{"id":99632,"date":"2024-07-17T11:55:16","date_gmt":"2024-07-17T15:55:16","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/blog.genealogybank.com\/?p=99632"},"modified":"2024-08-16T11:01:45","modified_gmt":"2024-08-16T15:01:45","slug":"an-explorers-dinner","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.genealogybank.com\/blog\/an-explorers-dinner.html","title":{"rendered":"An Explorer\u2019s Dinner"},"content":{"rendered":"

Introduction:<\/em><\/strong> In this article, Gena Philibert-Ortega writes about the unusual dinners served by The Explorers Club in New York City during the past 120 years. Octopus, ants, rooster combs, snake, pickled whale skin and lava worms, anyone? Gena is a genealogist and author of the book \u201cFrom the Family Kitchen.\u201d<\/em><\/p>\n

What did you have for dinner last night? Chances are the food you ate was familiar and not terribly exotic. But for 120 years, adventurous members of New York City\u2019s \u201cThe Explorers Club\u201d have gathered one night a year to honor exploration and their members, and experience bold dining.<\/p>\n

\"Photo:
Photo: room inside first floor of Explorers Club, New York City, 2023. Credit: Gena Philibert-Ortega.<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n

Who are these intrepid diners? \u201cHeadquartered in New York City with a community of Chapters around the world, The Explorers Club has been supporting scientific expeditions of all disciplines, and uniting our members in the bonds of good fellowship for over a century.\u201d (1) Their members have included Theodore Roosevelt, Robert Perry, Buzz Aldrin, and Sylvia Earle. Members have explored the highest mountains and the deepest depths of the oceans in an effort to learn more about our world.<\/p>\n

\"Photo:
Photo: sign on the Explorers Club building, New York City, 2023. Credit: Gena Philibert-Ortega.<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n

Like many organizations, The Explorers Club \u2013 founded in 1904 \u2013 gets together for events throughout the year that include dinner. Unlike most other groups, this dinner finds its way into the newspapers because of how unusual it is. It\u2019s not like the \u201crubber chicken\u201d featured at most large dinner events; different proteins including insects and reptiles are served for a night that is especially memorable.<\/p>\n

\"Photo:
Photo: flag on the Explorers Club building, New York City, 2023. Credit: Gena Philibert-Ortega.<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n

The Explorers Club Dinner at Mid-Century<\/strong><\/p>\n

Historical newspapers provide a glimpse into some of the foods eaten at the Club\u2019s dinner, providing readers with a glimpse of this annual event. The 54th dinner, attended by 600 Explorer Club members and their guests, featured octopus, ants, rooster combs, snake, pickled whale skin and lava worms among other delicacies. This 1958 article gives a few highlights of that year\u2019s dinner.<\/p>\n

\"An
Nome Nugget (Nome, Alaska), 17 March 1958, page 6<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n

Not all explorers are keen to eat the unusual. This article reports:<\/p>\n

And there were plenty of ants takusan. For some reason, the ants takusan didn\u2019t move very fast.<\/p>\n

\u201cThey keep me awake nights,\u201d explained one explorer as he passed over the ants.<\/p>\n

\u201cIt\u2019s all in your mind,\u201d mumbled his companion, who, being an ants takusan man from \u2019way back, piled several on his plate. As he nibbled on the delicacy, he sounded disturbingly as if he were eating a light bulb.<\/p><\/blockquote>\n

However, by the 1950s some explorers felt that the annual dinner had become \u2013 for the most part \u2013 less of a contest of who had the strongest stomach than it had once been, as the more \u201ccreative\u201d food had been ditched for standard conservative fare.<\/p>\n

This 1955 newspaper article accuses the explorers of becoming \u201ctame\u201d with their menu of \u201cAsparagus tips rolled in ham, with pansies in aspic; scraped raw choice beef, peeled shrimp; raw eggs yolk with capers; \u2018passion fruit\u2019 on smoked caribou\u201d instead of the previous year\u2019s alligator eggs and fried termites.<\/p>\n

\"An<\/a>
Boston Traveler (Boston, Massachusetts), 19 March 1955, page 3<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n

Tame is an apt description for some of the dinners since the 1951 dinner \u201ctreated\u201d guests to drinks chilled with glacier ice and supposed \u201cslices of a 250,000-year-old woolly mammoth that had been defrosted from Alaskan glacial ice.\u201d (In 2016, DNA tests on a piece of the meat kept as a souvenir by the Club verified that it was Green Sea Turtle, and not prehistoric Mammoth meat. (2)<\/p>\n

Over time, the annual meal has had brief newspaper coverage that focuses more on the food and less on the event itself. This 1963 mention includes the more unusual \u201cPolar sauerbraten, pate of deer and seal livers, jellied calves\u2019 eyes, and ground squirrel stew\u201d and the more tame \u201cbisque of Mississippi crawfish, roast prime ribs of Brahman beef, duchesse of Ireland potatoes, French string beans amandine, and southern cross salad.\u201d Of course, the term \u201cunusual foods\u201d is subjective; for example, squirrel stew isn\u2019t really that unusual depending on where the person is from.<\/p>\n

\"An<\/a>
Muskegon Chronicle (Muskegon, Michigan), 6 April 1963, page 1<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n

The Explorers Club Dinner 2023<\/strong><\/p>\n

I was honored to attend the 2023 Explorers Club 119th annual dinner as a guest of my son Daniel Ortega, an Explorers Club member. The star-studded event held at the Glass House in New York City capped off days of lectures, awards, and networking opportunities.<\/p>\n

\"Photo:
Photo: insect appetizers served at the Explorers Club 2023 dinner. Credit: Daniel Ortega.<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n

So how is the modern-day Explorers Dinner in contrast to its past dinners? Somewhat tame. The club no longer imports exotic foods for the dinner like they did in the past. Concerns over conservation and sustainability are front and center. The dinner itself was fairly standard for a large event \u2013 no iguana or foreign meats. The only adventure was in the types of appetizers served. Appetizers featured various insects like crickets and beetles. The crickets were described by my son as tasting like \u201cwood.\u201d Unfortunately, I missed the insect table. I\u2019m hoping to be able to get a taste in the future.<\/p>\n

Explore over 330 years of newspapers and historical records in GenealogyBank. Discover your family story! Start a 7-Day Free Trial<\/a><\/p>\n

Note on the header image:<\/strong> fireplace on the first floor of the Explorers Club in New York City. Credit: Rhododendrites; Wikimedia Commons.<\/p>\n

__________________<\/p>\n

(1) \u201cAbout,\u201d The Explorers Club (https:\/\/www.explorers.org\/about\/history-including-famous-firsts\/<\/a>: accessed 3 January 2023).
\n(2) \u201cStudy Proves the Explorers Club Didn\u2019t Really Eat Mammoth at 1950s New York Dinner,\u201d Science Alert (https:\/\/www.sciencealert.com\/study-proves-the-explorers-club-didn-t-really-eat-mammoth-at-1950s-new-york-dinnerL: accessed 3 January 2023).<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

In this article, Gena Philibert-Ortega writes about the unusual dinners served by The Explorers Club in New York City during the past 120 years.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":5,"featured_media":99647,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_acf_changed":false,"_jetpack_memberships_contains_paid_content":false,"footnotes":""},"categories":[12427],"tags":[58873,19013,58872],"class_list":["post-99632","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-food-recipes","tag-annual-dinners","tag-food-and-recipes","tag-the-explorers-club"],"acf":[],"jetpack_sharing_enabled":true,"jetpack_featured_media_url":"https:\/\/www.genealogybank.com\/blog\/wp-content\/uploads\/2024\/07\/photo-0717-2024-featured-graphic-explorers-club-fireplace.jpg","_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.genealogybank.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/99632","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.genealogybank.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.genealogybank.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.genealogybank.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/5"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.genealogybank.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=99632"}],"version-history":[{"count":9,"href":"https:\/\/www.genealogybank.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/99632\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":100231,"href":"https:\/\/www.genealogybank.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/99632\/revisions\/100231"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.genealogybank.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/99647"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.genealogybank.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=99632"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.genealogybank.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=99632"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.genealogybank.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=99632"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}