Article by K.M. Wehrstein/ Photography by Thomasz Szumski 

As we’ve shown in these pages, Muskoka cuisine is second to none in the world. But what did people eat and how did they cook here in the pioneer days – the time of logging, steamships and woodstoves, before the invention of electric stoves, cellphone timer apps and recipe websites? What recipes did they use?

We will start answering these questions in the slice of living history that is Muskoka Heritage Place’s Pioneer Village in Huntsville. The Village’s narrators – Village staff in period dress – describe and demonstrate for visitors how things were done back then, in genuine period buildings. Visiting the Maw House and sampling scones baked there by the narrator portraying Mrs. Maw is a time warp.

Originally located off Rish Lake Road east of Novar, the log house was built by the Mills family on land ceded to them in 1890, according to Muskoka Heritage Place manager Jillian Jordan. After passing through the hands of several other owners, it was bought by Katrine sawmill owners Nawton and Minnie Maw in 1932, then donated to the Muskoka Board of Education and dismantled by Huntsville High students in 1970. In 1984 it was donated to the Village and moved there.

“Settlers baked on Saturdays,” explains Jordan. “They would bake everything for that week on one day. You can imagine how hot a small house like this would get with the cookstove going, especially in the summer months. Early settlers would have cooked in an open hearth, with the baked goods sitting in the fire. If they were fortunate, they would have an oven built in or there would be a community oven. By the time there was permanent settlement by European people in Muskoka, they would have had stoves.”

Maw House has an antique cookstove in operation daily from the May long weekend to Thanksgiving. There isn’t a dedicated head baker; the work is shared by narrators who have a special devotion to traditional baking.

“Our narrators, all of whom live in and around Huntsville, have a variety of backgrounds,” says Jordan. “But they all have one thing that sees them returning every year – passion for sharing our local history. Some have been a part of the team for close to 20 years.”

Narrators who want to bake the old-fashioned way are taught period preparation of bannock – a type of bread original to the local First Nations – with students on school visits. For tourist visitor, they make scones.

The scone originated in Scotland, according to Jordan. I personally have a 1927 British book, delightfully entitled Modern Cookery, with a dozen scone recipes that call for all manner of ingredients including lemon, sultanas and potatoes. Blueberry scones will be mentioned below. But the Village narrators keep it simple and Scottish.

“We are fortunate in that we have a vast archival collection which includes family diaries and recipe books where we have sourced recipes such as this,” says Jordan. The precise origin of the recipe is lost to time, but it’s been used at the Village since the 1980s.

“Our scones are accompanied with freshly made butter,” enthuses Jordan. “They are tasty, buttery, slightly sweet and light. Many visitors try to sneak seconds and thirds!”

The British tradition of high tea is said to have originated during the Victorian era at the latest, and of course came to Muskoka with British immigrants and tourists. It is maintained to this day in restaurants and tea houses, including at the Blue Willow Tea Shop in Gravenhurst.

Established in 2006, Blue Willow was bought in early 2019 by business partners Pamela Harris and Alison McKinnon. When COVID struck the next year, the tasteful and resourceful co-owners pivoted away from restaurant service to retail, china sales on Etsy (they keep $200,000 worth of china stock) and other COVID-proof strategies to survive. Harris and McKinnon came to love selling retail enough to continue, so you can buy all manner of UK-imported food items, not to mention 36 varieties of tea plus tea accessories and other British-style goods at the front checkout.

High tea is all that Blue Willow serves, with themes that change monthly and for special holidays. However, the three-tier spread always contains a cucumber sandwich – a delicacy so beloved by the English that searching online for “Queen Elizabeth’s cucumber sandwich recipe” with some discernment will lead you to the correct recipe.

“We always include the cucumber cream cheese sandwich because it’s the most classic item, it’s a staple,” says Pamela Harris. “With the crusts cut off, it’s a dainty upper-class delicacy, with its roots in 19th century India.” Looking for relief in the sweltering Indian heat, the occupying British soldiers and officers began to make cucumber sandwiches at tea-time and tea houses, “because cucumbers have such a hydrating quality to them as a vegetable,” she explains. “Now it’s a quintessential part of British culture.”

But before we get to the Blue Willow cucumber sandwich recipe with its secret ingredient, let’s savour a tour of the high tea presentation themed “British Classics,” last served at Blue Willow in March 2024. A high tea is a delectable combination of small bursts of flavour, taking you through a gradual transition upwards from savoury (tier one) to semi-sweet (tier two) to very sweet (tier three), served with, of course, tea.

Thus on the beginning tier of “British Classics” you find the ubiquitous cucumber cream cheese sandwich, an egg salad tea sandwich, a smoked sausage roll with flaky pastry, a mini herb quiche and the wee plowman’s – a small skewer with cuts of ham and two cheeses – a nod to the more hearty and meaty working-class high tea.

The second tier combines blueberry and plain scones with imported British clotted cream that is delectable and a super-sweet strawberry preserve. If you dab the cream on a plain scone, it’s perfectly savoury, but you can also blast your tastebuds with double-berry sweetness in one bite if you so choose.

The very decadent tier three combines a melt-in-your-mouth toffee pudding, a lemon curd tart with big blueberries and fresh mint, a crispy shortbread cookie, a British-style fancy brownie and a chocolate-dipped strawberry.

All three tiers are delicious and accompanied with tea served in a proper china service. The steeping time for your tea selection is measured using a multiple-chambered hourglass.

Key in the experience is the joy of taking the time required to savour all these bites – life doesn’t get better than this. Like many, the focus on busyness and trying to get everything done hinders our social time and connections. An afternoon high tea takes you outside of time, into another world of contemplation, flavour and, if enjoyed with another, conversation. In the old days, life was more slow-paced and, in that way, arguably, more sane. A taste of this slower pace is good for your soul.

“The dill is what makes our cucumber sandwich special,” says Harris. “It’s not standard, not classic, gives it a little oomph. The sandwich is a little bit artistic because you layer the cucumber in a certain way, cut off the crusts. It’s such a simple thing, but there’s so much care put into the preparation of it.”

She’s absolutely right about the dill. While the warm and hence buttery cream cheese provides richness, the herb’s special zing makes this gentle, soft, moist and, yes, cooling sandwich into a flavour treasure.

Let’s shift now from food to décor for your return-to-traditions Muskoka feast. Eating is, after all, a total sensory experience; “You eat with your eyes first,” pastry chef Christine Chen shared in 2021.

What is the core goal for decorating? Lena Patten, owner of Hilltop Interiors in Rosseau, talks about “thoughtful décor,” “dialogue” and “intention” in decorating, and it’s all about how you want to make people in the space feel.

“It means form an intention and decorate to it,’’ shares Patten. “People feel like they’re special because I’ve created this beautiful tablescape.”

A Toronto native, Patten attended university in Guelph, then returned to the city to earn a fine arts degree at the Ontario College of Art and Design. Always interested in interior decorating, she would prowl interiors shops with a similarly inclined friend but started her career by going into marketing. After moving with her husband Randy to Muskoka, where both had enjoyed family cottaging as youngsters, she worked for another interior design business for four years. Then in 2000 when an attractive antique building in central Rosseau came up for sale, she bought it and started Hilltop Interiors, blending her passion for design with Randy’s for renovation.

“We are dedicated to creating spaces as unique as our clients,” she says. “The spaces balance form and function with emotional resonance, plus they tell a story, inspired by the client’s lifestyle and grounded in quality, timeless elements I’d welcome in my own home.” Nature and tradition are reliable inspirations to this designer, as you will see.

That includes dinner traditions. “While our two boys were growing up here, Sunday family dinners were very important, and everyone was welcome,” Patten reminisces. Neighbours and friends of the kids would attend. “Numbers ranged from 20 to 30 people on average.”

So, what does she recommend for dinner décor returning to old Muskoka traditions in summer? “I always like to theme things around the season,” shares Patten.

“Celebrate the charm of your grandmothers’ or aunts’ heirloom pieces,” advises Patten. “Pair them with modern dishes; create a mix of new, old, and a dash of vintage, balancing nostalgia with sophistication.” Mixing vintage or heirloom pieces with new ones gives a personal touch to your settings.

“Create a timeless type of dialogue – which is our motto at Hilltop – that looks curated but not cluttered. The timeless part is the important part.” That world outside of time that’s created at Blue Willow? It’s the same principles at home.

“Inviting settings, décor with a soul, soft lighting with the use of dimmed lights, or candle holders or lanterns… Play with subtle contrasts: woven rattan vases, recycled bubble wine glasses, modern dishes,” says Patten. “Layers of texture with cotton placements, seagrass chargers, all to create depth, over the smooth maple tabletop. Use handwritten place cards. Evoke summer’s breezy vibe with white accents in cotton or linen, paired with wildflowers from your garden or the fields.” The colours are light, the atmosphere is cozy yet airy, summery and fresh, with a nod to picnics in the meadow.

“Summer cottage dining,” Patten muses, “is about telling stories, clinking glasses, laughing, soft music in the background – big band era with Frank Sinatra on a Saturday evening is my go-to – against summer’s magical background.” Then she adds a crucial point, take this down: “All senses covered.”

Does Patten have tips for how to acquire the antique items that are necessary for true return-to-traditions dinner designs? “If I travel, I like to stop in to antique shops,” she says, sadly noting, “there aren’t as many as there used to be.” She recommends an antique shop that is her neighbour in Rosseau, especially on weekends when it hosts additional vendors, so it’s “more like a market.” It’s next to Memorial Hall on the corner of Victoria Street and Highway 141, and its sign just says “Antiques.”

Out and about or at home, summer is a perfect time to return to traditions. Setting the table, using a traditional recipe or following the stages of a high tea all harken back to simpler times. Take a moment and return to traditions… and bon appetit.

 Muskoka Heritage Place Traditional Scones

Muskoka Heritage Place

Ingredients

2 cups all-purpose flour

3 tsp baking powder

½ tsp salt

3 Tbsp white sugar

2 Tbsp shortening or unsalted butter

2 large eggs

⅓ cup milk

Method

1. Mix flour, baking powder, salt and sugar together in a bowl.

2. Cut shortening/butter into small pieces, add to flour mixture and mix until it resembles coarse sand.

3. In a separate bowl, beat eggs and add milk to them.

4. Add milk and egg mixture to flour mixture and mix lightly.

5. Roll out dough to ½ inch thickness and cut into 2½-inch rounds.

6. Bake at 425°F until golden brown. (Usually 15 minutes or so; check at eight minutes.)

Yield: 24 scones.

Chef’s Tips

• Non-dairy milks like soy or almond milks can be substituted for cow’s milk. The higher the milk fat content, the richer the dough.

• Shortening or butter? They both tenderize gluten (to avoid hard, dense scones) and add moisture – but have different flavours and textures and can even affect the shape.

• Mix lightly means don’t overmix the final mixture, or you’ll end up with tough, dense dough. You don’t want to develop the gluten like you do with breadmaking.

• Our old scone recipe doesn’t provide a baking time; judge by eyeing the dough for colour doneness. It’s important the stove is not too hot, as it will result in scorched scone bottoms and raw dough in the centre. However, you don’t want the stove to be too cold; you want a quick rise in the dough as this will result in soft, flaky layers.

• Thermometer use with the woodstove is permitted, period-wise, because the mercury thermometer was invented in 1714, well prior to Muskoka pioneer days, by Daniel Gabriel Fahrenheit.

Cucumber and Dill Cream Cheese Tea Sandwich  

- Blue Willow Tea Shop

Ingredients

4 oz. cream cheese at room

temperature

2 Tbsp fresh chopped dill

Kosher salt and freshly ground

pepper, to taste

6 slices of good quality fresh baked

white bread

½ large English seedless cucumber,

thinly sliced

Method

1. In a small bowl combine the cream cheese and dill. Season with salt and pepper.

2. Lay out slices of bread and spread cream cheese thinly and evenly on each slice. Arrange the cucumber slices in rows overlapping slightly until the cream cheese is covered.

3. Assemble sandwiches, carefully cut off crusts and cut into quarters.

Serve immediately.

Yield: 12 tea sandwiches

Tea pairing: English Breakfast or Queen Elizabeth