Do you ever decide to make a recipe because you want to use up an ingredient that is in your cupboards? Well, this is one of those times for me. I wanted to use up a  bag of rye flour that has been lingering in my kitchen for too long, so when I saw a recipe for Rye Griddle Cakes in a hundred-year-old cookbook I decided to give it a try.

When I selected the recipe, I didn’t have particularly high expectations, but I was very pleasantly surprised. The Rye Griddle Cakes (or pancakes to use more modern terminology) were absolutely wonderful. They were hearty and lovely with maple syrup. They don’t taste like rye bread, since rye bread often has additional flavorings like caraway or anise – but rather have a milder flavor. And, as an added bonus, the only flour this recipe calls for is rye flour, so it is a gluten free recipe. [2/18/23 update: My original post contained incorrect information. Readers who commented on this post noted that rye flour contains gluten – so this is not a gluten free recipe.]

Here’s the original recipe:

I am not sure why the egg is beaten until light, then combined with the milk before adding to the other ingredients. Maybe the recipe author was beating everything by hand. When I made this recipe, I just put all of the ingredients in a mixing bowl and then beat with an electric mixer.

Here’s the recipe updated for modern cooks:

I’ve been reading a 1923 home economics textbook. It’s fascinating to see the questions for papers and discussion in the book. Some of the questions we still ponder today. (Should children be paid for doing work in the home?) Others are too gender-based for comfort. (Should a boy have some training along the lines of household electricity, plumbing, and carpentry? What should a girl know of these things?)

It’s fun to see old-time kitchen gadgets. Here’s what a hundred-year-old magazine said about a lettuce washer featured in an article titled, The Newest Kitchen Utensils:

Lettuce Washer

There are few things more distasteful than a plate of lettuce or romaine or chicory which, no matter how carefully it has been selected, examined or washed, has been so imperfectly dried that the dressing is weakened almost to tastelessness by the water still remaining on the leaves. Yet this happens even in the most carefully administered households, for it is a difficult thing to dry salad plants well without breaking their delicate, tender leaves. This implement, which is a familiar object in all French kitchens, is a salad washer and dryer. The green leaves are rinsed and placed in it, then it is dipped several times in a pan of cold water, and finally it is hung in a cool place where it may drip uninterruptedly. If time presses it may be swung back and forth a few times and all superfluous water will be expelled. Place the basket close to the ice to crisp the salad until serving time.

Ladies Home Journal (March, 1923)

When I boil potatoes, beans, or other vegetables, I often have issues with the water boiling over. Here’s a household hint in a hundred-year-old cookbook about how to prevent a pan from boiling over:

To Keep the Lid on a Boiling Pot – A teaspoonful of butter dropped into the water in which you are boiling dry beans, or other starchy vegetables will stop the annoyance of having the lid on the pot jump off, as it will otherwise do. The butter acts the same as oil on troubled waters and keeps it calm and manageable.

Cook Book (Published by Bethany Shrine Patrol No. 1, Rochester N.Y., 1923)