Cooking in the Golden Era

[FountainPenGirl]

Hi, I just happen start reading this thread. I thought I would jump in with a picture of my cookstove. Vintage recipies come into play here along with building fires to get fast heat, long slow heat, maintaining temperature, and so on. I use this stove for all cooking everyday all winter long. We keep it going all day and it heats the house too.

 

[fortworthgal]

Today I'm making Barley Bread, from a 1918 recipe in a war booklet: "Best War Time Recipes" from the Royal Baking Powder Company. Anxious to see how it turns out! The whole book is online, here's a link as well as the recipe:

http://freepages.military.rootsweb....nt/BestWarTimeRecipes/BestWarTimeRecipes.html

Barley Bread

2 cups barley flour
1 cup white flour
5 teaspoons Royal Baking Powder
1 teaspoon salt
1 tablespoon corn syrup
1 tablespoon shortening (I used lard)
1 1/2 cups water and milk (this appears to mean equal amounts totaling 1.5 c - 3/4 c milk & 3/4 c water)

Sift dry ingredients; add liquid slowly to make a stiff dough; add syrup and melted shortening; mix and put into greased bread pan and allow to stand in warm place 25 to 30 minutes. Bake in moderate oven (350F) 30 to 45 minutes

 

[fortworthgal]

^ The bread turned out nice. Didn't rise much, more of a dense loaf like a beer bread, and not terribly moist. Still very tasty, the barley flour gave it almost a graham/brown bread type flavor. Excellent with butter!

 

[Wally in Cincy]

A pig in the winter was used to feed the family through the cold season. .

I remember my dad and uncles slaughtering and butchering hogs every Thanksgiving for my grandpa and grandma. They would smoke some in the smokehouse, salt some and freeze the rest.

 

[Wally in Cincy]

Hi, I just happen start reading this thread. I thought I would jump in with a picture of my cookstove. Vintage recipies come into play here along with building fires to get fast heat, long slow heat, maintaining temperature, and so on. I use this stove for all cooking everyday all winter long. We keep it going all day and it heats the house too.

That's amazing. My granny died when I was 12 but she cooked on one of those every day in the hills of Eastern Kentucky.

When company was in town she would fry 2 dozen fresh eggs, bake 2 dozen biscuits, and go to the henhouse at and kill and fry 2 chickens by the time the sun came up.

 

[FountainPenGirl]

WIth the warm weather we've been having this is the first day since last fall that I didn't make a fire. I had to use the electric stove to make breakfast. Boy, does that feel strange. I remember the wood stoves at Grandma's very well. I guess that made quite an impression on me. We spent some time looking for a good useable stove. As soon as we got this one in the house there was this strangely familiar feeling to using it. It felt like I'd been using it all my life. It is really great to have it.

 

[V.C. Brunswick]

Paw Paw enjoyed having hog head cheese over crackers. It's not actually cheese but rather a meat jelly and sometimes referred to as souse. I can't force myself to try it but he loved it and ate it almost everyday.

When I was a kid I liked head cheese (and still do). I used to bring head cheese sandwiches to school for lunch! :hungry:

 

[filfoster]

I remember my dad and uncles slaughtering and butchering hogs every Thanksgiving for my grandpa and grandma. They would smoke some in the smokehouse, salt some and freeze the rest.

My mom (93) describes fresh chicken dinners on Sundays. Her father and grandfather also butchered hogs and steers and smoked/preserved meat. I'd pass on the 'factory fresh' milk she describes at milking time.

 

[filfoster]

Most treasured hand me down: Mom's two heavy, blackened cast iron skillets. What stories these could tell!
Most regretted loss: Tossing the still functional waffle iron she got in the '40's.

 

[LizzieMaine]

We were big on fresh fish, since we lived within view of the shore. Neighborhood kids sold mackerel off red wagons, but if we didn't want to pay their prices, my mother or grandmother would send me down to the wharf with a dropline and I'd bring home a couple still wiggling. If we wanted clams, we'd send my grandfather down to the shore with a hoe and a pail, and half an hour later he'd be back with supper.

Preparing these feasts was a great and smelly event. I learned to cut up a fish before I learned to tie my shoes, and there's no smell that takes me back to childhood faster than a pail of fish guts.

 

[1961MJS]

... and there's no smell that takes me back to childhood faster than a pail of fish guts.

Hi Lizzie

I'm pretty sure Larry the Cable guy needs that statement for his next tour. That's funny, true, memorable, but FUNNY.

Later

 

[John in Covina]

I recall my friend's mom talking about how she learned to cook on a wood stove and had to re-learn for gas stove cooking.

 

[tealseal]

I would love to do some vintage cooking, but unfortunately, all my grandmother's recipes look something like this:
"Eggs, milk, flour, yeast, spices, soda. Bake 400. Cool"
Two of those I can do, but I'm not, nor will I ever be, knowledgeable enough to know just how much of everything to put in, nor how to combine them. Sigh...because I'd love to be able to re-create some of them!

 

[skyvue]

Some of you may enjoy Kitchen Secrets and Shortcuts: 83 Kitchen Hints and Ways to Save You Time, Steps and Food, a 1951 (I think) pamphlet that I like mostly for the graphics. The tips are kind of interesting, too, but I spend so little time in the kitchen that they're mostly wasted on me.

 

[FountainPenGirl]

I would love to do some vintage cooking, but unfortunately, all my grandmother's recipes look something like this:
"Eggs, milk, flour, yeast, spices, soda. Bake 400. Cool"
Two of those I can do, but I'm not, nor will I ever be, knowledgeable enough to know just how much of everything to put in, nor how to combine them. Sigh...because I'd love to be able to re-create some of them!

Hi, a good source of recipes is vintage cookbooks which there are plenty of floating around. A good book to have is the Betty Crocker cook book put out originally in 1950 and there were several printings after that. The earlier the better because they tell you to use things like lard and depend on more basic ingredients that you are more likely to have and can find. Better homes and gardens put out a good general cook book too. If you look at your Grandma's recipes and find ones in the books that use the same ingredients that will get you pretty close on the amounts. As you get experience you can adjust the amounts to your taste. I've used this theory to figure out some things my Grandma made. She had the most excellent bread and rolls I've ever had and have never had any like it since. Last winter through experimenting I managed to get some that was pretty close. Give it a try. You might be surprised with the results.

 

[Flicka]

I recently found this blogpost with the entire Sunset Magazine Kitchen Cabinet Cookbook. This cookbook has recipes ranging from the 20s until the late 30s, so it's a good source for anyone looking for vintage American recipes.