controlled by British interests. With the revolution, tea being expensive, lost its preeminence as the common beverage and never regained favor after the hostilities.

Salt, sugar, spices, and medicines did not come in neat little packages all finely ground and ready for use. Every cook had one or more Mortar & Pestle sets.

Knives are essential to food preparation. We are prepared to offer two lines of cutlery. "Green River" knives from Russell Harrington are the buck skinners ultimate classic knives. "Old Hickory" knives from Ontario are value priced carbon steel.

Hamburger, as we know it, did not exist. The hand crank grinder, sausage stuffer, chopper machines we see today are late inventions. Chopped meats were produced with a crescent shaped knife in a wooden bowl. These were produced in a variety of shapes, sizes and handle configurations by your local blacksmith. The Eskimo ULU knife is an example of these choppers still being produced. We have found a simplified version to use with our smaller wooden bowls.

Coffee keeps in whole bean form much better than ready ground. In fact most coffee in our period of interest was sold in green form and roasted by the user. We haven't found a proper roaster yet. We have obtained an affordable box type open hopper coffee grinder. Other models, made in England and Germany are available although pricey.

You did not run down to the corner market for butter. Every household that had a cow separated out the cream and made their own butter. Churns are made in pottery or wood. To work the water out of your butter you'll need butter paddles and a butter mold.

You will need something to store and transport your foodstuffs and water. Virtually nothing in frontier America came prepared and prepackaged. There was no plastic, no frozen food. Preservation of food was a household endeavor. Drying, salting, pickling, smoking, and conversion were all practiced.

With your food all prepared, you will need something to serve it on. The first plates in most families was the "Trencher", a hand carved plank of wood, one side for dinner, one side for pie. These often had a small spot carved out for salt. As you gained affluence, the family would acquire stoneware, tin-plate, pewter, and silver tableware.