“The kinkling and the doughnut die,
— Baltimore Sun 1910
The pancake and the waffle cease,
But now doth come the rhubarb pie,
Oh, may I have another piece?”
The Germans who colonized Western Maryland in the 1700s brought with them devout Christianity — primarily Lutheranism and Calvinism. But where one scratches the surface of devout Christianity, one often finds a little bit of Paganism hiding out, and Carnival season might be one of the times when the old ways are less hidden (despite the masks.)
Fat Tuesday aka Fastnacht happens to coincide with a time when a feast may have taken place among Germanic tribes, a celebration to drive away winter and usher in Spring fertility and sunlight.
This became the festivities referenced by Shakespeare in his 1601 play The Merchant of Venice:
“Nor thrust your head into the public street
To gaze on Christian fools with varnish’d faces.”
Although the area along the Monocacy River that Germans settled was a fertile region, it could also be a harsh and isolated one. There weren’t a lot of public streets to thrust one’s head into, and many of the social aspects of Carnival were left to the old world.
But not the sweet treats.
Fastnacht doughnuts famously took on the name “Kinklings” in Western Maryland and became a beloved tradition beyond the German communities where they originated.
An 1889 advertisement in the Frederick News touted “Golden Tinge” flour. “Next week will be fastnacht,” reminded the ad, “so all ye good housekeepers fill up your barrels.”
The same newspaper warned elsewhere that “old wiseacres say if you don’t make kinklins today you will have bed bugs all the year.” Who could risk that?
Eventually, churches and bakers helped people avoid the bedbugs with less hassle by selling fresh kinklings. One baker advertised that he would “have them delivered hot.”
Mrs. Eva Reeder shared her recipe in a cookbook produced in the 1970s by St. Mark Lutheran Church in Adamstown.
I chose her recipe because it contained potatoes. Contrary to popular belief, not all kinkling recipes do. A 1975 story in the Frederick News shared two recipes from Mrs. Catherine Gross. Her own recipe was made without mashed potatoes. Her grandmother’s recipe included them. According to her “the taste and texture are the same.”
I beg to differ. I also believe that the potato inclusion makes Kinklings feel a little extra special. Why did Mrs. Gross abandon her grandmother’s formula? Maybe potatoes had had a bad year.
Aside from when Mrs. Eva Reeder hosted meetings of the “Everfaithful Bible Class” that compiled the St. Mark Lutheran cookbook, she wasn’t mentioned much in the local newspapers. But her genealogy gives her Kinkling credibility.
Eva was born in 1914 to Anna and Clarence Koogle, farmers. Eva’s husband Melvin Reeder was a farmhand on their family farm. I traced Eva’s parents back for many generations and found primarily German names and Maryland births. I did find one ancestor born in Germany – Johannes Schumaker, born in 1720. With the young marriages of farm people at the time, Eva was separated from Germany by a half-dozen generations.
But Frederick County was a very German place, and Eva’s lineage is evident in the recipes she shared in the cookbook – including a black walnut pound cake and “Dressing for Potato Salad” made with vinegar and mustard.
Eva died in 1983, just ten miles from where she was born and raised. I thought of her while I rolled out my dough at a friend’s house: How Eva and her neighbors had no addresses on the censuses. Nothing but farms. How she was just fourteen when Melvin appeared on the census as a farmhand. How Eva’s foremothers swapped one German name for another, moving to adjacent farms, or taking a husband into the fold of their own farm. The beautiful hills of Frederick County. Using up homegrown potatoes as the lean seasons come to an end. Practicality even in decadence. Inadvertently creating something special and new. While my ugly little rectangles puffed up on the kitchen counter, I silently thanked Eva Reeder.
As I pulled fresh Kinklings from the oil, the small kitchen briefly became the center of the party. A helper picked each warm, fluffy little box from the paper towels and shook them in a bag of cinnamon sugar before piling them onto plates. They were swiftly scooped up and devoured before we all returned outside.
Gathering on a Tuesday is a pretty tall order for many of us these days, so the host’s annual Fastnacht bonfire is on a Saturday night. People wore masks and drank cider. Dry Christmas trees were tossed into the fire, going up in a bright blaze, a fitting goodbye to winter and a reminder of the bright days to come.
Recipe:
- 2 Cups mashed potato
- 1 Cup sugar
- .5 Cup lard*
- 3 eggs
- 1 Teaspoon salt
- vanilla
- 1 Pint milk
- 2 packages dry yeast
Cook potatoes in salt water, when done, drain and mash. Add sugar, lard, eggs, salt, warm milk, yeast and vanilla. Add flour the same as bread except not as stiff. Let raise double roll out and cut. Let raise again before baking 1/2 hour. Drop them in hot lard to cover and turn up-side down to bake.
*I used butter in case there were any vegetarians in my midst
Recipe from St. Mark Lutheran Church Recipes. Everfaithful Bible Class. 1970s.
