A beautiful cool Saturday morning with high white clouds and silver blue sky. I met a man with a little puppy, a deep molasses brown Boykin Spaniel. It is interesting that this registered small hunting dog, now renowned for it's water and land retrieval abilities, had an ancester who was a stray found just blocks away near the Presbyterian Church in Spartanburg. The man who found him called him "Dumpy" and gave him to his friend Whit Boykin of the Camden area who needed a dog that was light and compact enough to fit in a boat for hunting on Lake Wateree. Dumpy's progeny are now history, the breed, the Boykin Spaniel.
Along the way, I see the long pulpy legumes hanging from the Honey Locust Tree. The old people used to make Locust beer from the pulp. (There is a Black Locust Tree whose legumes are poisonous. I do not know where it grows So beware.)
Locust Beer from the Old Time and Modern Cookbook:
Locust Beans Sugar Water
"Get locust and break up and put in a wood barrel. Take a handful of broomstraw and put pieces crisscross in different layers in the bottom of the barrel like a rail fence. Put the locust on top of the broom straw and pour boiling water over them. Add a quart of sugar. Tie a cloth on top of the barrel. When that sours, take out everything and strain through a thin flour sack."
People " used to drink locust beer with persimmon pone .... the locust beer was real pretty, the color of broomstraw and kind of like the beer they drink today. Persimmons can also be put into the locust beer. Put them on the bottom on top of the broomstraw."
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