If you go to Washington D.C. make sure to visit the White House Visitor Center. While you need an invitation to visit the White House, the White House Visitor Center is free and offers fun exhibitions to enjoy with your kids such as the foods that some American presidents ordered. Ready to start this tour with us?

Presidents’ Tableware | White House

If you have the chance to visit the White House in Washington D.C., make sure to have a look at the beautiful tableware. Choose the design that you like the most and imagine, for one moment, how grandiose the state dinners are. Our Teuko family could not decide whether we would set table with President’s Clinton golden plates or with President Lincoln’s beautifully illustrated plates. Which set would you use?

Presidents’ Favorite Foods | White House Visitor Center

Not far from the iconic home of the American Presidents, there is the White House Visitor Center. The White House Visitor Center is free and accessible anytime you want during their operating hours. They have complementary artifacts and very fun facts exhibited there, such as the foods that some American presidents ordered.

Here are the photographs we took and the retranscription we made from this exhibition, hoping you will enjoy this as well, wherever you are in the world!

Squirrel Soup

“After President Garfield was shot in 1881 (President Garfield was the 20th president of the United States, serving from March 4, 1881, until his death by assassination six and a half months later), doctors suggested that the president’s favorite squirrel soup might revive his appetite. In the White House cookbook from 1894, steward Hugo Ziemann recommended using ‘THREE OR FOUR GOOD-SIZED SQUIRRELS’ and declared the soup to be ‘very good.”

Rice Pudding

Ulysses S. Grant was an American soldier and politician who served as the 18th president of the United States from 1869 to 1877. “A military man of simple tastes, President Grant brought an army quartermaster to run the White House kitchen, but First Lady Julia Grant soon replaced him with Italian steward Valentino Melah. Melah considered plain rice pudding, the presidents’ favorite dessert, TOO UNSOPHISTICATED FOR THE WHITE HOUSE, and experimented with more complicated versions.”

Salted Almonds

William Howard Taft was the 27th president of the United States and the tenth chief justice of the United States, the only person to have held both offices. “Weighing more than 300 pounds, President Taft had perhaps THE LARGEST PRESIDENTIAL APPETITE. Dinners typically involved multiple courses, including lobster stew, salmon, roast beef, cold tongue and ham, and potato salad, followed by pudding, cake, fruit, and coffee. Taft especially enjoyed salty almonds and snacked on them between meals.”

Jelly Beans

“More than THREE TONS OF JELLY BEANS arrived at the White House for President Reagan’s inaugural festivities in 1981. Reagan (who served as the 40th president of the United States from 1981 to 1989) ate jelly beans during cabinet meetings, in the Oval Office, and even on Air Force One, using a special holder designed to prevent the jelly beans from spilling out during turbulence.”

Fried Chicken

Harry S. Truman was the 33rd president of the United States from 1945 to 1953, succeeding upon the death of Franklin D. Roosevelt after serving as vice president. “One evening, White House maître d’hôtel Alonso Fields received a LAST-MINUTE CALL that 14 of the president’s senior advisors needed dinner. With the rest of the staff taking the day off, Fields sprang into action and prepared fried chicken – one of the president’s favorite foods – along with vegetables, biscuits, and dessert.”

Who would like to try the squirrel soup? For our Teuko kids, no doubt, they chose fried chicken, rice pudding, and jelly beans! 🙂 Discovering these fun foodie facts about the American Presidents was enjoyable by the whole family, and if you visit the White House Visitor Center, bonus! there is extra fun for the kids as they can pledge to become Junior Rangers! 😉

Later on, I packed fried chicken and rice pudding in my kids’ lunch boxes. They were happy to have somehow a presidential lunch to bring to school! 🙂

If you ever pack a presidential lunch for your kids too, share it with #Teuko on social media or upload it directly on Teuko.com! We would be especially amazed to see a squirrel soup! 🙂