The 1718 Project

Portland, ME, November 29, 2009 --(PR.com)-- In September of 1718, a small group of settlers arrived in Casco Bay, Maine, to spend the first of a lifetime of winters in America. The year 2018 will mark the 300th Anniversary of this final wave of the great English Diaspora Migrations to America: that of the Ulster and Border Scots/English people from Northern Britain. The 1718 project is a program that is devoted to scholarly research and public education about this cultural group and its contributions to American society. Scotch Irish Foodways in America: Recipes From History.

(The 1718 Project, $16.95) is the first of many projects that will be undertaken to celebrate this anniversary. It will be available online at Amazon.com and in a bookstore near you on December 10, 2009.

This book is organized to highlight the unique history of Scotch Irish foodways and their traditional reliance on oats, bonny clabber, and the potato. It also includes the realities of the evolution of new food choices that became fused with traditional Scotch Irish fare into the modern American diet. The recipes in this book have been derived from historic sources, historic cookbooks, and carefully treasured recipes obtained from food historians, family members and friends. The recipes in this book have been triple tested whenever practical, using open hearth and woodstove cooking techniques as well as on a modern stove.

The author M.M. Drymon is a historian living with her family in Maine. Drymon has written articles on historical subjects that have appeared in the Farm and Mill Gazette and the New York Times. With an extensive background as a writer, museum educator and curator, Drymon is dedicated to preserving information about historic foodways. Her Scotch Irish and English Borderland ancestors settled originally in New Jersey, the Carolinas, and Florida.

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