# Vintage Cookbooks



## highlandview (Feb 15, 2007)

Does anyone else enjoy or collect vintage cookbooks? My mother gave me a stack of my grandmother's old cookbooks today. I am looking forward to sitting in the living room and reading through them. I love to find obscure recipes that people don't make anymore and try them. Sometimes when I'm done I know why people don't make them anymore. But more often than not I find something good. I have a recipe blog for fun. I'm thinking about every now and then doing a recipe re-do from old cookbooks. I need to try the egg-less, milk-less cake recipe from a Depression cookbook I found. Does anyone else collect or read cookbooks like novels?


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## culpeper (Nov 1, 2002)

Some of my favourite recipes come from old cookbooks. I've actually put together my own book, using recipes passed down through several generations.

The best sources come from the old hand-written Bride Books. These were collections of recipes and handy hints written with love by mothers and grandmothers, and given to a new bride, who would in turn do the same for her daughters when their turn came. I was given several by my grandmother (born 1872) and other family members, then I started looking out for them at garage sales and the like. They are real treasures, and it's a real 'Eureka!' moment when I find one.

Many of them were in poor condition, ink faded over time, pages torn, stained and tattered, so I've copied everything out onto my computer and turned them into my own books.


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## highlandview (Feb 15, 2007)

culpeper said:


> Some of my favourite recipes come from old cookbooks. I've actually put together my own book, using recipes passed down through several generations.
> 
> The best sources come from the old hand-written Bride Books. These were collections of recipes and handy hints written with love by mothers and grandmothers, and given to a new bride, who would in turn do the same for her daughters when their turn came. I was given several by my grandmother (born 1872) and other family members, then I started looking out for them at garage sales and the like. They are real treasures, and it's a real 'Eureka!' moment when I find one.
> 
> Many of them were in poor condition, ink faded over time, pages torn, stained and tattered, so I've copied everything out onto my computer and turned them into my own books.



I have never seen a Bride Book before. I'm going to have to keep my eyes open for them. One of my grandmother's cookbooks that I read last night was from her nieces' church in Texas. The nieces has filled it with notes about recipes, tips and relatives. Awesome!


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## upnorthlady (Oct 16, 2009)

I LOVE old cookbooks! I have over 600 cookbooks, and about 100 of them are old. Some are from the turn of the century. (1900, that is). I find that the best recipes come from the 30's and 40's. That's when women really cooked. Yep - I read cookbooks like novels. One of the best old cookbooks is New Recipes For Good Eating, 1949 put out by the Crisco folks. I think every housewife in my neighborhood had one. My mother stills uses hers and wouldn't part with it, so I had to find my own copy at an antique store. That eggless, milkless, butterless cake you talk about from the Depression Era (and also the WWII era) is very good. I have a chocolate version of it, also, and that is good. 

I find that Depression Era cookbooks have great ideas for using vegetables and eggs and various noodle type dishes. I still make all my own noodles, and make and bake everything from scratch. And I wear an apron all day long, too! Do you all wear aprons? That might be a good topic for another thread. My favorite apron pattern is a 1947 full coverage type apron like my Grandma wore all day long. I'm the only one in my neighborhood that wears aprons and cooks from scratch and reads cookbooks, but that's ok. My kitchen is decorated to look like 1953 and I'm having fun! 

My oldest cookbook is Housekeeping In Old Virginia, 1879. My daughter in law found this for me at a flea market. Some of those "Brides" cookbooks you mention are books that were given to new brides, especially during the 30's and 40's, and were printed by insurance companies. In addition to recipes in there, was plenty of space to record household inventory and medical records. Ah! The old days!


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## rightathome (Feb 10, 2009)

I love old cookbooks, can't collect any right now though so I read them online. I was just looking at the old Settlement Cookbook and found a recipe from my childhood that my mom wasn't able to recall.


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## sewserious (Apr 2, 2010)

For those of you who love old cookbooks, I really do and am always on the lookout for them, here is a site that has some from as far back as the mid 1800's in PDF format. I have downloaded them and am slowly but surely reading them. Some early cookbooks were as much about keeping house as they were cooking. Lots of good lessons to be learned from them on being self-sufficient and founding out how our ancestors really did things way back then. Enjoy!!

http://digital.lib.msu.edu/projects/cookbooks/index.html


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## AR Transplant (Mar 20, 2004)

Maybe you could help me. I had an old betty crocker cookbook that got lost in a move. It had a recipe for the best whole wheat bread I have ever made. It was also called " graham bread". If you stumble across this recipe I would be ever so grateful if you could share it.

And yes. I love old cook books, especially the ones that call for a lump of lard the size of an egg, or a tea cup full of milk. What fun!.

Enjoy your books, and -----watch for that recipe


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## culpeper (Nov 1, 2002)

Is this the recipe you want, AR?

http://www.bettycrocker.com/recipes...at-bread/8f5e8c9b-ccb6-432a-a296-7807b18574f0


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## highlandview (Feb 15, 2007)

sewserious said:


> For those of you who love old cookbooks, I really do and am always on the lookout for them, here is a site that has some from as far back as the mid 1800's in PDF format. I have downloaded them and am slowly but surely reading them. Some early cookbooks were as much about keeping house as they were cooking. Lots of good lessons to be learned from them on being self-sufficient and founding out how our ancestors really did things way back then. Enjoy!!
> 
> http://digital.lib.msu.edu/projects/cookbooks/index.html


Thanks for the link!


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## Bonnie L (May 11, 2002)

upnorthlady said:


> I LOVE old cookbooks! I have over 600 cookbooks, and about 100 of them are old.


And I thought _I_ had a lot of cookbooks! If there is a prize for the most cookbooks, I think you've won it. :thumb:

I have a lot of the booklets put out by food companies. Those are especially fun because of the advertising.


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## upnorthlady (Oct 16, 2009)

Bonnie - And you know what? Before I moved up to northern MN I sold about 200 of my cookbooks because I didn't think I'd have room for them! Kinda wish I didn't do that because as it turned out, I did have room for them! I've been collecting cookbooks since 1971 - some I buy full price, some I get free, some I get at garage sales, some I get at used bookstores, some people give to me........it all adds up!


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## Lyra (Sep 15, 2009)

Almost all of my recipes are from older cookbooks and community cookbooks. Lately, I have been checking them out from the local library which has a huge cooking section. I have found that the older community cookbooks have more authentic ethnic cuisine than newer cookbooks which tend to change the recipes.


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## upnorthlady (Oct 16, 2009)

I agree that older cookbooks use more authentic ingredients. It seems like the modern ones use a lot of convenience mixes and packages and put them together along with plain ingredients. The old Pillsbury Bake Off books used plain ingredients, and everything was from scratch back in the early days of the contest. Now, the Pillsbury Bake Offs pretty much use packaged Pillsbury products and cake mixes and refrigerated dough to make things with. I don't like that. Packaged foods are full of chemical-like ingredients to preserve freshness, etc. 

Another really good older cookbook is the Woman's Home Companion cookbook. My copy is from 1942. It's a real thick (about 2 1/2 inches thick) cookbook with so many wonderful plain ideas. The cakes section is especially good, and in my copy the pages in the cake section are all stained from former users, so the recipes must have been good. I have tried the cake recipes and they are good! It's so easy to make a good cake from scratch - I can't understand using cake mixes. You can actually taste the chemicals in there.


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## Bricore (Sep 8, 2007)

Add me to your group of collectors (I collect old and new ones.)
My favorites are the old church cookbooks.

This week I got my hands on one of the Fannie Farmer from 1896. I can't wait to sit down and really look it over.


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## highlandview (Feb 15, 2007)

upnorthlady said:


> I agree that older cookbooks use more authentic ingredients. It seems like the modern ones use a lot of convenience mixes and packages and put them together along with plain ingredients. The old Pillsbury Bake Off books used plain ingredients, and everything was from scratch back in the early days of the contest. Now, the Pillsbury Bake Offs pretty much use packaged Pillsbury products and cake mixes and refrigerated dough to make things with. I don't like that. Packaged foods are full of chemical-like ingredients to preserve freshness, etc.
> 
> Another really good older cookbook is the Woman's Home Companion cookbook. My copy is from 1942. It's a real thick (about 2 1/2 inches thick) cookbook with so many wonderful plain ideas. The cakes section is especially good, and in my copy the pages in the cake section are all stained from former users, so the recipes must have been good. I have tried the cake recipes and they are good! It's so easy to make a good cake from scratch - I can't understand using cake mixes. You can actually taste the chemicals in there.



That is one reason I like the older cookbooks. Less processed food and more cooking from scratch.


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## AR Transplant (Mar 20, 2004)

culpeper 

Thanks for thinking of me, but that one wasn't it, mine had 100% whole wheat, thats the rub. But thanks, this one does look like it would be tasty.


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## GrannyG (Mar 26, 2005)

I love old cookbooks, and have boxes of them....love to read them and go over the recipes, many containing cute sayings and little stories that just make my day. I also collect recipes in poem form, and they are one of my favorites. I will buy an old cookbook just to get the poem........one of my favorites is an old war canning book.


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