This recipe for Brunswick Stew comes from “Canoe and Camp Cookery: A Practical Cook Book for Canoeists, Corinthian Sailors and Outers” by “Seneca” 1885. It mentions that “This is a favorite Virginia dish, of which the compiler of this book has eaten, but which he has never cooked. The recipe here given is said by an old Virginian to be reliable.” I would imagine that chicken could be substituted for squirrel.

Brunswick Stew

For a stew for five or six persons the following are the ingredients:

• two good-sized or three small squirrels
• one quart of tomatoes, peeled and sliced
• one pint of butter or lima beans
• six potatoes, parboiled and sliced
• six ears of green corn cut from the cob
• one-half pound of butter
• one-half a pound of fat salt pork
• one teaspoonful of black pepper
• one-half a teaspoonful of cayenne
• one gallon of water
• one tablespoonful of salt
• two tablespoonfuls of white sugar
• one onion minced small

Cut the squirrels into joints, and lay in cold water to draw out the blood; put on the gallon of water, with the salt in it, and let it boil for five minutes; put in the onion, beans, corn, pork which has been cut up into fine strips, potatoes, pepper and the squirrels; cover closely, and stew two-and-a-half hours very slowly, stirring the mass frequently from the bottom to prevent its burning. Then add the tomatoes and sugar, and stew an hour longer. Ten minutes before it is to be taken from the fire, add the butter, cut into bits the size of a walnut, and rolled in flour; give a final boil, taste to see that it is seasoned to your like, and serve at once.