Dolley Madison, Fairy Butter and Slime Mold?
Plus Eating Like America release schedule!
Last time, I revealed the magic of Harry Truman’s favorite Pineapple Fairy Fluff. This time it's a slightly more well-known creation, but still foreign to most of you, I’d guess. Equally mystical, obviously sugary, Fairy Butter.
I ate this delicious morsel as part of Dolley Madison’s full day of eating for Eating Like a First Lady — the butter always graced the tables of the White House for suppers hosted by Dolley. It was considered whimsical and elegant.
Also it was potentially named after dog vomit slime mold.
Fuligo septica, aka dog vomit slime mold (above) is also called witch’s butter and even fairy butter in certain places, which seems like just the inspiration for our sweet treat. Which came first? We don’t know. They could be totally unrelated.
Dolley didn’t invent Fairy Butter, to be clear. It was popular in the 1700s, and she loved eating and serving it, and this is the recipe associated with her, below, with my language on the how-to:
Ingredients
2 eggs
1 tbsp sugar
1 tbsp orange flower water
1.5 tbsp butter
Instructions
Hard boil 2 eggs for 13 minutes. Remove, cool and unshell, eating the egg whites at your own pace and saving the egg yolks. Place the yolks in a mortar and pestle and grind them into a paste. Next, add 1 tbsp sugar (for a less gritty experience, use powdered sugar or for authenticity, grind your refined sugar yourself) and 1 tbsp orange flower water to the yolks. Mix thoroughly. Add 1.5 tbsp room temperature butter (Dolley would’ve used freshly churned but I’m not Walter Staib — maybe you are and that’s very cool). Mix until smooth and well-integrated. Press mixture through a fine mesh strainer, either onto a plate or directly on a piece of fresh bread. Live whimsically.
See When Your Day is Coming Up Next
I’ve decided that while the website is getting a phresh, lively redesign (my god it takes a long time), I’ll use the newsletter here to preview what districts are coming up next on my Eating Like America series (it was a great idea from an Instagram subscriber, thank you!). So on a monthly basis, I’ll roll out the next four coming up.
Eating Like America: July Schedule
Video Game Creative Director, OR3
Army Chaplain, GA2
Midwife/Rodeo Star, KY5
MLB Baseball Player (seriously), TX18
And so many more fun ones this summer. If YOU want to submit your daily day of eating to the Eating Like America series or you’ve got a funky Miracle Whip cake your gramma used to make that’d be perfect for Your Weird Family Recipes, you can sign up to be a paid subscriber here: patreon.com/cookinwithcongress. If you’re already a paid subscriber on Substack (or Instagram or TikTok) and have trouble finding the forms, please let me know and I’ll send them your way.
Stay fun,
-Bennett