My mother knew how to dress a chicken. I’m (happily) clueless about how to even approach dressing a bird. A hundred years ago,  dressing a chicken was apparently considered such an important skill that a home economics textbook contained directions for how to do it. Times sure have changed!

In case you ever need to dress a chicken, here are the directions:

To Dress a Chicken

1. Remove feathers by pulling them out, after plunging the fowl into boiling water and holding it there for a moment or two. Fowls are sometimes picked without scalding, if the work can be done immediately after they are killed.
2. Singe the plucked fowl by holding it in a flame of gas or burning paper, being sure that all parts are exposed during the process so that all hairs are removed.
3. Cut off the head, if it has not been removed. The neck may be removed by pushing back the skin and cutting it off.
4. Remove the feet in cutting and breaking the legs at the joints.
5. Make an incision one inch above the vent and crosswise between the legs. Draw out the intestines and other organs carefully, cutting away the vent. Remove from the mass the heart, liver and gizzard, being careful not to break the gall bladder which lies under the liver. Cut the gall bladder away carefully.
6. Remove the skin from around the gizzard; open the gizzard and remove the inner skin and contents.
7. Wash the liver, gizzard and heart, squeezing the latter to remove any blood. These organs are known as the “giblets.”
8. The crop and windpipe may be removed at the neck. Do this without breaking the crop, or tearing the skin at the neck.
9. Remove all pinfeathers with a sharp-pointed small knife. Remove the oil bag from the tail.
10. Wash the chicken well in cold water, both inside and out. Dry  with a cloth. The fowl is now ready to be used from baking.
11. When a fowl is to be cut into pieces, as for stewing, it is usually convenient to remove the wings and legs before removing the intestines and other organs from the body.

Poultry should always be allowed to stand several hours after dressing before it is cooked.

Elementary Home Economics (1921) by Mary Lockwood Matthews

Some foods have retained their popularity across the years. Bacon is one of those foods. Here are hundred-year-old directions for frying bacon:

To Fry Bacon

Use a thick, or what is called a well-seasoned, frying pan. Put the slices of bacon in the cold pan and set over a slow fire until cooked, pour off the fat and set aside, not mixing it with other frying fats, for it is best kept separate for cooking eggs and frying slices of graham bread. Put some of the slices of bacon back into the pan to crisp, for those who like it that way, and toss about. 

American Cookery (August/September, 1921) 

I enjoy reading the questions at the end of chapters in old textbooks. They provide so much insight into what the book author considered important. These questions in a hundred-year-old home economics textbook at the end of a section about milk made me realize that the issues and concerns were somewhat different back then.

In case you are wondering, here is what it said earlier in the book about clean milk:

Clean milk is the only safe milk. Dirty milk may contain disease germs that cause typhoid fever, tuberculosis, or other diseases. Clean milk comes from clean cows kept in clean barns. The milk must be handled by persons with clean hands and clean clothes, and it must be placed in clean pails, bottles, or pans. 

If milk is purchased from a store or dairy wagon it should be in bottles, tightly covered. The bottles must be kept in a cool place where there are no flies. If a bottle of milk is put in the refrigerator it must always be tightly covered. 

Elementary Home Economics (1921) by Mary Lockwood Matthews 

The foreword to a 1921 cookbook begins with this quote. Nice quote – but I was curious about who Henry T. Finck was and why I should care about what he thought.

A quick google search turned up information about Henry Finck. He was both the music editor and the epicurean editor at the New York Evening Post. According to Oregon Encyclopedia:

Music critic Henry T. Finck spent his childhood on an apple orchard near the Christian agricultural colony of Aurora in the lower Willamette Valley. The first Oregonian to graduate from Harvard, Finck was a prolific writer and critic of contemporary music. He also wrote about horticulture, romantic love, travel, food, and his Oregon boyhood.

Photo source: Ladies Home Journal (July, 1911)

Here’s a few table etiquette rules that appeared in a 1921 home economics textbook: 

Table Manners

• Never go to the table unless hands and face are clean and hair is in order. 
• Stand behind your chair until the hostess takes her seat. 
• The napkins should be laid across the lap without being entirely opened out. Never stick the corner inside the collar. If the napkin is to be used again, fold it neatly before leaving the table. 
• Always sit erect in the chair while eating. Keep the arms and elbows off the table. 
• Never eat hurriedly. 
• Do not talk when the mouth is full of food. 
• Ask politely for dishes to be passed, rather than reach across the table. 
• Never complain about the food. If it is not the kind desired, it need not be eaten. 
• If it is necessary to leave the table before the others are ready, ask to be excused by the hostess. 
• Do not talk about disagreeable things during the meal. 

Source: Elementary Home Economics (1921) by Mary Lockwood Matthews