Maybe it’s the burgeoning slow food movement, but something about cooking in a brick oven without a thermostat, or over an open fire, sounds lovely. Then again, if the only way to get food to table was the slow, laborious way, I’d probably melt down as my sugar level plummeted. Still, I can imagine I’m a more patient person than I am, perhaps with an open day to spend preparing a feast in a walk-in fireplace, as the aroma of fresh-baked bread wafts through the air…Wouldn’t it be lovely?

If primitive kitchens get your fires burning, you can explore two kitchens of yesteryear via Historic New England on May 9, 2009 in Portsmouth, NH. Get a sense of how eighteenth and nineteenth century cooks got the job done. Visit the Wentworth-Cooldige mansion and its early French-style kitchen, complete with a potager, and the Rundlet-May home, which boasts a Rumford kitchen with a large two-shelf roasting oven, shallow fireplace, and three stew holes.

If you’re still hungry for more, return for the “America’s Kitchens” exhibit which opens June 11, 2009 at the New Hampshire Historical Society in Concord, N.H.

Not yet sated? All of 2009 is the “Year of the Kitchen” at Historic New England. Visit their website to see if other kitchen-related events whet your appetite.

by Katie Hutchison for House Enthusiast