Wednesday, October 21, 2015

Eating Pancakes in 1625

"The Pancake Baker" by Adriaen Brouwer (WikiArt) 
At the Philadelphia Museum of Art last week, I enjoyed seeing "The Pancake Baker," attributed to Adriaen Brouwer (1605-1638). Brouwer lived in Antwerp, Haarlem, Amsterdam, and maybe other cities in Holland and Belgium. He and other painters of the Dutch Golden Age were fascinated by scenes inside taverns and kitchens, and their work is amazingly revealing about the way people in their time cooked and ate.

Here, you can see that the pancake maker is spreading the batter from a wooden mixing bowl into a pan. Near his feet is another pan, and a jug and crock of some sort. He's cooking over an open fire. And in the background are people scarfing the pancakes. I bet they were delicious!

I used the reproduction from WikiArt above, but I also took some close-ups of the painting with my camera:

Spreading the batter. 
The fire and the wooden bowl of batter. 
Yum! 
We love pancakes!

Another Dutch kitchen scene from my visit to the Philadelphia museum:

"Woman Plucking a Duck" by Nicholas Maes (1634-1693).
Close-up of the disordered kitchen items on the floor in Maes' painting.


3 comments:

Pam said...

Interesting with the great works of art. I see how our Dutch ancestors on my mother's side made their pancakes and they had to be delicious for sure! Nice post! Plucking the duck doesn't do much for me though. :-)

Barbara said...

Love it! Hope that cat doesn't go after the duck...he looks like he'd be delicious roasted. 😀 I plucked many a duck when I was younger...shot them too.
My mother always loved Dutch Babies...wonder if that's the kind of pancake they ate. You know, Mae, I always have loved pancakes...especially buckwheat pancakes, but never eat them anymore. Cooking for one, I rarely fuss...stick with eggs.

Jeanie said...

I love it when you visit the museum, find the wonderful food art and then amplify it all the more with your details! Wonderful!