Thanksgiving with Alexander Hamilton

Eels and ‘promiscuous’ dining were 1789 fashion

What if Alexander Hamilton had hosted a Thanksgiving dinner? That’s a lot easier to imagine than a Broadway show with a hip-hop score that has made him the most popular Founding Father of the decade.

Thanksgiving was not an annual national holiday until 1863, but there were official thanksgiving proclamations before then. For example, President Washington declared Thursday Nov. 26, 1789, to be “a day of public thanksgiving and prayer.”

Hamilton and his family lived in a prosperous Lower Manhattan neighborhood at that time. They had four young children and were also raising the orphaned daughter of a friend. Hamilton’s wife, Eliza, would have decided what dishes to include in a celebratory dinner. Many of the possibilities are familiar to our modern palates. Others — turtle soup, pigeon pie, hogs’ ears and stewed eels — would probably elicit grimaces today. Like any other well-off family back then, they would not have prepared or served the meal themselves. It is unlikely that the Hamiltons had slaves at that time, but they certainly had servants.

The English fashion, often followed by prosperous Americans, was to serve multiple courses. One contemporary authority recommended nine dishes in each course for a dozen diners or 15 dishes for a party of 18. Cookbooks provided elaborate diagrams for each course, showing the exact position for every dish on the table. It was considered bad form to include two dishes containing the same main ingredient in the same course. Typically, the first course would include soups and stews, large pieces of meat, poultry served whole, and fish. The second would include savory pies, smaller game birds such as pheasant, and seafood. Vegetable dishes were part of both courses, as were garnishes and condiments.

Desserts included puddings, pies, cakes, cookies, and jellies and other small sweets we could call candies. Hamilton enjoyed wine and would have served it with the meal. Fruits and nuts might be served afterward.

The Hamiltons liked to entertain. Although all-male dinners were common at the time, it was becoming fashionable for men and women to dine together. Seating for the latter, alternating men and women at the table, was referred to by one writer as a “new, promiscuous way of dining.” Maybe that would have required the Hamiltons to find a “date” if a single gentleman did not bring a female companion.

Eliza was pious and spiritual. Although her husband was less attached to formal religious observance, he too had a firm belief in a higher being and was supportive of religion. They would likely have started the meal with a prayer. If Alexander led it, the prayer might have been not a rote recitation, but an eloquent and heartfelt invocation.

Hamilton was known as an excellent dinner companion, and he would likely have kept the conversation flowing. If pressed, he might invite a political adversary, such as Aaron Burr, Thomas Jefferson or James Madison. More likely, he would have avoided that, hoping that the dinner would simply be an enjoyable social event. Still, there was always the chance that a real or perceived insult would lead to a duel, and we all know what could happen then.

Though it’s fun to speculate, the Thanksgiving dinner described is as unlikely as, well, a real Founding Father breaking out into a hip-hop song. Thanksgiving with a capital “T” didn’t exist at the time. And Norman Rockwell-style roast turkey, though it did exist, was not especially popular in the late 18th century.

If Hamilton observed Nov. 26, 1789 (or any other day proclaimed for thanksgiving during his lifetime), he probably did something more akin to what politicians and their families do these days when they serve holiday meals at soup kitchens. Hamilton’s mentor, Washington, set an example that many in public life have followed ever since. He attended religious services, and donated beer and food to imprisoned debtors.

Laura Kumin blogs on food and cooking at Mother Would Know and is the author of The Hamilton Cookbook: Cooking, Eating, and Entertaining in Hamilton’s World, published Tuesday.