Spring Peas With Mint Recipe

Peas were President Jefferson’s favorite food. His relative, Mary Randolph, kept a record of his recipes and in her 1860 cookbook, ‘The Virginia Housewife or, Methodical Cook’ instructs “To have them in perfection, they must be quite young, gathered early in the morning, kept in a cool place, and not shelled until they are to be dressed; put salt in the water, and when it boils, put in the peas; boil them quick twenty or thirty minutes, according to their age… add a little mint chopped very fine… put in a bit of butter, and serve then up quite hot.” — Maite Gomez-Réjon. Adapted from the ArtBites tour of The Metropolitan Museum of Art.