Cooking up some Colonial history

By guest blogger Susan Sprague Yeske

The chance to meet Thomas Jefferson, George Washington, Lewis and Clark, and Betsy Ross doesn’t come along very often. Nor does the opportunity to dine on Colonial-style foods.

But opportunity knocks each January in Bucks County, when the Cock ‘N Bull Restaurant in Peddlers Village reprises its Evenings in the Colonial Kitchen. The special dinners began this past Monday, January 4th and continue every Monday through March 29th.

This is the 31st season for the Colonial Kitchen, and actors from the American Historical Theatre  take the parts of a variety of historic characters, playing usually two characters each night. They walk around the dining room in full Colonial dress and engage diners who are enjoying Queen Anne’s Pye (chicken pot pie, colonial-style), jambalaya, New England-style cod, boiled brisket of beef, chicken breast with sausage stuffing, Madeira ham and roast pork with sauerkraut.

It’s a fun experience and a chance to shake off the post-holiday winter doldrums. Diners can pick two entrees to try if they wish, plus they receive soup, a salad and dessert for a prix fixe $19.95 for adults and $10.95 for children 10 and younger.

More history is on display in the restaurant foyer, where re-enactors cook fish on a wooden plank, bake pie in a Dutch oven and roast beef on a spit. They also field questions about the cooking practices of the late 18th century.

Reservations are recommended and can be made by calling (215) 794-4000.

Here is the schedule for appearances by the Colonial personalities; choose your favorite in history:

Jan. 4 – Benjamin Franklin and John Hancock
Jan. 11 – Soldier and statesman the Marquis de Lafayette and Baron Von Steuben, who trained American troops for Gen. Washington
Jan. 18 – Sail maker and Revolutionary War powder boy James Forten and flagmaker Betsy Ross
Jan. 25 – Patriot/orator Patrick Henry and Continental Congressman James Wilson
Feb. 1 – President Thomas Jefferson and Alexander Hamilton, the “father” of the U.S. Treasury
Feb. 8 – Harriet Tubman from the Underground Raiload and President Abraham Lincoln
Feb. 15 – Martha and George Washington and Annis Boudinot Stockton, the wife of New Jersey’s Richard Stockton, who signed the Declaration of Independence
Feb. 22 – President John Adams and his wife Abigail
March 1 – Philadelphia artist Charles Willson Peale and his wife Sarah
March 8 – Pirate Anne Bonney and pirate captive Mary Reed
March 15 – Suffragette Susan B. Anthony and an indentured servant
March 22 – Explorers Meriwether Lewis and William Clark
March 29 – Soldier Molly Pitcher and first lady Dolley Madison

Cock N’ Bull Restaurant
U.S. 202 & Route 263
Lahaska, PA 18931
(215) 794-4000
www.peddlersvillage.com