When shopping for meat, do you ever find it difficult to select the “best” meat? Here’s some hundred-year-old advice:

Selecting Meat

In selecting meat one must consider: (1) the taste of the family with regard to kind and cut; (2) the cost, being sure to note carefully the amount of waste, such as bone, rind, and rough fiber, or fat that cannot be used; (3) the fuel that will be required in cooking; (4) time and labor required for preparation.

The number of individuals in a family influences one in the choice of cuts and the method of cooking. Steaks for broiling should be comparatively thick; therefore, if the family is small a sirloin steak is too large unless only half of it is cooked at a time. A large roast may be used if carefully reheated in various forms.

In addition to the cut, there are certain standards of quality to be observed. The meat from fat animals is of higher food value and of better flavor than that from thin animals. If a cut of meat is excessively fat, there is, of course, a waste, but meat from a comparatively fat animal will be of the best quality. A cut from the round of the best beef is better than the choicest cuts of inferior animals.

Good meat is odorless except for a certain fleshy smell, not tainted, strong, or musty. Meat must be dry on the surface – thick plump, and firm, but not hard to the touch or coarse in fiber; it should feel like velvet and should be easy to cut with a sharp knife. The bones of old animals are white and hard; of young ones, reddish and soft.

Good meat should be well marbled with fat; roasts and chops from mature animals should have a layer of fat on the outside from one-fourth to one-half inch thick.

The Science of Home Making: A Textbook in Home Economics (1915) by Emma M. Pirie

I don’t generally worry about the safety of the water I drink. That wasn’t always true a hundred years ago. Here’s  an abridged version of what a home economics textbook from the early 1900’s  had to say:

Pure water is the most important of our foods. Water may contain impurities that come from decaying vegetable or animal matter, or it may carry the germs of disease, or minute insects or their eggs. Where shallow wells are used, water may wash filth into them. In deep wells, properly protected from insects and animals by high curbs, the water is usually pure because the many layers of soil, gravel, and rock through which it has filtered have taken out the impurities.

Even apparently pure water may contain germs only visible under the microscope. If there is any questions as to the purity of the water, send a sample to the state health laboratory or to a chemist for analysis.

If water is muddy let it settle, then pour off the clear water and boil it hard for five minutes. Put it into clean glass jars or bottles, cover it, and keep it cool. Boiled water is flat because the air is driven off, and may be aerated by being poured from a pitcher held at some height into a drinking receptacle. Distilled water, if bottled under clean conditions, is very useful in times of typhoid or epidemics of like nature. 

The Science of Home Making: A Textbook in Home Economics (1915) by Emma E. Pirie

Here’s a “Dollar Stretcher” tip for making lemonade that appeared in a hundred-year-old magazine:

If you add a teaspoonful of cream of tartar for each lemon, you can make double the amount of lemonade for the number of lemons you use. Another way to make your lemonade cheaper is to put the lemon rinds through the food chopper, pour ice water over them and drain. By doing this fewer lemons are needed.

Ladies Home Journal (January, 1918)

I can learn a lot about what it was like a hundred years ago by reading old poems. For example, this fascinating poem provides lots of details about what people in the U.S. ate during World War I.

Wheat was in short supply during the war. Much of the wheat flour was shipped to Europe to feed the troops – so it was difficult (and expensive) to make white bread.  And, cooks in the U.S. had to substitute other foods.

Cookbooks are chock full of different words that describe how recipe ingredients are mixed together. Ever wonder how  “stirring differs from beating? . . or how “creaming” differs from “rubbing”?  Well, I found the answers in a hundred-year-old home economics textbook:

Methods of mixing are important, where several ingredients are combined. We seek for a way that will give the most complete mingling of all the substances with smoothness and lightness, at the same time saving time and strength.

Sifting, or putting materials through a fine mesh, is used to lighten flour that has been packed down, to remove coarse portions, or to mix thoroughly several dry ingredients.

Stirring is done with a spoon, and is a round and round motion, used for mixing a liquid and a dry ingredient.

Rubbing is used for combining a dry ingredient with a semi-solid substance like butter.

Creaming is a term used for the rubbing of butter until it becomes soft and creamy. A spoon should be used, not the hand.

“Cutting in” with a knife is used for combining butter with flour for biscuits and pastry where the butter should not be softened.

Beating with a spoon, or beater of the spoon type, is free over and over motion, the spoon being lifted from the mixture for the backward stroke. This is used for increasing the smoothness of the mixture after the first stirring, and for beating in air. It needs a strong free motion of the forearm. Beating is also accomplished by the rotary motion of a mechanical beater like the Dover.

Cutting and folding is the delicate process of mixing lightly beaten egg with a liquid or semi-liquid without losing out the air. The spoon is cut in, sidewise, a rotary motion carries it down and up again, and it folds in the beaten egg as it goes.

Kneading is an option used with dough, and is a combination of a rocking and pressing motion, accomplished by the hands. A good result can be obtained by some bread machines, and this is the cleaner method.

Rolling out is just what the term denotes, a rolling of a thick piece of dough by means of a cylindrical wooden “pin” to the thickness proper for cookies and crusts. Dry bread is also rolled to break it into fine crumbs.

Pounding and grindingare usually accomplished for us now in factories in breaking of spices and coffee. It is better to have a coffee mill at home.

Foods and Household Management: A Textbook of the Household Arts by Helen Kinne and Anna M. Cooley (1915)

Today there are many tasty bread options. Some breads are made with wheat flour and contain gluten; others are gluten free.  Here’s a hundred-year-old description of the different types of flour that might be used to make bread:

Flour

White flour is the most important in bread making. Wheat contains gluten, which is the name given to the protein content. When the grain is ground into a fine flour, the gluten is elastic and has the power of stretching and expanding; making it ideal for bread making since it retains the air and carbon dioxide and hardens on baking, forming the framework of the loaf of bread.

The protein in corn and oats lacks this quality and therefore they are combined with white flour for baking purposes. Rye flour may be used alone or with white flour in bread making.

The Housewife’s Cook Book by Lilla Frich (1917)