Inspired by Massachusetts
THE MEAL
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For a state as rich with history as Massachusetts, I had a ton of recipes to choose from. Boston baked beans, Boston brown bread, chocolate chip cookies, pizza strips… While I’d really liked the Rhode Island clam chowder, I couldn’t resist making the iconic, creamy New England clam chowder, some dinner rolls, and the classic Boston cream pie.
NEW ENGLAND CLAM CHOWDER
“Chowdah” is the creamy, bacon-y version of clam chowder that most likely first comes to mind. It was a common meal for European settlers in the 1700s, and the oldest continuously operating restaurant in the U.S., Ye Olde Union Oyster House, has been serving it in Boston since 1836.
As with the clear clam chowder I made last time, the main ingredients are clams, potatoes, celery, and onion. And, like last time, I was so happy with how fast it was to put together. I’m used to making soups and stews that have many many steps and take hours of slow cooking to be perfect. Clam chowder in its varieties is quick and easy and so good!
I definitely like this version better than the clear kind, though both were delicious. I just love creamy soups—I mashed some of the cooked potato to make my clam chowder extra thick—and the addition of bacon took it up to eleven. At first I was really proud of myself for figuring out how to make a single serving of this meal, but when my bowl of clam chowder was gone, I wished I had made a whole lot more!
PARKER HOUSE ROLLS
A famous Boston hotel, the Parker House Hotel, has been making these buttery dinner rolls since the 1800s. (Incidentally, this was the same hotel that invented teh Boston cream pie!) The oldest printed recipe appeared in 1874, and the hotel still makes them today!
These rolls are very similar to the flaky potato rolls from the Idaho-inspired meal, with instant potato flakes in the recipe to make them extra light and flavorful. The main distinguishing feature is that the shaped dough is folded in half (with butter in the middle), and more butter is brushed on top to give them an extra buttery flavor. They’re easy to break apart to add more butter and jam—the perfect dinner roll.
I’m pretty happy with how these rolls turned out, but I feel like I need to get a bread machine. Recipes I follow always say that you only need to knead the dough for like 10 minutes before it’s smooth, but it always takes me at least 30, and even then I feel like I don’t knead the dough enough. I either need machine help, or someone need to teach me what I’m doing wrong. But they were still light and fluffy and delicious!
CRANBERRY JUICE
I didn’t make cranberry juice from scratch as originally planned, but I learned a lot about it when researching for this meal! For example, did you know that the name “cranberry” is an evolution of “crane berry” because colonists thought the flowers resembled sandhill cranes?
Cranberries were already being cultivated in Massachusetts by Native Americans before European settlers arrived. They were an important food crop and produced a beautiful dye. When Europeans came across them, cranberries quickly became popular on ships to prevent scurvy. They only grow in very specific conditions—peat soil, coarse sand, and a constant water supply—making Massachusetts their perfect growing environment. The vines don’t have to be replanted each season—some growing today are over 150 years old! And you’ve probably seen images of cranberries being harvested as they float on the surface of flooded bogs, but those berries can only be used for juice and sauce; the kind you buy whole to make into sauce yourself has to be dry-picked. Who knew??
I accidentally bought a bottle of cranberry juice with no sugar added, which was EXTREMELY tart, but oh well. I love cranberry juice, and was glad for the excuse to buy some.
BOSTON CREAM PIE
As previously mentioned, Massachusetts is the home of one of my favorite desserts—the chocolate-chip cookie. I was very tempted to make those for this meal’s dessert. However, I’ve made dozens of batches of chocolate-chip cookies before, but never once had I made a Boston cream pie. And that’s one of my other favorite desserts, so I had to go with that!
You may be surprised to see that a Boston cream pie is, in fact, a cake. It’s called “pie” because back in the day, there was only one kind of baking pan used to make both pies and cakes, so the words were basically interchangeable. This amazing custard cake is said to have been first made at the Parker House Hotel in 1856. Custard cakes had been around for a while before that, but topping it with chocolate was innovative and quickly became a hit.
The custard was almost the exact same recipe as the filling I made for the zeppole last time. I love seeing how different states use similar elements in their cuisine. This time I had better luck getting the filling nice and thick, and I was worried about making the chocolate glaze too thin so that turned out VERY thick as well. Fine by me! But definitely add fewer chocolate chips if you prefer a thinner glaze. The cake itself is a light yet chewy sponge, like an angel food cake almost!
It was delicious, of course. I love Boston cream pie. I love custard and I love chocolate. Put them together and I am a happy camper. The rare time that I buy a donut, it’s always chocolate glazed with custard filling. I made a little Boston cream pie for the purposes of this one-person meal, but I could have happily eaten a full-size version on my own.
So how do you think I did? Let me know in the comments if you have any suggestions for improvement, and be sure to tune in next time for my take on a meal inspired by Maine! If that’s where you’re from, what do you think I should make to represent your state? Bonus points if you have reliable recipes or pro tips before I make the attempt! Thank you for reading!