The president's kitchen - African American cooks in the White House; includes recipes; Special Issue: The Untold Story of Blacks in the White House

The intimate link between black cooks and presidents dates back to George Washington. Long before he assumed the presidency, Washington was accustomed to welcoming both friends and strangers alike to Mount Vernon, his grand Virginia home. His guests were served sumptuous meals prepared by slave cooks, one of whom, Hercules, was especially esteemed for his culinary mastery. Indeed, Hercules often traveled with Washington to the presidential mansion in Philadelphia, in the days before the District of Columbia became the nation's capital.

Martha Washington's grandson, George Washington Parke Custis, remembered Hercules as "highly accomplished and [as] proficient in the culinary art as could be found in the United States." Hercules' skills and energies went far beyond mere cooking. He helped manage Washington's kitchen, which at one point contained a German cook, Jacob Jonus, and two French cooks, Peter Gilling and a man named Lamuir. He managed with a high regard for propriety, performance and pomp. "Under [Hercules'] iron discipline, woe to his underlings if speck or spot could be discovered on the table ... or if the utensils did not shine like polished silver. ... His underlings flew in all directions to execute his orders, while he, the great master-spirit, seemed to possess the power of ubiquity, and to be everywhere at the same moment," one observer wrote.

One can envision the scrupulous Hercules in the heat and bustle of an 18th-century kitchen. Assisted by a crew of stewards, butlers, undercooks and waiters, operating over a fireplace, he is busy creating such delicacies as trifle, a sponge cake soaked in wine and layered with custard; almond pudding; fricassee chicken; and beefsteak and kidney pie. The fireplace is full of a series of iron pots. Hooks and cranes are readily visible, and the cook--anxiously watching over the fires--uses them to check on the pots located at the back of the fireplace. To bake Martha Washington's famed "Great Cake"--consisting of 10 eggs and one peck of flour--Hercules builds a fire to heat the walls of the brick oven, and then gauges the temperature, using either his hand or a slip of paper.

If George Washington initiated the link between black cooks and the presidency, it was our country's third president, Thomas Jefferson, who forged the enduring pattern between African Americans, haute cuisine and the White House. Long before he assumed the presidency, Jefferson had sought a French chef to train one of his slaves in the art of fine cooking. This intention was amended in 1784 when Jefferson, as minister to France, was sent to Europe to negotiate treaties of commerce for the new republic. He decided that his body servant, James Hemings, was to journey with him "for [the] particular purpose" of mastering the French style of cooking. Hemings' culinary apprenticeship began under caterer Monsieur Combeaux and continued with a pastry chef in the household of the Prince de Conde.

Before long, Hemings assumed the role of chef de cuisine in Jefferson's kitchen on the Champs-Elysdes, earning 288 livris ($48) annually. Although under French law he could have claimed his freedom at any time he was residing there, Hemings chose not to do so--of reasons that remain a mystery. Hemings returned with Jefferson to New York, and in 1790 followed him to Philadelphia when Jefferson became America's first secretary of state. In a city with only 210 slaves, surely Hercules and James Hemings were each aware of the other's existence--and probably would have had amazingly intimate knowledge of the households and personalities of two of America's greatest men.

In 1793, Hemings entered into a manumission agreement with Jefferson. In that contract, Jefferson wrote that "if the said James shall go with me to Monticello ... and shall continue until he shall have taught such persons as I shall place under him for the purpose to be a good cook ... he shall be thereupon made free." In April 1796, having fulfilled the terms of the manumission agreement by having taught his brother Peter the cooking techniques that he had learned in France and the United States, James became free. He departed Monticello, leaving behind him only a well-written inventory of the kitchen and some recipes, both composed in his own hand.

It is entirely possible that the news of Hemings' emancipation--and the contrast with his own position--encouraged Hercules to run to freedom, for he escaped late in 1796, roughly seven months after Hemings had acquired the liberty of his person. After initially resolving to purchase another slave to take the place of the escaped cook, Washington ultimately took steps to get Hercules back. He authorized a former steward, Frederick Kitt, to "hire someone who is most likely acquainted with his haunts, to trace them out," urging him to use only "indirect inquiries" because "if [Hercules] was to get the least hint of the design he would elude all your vigilance." But Hercules' skills as a cook and travels with the president seem to have secured him many friends--or at least the ability to function independently in a white world--for he was never recaptured.

When Jefferson was elected President of the United States and moved into the White House, his thoughts returned to James Hemings, to whom he offered the position of White House chief chef. Hemings, however, declined the offer (as another African-American chef, Patrick Clark, would also do almost two centuries later), and President Jefferson was obliged to grant the post to French chef Honore Julien.

But Julien was incapable of satisfying the president as completely as the Hemings brothers. Writing to his daughter, Martha, at Monticello, Jefferson plead "pray enable yourself to direct us here how to make muffins in Peter's method. ... My cook here cannot succeed at all in them and they are a great luxury to me."

The French cuisine brought into the White House by Thomas Jefferson in 1801 has largely remained the food of choice at state functions, and has influenced the choice of White House chefs even when the president actually eats food prepared by his personal cook.

President James K. Polk (1845-49), for example, hired Honore Julien's son, Auguste, to prepare formal dinners during his term, even though he loathed French cooking. "All the dishes were prepared in the French style of cooking," Polk complained, "and to one unaccustomed to it [it] was difficult to tell of what they were composed." Polk resolutely avoided the French concoctions of Augusto Julien, preferring instead the meals prepared by the slave cook he had sent to him from his Tennessee plantation.

For reasons that elude historians, the known black presence in the kitchen of the White House declined sharply in the period between 1881 and 1933. One notable exception to this trend was Dolly Johnson, the cook for President and Mrs. Benjamin Harrison. Johnson had been the Harrisons' cook in Indianapolis and was urgently called to the White House sometime around 1890 to replace the French chef Madame Petronard. History repeated itself in Harrison's urgenca, "The President likes the plain dishes of Dolly Johnson ... better than the complicated French menus of her predecessor, Madame [Petronard]. In her way Dolly Johnson ... is an artist," a contemporary observer reported.

Decades later, the presidential need for a personal cook again brought African Americans to the forefront of the White House kitchen. During Franklin Delano Roosevelt's first two terms, recalled the president's son James, not only did FDR complain about the cooking, but "the meals were so bad that guests hated to eat at the White House. Invitations to dinner from the president, normally treasured, were being refused."

Salvation came in the person of Mary Campbell, an African-American cook who had been employed by the president's mother in the family home at Hyde Park. When FDR's mother died, Campbell took up residence at the White House. There she prepared the gourmet American meals--duck, venison and terrapin--that the president enjoyed. FDR's complaints about food halted, and, as James later remembered, his father promptly put on a few extra pounds.

Harry Truman contrasted with FDR in almost every respect, including his tastes in food, relishing Missouri home-cookin'. One of the few things he shared with his predecessor was a reliance on an African-American cook. Vietta Garr worked for the Trumans for 36 years, preparing the family's favorite dishes--Southern fried chicken, candied sweet potatoes and angel-food cake. Although Garr was never the official White House chief chef, she was clearly the favorite source of meals for the Trumans: In her memoirs, Margaret Truman referred to her as "the best cook in the world."

Lyndon and Lady Bird Johnson continued the Truman preference for Southern fare, bringing Zephyr Wright from Texas to Washington, D.C. Wright, hired by Lady Bird Johnson while still a home economics student at historically black Wiley College in Texas, worked for the Johnsons for 27 years and was regarded as a special member of the Johnson staff by both Lady Bird and the future president. After serving as the Johnson's White House cook, Wright remained behind in D.C. when the president retired and returned to Texas. But whenever the former president returned to the capital, he would always pay her a call. As Wright recalled fondly, "He was the best. He was just the greatest."

Although in its 200-year-old history, the White House has never seen an African American who formally bore the title of chief chef, black chefs first established the tradition of haute cuisine served by the presidents. Moreover, more often than not, presidents have relied upon highly skilled black cooks to prepare the food they consumed daily.

RELATED ARTICLE: JAMES HEMINGS' CHOCOLATE CREAMS

"Put on your milk, 1 quart to 2 squares of chocolate; boil it away one quarter; take it off; let it cool; and sweeten it. Lay a napkin in a bowl, put 3 gizzards in the napkin and pass the cream through it four times, as quick as possible, one person rubbing the gizzards with a spoon while the other pours. Put it in cups and set the cups in cold water half way up their sides. Set the water on the fire; cover it and put fire on the top, also as soon as the water boils, take the cups out and set them to cool.

Note: The gizzards used for this purpose are only the inside skins taken off as soon as the chicken is killed, washed, dried, and kept in paper bags in a dry place. The effect is the same with rennet.

RELATED ARTICLE: SHRIMP CURRY A LA ZEPHYR WRIGHT

2 pounds raw shrimp, shelled

and deveined

5 tablespoons butter

1/2 cup minced onions

6 tablespoons flour

2 1/2 teaspoons curry powder

1 1/4 teaspoons salt

1 teaspoon sugar

1/2 teaspoon powdered ginger

1 chicken bouillon cube,

dissolved in 1 cup boiling

water

2 cups milk

1 teaspoon lemon juice

Steam shrimp until done--approximately 5 minutes or until pink. Saute onions in melted butter until tender. Stir in flour, curry powder, salt, sugar and ginger. Dissolve bouillon cube in water. Gradually combine bouillon and milk with onion and spice mixture, stirring until thickened. Add cooked shrimp and lemon juice, cooking only enough to heat through. Serve over rice, (Makes 8 servings.)

Sharron E. Wilkins is a research associate at American Visions.

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