Hundred-year-old cookbooks are filled with lots of household tips. Some tips stand the test of time better than others. Here’s one that leaves me scratching my head.
Warm some mutton tallow and put on the ink stain; place in hot sun or over the hot register for half an hour. Apply soap and rub on washboard with warm water. If white material, put in the boiler; if colored, apply the tallow, etc., until stain disappears.
Order of the Easter Star Relief Fund Cookbook (Michigan Grand Chapter, 1923)
Where do I find mutton tallow? And, for that matter, where do I find a washboard? And, I don’t have a boiler. (What is a boiler?)
Eggplant is one of those vegetables that I seldom use. I’m often not quite sure how to prepare it, and will pass over it when selecting vegetables to purchase. But I recently saw a really basic Fried Eggplant recipe in a hundred-year-old cookbook and decided to give it a try. Slices of eggplant were breaded with bread crumbs, then fried. It turned out well. The Fried Eggplant slices were crispy and delicious.
Here’s the original recipe:
Larkin Housewives’ Cook Book (1923)
I dried the eggplant slices using paper towels. The recipe makes it sound like cloth towels would have been used a hundred years ago.
I breaded the eggplant slices with bread crumbs rather than dipping in flour. I made my own bread crumbs. Starting with 2 slices of bread, I used a blender to make fine bread crumbs. A food processor would also work, or purchased bread crumbs could be used.
The old recipe called for soaking the eggplant slices in salted water for several hours before cooking. I think that modern eggplants are less bitter than the eggplants of days gone by, so I’m not sure if soaking is needed, but I did it. I’ve seen other recipes that call for just sprinkling eggplant with salt, letting sit for awhile, and then drying with paper towels. That might be another option.
Peel eggplant, then slice into 1/4 inch thick slices. Put in a bowl and cover with water that contains the salt. Let sit for 2 – 4 hours, then drain, and dry the eggplant slices with paper towels.
Put the beaten egg in a shallow bowl, and put the bread crumbs in another shallow bowl. Dip each eggplant slice in the egg, and then roll in the breadcrumbs to coat.
Heat 1/4 inch of fat or oil in a large frying pan. Carefully place the breaded eggplant slices in the pan in a single layer. Depending upon pan size, the slices may need to be cooked in several batches. Fry for approximately 3-5 minutes or until the bottom side of each slice is lightly browned, then gently turn and fry until the other side is browned. Remove from pan and drain on paper towels. Serve immediately.
Some things that were considered polite a hundred years ago, are no longer considered polite and vice versa. Whether a guest should tell a host about food dislikes or dietary restrictions has changed across the years. In 1923, it was considered polite to eat what was served, whether or not the guest liked it. Allergies were not generally considered. Here’s what it said in the introduction to a 1923 cookbook:
Personal culinary dislikes are not assets to boast of, though most people seem to think they are. They are liabilities to be got rid of as quickly as possible. Learn to like the things that are good for you. Can’t. Bosh! Nonsense! And again, tut, tut! I guess I know. I did it.
Up to my twenties I ate only bread, meat, potatoes, and sweets. I got sick – very sick- and suffered more than I should have suffered had I eaten properly. That was one reason for waking up and behaving. There were two others though.
First – if other people ate and relished all these things I despised, they must be good, and I was missing something. I wished to miss nothing.
Second- I discovered my limited diet made me a terror to hostesses. People dreaded to invite me, as I since have dreaded to invite people with limited tastes. No one likes to have to keep a card index system of the intricate dislikes of one’s friends. It’s a nuisance. I realized this as I saw harassed glances at things I wasn’t eating. I was unhappy. I didn’t want the particular hostess of the moment to worry about me, but she did, of course, and I do not like to be a worry and a bother to other folks, and I do like to be invited out. I was afraid if I didn’t reform I’d be an unwelcome guest. So I set to work. Seafoods, salads, vegetables – I can eat ’em all, though I freely acknowledge there are some I like better than others, and coconut and caraway seeds still do go down very, very hard, and only when I’m being polite. I am hoping to like them eventually.
The Calorie Cook Book (Mary Dickerson Donahey, 1923)
Proper etiquette has changed across the years. Here is what it said in Reader’s Digest in a 2023 article:
Not Telling Your Host about your Dietary Restrictions
If you have food allergies or other dietary restrictions, you’re probably well aware that talking about what gluten does to your tummy doesn’t make for the most artful dinner party conversation starter. If you’re a vegetarian, you might also not want to force them to cater to you. (After all, there’s always a salad or a side dish, right?) Accordingly, you may be under the impression that when invited to a dinner party, the politest course of action is to keep your dietary concerns to yourself and hope there will be something you can eat.
But if you don’t talk to your host about this in advance, it could be awkward for both you (you’ll go hungry) and them (they’ll definitely notice if you’re not eating the food they’ve put on the table and wonder why). Remember: They’ve taken a lot of time to prepare the meal and want you, as their guest, to be happy.
Do this instead: If you have dietary issues, mention them to your host in advance. Then you can decide, together, what works best for both of you and for the sake of the party’s flow.
I can remember eating gelatin salads that contained vegetables when I was a child, so was intrigued when I came across a hundred-year-old recipe for Combination Cabbage Salad. The salad actually is a gelatin salad that contains shredded cabbage, chopped celery, and chipped pimento. It is made using unflavored gelatin. The recipe only called for 1/2 cup of sugar, while calling for 1 cup vinegar and the juice of a lemon. The result was a salad that was very tart and tangy.
The recipe suggests serving the salad with whipped cream that has a little salad dressing stirred into it. I used Ceasar dressing. This added to the overall tartness of the salad.
This salad is very old-fashioned–and definitely very different from modern sweet, fruit-flavored, gelatin salads, but I enjoyed it. The salad was refreshingly tart on a hot summer day – though if I made it again I think that I’d skip the whipped cream topping. The whipped cream and salad dressing mixture amplified the sourness of this dish, and overwhelmed the other ingredients.
Here’s the original recipe:
Source: Larkin Housewives’ Cook Book (1923)
I skipped the suggestion to mold this gelatin salad in teacups, and went right to the suggestion to put it in a pan – though I actually used a square, flat baking dish.
This recipe required lots of interpretation on my part. I have no idea how much one-half package of Larkin Gelatin would be, so I added up all the liquids and estimated that this recipe calls for approximately 5 2/3 cups of liquid. My rule of thumb is to use one packet of unflavored gelatin for each 2 cups of liquid, so I used 3 packets. That worked well.
I don’t know how much 1/4 can of pimientos would be. I used 2 tablespoons of chopped pimento.
I put a little salad dressing in the whipped cream. I’m curious about what type of dressing the recipe author used. I used Ceasar dressing because I had it on hand – though that’s probably not very authentic when making a hundred-year-old recipe. If I made this recipe again, I skip the salad dressing (and probably would also skip the whipped cream).
Here’s the recipe updated for modern cooks:
Combination Cabbage Salad (Cabbage and Celery Gelatin)
2 teaspoons salad dressing (if desired) – I used Ceasar salad dressing, though think that a sweeter dressing might be better.)
Put 1/2 cup cold water in a bowl. Sprinkle the gelatin on top of the water, and let soak for 5 minutes.
Put 4 cups water, the sugar, and salt in a saucepan. Bring to a boil. Add the gelatin that has been soaked in water. Bring back to a boil while stirring constantly until the gelatin is dissolved. Remove from heat and stir in the vinegar and lemon juice. If needed, strain. Cool slightly, then stir in the cabbage, celery, and pimento. Mold or pour into a dish or bowl. (Use a fairly flat dish, if you plan to cut the gelatin into squares to serve. A 9″ X 9″ baking dish would work well.) Refrigerate until firm.
If desired, serve with whipped cream. Whip the cream until peaks form, then stir the salad dressing into the whipped cream. Put a dollop of the whipped cream on top of each serving.
General Welfare Guild Cook Book (Compiled by The Beaver Valley General Hospital, New Brighton, Pennsylvania, 1923)
I have an early apple tree that is just loaded with apples this year. There’s no way my husband and I can eat all the apples, so last week-end I canned 14 quarts of apples. When I was flipping through a hundred-year-old cookbook for ideas for this post, this quote at the beginning of the chapter with jelly and preserves recipes really resonated with me. Maybe I’m the exception, but when it comes to canning for me, some things haven’t changed over the last hundred years.
Sometimes the most basic ways of preparing a simple food changes over the course of a hundred years. String beans are a good example. Here’s what it says in a hundred-year-old cookbook:
Source: Boston Cooking-School Cook Book (1923)
The old recipe calls for boiling the string beans 1-3 hours!! And, for breaking or cutting them into 1-inch pieces. Today, many people leave them whole. (I normally break string beans into 2 -3 inch pieces, but if preparing a meal for my children or grandchildren I would definitely leave them whole.) The old recipe also calls for removing the strings from the beans – which many string beans no longer have. (I guess that technically they may not be string beans.)
When I made the recipe I did cut the string beans into 1-inch pieces, but I couldn’t bring myself to cook the beans for 1-3 hours, and in the updated recipe say to boil them for 10-15 minutes – though I did provide information about cooking longer, if desired.
Trim the ends of the beans, and then cut or break the beans into one-inch pieces. Wash and put in a saucepan. Cover with water; add salt. Bring to a boil using high heat; then reduce heat and cook 10-15 minutes. Drain, then add butter. Let the butter melt, stir gently, then serve. (If desired, cook longer for a softer consistency. This will result in string beans that are prepared more similarly to how it was done a hundred years ago. A 1923 cookbook calls for cooking the beans 1-3 hours.)
Source: The Boston Cooking School Cook Book (1923)
A hundred years ago there was a coffee beverage called Cafe des Invalides. Not sure that name would work today (or that I’d buy this product), but I love the descriptive nature of the name.
Hundred-year-old cookbooks are filled with lots of household tips. Some tips stand the test of time better than others. Here’s one that leaves me scratching my head.
