COXSACKIE — Ever wondered what the adult beverage of choice was in colonial times? It was a concoction called “Flip,” a mixture of bitter beer, rum, molasses and a hot poker.
The hot poker both warmed the drink and caramelized the sugars, historical reenactor Richard Muggeo, dressed in period garb as Pieter Bronck, told onlookers at the Heritage Craft Fair at the Bronck Museum on Sunday.
He passed around cups of Flip for all to try.
The craft fair has been held each year on the grounds of the museum for the past 25 years or so, museum curator Shelby Mattice said.
Flip — one of the most popular features of the event — dates back to the 1600s.
“Flip is a traditional drink of colonial America,” Muggeo said. “I have found it written about in literature as early as 1690 and as late as 1851. It is mentioned in ‘Moby Dick.’ Herman Melville has them drinking Flip on the deck of the [whaling ship] Pequod, but he doesn’t tell you what Flip is, because back then, when the book was published in 1851, everybody would have known what Flip was.”
Coeymans resident Amanda O’Donnell, who used to live with her husband on the grounds as one of the museum’s caretakers, said Flip is always tasty, but takes a bit of getting used to.
“It was definitely an acquired taste at first, but now I like it,” O’Donnell said.
Her husband, Jason O’Donnell, said he looks forward to the drink at every Heritage Craft Fair.
And that is the goal of the fair, Mattice said — to give local people an appreciation for the area’s heritage.
“We do this to get local people to enjoy where they live,” Mattice said. “In a normal year, when people are not reticent because of COVID, a lot of people come here to meet friends and support all the crafters. Almost all of them are from Greene County, so the money goes back into the community.”
Crafters sold wares like handmade wooden crafts and homemade jams and jellies, several of them in historic buildings on the property.
“This is my third time here [at the craft fair],” said Susan Hoffman, owner of Creekside Farm Homemade Jams, in Freehold. “It is amazing being in a historic barn like this. It really adds to the experience.”
Dolores Canna, from Pondview Woodworking, also based in Freehold, said she has been coming to the fair four years to sell her husband’s handcrafted wooden products.
“It is amazing being in a historic barn like this,” Hoffman said.
In a typical year, the fair also offers indoor tours of the historical Bronck Museum and home, but with the ongoing COVID pandemic the tours were not offered this year.
The final event of the 2021 season for the Bronck Museum is coming up Nov. 20 and Nov. 21 when the Chilly Willy tours will be offered at 11 a.m., 1 p.m. and 3 p.m.
Visitors will learn about the holidays celebrated by the Bronck family.
“Chilly Willy is a celebration of three almost unknown holidays — St. Nicholas Day, Martinmas and St. Lucia Day,” Mattice said. “For this Dutch-Swedish family that came from Europe, those would have been the holidays they would have recognized.”
Christmas didn’t become a prominent holiday in the region until later years, during the Victorian era, she added.
The Chilly Willy tours are just that — chilly.
“The house is not heated and in mid-November, it is about 45 degrees inside,” Mattice said. “But that was their maximum winter temperature back then. When people come to Chilly Willy, they leave with a pretty good sense of what winter living was like in those days.”
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October 05, 2021 at 04:06AM
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