People began eating turtle soup in the 1700s, and they kept eating it through the early 1900s. Companies like Campbell’s and Heinz made canned turtle soup (and something called mock turtle soup). And it wasn’t just available. It was a real culinary obsession. In the early days, there would be these big, elaborate parties, called Turtle Frolics, where people would get together to enjoy it. Including a notable Turtle Frolic in Newport, prepared and served by a talented chef named Cuffy Cockroach.
Episode Source Material:
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- A Newport Rhode Island Turtle Feast, 1767 – Afroculinaria
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- Dark Work: The Business of Slavery in Rhode Island
- The Negro in Rhode Island: His Past, Present, and Future
- Separate and Sometimes Equal: African Burials in Colonial Newport
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- 1776 Season 1 Episode 4
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