On December 1, 2022 the Folger’s virtual book club discussed Black Cake by Charmaine Wilkerson. To prepare for the discussion, we pulled together a list of Folger resources related to food and food pathways.
- EXPERIMENT in the kitchen with recipes from the Folger collection
- Early modern recipe combinations to get you through the winter
- Taffety Tarts: How Folger manuscript recipes helped a 17th-century pastry make it into the Oxford English Dictionary
- Mince pies and mirth: Transcribed 17th-century recipes
- LEARN about food pathways
- Making rum in unexpected places
- A spoonful of sugar helps the medicine go down
- Before ‘Farm to Table’: Early Modern Foodways and Cultures
- EXPLORE the connections between black cake and Emily Dickinson
- The Messy History of Emily Dickinson’s Black Cake Recipe
- Make Emily Dickinson’s Black Birthday Cake with The SugaChef
- CONTINUE the conversation with this year’s Emily Dickinson Birthday Tribute
We would like to thank the following organization for its generous support of this program
Join us for a future event
On View: Mandy Cano Villalobos
On View: Mandy Cano Villalobos
In this small solo exhibition, artist Mandy Cano Villalobos harnesses the leftover materials of home, belonging, and cultural identity to draw attention to the lasting legacies of injustice and environmental damage that are a consequence of early modern colonization and empire building.
Fri, Feb 20, 2026 – Sun, April, 5, 2026
Blackwork Embroidery with Heidi Henderson
Blackwork Embroidery with Heidi Henderson
Celebrate Women's History Month with a drop-in embroidery program with Folger Artist Fellow Heidi Henderson, who will be demonstrating the early modern technique of blackwork embroidery.
Sat, Mar 07 — Fri, Mar 13, 2026
Shakespeare Exhibition
Our Shakespeare Exhibition
See the Folger First Folios, learn more about Shakespeare and his plays, and explore the complexities of his cultural legacy.
Ongoing
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