Dinner at captain’s table was adventure in itself

WHEN we step aboard a car ferry, take a pleasure boat ride at a seaside resort or even holiday on a cruise ship, we’re not really going to miss any of the mod cons we expect to make life comfortable at home. From the basics of flushing loos, showers and decent beds to wi-fi, five-star cuisine, golf ranges and Sky Sports, pretty much anything is possible. Life on the ocean wave does not present the long-drawn-out flea and lice-bitten experience endured by pioneers hundreds of years ago.

While enjoying a cocktail on deck or watching out for the first sight of dry land as your ship is expertly guided by cutting-edge electronic technology, it’s easy to forget the perils and privations that the great explorers and their trusty crews suffered in order to discover and chart the world, bringing back knowledge that would further our understanding of what lay beyond what had in ages before been considered as “off the edge” of a flat map of the world.

The likes of Christopher Columbus, Ferdinand Magellan and James Cook usually sailed away for years, leaving behind families who were not sure when – or if – they would return.

Cook was born the son of a farmworker in 1728 near Middlesbrough and later settled in Whitby. He left his job with a coal merchant to join the Royal Navy, and learned to survey and chart coastal waters while serving in North America. In 1769, the planet Venus was due to pass in front of the Sun, a rare event visible only in the southern hemisphere. The British government sent an expedition to observe the phenomenon, with a secondary agenda of searching for the fabled southern continent. Cook was chosen to command the HMS Endeavour, and among those on board were astronomer Charles Green and young botanist, Joseph Banks.

Much is known of their encounters on dry land, the people, animals and plants they observed, and their impressions of the topography and coastline of the lands they visited. But what of the seemingly endless days aboard ship, when storms raged or the sun baked their skin and they possibly dreamed of a plate of freshly cooked stew and a bed that wasn’t damp? What happened when the expedition was running into its third year, food supplies were exhausted, and the fish were simply not biting?

At the Captain Cook Memorial Museum in Whitby the team have looked at the life and work of the great local man from almost every angle. But never before have they mounted an exhibition that views the explorer’s adventures through the prism of food, and this angle on Cook’s story provides a fascinating shaft of light. After all, how many of the greatest minds in the world would not have survived to tell their tales of derring-do had they not (sometimes in desperate circumstances) found the wherewithal to stay alive?

In an exhibition called Fish and Ships, curators have brought together artefacts to tell the story of how Cook and co ate their way around the planet, even when the going was extremely rough and what little food was left in the galley was riddled with weevils.

“It’s great to be able to give a fresh perspective on a well-known story,” says Sophie Forgan, chairman of the trustees of the Museum and a former university history lecturer, who also researches the CCHM’s exhibitions. Most of the items in the show circumnavigated the globe with Cook on one or more of his great journeys.

“On each voyage they had to take huge supplies of food, but even so they wouldn’t take more than two years’ worth. This would include live chickens, goats for milk and cattle, salt beef, salt pork and dried foods like peas, oats, raisins and a small amount of flour, which didn’t keep too well. There was a huge problem of vermin – cockroaches, rats and weevils – so that would take care of some of the supplies. The Admiralty set down a strict rule about the size of proper ‘square meals’ (served on a square plate) that each sailor must eat, with set rations of butter, cheese, beer and grog each week. Cook was always meticulous about food. He had a cook and a cook’s assistant, often a young lad, and they learned to cook whatever could be bartered for in lands visited along the way. Sailors also fished from the deck, catching bonito or shark or whatever was around to add to the table. John Thompson, the cook on the Endeavour, had only one hand, so the services of his young assistant were essential.”

The salt meat would become very tough and stiff to eat, so it would be dragged in the water behind the ship to soften it up and get rid of some salt. Sometimes it attracted a shark, and they would be lucky enough to haul that in for dinner. Cook set a fine example in many ways, and he would tuck into whatever weird bird, fish or mammal his crew managed to catch. The only crew rebellion over food came when the Captain sat down in front of a plate of oily, blubbery walrus, says Forgan.

A captain was expected to keep a fine table for visitors who came aboard, with good china and glassware, silver cutlery, pepper pot, nutmeg grater and linen tablecloth. At some point Cook had picked up a fine china dinner service, but as the crew returned from the third epic voyage (the one which Cook did not survive), food ran out and the dinner service had to be sold in the Orkney Islands so that food could be bought for the final leg of the journey. The museum has borrowed a few pieces back for the new exhibition. Forgan and her husband also picked up exhibits on a recent trip to New Zealand.

“We found a beautiful early depiction of a manuka plant in a second hand book shop. The manuka was one of the plants they discovered there which the locals used to brew tea from, and which was also known as the tea tree plant, still believed to have medicinal properties today. The Natural History Museum in London lent us dried samples from the actual plants Cook brought back from his first voyage. They were also able to make great use of the journals kept by the young, handsome Banks, whose entries included details instructions on how to cook albatross.

“Other surviving recipes include one for ‘shag pie’ made from a bird that’s like a cormorant. As Captain Cook no doubt told his men, ‘hunger is a most excellent sauce’.” • Fish and Ships is at the Captain Cook Memorial Museum, Grape Street, Whitby, until the end of October. Tel 01947 601900, www.cookmuseumwhitby.co.uk.