Baltimore’s Front Street Theatre had undergone “extensive alterations and improvements” in 1850. Carpenters Carnan & Eckert built out a parquet for standing room theatergoers. “Skillful” painter John Delpher was hired to apply a fresh coat of paint. New curtains were hung, and 600 cushioned seats with spring-backs were installed.
A decade and a half later, Abraham Lincoln would be nominated as the republican presidential candidate in “the old Front Street Theatre”; through the years the theater was scene of the occasional theft or shooting. Those events would fade from memory long before the concerts that necessitated the 1850 renovations.
Hundreds of Baltimore citizens gathered in the rain on Monday December 9th, 1850 for a chance at tickets to see Jenny Lind, “The Swedish Nightingale,” live in concert. Front row tickets went for the modern equivalent of a few thousand dollars. Many would-be concertgoers were dismayed that many of the remaining tickets – about 1900 in all, were quickly bought up for resale.
For the next few days, ads appeared in the Baltimore Sun, offering tickets to see Jenny Lind. Businesses that didn’t have tickets to sell advertised hats to wear to the concert, “Jenny Lind Bouquets” for the concert, “Jenny Lind Candy” bearing “a perfect likeness of the divine songstress.”
Hopefully I’m posting this recipe in time to catch any post-holiday abundance of fresh cranberries available in grocery stores near you. It’s finally cold in Maryland, and a warm muffin from the oven falls somewhere on the list of comforts for chilly days… probably.
There are quite a few recipes online for Orange-Cranberry Muffins and it is likely that they are all pretty good. This particular recipe, however, uses the aforementioned fresh cranberries. Also, it is attributed in the “Southern Heritage Cookbook Library” to the historic Robert Morris Inn on the Eastern Shore.
The Inn is built upon the one-time home of Morris, father of the “financier of the revolution.” The latter also once lived there as well. He’s the one everyone cares about with that whole Declaration of Independence signing and whatnot.
The elder Morris was a merchant who imported goods into the busy little port in Oxford. At the time Oxford and Annapolis were the bustling ports of Maryland – Baltimore rose to significance later.
1745 advertisement for imported goods
After Morris’ death in 1750, the house was converted to a hotel. Through the decades the inn changed names and owners and expanded too many times to list (which didn’t stop the current management from trying). Most of the presently visible exterior was constructed around 1870.
Today, visiting the inn from the west makes for a quaint trip; taking the Oxford-Bellevue Ferry across the Tred Avon River, the inn is the first prominent Oxford building that comes into view.
Oxford-Bellevue Ferry
For the record, I tend to believe that the muffin recipe is a
more recent product of the famed inn. When Robert Morris, Sr. arrived in
Oxford in 1738, the word ‘muffin’ would still have referred to what we
now think of as an English muffin. Which makes sense when you think about it.
Newspaper searches turn up a flurry of mentions of the Robert Morris Inn in the early 1950s. The Inn has remained a well-known charming getaway ever since. The muffin recipe probably came to be some time along the way.
Today the inn is owned by chef Mark
Salter. This past summer I enjoyed a nice lunch there, although muffins were not on the menu. The surrounding historic town of Oxford is lovely, with a tiny river beach and a nearby destination for amazing ice cream.
A lot of us here on the other side of Maryland may not be passing through Oxford until beach season, but these delicious muffins could be a fall and winter staple.
Recipe:
½ teaspoon grated orange rind
¼ cup plus 2 tablespoons orange juice
1 egg, beaten
2 tablespoons butter, melted
1 cup flour
½ cup sugar
¾ teaspoon baking powder
¼ teaspoon baking soda
½ teaspoon salt
½ cup chopped fresh cranberries
¼ cup chopped pecans (I used walnuts)
Beat egg in a small mixing bowl, then beat in orange rind, juice, and butter. Set aside.
In a medium bowl, combine flour, sugar, baking powder, soda, and salt.
Make a well in center of dry ingredients; pour in orange juice mixture.
Stir just until dry ingredients are moistened. Gently fold in
cranberries and pecans.
Spoon batter into greased muffin pans. Bake at 350° for 25 minutes. Remove from pans, and serve warm.
Recipe adapted from Southern Heritage (Oxmoor House)
