MARJORIE KREIDBERG

A HOUSEWIFE in the 1870s stirs the cur­ household manuals in the Minnesota His­ rant ketchup that simmers on the wood- torical Society that together represent over burning stove, and the aroma of its spices a hundred years of cooking literature. mingles with the compelling fragrance of Among the books produced prior to 1900 freshly baked bread cooling on the kitchen are those published locally by church- table. Happily she knows her husband will women, others planned as promotions for not become either "dyspeptic or frowning" commercial interests, and larger works that from the bread, its sweetness guaranteed in enjoyed nationwide sales. her book of Valuable Recipes (187[?] ).i A landmark in cookbook publishing his­ Within its covers she finds instructions for tory— and one of the earliest in the socie­ preparing pickled chicken, strawberry acid, ty's collection — is Miss Beechers Domestic hickory nut cake, corn bread, and hominy Receipt Book (1852). Its author, Catherine pudding, but she also discovers a formula to E. Reecher, a reformer with an evangelical cure wrinkles, a remedy to relieve neuralgia zeal, hoped to remedy the evil suffered by pain, and a method for cleaning alpacas and young women who enter "their most ardu­ ribbons. ous and sacred duties so inexperienced and Her domestic guide, published by the uninformed" that their health, spirit, confi­ ladies of the Westminster Presbyterian dence, and happiness are threatened.- To Church in Minneapofis, is part of a diverse achieve her goal, the sister of the Reverend and extensive collection of cookbooks and Henry Ward Reecher and Harriet Reecher

Mrs. Kreidberg, a former part-time editorial ^Westminster, Valuable Recipes, 27. A list of the books used in preparing this article appears on assistant on the staff of the historical society, page 116. Pages cited in these footnotes refer only is compiling a recipe collection from the so­ to the quotations given. ciety's holdings. ^ Beecher, Dome.^ic Receipt Book, preface.

Fall 1968 105 Stowe dedicated her life to education. She founded schools for women and promoted domestic science as an essential part of the curriculum. She wrote articles and books and lectured widely to pursue her crusade for domestic education. Miss Beecher's treatise, first published in A "kitchen =S=^ 1841 and quoted — not always with luxury" =^=~^_^-__ .=^g^ credit — for many years afterward, com­ bines recipes, cooking instructions, and ex­ haustive advice on matters of domestic poor cooking is but one of Miss Beecher's concern. Central to all of her rules for house­ aims in her campaign to relieve the "deplor­ keeping is the "habit of doing everything in able sufferings" of young women subjected the best manner," a basic tenet that she to a "defective domestic education^ She equates with good taste, "that nice percep­ emphasizes the need to plan ahead, preserv­ tion of fitness and propriety which leads a ing, canning, and drying food in the proper person to say and do whatever is suitable season to provide an agreeable variety and appropriate in all possible circum­ throughout the year. Fundamental to such stances."^ planning is the care of family stores. The She is not content merely with prescribing storeroom should be cool and dry. Barrels standards but tells how and why they are of salt fish "must not be kept near other to be applied. Her general directions for food, as they impart a fishy smell and taste to preparing cakes, for example, caution the it." Decayed vegetable matter should be dis­ cook to "Tie up your hair so that none can posed of regularly to prevent the "miasma" it fall, put on a long-sleeved apron, have the creates "that sometimes causes the most fatal kitchen in order, and then arrange all the ar­ diseases." ^ ticles and utensils you will have occasion to Prevention of illness and care of the sick use." In advance of her time. Miss Beecher are among Miss Beecher's concerns. She sup­ instructs the cook to weigh the ingredients plies designs for furnishings to bring comfort the first time she prepares a recipe, then to them. Her interest in functional conven­ transfer each to a "small measure cup," not­ iences extends to household needs as well. ing the amount in her "receipt book, and Efficient broom closets, a combination iron­ ever after use the same measure cup." •* ing table and settee, a reflector oven, a long- A sound reason for the cook to follow handled dustpan, and a dual-purpose knife exact instructions is dramatized by Miss and saw blade are some of the useful ob­ Beecher in the chapter on breadmaking. jects illustrated and described in the book. Such care, she writes, may be considered "a Details for the construction of an inexpen­ great drudgery, but it is worse drudgery to sive refrigerator are included for persons have sickly children, and a peevish husband, who cannot afford to buy one. made so hy having all the nerves of their When Miss Beecher turns her attention stomachs rasped with sour, or heavy bread. to the specifics of cooking, she provides A woman should be ashamed to have poor varied recipes for meat cookery, soups, bread, far more so, than to speak bad gram­ cakes, puddings, pies, preserves, ice creams, mar, or to have a dress out of fashion." A and temperance drinks. All ingredients, housewffe, she continues, who turns out poor bread regularly "may set herself down as a slack baked and negligent housekeep­ '' Beecher, Domestic Receipt Book, 217, 274. er." ^ * Beecher, Domestic Receipt Book, 130. ^Beecher, Domestic Receipt Book, 230, 231. To counteract the disastrous results of " Beecher, Domestic Receipt Book, preface, 223.

106 MINNESOTA History amounts, and methods, when included, are recorded in a series of running sentences. Measurements are most often expressed in terms of gills, ounces, pounds, pints, and quarts — infrequently in cups or spoons. "One great spoonful of flour, loaf sugar, or of melted butter, equals a quarter of an ounce of same. It should be a little heaped." ^

IN CONTRAST to Catherine Reecher's en­ cyclopedic, all-purpose treatise is Miss Leslie's New Cookery Book (1857), a six- hundred-page "complete manual of domes­ tic cookery in all its branches." The author, Eliza Leslie, who also wrote children's stories and contributed to women's maga­ zines, became wealthy through the sale of her culinary works. Distinctive in the 1. Shoulder. 4. Breast S. Neek. 6. Sctag. recipes is Miss Leslie's use of the provender 3. Haunch. of America such as venison, buffalo, and game. Indian meal is basic to many of her A meat chart from Miss Leslie's recipes for breads, griddle cakes, muffins, New Cookery Rook and even cakes for dessert. Her recipe for minced sage, and simmered with the addi­ "Very Plain Indian Dumplings," a combina­ tion of onions and a quarter of a pound of tion of Indian meal, salt, and boiling water, butter that is first rolled in flour. The cooked she explains, is "an excellent appendage to soup is then thickened with boiled or salt pork or bacon." ^ roasted chestnuts that have been peeled and With recurring enthusiasm she summons mashed. Quite different but unquestionably her primary theme that implicit in the na­ appropriate for a gift to give "friends going tion's plentiful food supply is the oppor­ the overland journey to the Pacific" is her tunity to improve nutrition, cooking "Portable Soup," a forerunner of the bouil­ practices, and the kitchen habits of America. lon cube. The soup requires three days to Characteristically, she observes that in prepare, and is made "into a jelly, and then "America, where good things are abundant, congealed into hard cakes, resembling there is no necessity of imbibing the flatu­ glue." Further, her awareness of the Ameri­ lency of weak washy soups." Her recipe for can way of life inspired other recipes such "Squatter's Soup" underscores the point. as one for "Camp Catsup" that she claims When served with wdd turkey or roasted will keep for years if the bottles are well buffalo hump and stewed grapes sweetened corked and stored in a dry place. The for­ with maple sugar, it "will make a good back­ mula calls for strong ale or porter, mixed woods dinner." ^ with white wine, minced shallots, and sea­ For a company dinner. Miss Leslie fur­ soned with mace, nutmeg, and gingerroot, nishes a recipe for soup made from four then boiled slowly and bottled with the ad­ wild ducks, seasoned with salt, pepper, dition of a teaspoon of salad oil.^" When the practical-minded author fo­ ^ Beecher, Domestic Receipt Book, 283. cuses on meat cookery, she calls attention 'Leslie, New Cookery Book, title page, 418. " Leshe, New Cookery Book, 35, 68, 69. not only to the abundance of meat in Amer­ "Leslie, New Cookery Book, 51, 53, 328. ica but to its reasonable cost. Therefore it

Fall 1968 107 Miss Leshe scatters pronouncements on weaknesses in the nation's customs through­ out her cookbook. Yet the custodians of the American home whom she sought to change could find Miss Lesfie had fulfilled her com­ mitment to produce a complete guide to cookery.

HOUSEWIVES of the late 1870s would dis­ cover in Buckeye Cookery and Practical Housekeeping, another book in the society's collection, a combination of recipes and in­ structions on domestic matters. The book was first pubfished in 1877, a time when a competent housewife got ready for spring cleaning by laying in a supply of gall soap to wash floors and bedsteads, sawdust to dampen and use as a sweeping compound, cayenne pepper to discourage mice, rats, and vermin, lime for whitewashing, kero­ sene to keep stoves and iron utensils from rusting, and carbolic acid to disinfect sinks and drains. Appropriately the book is dedi­ cated to the "Plucky Housewives Of 1876, Who Master Their Work Instead Of Allow­ ing It To Master Them." A corresponding Housewife in a titrn-of-the-century kitchen tenacity is apparent in the United Brethren is unnecessary for anyone to prepare more churchwomen of Marysville, Ohio, who pro­ than is essential for use at any one time. duced the book as a benevolent project and Only well-done meat is wholesome and di­ hoped to "pack between its covers the great­ gestible, she declares, and underdone meat est possible amount of practical information "is now seldom seen but at those public of real value to all, and especially to the in­ tables, where they consider it an object to experienced." ^^ have as little meat as possible eaten on the Their orderly guide abounds in rules, first day, that more may be left for the sec­ procedures, directions, and suggestions. ond day, to be made into indescribable Little is left to the housewife's imagination. messes, with ridiculous French names, and "Provide on Saturday for Monday," she is passed off as French dishes, by the so-called counseled, "so as not to take up the fire with French cook, who is frequently an Irish- cooking, or time in running errands on 11 washing-day." When work allowed the man. While the author sanctions the use of al­ housewife time to pause, she could consult coholic beverages in some recipes, she vigor­ the manual to learn the effect of food on her ously disapproves of the tradition of adding complexion. "Strong coffee, hot bread and liquor to mince pie. "The foolish custom of butter, heated grease, highly spiced soups, setting the pies on fire after they come to meats, or game, hot drinks, alcoholic liquors, the table, and causing a blue blaze to issue from the liquor that is in them, is now obso­ '^ Leslie, New Cookery Book, 139, 140. "^ Leslie, New Cookery Book, 490. lete, and considered ungenteel and tavern- ^^ United Brethren, Buckeye Cookery, 1877 edi­ like." ^^ Resolute and firm in her convictions, tion, preface.

108 MINNESOTA History fat meats, are all damaging to beauty," the prising Yankee or Buckeye girl shall invent Ohio ladies warn.^^ a stove or range with a thermometer at­ Most of all, however, the Buckeye women tached to the oven, so that the heat may are writers for the kitchen, dedicated to be regulated accurately and intelligently." ^'' helping the homemaker avoid the "whole The host of subjects covered, the many train of horrors that result from bad house­ recipes and instructions are all intended to keeping." One horror is the cookstove with simplify household tasks and "stimulate that its complex of dampers and ventilators. The just pride without which work is drudgery advisers recommend hardwood, such as and great excellence impossible." ^*^ With ash, for the firebox for use when baking that ambitious goal and a parallel desire to cakes. Dampers must be turned to force sell their book, the United Brethren church- heat to the bottom of the oven after the fire women had fourteen thousand copies of the has produced a "good body of heat." To first edition printed. By 1883, the book had achieve a more uniform heat, the hearth is enjoyed a sale of "more than 100,000 then closed when the cake goes into the copies," according to its title page. The oven. The housewife's guide for determin­ Buckeye Publishing Company of Minne­ ing oven temperature is the knowledge that apolis is designated as the publisher. "if the hand can be held in [the oven] from The later editions are more enlarged than twenty to thirty-five seconds (or while they are revised. "Jugged Pigeons" and counting twenty or thirty-five), it is a quick "Partridge Pie," for instance, are dropped oven." A "moderate" oven requires a count after the first edition. Added to the 1883 of from thirty-five to forty-five seconds; a edition are menus for a full year, and a "slow" oven, forty-five to sixty seconds. "All chapter on the chemistry of food to help systematic housekeepers," the writers proph­ the housewife adapt meal planning to her esy, "will hail the day when some enter- family's specific needs. She learns that the "brain-worker demands a diet rich in phos­ phorous, and [that]. . . . The food that " United Brethren, Buckeye Cookery, 1877 edi­ tion, 343, 419. best sustains a laborer in the open air is not ^^ United Brethren, Buckeye Cookery, 1877 edi­ the best for those who live among the excite­ tion, 44, 332. ments and exhausting demands on the "United Brethren, Buckeye Cookery, 1877 edi­ tion, preface. brain, that are the rule in city life." For

A coal-burning .stove, .sink, and covered ivash- tubs in a 1900 kitchen those reasons, the compilers recommend and seasonings, 74 cents; and three eggs fish, game, cheese, vegetables, and espe­ scrambled in an ounce of butter, 5 cents. cially potatoes for city dwellers.^''^ An example of Miss Corson's methodical orderliness, clarity, and disposition for de­ EMPHASIS on the chemical composition of tail is found in a recipe for an oyster sauce food along with its dollars-and-cents value to accompany boiled fowl. "Blanch one claimed the attention of Juliet Corson, an­ quart of oysters by bringing them to a bofl other author, lecturer, and teacher. Promi­ in their own liquor; drain them, saving the nent in her field, she conducted cooking liquor; wash them in cold water and set classes in the United States, Canada, and them away from the fire until you are ready Europe. At the Columbian Exposition in to use them; stir one ounce of butter and Chicago in 1893, she was awarded a prize one ounce of flour together over the fire for scientific cooking and sanitary dietetics. until they form a smooth paste; strain into Her reputation had been established earlier, them enough of the oyster liquor and that however, as a result of her writing. In 1879, in which the chicken was boiled, to make a when she was superintendent of the New sauce as thick as melted butter; season with York Cooking School, Miss Corson prepared a teaspoonful of salt, quarter of a saltspoon- a Cooking School Text Book; And House­ ful of white pepper, and some grated nut­ keepers' Guide to Cookery and Kitchen meg; put in oysters and serve." The total Management (1879). The book, she ex­ cost for the chicken and oyster sauce is 66 plains in the preface, is intended to meet cents.^^ the growing public interest in "cheap and Miss Corson's penchant for the explicit good cookery." Requirements for good carries over into her opinions on food, nu­ cooking, she continues, demand "intelligent trition, and kitchen management. She comprehension" of the fundamentals of recognizes that occupational needs, habits, food chemistry, economic values, and the and mental conditions influence nutritive "physiology of nutrition." demand. "An unperverted appitite [«c]," The book is divided into three sections: she writes, "is the voice of the physical sys­ lessons for the young daughters of working tem making known its needs, and it may people, referred to as "artisans"; courses for always be trusted to indicate the foods nec­ plain cooks, young housewives of moderate essary to the preservation of health." ^^ and comfortable circumstances, and domes­ The author's accomplishments as a lec­ tics who seek employment in families turer and teacher became known to twelve "where the table is nice without being too hundred persons who attended a cooking expensive"; and, lastly, the "Ladies' Course" demonstration at the University of Minne­ that provides "some of the elegancies of sota agricultural college in 1884. Miss Cor­ artistic cookery with those economical in­ son's series of six lectures, interspersed terests which it is the duty of every house­ with her views on food, were published by wife to study." ^^ the board of regents under the title A A revolutionary departure from the usual Course of Lectures on the Principles of Do­ narrative style is the tabulation of a list of mestic Economy and Cookery (1886). The ingredients for each recipe, and next to that series covered a broad range of cookery, the cost of the amount needed, as well as the including "Cheap Dishes for Rewarmed total sum of all costs. The expenditure re­ Foods" and cooking for the sick. quired for all ingredients appears in the " United Brethren, Practical Housekeeping, 1883 index. A six-pound beef rib roast, prepared edition, 596. with vegetables and seasoning, costs $1.00; "Corson, Cooking School Text Book, 25, 103, apple pie, 19 cents; a three-pound chicken 143. ®' Corson, Cooking School Text Book, 125. sauteed* with mushrooms, wine, flour, oil, ^^ Corson, Cooking School Text Book, 210.

110 MINNESOTA History Guests at the Minnesota lectures also dinary in food preparation, enhanced with heard Miss Corson's lament that Americans a measure of elegance, is suggested in the think that only meat provides nourishment. titles and sometimes in the ingredients as They listened to her praise the strength-sus­ well. In a selection of chicken recipes, she taining value of lentils, fresh or dried peas includes chicken souffle, blanquette, char­ and beans when they are prepared with fat treuse, chaud-froid, quenelles, and pilau, as meat, suet, or butter. The nutritious value well as fried chicken and pot pie. of some vegetables, she declared — "what Advanced as she was in some areas, Miss the dressmakers would call 'trimmings'" — Parloa did not advocate commercial baking is comparable to meat.^^ powder as a leavening agent for cakes, muffins, and quick breads at the time the cookbook was published. Even though com­ mercial baking powder was available and was advertised in the book. Miss Parloa SIMILAR practical lessons in cooking were nevertheless specifies saleratus or the com­ presented by Maria Parloa, another profes­ bination of cream of tartar and soda in the sional in domestic education. But Miss Par­ recipes. loa s New Cook Book (1880) is also repre­ Perhaps commercial baking powder was sentative of a group of cookbooks in the less suspect among St. Paul housewives who society's collection used as promotions to received a gift copy of The Snow Flake advance business interests. The Washburn- Cook Book (1881). Charles R. Groff, a Crosby Company of Minneapolis presented manufacturer and retailer of spices, ex­ Miss Parloa's book as a complimentary gift tracts, and baking powder, intent on the to consumers of the company's flour. A bread promotion value of the cookbook as an ad­ recipe and a line drawing of the mill ap­ vertising device, dedicated the hundred- pear on a separate sheet tipped into the page book "To the Ladies Using the book. Celebrated Snow Flake Raking Powder." Miss Parloa, founder of two cooking Generally the recipes offer the gamut of schools and a prolific author of cookbooks, cookery: soup, meat, fish, vegetables, salads, states in the preface that it is "unwise to sauces, pastry, cakes, puddings, and pickles. leave much to the cook's judgement. . . . Pickle recipes, found in quantity in the early Many ladies will not undertake the making cookbooks, are grouped in two sections, one of a dish that requires hours for cooking, for brine-prepared, the other for sweet. In­ and often for the poor reason only that they structions for preparing quail and wood­ do not so read a recipe as to see that the cock, as well as chicken, duck, and turkey, work will not be hard." appear in a section on poultry. Further con­ Mindful of this dictum, she tells how long sideration for native bounty is evident in a to stir curry sauce, how long to allow it to recipe for parsnip stew made with the addi­ simmer, and how it should be served. She tion of salt pork. furnishes pan sizes, designating the need Directions for the most part assume for deep or shallow pans, "sheets," and loaf knowledge and experience on the part of pans with a welcome consistency. Indeed, the cook, but occasionally some rules, com­ it is Miss Parloa's practice to suggest serv­ ments, and suggestions are interspersed ing styles, borders, and garnishments as among the recipes. Instructions for roasting part of the recipes.-- a goose, for example, caution that a "green" Her concept of a departure from the or- goose, four months old, is the most desir­ ^ Corson, Principles of Domestic Economy and able. The breastbone of the goose should be Cookery, 21. beaten flat with a rolling pin and the wings " Parloa, New Cook Book, 43. and legs securely tied before stuffing.^^ ^ Groff, Snow Flake Cook Book, 29.

Fall 1968 111 of study and course of diet" in a young ladies' seminary, is quickly restored when she eats bread and rolls made exclusively from Orange Blossom flour used in the cook­ ing school. Romance develops when an urbane colonel, Frank Mayo, realizes his considerable admiration for the "two ear­ nest, warm-hearted and truthful women." At the end of the first installment, the colonel faces the dilemma of choosing be­ tween them.^^ Digressions from the main story allow for a recital of the gradual progress made in flour and milling production, and Lucy Knight's role of teacher is the artifice used to bring in recipes and instructions on the The Snow Flake Cook Book also furnishes art of breadmaking. Special emphasis is the custodians of the household with given to the excellence of the hard wheats enough advice to fill the final third of the grown in Minnesota, the enterprise of the book — advice appropriated word for word millers in the state, and their leadership in from Catherine Reecher's Treatise. But the production of quality flour. Groff's practical recipes and purloined rec­ ommendations for efficient household man­ TO E. M. MAY of Minneapolis the virtues agement are altogether different from those of flour, problems of oven temperatures, and published as a promotion for the St. Paul principles of breadmaking were minor con­ Roller Mill Company in 1885, producers of cerns. His primary interest was quality food Orange Blossom flour. The Orange Blossom of all kinds, its preparation by the catering Cook Book intermixes a history of flour company he operated, and the solicitation development, an unresolved romance, twen­ of patrons who would use his service. To ty-one recipes, and baking instructions that end, he produced a volume that he all within fifty pages. called a Catalogue (1887). The book is a The mill's manager, Kingsland Smith, in­ conglomeration of many things, recipes troduces the book as his company's effort among them. It lists the company's products to offset the deficient instructions in popular and services, but it also presents essays on cookbooks on "every point about bread table courtesies, ballroom etiquette, the making." To insure greater interest and ap­ correct form for calling cards, invitations, peal, he writes. Orange Blossom's guide to and programs, and a description of wedding breadmaking is "woven into a story" to be arrangements. It features discourses on cor­ continued in later editions. If later editions rect dress, a history of gloves, instructions appeared, it is not known; the first is the for wine selection, diagrams of table settings only one in the society's collection. to meet a variety of occasions, articles on The story revolves around Lucy Knight, how to achieve a well-ordered kitchen and a "cultured young heiress" from Minnesota. dining room, a resume on the digestibility Lucy, who has earned the degree of mis­ of food, a table of weights and measures, a tress of household science from the School calendar of foods in season, and menu sug­ of Domestic Economy in Ames, Iowa, oper­ gestions. ates a cooking school in Florida. One of Significantly, the catalog reveals an ele- Lucy's students, Sophie Southgate, dis­ covers that her health, ruined by the "course ' Gray, Orange Blossom Cook Book, 6, 47.

112 MINNESOTA History 'Kings of the Kitchen," according to the legend in May's Catalogue gance in food, dining, and style of living catering to routine needs rather than to ele­ that was available at least to some residents gant entertainments. In the introduction to of Minnesota during the late 1880s. From his gift cookbook, he notes that ten thousand E. M. May & Son ice cream — thirty-eight copies were produced at a cost of "several flavors — and ices could be had in a variety hundred dollars." If achievement can be of dramatic forms such as a mold of a large measured by four more editions that ap­ deer (for $5.00) or an elephant ($6.00), peared biennially, T. K. Gray's Cook Book either sufficient for serving twelve guests. (1896) justified the investment. Some edible, decorative pyramids made Gray's good-will offering is as much a from fruit, macaroons, bonbons, or ice merchandising promotion as it is a cook­ cream are offered. A wide assortment of book. The left-hand pages announce and meat and poultry suggestions includes a sometimes illustrate a wide range of com­ haunch of venison and fillets of hare with pounds and nostrums to cure, correct, and truffles. A miscellaneous list provides a num­ rehabilitate people and horses. Hair restora­ ber of timbales, a "Mounted Wild Goose," tives, paint, and chewing gum are other a "Wild Boar's head in gelantine," pheasant products advertised. Each advertising page prepared with sauerkraut, and a separate states that the product is available from category for oysters prepared in eighteen T. K. Gray, whose portrait appears on the different ways. front cover. His stately residence adorns Table appointments — silver, china, glass the back cover. and tableware, linens — are available for Imagination is an integral part of Gray's rental along with awnings and special cookbook, however. A section devoted to lights. A "full drilled corps" of servants is leftover food is titled "Made-Over Delica­ another service offered in the introduction. cies," while another division is labeled "Pic­ THOMAS K. GRAY, a Minneapofis drug­ nic Dainties." Names for recipes such as gist, promoted eating as opposed to feasting, "Minnehaha Cake" and "Prairie Tea Cake"

Fall 1968 113 suggest a native influence, although there is nothing that distinguishes the basic in­ gredients from other cakes of the period.-'' The druggist turned to poetry to introduce each edition. His personal rhymes focus on the location of the drugstore —108 Bridge Square — and praise the quality, selection, quantity, and economy of his products. Claims of excellence were not unusual in the cookbooks published during the last half of the nineteenth century. The "best receipts are not to be found in any other book of receipts." So boasts the introduction to Our Chef's Best Receipts (1899), a book used to promote James J. Hill's Northern Steamship Company of St. Paul. Advertising within its pages describes the merits of Hill's Great Northern and Duluth, Missabe & Northern railways as well as those of hotels and mer­ chants in St. Paul and Duluth. The chef is not identified, but other per­ sons who contributed to the collection are named. Credit is given, too, for the source of quoted lines used to describe the general content of recipes in each chapter. Thus Ralph Waldo Emerson's statement, "The A typical front cover from T. K. Gray amassed thought and experience of innu­ merable minds," keynotes a miscellaneous selection with its mixture of a recipe for earliest church-sponsored cookbook in cheese fondue, a formula for cleaning wall­ the society's collection. Prepared "for the paper, advice on using stale cheese, recom­ benefit of the public in general, and the mendations for washing point lace, and the Church in particular," the book has an in­ suggestion that "Common cooking molasses formal style, sprinkled with the comfortable will remove grass stain from garments." ^"^ language of the kitchen — "Take your beef, Recipes, however, far outnumber the con­ be it much or little." ^^ fection of generalities and advice in the Here are recipes for curing hams, making cookbook. The form in which they are pre­ beer, preparing Indian bannocks, corn meal sented reflects the gradual drift toward the muffins, corn batter cakes, and corn bread. standard columnar listing of ingredients, Here also are two recipes for corn fritters, but chancy directions for amounts — one called "Corn Oysters," the second sim­ "Enough flour to roll," or "Sugar to suit ply "Another." Chicken — fried, jellied, taste" — continue to prevail.-" pickled, or used in salad — yeast to be made from hops or potatoes, and a method for LOCALLY PUBLISHED cookbooks pro­ making vinegar are among the recipes vide clues to the preparation of daily fare and homemade cures in Minnesota before "•'Gray, Cook Book, 1896 edition, 25, 63, 83, 97. the turn of the century, and Valuable Reci­ "^Our Chef's Best Receipts, 112. pes, compiled by the ladies of the West­ '' Our Chef's Best Receipts, 52. ^'Westminster Church, Valuable Recipes, intro­ minster Church of Minneapolis, is the duction, 13.

114 MINNESOTA History gathered into the book. Here, too, are for­ Church to publish A Cook Book in 1892 in mulas for preparing cough medicine, a pre­ response to interest that developed from a scription for cholera, and a cure for wrinkles cooking school conducted at the church by that calls for a contented mind and glycerine a domestic science teacher, Mrs. Willett M. added to the morning wash water. Hays. In the tradition of Catherine Beecher, Here is the easy nonconformity of style in Mrs. Hays describes cooking as "the most which one cake recipe is merely an enumer­ useful, elevating, dignified and important ation of ingredients while another details of all occupations lying at the very founda­ ingredients, method, and pan sizes. Among tion of our peace, prosperity and happiness." the measurements that are set forth in Formal instruction in cooking principles, standard terms, there are some calling for nutritional awareness, and the practice of a "bowl of flour" and a "large ironspoonful economy are the bases for Mrs. Hays's mul­ of lard." Cakes and breads are called by tilateral approach to cookery. The simple names that simply designate a dominant in­ system, she writes, of "ordering wisely, gredient: hickory nuts, cornstarch, coffee, cooking properly, and wasting nothing" can sugar cakes, or gingerbread.-^ keep food costs to $1.50 a week for each per­ This personal quality in recipe writing son in any city in the country.'^^ also characterizes The Tried and True Cook Book (1881), published by the ladies' so­ ciety of the First Baptist Church of St. Paul. The volume is a significant record of the everyday kitchen arts practiced by Minne­ sotans in the 1880s. They cooked parsnip stew and made squash and cranberry pies; they prepared the batter for Indian meal muffins at night, ready to bake for break­ fast the next day. For "Sunday Pudding," tapioca was "put to soak on Friday night" and baked into a pudding on Saturday. NEITHER explanations nor counsel on gen­ Brown sugar, molasses, and tartaric acid eral cooking principles appears in the forty- were mixed together, a base for "Sassafras page Christmas Cook Book published in Mead" when it was needed. 1899 by the Ladies' Aid Society of the Although recipes are the primary concern Methodist Episcopal Church in Buffalo, of the Baptist ladies, they also supply de­ Minnesota. Instead the book is limited to tailed formulas such as a hair restorative signed recipes that represent a medley of made with a "quart of strong sage tea individual specialties grouped under gen­ drawn in porcelain teapot, one-quarter pint eral headings. The collection is a record of of good whiskey, one large tablespoonful daily fare, of how to make do with whatever of pulverized borax, thirty grains of quinine. provender is available. Use soft water. Put on boiling hot."^*' A half gallon of pumpkin becomes The Tried and True Cook Book reflects "Grandma's Pumpkin Butter" with the ad­ the dedication of the women who produced dition of molasses, cinnamon, cloves, and it. A similar devotion prompted the women black pepper, mixed and then boiled for of St. Paul's Dayton Avenue Presbyterian two-and-a-half hours. Sugar, water, egg white, and raisins are the ingredients for ^ Westminster Church, Valuable Recipes, 34, 55. "Minnehaha Frosting." If maple sugar is '"First Baptist Church, Tried and True Cook available, it can be boiled with cream and Book, 96. butter, flavored with vanilla, and used as a ••'^Dayton Avenue Presbyterian Church, A Cook cake filling. Dried apples, soaked and then Book, 4, 6.

Fall 1968 115 simmered in molasses, are the basis for a coughs appears in a chapter on "Confection­ "Dried Apple Cake." A recipe for "Pork ery." The homemade cough syrup is pre­ Cake" calls for salt pork, molasses, spices, pared from brown sugar and gin boiled to eggs, soda, currants, raisins, and "enough a syruplike consistency. A dose of one tea­ flour to make as a pound cake." A "Christ­ spoon every two hours is recommended. mas Pudding," with instructions to "Boil in The "Central" Cook Book and all of the a bowl 12 hours," is the only recipe directly church-sponsored, commercially supported, associated with the book's title.^^ or major recipe books and domestic guides Over three hundred signed recipes pub­ in the Minnesota Historical Society's collec­ lished by the Central Presbyterian Church tion are a contemporary record in the fitera­ women of St. Paul in 1900 give further ex­ ture of cooking and domestic life. In the amples of daily fare. The contents of The quickened pace of 1968, with household "Central" Cook Book reveal some of the conveniences undreamed of a century ago, difficulties encountered in food preparation these volumes can bring the "Plucky House­ and marketing. "Get a hard Hubbard wives" of the past as close as today in so squash, one that has to be broken with a congenial a place as the kitchen. hatchet," writes the contributor of a squash pie recipe. The brief instructions for pre­ "^Methodist Episcopal Church, Christmas Cook Book, 24. paring a sponge cake end with the admoni­ ^Central Presbyterian Church, "Central" Cook tion to "beat, beat, beat!"^^ Book, 40, 41, 42, 68. A miscellaneous chapter includes recipes THE PHOTOGRAPHS on pages 108 and 109 are for grape wine, creamed celery, baked to­ from the society's collection; the drawings on pages 106 and 111 are from Practical Housekeeping; and matoes, a formula for mucilage, and one for those on pages 112 and 115 are from the Dayton furniture polish, but a remedy to relieve Avenue Presbyterian Church cookbook.

BIBLIOGRAPHY Beecher, Catherine E., Miss Beecher's Domestic Groff, Charles R., The Snow Flake Cook Book. Receipt Book: Designed as a Supplement to A Collection of Practical Recipes (St. Paul, A Treatise on Domestic Economy (New York, 1881). 1852). Leslie, Efiza, Miss Leslie's New Cookery Book Corson, Jufiet, Cooking School Text Book; And (Philadelphia, 1857). Housekeepers' Guide to Cookery and Kitchen May, E. M., Catalogue (Minneapolis, 1887). Management (New York, 1879). Methodist Episcopal Church, The Christmas _^ , A Course of Lectures on the Prin­ Cook Book (Buffalo, 1899). ciples of Domestic Economy and Cookery, Our Chef's Best Receipts: A Practical Cook Appendix to Supplement I, Fourth Biennial Book for People Who Like Good Things to Report of Board of Regents of the University of Minnesota (Minneapolis, 1886). Eat (Chicago and New York, Rand, Mc- Central Presbyterian Church, The "Central" Nally & Company, 1899). Cook Book (St. Paul, 1900). Parioa, Maria, Miss Parloa's New Cook Book Dayton Avenue Presbyterian Church, A Cook (Boston, 1880). Book (St. Paul, 1892). United Brethren Church, Buckeye Cookery and First Baptist Church, The Tried and True Cook Practical Housekeeping (Minneapofis, 1877). Book. A Collection of Practical Recipes (St. , Buckeye Cookery, with Hints on Paul, 1881). Practical Housekeeping (Minneapolis, 1881). Gray, Ellen (pseud.). The Orange Blossom , Practical Housekeeping. A Careful Cook Book. An Explanation of the Art of Compilation of Tried and Approved Recipes Breadmaking (St. Paul, 1885). (Minneapofis, 1883). Gray, Thomas K., T. K. Gray's Cook Book (Min­ Westminster Presbyterian Church, Valuable neapolis, 1896, 1898, 1900). Recipe,? (Minneapolis, [187?]).

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