Drink It Up

No satisfying meal or snack in the Little House books is complete without a drink to go with it. I already discussed the use of lemonade and milk in the party food, but here I shall go into more detail about them.

Milk is a favourite drink of the Ingalls family, not only for its creamy taste but probably also because it can go with anything. It is a good choice of drink to have for breakfast or with sweet foods such as the vanity cakes, mainly because the taste of it will not be affected by what you eat. It is also an accessible drink for the family, as they have cows to get the milk from, as depicted in On the Banks of Plum Creek when the family receive the cows for the first time and Laura instantly gets a tin can to put the milk in. It is stated that “nobody had taught Laura. She knew how to milk a cow; she had watched Pa do it” (p. 33). Laura is immediately portrayed as an economical young worker used to the idea of getting her own milk rather than buying it and the idea of watching family members carry out the same task shows the deep connection between them all. Another interesting thing to note is that Pa frequently gives Laura the nickname “half-pint” throughout the series – could we compare this to the half-pint of milk?
 

When Laura first encounters lemonade, it is at Nellie Olson's party in On the Banks of Plum Creek. As I stated into my post on party food, she would not have had it before because lemons were considered to be an exotic fruit at the time that her family would not have been able to farm. The other children attending the party would have the same experience as her, with Nellie being the only exception. The way they drink it is methodical – they take a sip before eating a bit of the marble cake, and then they take another sip. There is no enjoyment out of this controlled approach to drinking, especially since the lemonade taste sour after eating the cake.
 

This changes when Laura tastes lemonade at the Independence Day party in Little Town on the Prairie, several years after the events of the party. It has been freshly made with the water coming from the hotel well, making it cold. Everyone takes turns dishing it out of a large barrel with a tin dipper and drinking from that before passing it to the next person. Nowadays this would be seen as disgusting and unhygienic but in the book it is presently as a lively occasion and represents the togetherness of the community. The lack of a methodical approach to drinking like with the lemonade at the town party also allows for everyone to bond with one another. Additionally, Laura and Mary are used to drinking from the same cup already, highlighting both the closeness of their family and the fact that they cannot afford to buy more cups. The scene references back to Nellie Olson's party and compares the lemonade there to the lemonade that Laura is drinking, proudly claiming that “this lemonade was even more delicious” (p. 61). This helps to undermine Nellie in the same way that the vanity cakes did, showing how her party was nowhere near as enjoyable as the Independence Day party.

 

I made lemonade in the same way that it would have been made in Little Town on the Prairie, complete with lemon slices floating in it. In fact, Pa sees this as a good thing in the text, saying that "they put in plenty of lemons, so it ought to be good" (p. 61). The drink was very nice in small sips, though it would have been too sharp for me if I had received a full glass, and I feel that it tastes better than lemonade nowadays, which tends to have preservatives added to it.

In The Little House Cookbook, Walker mentions that the Ingalls were unusual in that they did not drink alcohol much. This could be for religious purposes, as the family are Christians and the church had a negative view on alcohol beverages. Instead, the frequent drink that they have is tea. The younger children in particular drink Cambric tea, which is a watered-down version that consists of mainly hot water and milk with a drop of tea from the pot.