Christopher Kimball’s Milk Street Radio
Oct 30, 2026 · 59 min · 26 segments
We’re serving up an extra frightful hour of Milk Street Radio! Folklorist Lesley Bannatyne reveals the mischievous origins of the jack-o’-lantern, and Oaxacan tour guide Gabriel Sánchez shares…
Christopher KimballHost:max_bytes(150000):strip_icc()/stella-parks-1fc39c6ef56e4c41b1481dbe8d2125b7.jpg)
Stella ParksGuestSusan BenjaminGuest
Lesley BannatyneGuestIn Shakespeare's Macbeth, three witches fill their cauldron with bits of real and mythical animals, plants, and even people.
But what might the first play's audiences have thought of their gory recipe? It turns out that early modern women and men used similar ingredients to make medicines and even cast spells.
Historical books on animals, plants, and minerals, as well as early recipe books, confirm that what feels spooky in this scene would have felt a little more normal in the 17th century.
For example, the witch's wolf's teeth and eye of newt would be familiar to readers of English books about animals.
One author noted that the eye of a lizard was part of a remedy for fever, and the teeth of a wolf, being rubbed upon the gums of young infants, doth open them, whereby the teeth may the easier come forth.
On the other hand, some of the witch's ingredients might also refer to plants.
For example, herbalists recommended the plant houndstongue for various ailments, including hair loss.
Even the more mythical-sounding ingredients, like the witch's mummy and dragon, appear in early remedies.
Both are recorded in 17th-century recipe collections.
One manuscript includes a recipe to treat bruises that includes mummy, or mumia.
This ingredient was a resinous fluid derived from real mummies, and it was sold by English apothecaries.
So instead of the local drugstore filling your prescription, the apothecary could sell you mummy for you to make your own medicines.
When these recipes require dragon, they probably refer to what we now call dragon lily or voodoo lily used in treatments for coughs, bleeding, and other ailments.
So while the witch's potion certainly inspires a shiver, audience members at early performances might also have recognized them as diabolically domestic.
Emily is the Associate Curator of the Wongastein Historical Library of Biology and Medicine at the University of Minnesota.
In Shakespeare's Macbeth, three witches fill their cauldron with bits of real and mythical animals, plants, and even people.
But what might the first play's audiences have thought of their gory recipe? It turns out that early modern women and men used similar ingredients to make medicines and even cast spells.
Historical books on animals, plants, and minerals, as well as early recipe books, confirm that what feels spooky in this scene would have felt a little more normal in the 17th century.
For example, the witch's wolf's teeth and eye of newt would be familiar to readers of English books about animals.
One author noted that the eye of a lizard was part of a remedy for fever, and the teeth of a wolf, being rubbed upon the gums of young infants, doth open them, whereby the teeth may the easier come forth.
On the other hand, some of the witch's ingredients might also refer to plants.
For example, herbalists recommended the plant houndstongue for various ailments, including hair loss.
Even the more mythical-sounding ingredients, like the witch's mummy and dragon, appear in early remedies.
Both are recorded in 17th-century recipe collections.
One manuscript includes a recipe to treat bruises that includes mummy, or mumia.
This ingredient was a resinous fluid derived from real mummies, and it was sold by English apothecaries.
So instead of the local drugstore filling your prescription, the apothecary could sell you mummy for you to make your own medicines.
When these recipes require dragon, they probably refer to what we now call dragon lily or voodoo lily used in treatments for coughs, bleeding, and other ailments.
So while the witch's potion certainly inspires a shiver, audience members at early performances might also have recognized them as diabolically domestic.
Emily is the Associate Curator of the Wongastein Historical Library of Biology and Medicine at the University of Minnesota.
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