Eating on the Run

This chapter explores how presidential food preparation changes when the president travels to a destination, and stays away from the White House for an extended period of time. This chapter focuses on cooks who prepared food in a variety of contexts: the presidential train, the presidential yacht and Air Force One. This chapter chronologically profiles: railroad cooks Joe Brown, John Smeades and Delefasse Green; Elizabeth "Lizzie" McDuffie, Daisy Bonner, Ronald L. Jackson, Charlie Redden, Lee Simmons and Wanda Joell. Through their experiences, this chapter illuminates the strategies that presidents would pursue to get the comfort foods they loved and take a temporary break from the diets imposed upon them by the First Lady or the presidential physician. The chapter also details how the White House Mess was created and initially staffed. This chapter includes recipes for Daisy Bonner's cheese soufflé, Hawaiian French toast, and jerk chicken pita pizza.

Semisweet

The presidential kitchen employed a number of free African Americans who worked side-by-side with enslaved people and indentured servants. After Emancipation, African Americans dominated the White House kitchen staff, and upon several occasions, the entire culinary workforce. These cooks come to the White House due to professional merit they possess, not the happenstance of being enslaved by the incumbent president. Still, these cooks faced a number of challenges and barriers, inside and outside of the White House, due to racial prejudice. The chapter chronologically profiles James Wormley, Lucy Fowler, Laura "Dollie" Johnson, Alice Howard, John Moaney and Zephyr Wright. These profiles indicate how they overcame various racial challenges. This chapter includes recipes for Pedernales River Chili, and President Eisenhower's Old-Fashioned Beef Stew.

The Key Ingredients of Presidential Foodways

This chapter itemizes and elaborates on four different component parts (described in the book as "ingredients") that make-up presidential foodways. The first ingredient relates to the president: his or her palate, food philosophy, schedule, wealth and prerogative. The second ingredient involves the people who surround the president: the First Lady, the president's physician, and those who procure food for the White House. The third ingredient is White House culture: the workspace, kitchen equipment and technology, co-workers, perks, presidential pets, wildlife in and outside of the White House and racial attitudes. The fourth ingredient is the unexpected influences: the U.S. Congress, public perception, food gifts from the public, and the climate in Washington, D.C. The chapter includes recipes for roast ducks, popovers (a quick bread), and sweet potato cheesecake.

Above Measure

This chapter opines on the prospect for another African American to helm the White House kitchen at some point in the future. No African Americans have presided over the White House kitchen since Zephyr Wright did in the late 1960s. Given the current way that chefs often get hired to work in the contemporary White House, future chefs will likely come from the existing kitchen staff, as the personal chef of a future president or as someone of stature in the culinary world. The chapter gives the back story of the 1994 State Dinner held in honor of Republic of South African President Nelson Mandela. The chapter ends by looking at how the contemporary White House kitchen inspires young people today with a special emphasis on former First Lady Michelle Obama's "Let's Move" Initiative and the Kids' State Dinners she hosted during her tenure. This chapter profiles Chef Patrick Clark, Chef Marcus Samuelsson, White House kitchen steward Adam Collick and Kiana Farkash. The chapter includes recipes for sesame and wasabi-crusted halibut, layered late-summer vegetables with lemongrass and red curry dressing, grilled salmon with farro, Swiss chard salad, and a tropical smoothie.

Bittersweet

The U.S. has had a significant number of slaveholding presidents. Accordingly, a number of White House kitchen staffers in antebellum America were enslaved African Americans. This chapter chronicles how these individuals met the demands of the presidential masters while attempting to assert their humanity while they remained in bondage. In many ways, the presidential kitchen became a prison from which these cooks could not escape. There were however rare moments where these cooks obtained freedom by successfully escaping from slavery or by negotiating their manumission. This chapter chronologically profiles the following enslaved cooks: Hercules, James Hemings, Edith Hern Fossett, and Frances Gillette Hern. The chapter ends with a profile of Mary Dines, a formerly enslaved woman who cooked part-time for President Abraham Lincoln. This chapter includes recipes for hoecakes, snow eggs and baked macaroni and cheese.

Feeling at Home

This chapter profiles several African Americans who supervised presidential food service operations as steward, maître d'hôtel, or chief usher. Their duties variably included hiring the kitchen staff, procuring food, menu planning, and at times, food preparation. This chapter focuses (chronologically) on the experiences of the following people: Samuel Fraunces, William T. Crump, Henry Pinckney, Alonzo Fields, Rear Admiral Stephen W. Rochon and Angella Reid. Their experiences illuminate how White House operations have changed over time. The White House first was operated as a plantation big house. After the Civil War, it was operated as a wealthy person homes. With the changes implemented by First Lady Jacqueline Kennedy, the White House has been operated like a hotel since the 1960s. The chapter includes recipes for: minted green pea soup and bison meat Brazilian onions.

Seeing through a Glass Darkly

This chapter explores the ways that presidents have used beverages as either subterfuge or a symbol for their presidency. This chapter shows how the power of the U.S. temperance movement in the eighteenth and nineteenth centuries affected the public drinking habits of presidents and the presence of alcoholic drinks at White House functions. Such power also affected public acknowledgement of a wine cellar in the White House and to what extent such cellar was stocked with wine. This chapter chronologically profiles Arthur Brooks (White House wine cellar custodian), Charles Ficklin (White House wine steward), and Alonzo Fields. The chapter elaborates on presidential drinkways through a succession of beverages: wine, punch, eggnog, cocktails, and beer. The chapter ends with recipes for Inauguration punch, White House eggnog, and White House honey ale.