Doughnuts, Cookies, Butterscotch Pie - Family Recipe Friday

These are the last three recipes on the last page of my grandmother Emma (Bickerstaff) Meinzen's recipe book that she wrote in a Webster's Spelling tablet.

As with past recipes there is the assumption that those using the recipes would know the procedures to make the final products.  We can assume the doughnuts were fried; the cookies were rolled out and cut with cookie cutters; the butterscotch pie recipe is for the filling that gets cooked and poured into an already baked shell.  And the quantity of flour in the doughnuts?  The experienced cook probably knew the consistency required for the dough to become doughnuts instead of bricks.


     Doughnuts.
     4 or 5 mashed potatoes
     1 tablespoon butter
     3 eggs
     2 cups sugar
     1 cup milk
     4 teaspoon B. Powder
     flour

     Cookies
     2 cup sugar
     2 eggs.
     1 cup butter or 1/2 lard
     1 "  milk
     5 teaspoons Baking Powder
     flour  --  flavor.

     Butter Scotch Pies
     1 cup brown Sugar
     1 tablespoon butter
     1 Pt. boiling Water
     Yolks of 2 eggs.
     2 tablespoon Corn Starch
     Beat whites of
     eggs for top.

The back of this spelling tablet has writing on it which is very difficult to read.  I can decipher some of the words and measurements but not enough to make the recipe. In fact, there's no indication at the top what the ingredients make.

This is what I can read:

     1/2 [possibly shortening]
     1 teaspoon [?]
     1 egg
     1 cup
     1 teaspoon soda
     1 3/4 flour
     Nutmeg
     [2?] or 3 [apples?]
     1/4 [?]
     1 [?]


And that is the end of the recipes in my grandmother's Webster's spelling tablet.  I will compile a post with the names and links to all the recipes. 

--Nancy.
.

Cream Puffs - Family Recipe Friday

This is the next-to-last page of recipes that my grandmother, Emma (Bickerstaff) Meinzen, recorded in a Webster's spelling test tablet.

I'm probably in the minority but I've never liked cream puffs.  This recipe may produce perfectly delicious ones but I don't remember tasting them and I know I won't make the recipe to try them.  (The image at left does not show the cream puffs from this recipe.)
 

Cream Puffs.
1/2 cup water.
2 eggs.
1/2 cup flour.
1/4 teaspoon Salt.
3 tablespoon Shortening.
Mix Water & fat
& heat mixture
until the water
boils add flour
& salt & mix
thoroughly.  Stir
& cook until the
ingredients are
well blended &
paste does not
stick to the sides
of the pan.  Care
Should be taken
not to cook
the mixture too
long.  While
mixture is hot
add eggs one at
a time.  Beat




Cream Puffs.
until thoroughly
mixed.  Drop by
tablespoonfuls on
oiled sheet & bake
45 Mins.  When
cool slit open & fill.

Filling.
1/4 cup flour.
1 tablespoon corn starch
3/4 cup Sugar.
2     " scaled [scalded] Milk.
1 tablespoon butter
1 or 2 eggs.
1/4 teaspoon Salt
1 teaspoon Vanilla.
Mix flour, corn
starch, & sugar add
hot milk slow [slowly]
& cook 20 min. then
add beaten
eggs.  Cook again
then add
Salt & Vanilla.

--Nancy.
.

Apple Sauce Cake, Sweet Pickle, Jam Cake - Family Recipe Friday

This is an interesting group of recipes from Gramma's Webster's Spelling Recipe Book.  Or, better said, there are some interesting aspects to these recipes.  I transcribed all spellings as found in the recipes. 

The Apple Sauce Cake recipe calls for lard.  Crisco may not yet have been invented when the recipe was created or Gramma may have preferred lard over Crisco.  Crisco was invented in 1911.  Also, I believe this is the first recipe in which the temperature of the oven is mentioned, although "slow oven" isn't a precise temperature.

The recipe for Sweet Pickle is vague. 
- The quantities of most ingredients are not included. 
- The recipe doesn't indicates the kind of vegetable.  Cucumbers are the most common vegetable for pickles and I assume that's the vegetable of choice for these pickles because they are to be scalded until white.
- The canning process seems to have been only filling the jars with hot ingredients then putting the lids on to seal them, completely omitting the water bath canning process. 
- "Saccerine" is written at the end of the recipe.  I believe it's a misspelling of the word saccharine, a word with several meanings.  The one probably intended by Gramma was that the pickles were very sweet.  However, Webster's 1913 dictionary indicates that Saccharine was already a trade name for benzoic sulphinide, a synthetic sweetener.  In light of the fact that she indicates they are "saccerine," I find it interesting that the quantity of sugar is not included in this recipe.

The recipe for Jam Cake is very general.  Shall I mix the jam into the batter before baking or do I bake and then layer with jam?  And the quantities of spices are not mentioned at all.  Perhaps it's assumed that the baker knows the preferences of her family members when it comes to the spiciness of cake. 

Apple Sauce Cake
1 cup brown Sugar.
1/2 cup lard.
1 1/2 cup apple Sauce
2 level teaspoons Soda.
2 cups flour.
1 egg well beaten
1 cup raisins
1 pinch cinamon,
nutmeg & alspice.
Cream the lard &
sugar, & then mix
in the well beaten
egg.  Mix the soda
into the apple
sauce when hot.
Add to the first
mixture, & then add
the flour, spices, &
the raisins which
have been dusted
with flour.  Mix all
thoroly & bake in a loaf
pan.  Sprinkle
granulated sugar
& cinamon over top &
(over)


bake in slow oven
40 minutes.  Very good
also with carmel
icing.

Sweet Pickle.
Put in strong salt
water over night.
Take out in morning
and wash all off.
Put in Weak Vinegar
& scald until they
get white.  Have
vinegar boiling
& sweeten & spicen
& pour over them
in the jars.  Seal
while Hot.  (Saccerine)

Jam Cake.
4 eggs.  1 cup Sugar
1/2 cup butter.
1 cup sour milk.
1 teasp. Soda.  1 cup jam
cloves, cinamon, Spice

I'm baking Applesauce Cake tomorrow.  Won't you join me? 

--Nancy.

Copyright © 2015 Nancy Messier. All Rights Reserved.

Bran Muffins - Gramma's Webster's Spelling Recipe Book - Family Recipe Friday

Bran is the hard outer layers of any cereal grain -- rice, corn, wheat, oats, barley, millet -- and is the byproduct of milling grains to refine them .  When I buy bran at the store I don't believe it indicates which kind I'm buying, or maybe I always buy wheat bran and never noticed.  Bran is usually added to breads, muffins, and other baked goods.  It's healthy because it's high in dietary fiber and essential acids.  I believe the bran required for this recipe is raw bran, not a prepared, boxed bran cereal.

Bran  Muffins
1 cup bran.
1 cup Sour Milk
1   "   flour.
1 teaspoon soda.
3/4    "    Salt.
1/4 cup Sugar.
1 tablespoon Molasses
2       "      Shortening
1 egg.
Soak bran in
Sour milk while
getting other
ingredients ready.
Sift together flour,
Salt, Soda, Cream
Shortening.  Add
Sugar.  Add
beaten Egg.  Add
Molasses.  Add
flour +
milk alternately.

Gramma didn't include baking instructions but muffins usually bake at 375 degrees for 20 to 30 minutes.  These would probably be delicious with the addition of dried fruit such as raisins, cranberries, or blueberries.

I think every cook and baker has a personal preference about how recipes are written.  (Or maybe it's just me?)  When I put this on a recipe card it will look like this:

Soak:                1 c. bran
in:                    1 c. sour milk while preparing ingredients below

Sift together:   1 c. flour
                        1 tsp. soda
                        3/4 tsp. salt

Cream:             2 tblsp. shortening
Add:                 1/4 c. sugar
                        1 egg, beaten
                        1 tblsp. molasses

Alternately add the flour mixture and the milk/bran mixture to the shortening mixture.

Pour into greased or paper-lined muffin tins.  Bake at 375 degrees for 20-30 minutes.  Test for doneness with a toothpick.  (If it comes out clean, the muffins are done.)

Enjoy!

--Nancy.

Copyright © 2015 Nancy Messier. All Rights Reserved.

Salid Dressing, Peach or Apple Pudding - Family Recipe Friday

The recipe for Salid [sic] Dressing calls for Eagle Brand Milk, generally known as Eagle Brand Sweetened Condensed Milk.  I wondered if that could help me date this recipe book.  It can't.  The company's website tells me that Eagle Brand Milk was first introduced in 1856 -- and my grandmother wasn't born until 1893.  Eagle Milk had been around almost 40 years by the time she was born. 

This recipe also calls for a raw egg, an ingredient most of us would shun these days for fear of salmonella.  The ingredients suggest to me that this is a mayonnaise type dressing that would be great for cole slaw (if only the egg were cooked).  Maybe salmonella was less of a problem a hundred years ago, before egg factories.

Salid Dressing.
1 can Eagle Brand
         Milk.
1 egg.
1 teaspoon Must-
      ard--Dry.
1/2 cup Vinegar.
Beat egg well
add Mustard &
salt.  Mix well &
then add Eagle
Brand Milk &
then the Vinegar.


Peach or Apple Pudding
1 tablespoon butter
1 egg.
1/2 cup Suagr.
1/2 cup Sweet Milk.
1 cup flour
Fill a buttered dish
with sliced apples or
peaches & pour over
the top a batter
made of the above ingredients.

This is another page from my grandmother Emma Bickerstaff Meinzen's Webster's Spelling Tablet, probably a tablet with pages for taking spelling tests, unused and left by one of her daughters.

--Nancy.

Copyright © 2015 Nancy Messier. All Rights Reserved.

Chili Sauce, Pepper Relish - Family Recipe Friday

If the recipes in this collection from my grandmother's Webster's Spelling Book are any indication, she preserved the produce from her garden in a healthy variety of ways beyond the solitary vegetables of corn, green beans, etc.  Other recipes in the book include Tomato Catsup, Quince Honey, Mixed Pickles, and Sweet Pickles.

Sealing jars of jellies and jams with paraffin was a common practice through the 1980s but I had not realized it was used to seal relishes, too.  These days we wonder at the safety of it but I don't know a single person who died or became ill from home-canned goods sealed with paraffin. 

____________________________________________________________

Chili Sauce.
12 tomatoes
1 onion    1 pepper
1 cup brown sugar
put in bag 2 teasp. cinamon [sic]
2 Teaspoon nutmeg
2      "          allspice
2      "          cloves
cook to desired thickness

Pepper Relish
12 red peppers
 "  green  "
6 large onions
Pour boiling water over
and let stand 15 min.
drain and bring to
a boil with cold water
and drain again  boil
vinegar, sugar, salt 5
min.  pour [??] and
let stand untill [sic] cool
and then bottle
2 cups sugar, 1 table salt
1 quart vinegar
[new page]
Remove and bottle at once.  Seal air-tight with paraffain wax.

Image of woman at canning table, above, from Home Canning and Drying of Vegetables and Fruits, courtesy of Internet Archive Book Images.

--Nancy.

Copyright © 2015 Nancy Messier. All Rights Reserved.

Brown Sugar Cookies, Corn Meal Muffins - Family Friday Recipe

This recipes comes from a collection Emma Bickerstaff Meinzen, my maternal grandmother, wrote in a Webster's Spelling booklet.  I believe they were written in the mid-1910s or early 1920s.  The recipes appear to have been well-used though I don't remember seeing Gramma use them.

As with most recipes from this time period the instructions, oven temperatures, and baking times are limited or omitted.  In fact, the recipe for Brown Sugar Cookies does not include the dry ingredients or the measurements for those ingredients.  It was either an oversight or there were generally accepted quantities to be used for certain kinds of recipes.  (I looked for more of the recipe on the previous and subsequent pages, both front and back, but it was not there.) 

Brown Sugar Cookies
2 eggs.
5 tablespoon Sweet milk.
{Put dry ingredients
{together and make
{a well in center
{and put in
{remainder.
{Beat well together.

Corn Meal Muffins
1 Egg.
1/2 cup Sugar --(Not quite)
2 tablespoon lard
              --beat to cream
1 cup Milk.
1 cup white flower [sic].
1 cup corn meal.
2 teaspoon Baking
                      powder.
Salt.

--Nancy.

Copyright © 2015 Nancy Messier. All Rights Reserved.

Butter Scotch Cookies, Country Creamed Corn - Family Recipe Friday

Update of August 22, 2014

After seeing this recipe for Butter Scotch Cookies last week my daughter decided to make them.  The recipe was a great success.  The cookies were cakey, moist, and delicious.  They may be a new family favorite!

She made a few substitutions.  Because we didn't have walnuts she substituted an equal amount of butterscotch chips.  We didn't have cream of tartar, either, so she used an equal amount of vinegar.  She baked them in a 350-degree oven and checked them after 10 minutes.

Original post of August 14, 2014

The phrases "made from scratch" and "homemade" came to mind when I first read these recipes.  They both call for good, plain, wholesome ingredients cooked to deliciousness.

I have no date for these recipes but when the directions for the cookies suggest putting the dough (made with eggs) in a cool place overnight, I imagine that Gramma made the cookies only in the winter because refrigerators -- and possibly ice boxes -- had not yet been invented.  Of course, her "cool place" may have been a spring house.  My modern adaptation to this recipe is putting the dough in the refrigerator overnight. 

Look at the recipe for Country Creamed Corn.  Oh, my.  Do you know many cooks modern-day cooks who would "scrape out the hearts" of every kernel of corn to make creamed corn?  My impression of homemakers in the early 1900s is that they had a heavy burden of work, done by hand, without the aid of labor-saving devices.  I wonder at such a labor-intensive recipe for a side dish.

My last thought about the creamed corn recipe is that it directs cooking the corn over a "slow fire."  Hmmm.  Either Gramma was using a wood-burning stove or the phrase was a hold-over from a time when she did.  Gramma was born in 1893 so it's entirely possible that by the time she married in 1914 she was still using a wood-burning kitchen stove.

These recipes bring to mind two movie scenes:  first, the opening scene in "Meet Me in St. Louis" where the ladies are making ketchup over a wood-burning stove; and, second, the scene in the movie "Anne of Green Gables" in which Anne finds a mouse in the pudding sauce because she forgot to put a cover over it.  How times change. 

Butter Scotch Cookies
1 cup butter
1   "   brown sugar.
3 eggs
About 5 or more cups
     of flour.
1 teaspoon cream Tarter
1      "     Baking Soda
1      "     Vanilla
1 cup English Walnuts
Cream Butter, add
sugar, then
beaten eggs.  Add
dry ingredients to
sifted together,
Vanilla, chopped
nuts.  Mix with
Spoon until stiff
enough to
knead then
work in flour
enough so as to
make in long
roll with hands
Put in a cool
        (over)



Butter Scotch Cookies [continued]
place over night.
Make cookies as
thin as possible
as they raise in
the oven

Country Creamed Corn
Cut the tops of
the kernels &
scrape out the
hearts.  Put in a
saucepan & one
tablespoon butter
for each cup of
corn, 1/2 teaspoon
salt & 1/8 teaspoon
pepper.  Add just
enough milk to
make moist
& cook over a
slow fire, Stirring con-
stantly until very
hot.  Add cream to
barely cover & continue
cooking for 8 minutes.  Stir
                        Constantly.



These recipes are from the Webster's spelling tablet my grandmother Emma (Bickerstaff) Meinzen used to write recipes.  More of her recipes are available at Gramma's Webster's Spelling Recipe Book.

--Nancy.

Copyright © 2014 Nancy Messier. All Rights Reserved.

Shortcake, Muffins, To Brighten Carpet - Gramma's Webster's Spelling Recipe Book - Family Recipe Friday

Just in time for strawberry season, my grandmother gives you recipes for shortcake and muffins.  These recipes will be quick and easy to make and delicious under a layer of strawberries with whipped cream on top!

Both recipes use baking powder, which means as few strokes as possible to mix the ingredients, then quickly into their pans and into the oven.  The shortcake should go into a greased and floured pan; the muffins into, well, muffin tins, either greased and floured or lined with cupcake papers.

Recipes were simpler in those days a hundred years ago:  just the ingredients, and the woman with experience in the kitchen knew how hot the oven should be for whatever she was baking.  There were no thermostats or temperature gauges on ovens in those days.  These should bake just fine in a 350-degree oven.  Start with about 20 minutes for the shortcake, 15 for the muffins.  Test for doneness with a wooden toothpick.  If it comes out clean or with baked crumbs, they're done.  If there's batter on the toothpick, bake a little longer and retest.

And about the carpet cleaning....  Perhaps this "recipe" was copied before there were vacuum cleaners, or before my grandmother's home had a vacuum cleaner.  In humid Ohio summers, I wouldn't want to add any more moisture to our already sticky environment but you might like to try this if you live in a dryer climate.

Short Cake
2 cups flour.
1/2 teaspoon Salt
4 teaspoon B. Powder
2 tablespoon Sugar.
3/4 cup Milk.
3 tablespoon
     Shortening.

Muffins
1 tablespoon butter
2 cups flour.
2 tablespoon Sugar.
2 teaspoon baking P.
2 eggs.
1/2 teaspoon Salt.
1 cup Milk.

To Brighten Carpet
A carpet is
freshened & improved
by brushing it
with a cloth
wrung out of a
mixture of Vinegar
and water.

Unaltered photo of strawberries courtesy of Darwin Bell : Darwin Bell via photopin cc at Creative Commons.

--Nancy.

© 2014 Copyright by Nancy Messier
.

Steamed Raisin Pudding - Family Recipe Friday

This is another recipe from my grandmother's Webster's Spelling Book turned recipe book.  I've never made a steamed pudding and I'm not sure how my family would respond to a recipe with raisins as the main ingredient.  During my childhood raisins were used much more frequently that they are in my home.

The recipe doesn't mention flouring the raisins but calls for adding "the floured raisins" along with the other dry ingredients.  Gramma probably sifted the dry ingredients together then tossed in the raisins, mixed them to coat them, then add them with the dry ingredients.  It makes sense to me.  That's what I would do.

Also, thinking about soda in a steamed pudding makes me think it rises as it's steaming.

Gramma did not include a recipe for Hard Sauce.  I suppose that recipe was memorized and became part of the repertoire of young cooks.

Steamed Raisin Pudding
1 1/4 cups Raisins
1/2     "    Molasses,
1/2    "     milk
1 7/8  "     flour
3 tablespoon fat.
1/2 teaspoon Soda.
1/2    "          Salt.
1/4    "         cloves.
1/4    "        allspice.
1/4    "       nutmeg.
Melt fat, add mollases
Milk, then the dry
ingredients which
have been sifted
together and the
floured raisins.
Beat well and
steam in a greased covered
tins 2 hrs.
Serve with hard
sauce.

If you try this recipe, I'd love to hear what you think of it.  Thanks.

You can see other recipes from this spelling tablet/booklet here.

--Nancy.
.

Picnic Caramel Cake, Baked Apple Pudding, & More Recipes from Gramma's Webster's Spelling Recipe Book - Family Recipe Friday

Gramma usually used only the fronts of the pages in this spelling booklet but this page has recipes both front and back.  And this is the only time she pasted recipes that she'd clipped from a magazine or booklet onto the pages.  Most certainly the first recipe came from an advertisement for or from a box of Swans Down Cake Four.  By the pristine appearance of this page I can only guess that my grandmother either did not use these recipes or memorized them.

Picnic Caramel Cake

    Cream ½ cupful butter, or substitute, with ¾ cupful sugar.  Beat the yolks of 4 eggs until light and add ¾ cupful sugar, beating hard.  Add the egg and sugar mixture to the butter and sugar, mixing well.  Sift 3 cupfuls SWANS DOWN CAKE FLOUR, measure, add 4 teaspoonfuls baking powder, ¼ teaspoonful salt, and sift three times.  Add the flour and 1 cupful milk alternately to the mixture, then add 1 teaspoonful vanilla extract.  Fold in 4 stiffly beaten egg whites and bake in two layer cake pans in a moderate oven.  Put the layers together and cover the cake with caramel or any desired frosting.

Baked Apple Pudding

Cover the bottom of a baking dish about one inch deep with pared and sliced apples, add sugar and cinnamon and cover with a batter made by mixing together one pint of flour, two teaspoonfuls baking powder, one-half teaspoonful salt, one-half cupful sugar, one egg, well beaten, two tablespoonfuls melted lard and three-quarters of a cupful of sweet milk.  Bake about one-half hour.  Make a sauce of sweet milk, adding a little sugar and cinnamon to taste.  This recipe may also be used for cherry pudding, using the juice of the cherries thickened with cornstarch as a sauce.   Mrs. F. G. Steffen, Michigan.

Pop Corn Balls (236 degrees).

    For about six or eight quarts of well-popped corn take one cup of sugar and one cup corn syrup, with a little water, and cook to a soft ball, then add a little vanilla to it and slowly pour over the corn, stirring it well to get it all covered.  Now moisten the inside of your hands slightly with cold water, as this prevents it from sticking, take a small portion and press lightly into a ball.  If you wish, you may color this syrup pink and flavor with strawberry.  The corn syrup prevents the batch from going to sugar while stirring through the corn.

Pop-Corn Crisp.

   Take 2 cups of sugar and 1½ cups of corn syrup and 1½ cups water and cook to hard ball, or until it bubbles  up rather thick, then add one tablespoonful of butter and stir through batch and cook until it is a light golden brown.  This requires only a few minutes cooking after the butter is in, so do not let it burn.  Pour this over about six quarts of well-popped corn, sprinkling well with salt while stirring it.  Pour out an [at] once and spread out [to cool.]

Apple Fritters

1 cup flour                        ¼ teaspoon salt
1½ teaspoons baking        ½ cup milk
    powder                         1 egg
1½ tablespoons sugar        5 large tart apples
     Mix and sift flour, baking powder, sugar and salt together.  Add milk and beaten egg and mix well.  Pare and cut apples into quarters, then into thin slices.  Dip slices in batter and try in deep fat about 5 to 8 minutes until brown.  Drain on brown paper, sprinkle with sifted powdered sugar and serve hot.

    Banana Cake
1¼ cup sugar
scant ½ cup butter
1 cup sour milk
2 cup flour
1 tsp. soda
1 tsp. B. Powder
2 egg
2 bananas
1 tea vanilla
  __________
      Method.
Cream butter and sugar
add eggs well beaten
slice bananas.
sift flour, soda, and
B. powder to-gether
add with milk last
the vanilla.

--Nancy.
.

Extra Fine Tarts, Cookies - Gramma's Webster's Recipe Book - Family Recipe Friday

I'm not sure what makes these tarts "extra fine" but maybe it's the coconut. Coconut is one of my least favorite baking ingredients but when this recipe was new, perhaps in the early 1900s, coconut may have been an uncommon, special, and expensive ingredient.

As for the cookies, they're made with molasses and baked in muffin tins or gem pans.  From what I can tell, gem pans were similar to muffin tins except generally made of cast iron and had rounded bottoms.  Some recipes called for heating the pans in the oven before filling and baking.  I think for this tart recipe the gem pans were not to be pre-heated.  Maybe these cookies are more like gingerbread or sweet bread than cookies.  Now that fall's here, I think I'll try them.  The challenge may be the less-than-exact measurement of "rounded tablespoons" of shortening.  Too much or too little shortening can ruin a recipe.

As with all of the previous recipes, no oven temperatures (other than "moderate") or baking times are given.

________________________________________________________

Extra fine Tarts
Line gem tins with
pie crust place in
them 1 tsp. jam or jelly
Mix 1 egg with 2/3 cup sugar
butter size of egg small
pkg. coconut   beat to-gether
and fill remaining part
of tart space

_________________________________
    Cookies.
1/2 cup Molasses
1/2   "   B. Sugar
3 rounded tables-
poon Shorting [sic]
1/2 cup boiling water
1 egg        1 1/2 cup flour
1 teas. Soda
1   "   ginger
1/2 cup cinaimon [sic]
Pinch Salt.
Stir molasses,
Sugar, Shorting
into Boiling Water
Sift spices with
flour  also
Salt & Soda (over)
add first mixture
& Stir In last of
all the well
beaten eggs
Butter muffin
tins or gem pans
fill 3/4 full &
bake 20 min. in
moderate oven

________________________________________________________

The image of the pans, above, comes from Household Discoveries: an Encyclopaedia of Practical Recipes and Processes by Sidney Morse and Isabel Gordon Curtis, New York:  Success Company, 1909, p. 31.

--Nancy.
.

Mixed Pickle, Sweet Pickel - Gramma's Webster's Recipe Book - Family Recipe Friday

Someone commented on last week's recipe post that generations ago cooks kept a lot of information in their heads.  It seems they didn't require the details provided by today's recipes as many modern cooks do.  Was it because there were fewer options for ingredients and cooking methods?  Maybe recipes didn't have such individual, specific needs or, if they did, perhaps they were learned at the side of a mother or sister, using the same recipe of ingredients often enough that the recipe became rote.  Was it because times were simpler?  I doubt they had a constant tide of new information assailing them on an hourly basis so perhaps it was easier to focus.  Whatever the reason, I sometimes stumble to decide how to mix and bake the old recipes.

Mixed pickle
5 qt.  [bracketed to left of first 3 lines]
1 quart small cucumbers
1    "   small onions   green tomato
1    "    cauliflower   (peppers)
sprinkle with salt
and let stand over
night
2 quart vinegar when
boiling add 8 tablsepoon
mustard.  3 cup sugar
1 1/2 cup flour
1 teaspoon cayenn pepper
1 tablespoon tumeric
boil in weak vinegar
10 min put in paste [?]
and boil. then seal.
while hot

Sweet pickel
For Pear, peaches, or apple
1 qt vinegar, 3 lb. sugar
1/2 ounce each whole cloves
and stick cinnamon
Boil fruit remove and
Boil syrup until clear
put in fruit & seal.

It looks like Gramma adapted the Mixed pickle recipe over time adding green tomatoes and peppers to the other ingredients.  I was surprised to see flour in the ingredients for pickles and also surprised at the quantity of spices.  I have a tender palette:  my husband teases me that I think catsup is spicy.  I'm not sure how well I'd enjoy these pickles with their cayenne and tumeric.

She doesn't mention the quantity of ingredients for the sweet pickle recipe.  Three pounds of sugar seems like a lot, but then they <i>are</i> sweet pickles.  I also find it interesting that she gave the weight of the spices instead of spoonful measurements.  The other recipes I've transcribed call for spoonful measurements.  I think this recipe may be the most challenging yet.

Gramma probably used Ball or Mason canning jars (as opposed to crocks or metal cans).  She didn't mention how long to boil the pickles.  These days each food being canned has a recommended processing time in a water bath or pressure canner for the food to be considered safely canned.  I doubt much detail existed during Gramma's time.  However, I don't know of a single family member who was harmed by her canning methods or those of any other family member.

The grandmother to whom these recipes belonged was Emma Virginia Bickerstaff Meinzen.

Happy canning (when canning season finally arrives)!
--Nancy.
.

Dip, Molasses Cake - from Gramma's Webster's Recipe Book - Family Recipe Friday

Here's another page from my grandmother Emma (Bickerstaff) Meinzen's Webster's Spelling Recipe Book.  The patent number date is 14, 1909, so we know Gramma wrote the recipes after that.  In 1909 she was 16, but the handwriting looks like it's written with a mature hand.  I have no doubt that she used these recipes:  they are spotted and dotted with ingredients that missed the bowl!  If you'd like to see the other recipes from her book, click on recipes under the Post Topics at the bottom of the page and a list will appear.

The dip recipe is a sweet one, probably used for fresh fruit, or possibly for cakes or cookies at parties or on special occasions.  I don't ever remember my grandmother making or serving it.

The order of ingredients for the Molasses Cake, which sounds quite a lot like gingerbread, seems unusual to me.  Commonly, cake batter is mixed with sugar and eggs first, then other liquid ingredients, with dry ingredients last (unless liquid and dry ingredients are alternated).  It's also hard to tell what's to be mixed together from the way this recipe's written.  The spices could easily be mixed in either the flour or the molasses.  I think the lard and soda go into 1 cup of hot water.   Cakes are usually baked in a 350-degree oven for anywhere from 20 minutes to 45 or 50 minutes.  Use a toothpick to test for doneness:  stick it in the cake, if it comes our clean, the cake is done; if it comes out with moist cake ingredients on it, bake a little longer.

Dip.
1 tablespoon corn Starch
1     "      "     flour.
1/2 to 3/4 cup Sugar, --
               or to taste.
Butter size of egg.
Pour on Boiling
Water to make
thick enough.
Nutmeg or Vanilla


Molasses Cake.
2 cups flour.
1 cup molasses.
mixed together.
1 tablespoon cinnamon
1/2 teaspoon nutmeg
1       "          cloves.
1 table spoon lard
1 teaspoon of Soda
Cup in Hot Water
Pinch Salt.
1 egg beaten last.


Enjoy!
--Nancy.
.

Spice Cake, Oat Cookies - from Gramma's Webster's Spelling Recipe Book - Family Recipe Friday

Gramma Emma Bickerstaff Meinzen wrote these recipes in pencil. The paper may have originally been a light off-white color and the handwriting may have been darker, but time has muted the pencil and deepened the paper's color so that the handwriting nearly disappears. On the image you see below the color has been altered so that the handwriting is visible.

There aren't any surprises in these recipes. We rarely use lard these days but it was common in the early 1900s. There are no mixing or baking directions, also common for the time. In the Spice cake recipe she used one large bracket to indicate that the soda and baking powder should be mixed into the flour. When I bake this cake I will omit the nut meats and bake in a 350-degree oven. When I try the cookies I will substitute Crisco for the lard. Gramma may or may not have used Quaker Quick Oats which were introduced in 1922. There's no date on the spelling tablet or on any of the recipes.

I was talking with a friend today about food and cooking. She said someone had come to her home and couldn't figure out what there was to eat because there were no boxes of mixes or other prepared foods; no microwave meals in the freezer; no pre-prepared food at all. My friend makes real food, from scratch. These recipes from Gramma were written when prepared food probably included things like saltine crackers, rolled oats, canned soup, and pre-ground coffee. I still like real food from scratch best.

Spice cake
2 cups brown sugar
1/2 " butter
2 eggs
1 cup sour milk
2 1/2 " [cups] flour
1 teaspoon soda }
1 [teaspoon] B. P. [baking powder] } in flour
1 [teaspoon] cinnamon
1/2 [teaspoon] nutmeg & cloves
1/2 cup nut meats

Oats cookies
2 cups flour
2 [cups] oats
1 [cup] lard
1 [cup] sugar
2 eggs
pinch of salt
1 cup raisens [sic]
1/2 [cup] milk
1 teaspoon soda in milk
1 teaspoon cinnamon

Orange Cake, Filling, Cupcakes -- Family Recipe Friday

This is another of Gramma Meinzen's recipes, copied into the Webster's Spelling recipe book.

I was surprised to see "crisco" as an ingredient in the cupcakes. I had no idea of Crisco's history and found that it was first available in 1911, at least a few years before my grandmother wrote her recipes. An excerpt from the Crisco website tells us that

Crisco was introduced by Procter & Gamble in 1911, to provide an economical alternative to animal fats and butter. To emphasize the purity of the product within, the Crisco can came inside an additional, removable over-wrap of white paper. Crisco, the first solidified shortening product made entirely of vegetable oil, was the result of hydrogenation, a new process that produced shortening that would stay in solid form year-round, regardless of temperature.

The first print advertisement for Crisco was released in popular women's magazines in January, 1912.

I also wondered about the "S. D. flour." I finally decided that it was Swans Down Cake Flour, "Americas #1 selling cake flour, [which] has set the standard for excellence in baking for more than 100 years." Who knew!

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Orange Cake
3 cups S. D. flour
3 level teas. Baking Powder.
1/2 cup butter.
1 1/4 " sugar
yolk 3 eggs well beaten
juice of one orange in
cup fill cup with water
making 1 full cup.
Rind of one whole orange
whites of 2 eggs.
Sift flour once measure
and add B. P. sift 3
times. cream butter and
sugar add grated rind
of orange and eggs yolks
well beaten now add flour
and water alternatley [sic]
beating long and hard.
Lastly add well beaten
whites of eggs.

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filling for cup cakes
hollow out centers
Mix crumbs with 1 cup
cream beaten stiff with
3 tablespoon powdered
sugar 1/2 cup diced
pineapple |drained|
refill cakes and replace tops
_____________________________
cup cakes
1 1/2 flour
1/2 cup sugar
2 tea. B. powder
1/2 tea salt
1/4 cup crisco
1/2 cup milk
2 eggs.
flavoring

Orange cream filling
white of one large egg juice
of 1 orange 2 cup powdered
sugar. Put egg and
orange juice in deep
bowl. add sugar gradually
beating long and hard
until creamy and
consistency to spread
Spread on cake when cool

Wonder Cake, Icing - Family Recipe Friday

During those times when I have unthinking kinds of work to do, such as stitching a hem or scrubbing a floor, I spend part of the time wondering about many different things but often especially about the lives of my ancestors (unless I'm otherwise preoccupied with wedding preparations as is the case just now). One thing I have never wondered about is my grandmother's recipe for Wonder Cake. Now, as I sit to transcribe it, I wonder why it is called Wonder Cake. Was it an exception in it's time? Was it unusual in it's lightness or easiness to bake? Did it have fewer ingredients than most cakes? Why Wonder Cake? I doubt I'll ever know.

This recipe comes from my grandmother's, Emma Bickerstaff Meinzen's, Webster's Spelling Recipe book. This recipe is unusual, compared to the other recipes in this booklet, because it tells the length of time to bake the cake. It does not, however, tell the temperature at which to bake it. Probably about 350 degrees, which is the temperature at which most cakes bake.

I still think my grandmother did not use enough chocolate in her recipes! They do seem to call for healthier ingredients, though, including plenty of nuts and fruit.

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Wonder Cake
cream 1/2 cup butter
with 1 1/2 cup powdered
sugar 1/2 cup milk
a little at a time
add 2 cups flour
with 2 teaspoon R.
Baking powder
sifted with flour
1 teaspoon vanilla
fold in 6 beaten
egg whites last
Bake 20 min.

Icing
Boil 1 1/2 cup sugar
with 1/2 cup water
untill spins a thread
add slowly to 3 egg
whites beaten add
1/3 cup raisins (cut)
1/2 cup nut meats
1/2 " chopped figs
vanilla

Carrot Pudding and White Candy - Family Recipe Friday

This is another recipe from my Grandmother Emma Bickerstaff Meinzen's Webster's Spelling Recipe Book.

It's hard to decide what kind of dish Carrot Pudding is. At first I thought it was a savory side dish but after reading all the ingredients, changed my mind and decided it must be a dessert. What do you think?

The second recipe on this page is White Candy. On the reverse are Dark Part and Light Part. I can only assume they are a continuation of the recipe for White Candy. White Candy calls for "karo." A search for Karo Syrup revealed that it was first produced in 1902. The website shows images of the covers of early cookbooks but none of the recipes hidden inside. Was this recipe taken from one of those early Karo cookbooks? I searched for "Karo" at HEARTH and found multiple results, especially in conjunction with children's diets, then remembered that HEARTH doesn't publish cookbooks.

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Carrot Pudding.
1 cup grated carrots.
1 " Potatoes.
1 " Suet.
1 " raisins (Roll in flour)
1 " currants.
1 " brown Sugar.
1 Egg.
1 teas. Cinamon
Citron.
1/2 Cloves.
1/2 Allspice.
1 level Soda.
Dissolve in Warm Water.
Steam 3 hrs.

White Candy.
2 cups white sugar.
1/2 cup karo.
1/2 cup water.
Beat white egg
last and beat
altogether.
Vanilla

Dark Part
[written on right side] D. F. lak [?]
Mix 2/3 cup cocoa
2 cup - White sugar
Add a little hot water ["less" written below]
at a time to dissolve
add than half cup)

Light Part
1/2 cups = butter
1 " = white Sugar
3 egg = Yolks
1 cup = sour milk or buttermilk
2 cups = flour
1 t[sp] = Soda dissolved
in 1 T. = hot water
1 egg white beaten
added last
2 egg whites for frosting

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Note added later: Lisa asked in a question about suet in a comment to this post. I did a little research and found that Ochef had some insight into suet, then and now. Suet is a hard fat from around the kidneys of cows and sheep which is very unlike the suet sold in most stores today. Buy suet from a butcher.

I also appreciated this information about how suet works: "Because suet has a high melting point, it serves as a place-holder in puddings and crusts when the dough has begun to set, and long after other fats would have melted. As a result, the structure of the pudding is already defined by the time the suet melts, leaving thousands of tiny air holes that give the pudding a light and smooth texture. Additionally, suet, which does not have any meaty taste, imparts a rich flavor."

Could our ancestors eat suet with little complication because they performed more physical labor? Did the bad stuff get worked out of their arteries? Maybe so.

Ginger Bread and Blitz Kuchen in Gramma's Webster's Cookbook - Family Recipe

My grandmother's recipe book, sadly, calls for chocolate http://www.blogger.com/img/blank.gifin only three recipes. But then her recipes are probably healthier than mine (except that she used lard). Instead of chocolate, she frequently used flavorings such as lemon, molasses, and sweet spices.

Blitz Kuchen, which translates to Lightening Cake, is a German recipe. Was it given that name because it's quick to make, because it disappears as quick as lightening, or for some other reason? I don't know if Gramma's recipe came from her German in-laws or if she had neighbors with German traditions. The cake looks very much like some of our American coffee cakes.

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Ginger Bread
1 cup Sugar.
1 " lard.
2 eggs.
2 teaspoon ginger
pinch of Salt.
1 cup Molasses.
2 teaspoon Soda.
1 cup milk or Coffee
4 cups flour.

Blitz Kuchen
3/4 cups Sugar.
butter size of egg
one cup milk
1 teaspoon Baking P.
flavor to taste,
cream butter, sugar
then, add egg, milk
& finally flour
with B.P. Sprinkle over
top with one half
cup nuts 1/2 cup
Sugar. 1 teaspoon
cinamon, bake
[tattered lower edge unreadable]

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Below is my immediate family's favorite gingerbread recipe. My daughter found it in our local newspaper when she was about ten. For a school assignment she was asked to double a recipe and when I received a copy from her, I didn't realize it had been doubled. We had a lot of gingerbread to eat. This recipe has a wonderful mix of spices and, unlike most gingerbreads, is moist. (The recipe below is the single version.)

Mount Vernon Gingerbread

Mix:
1/2 cup butter
1/2 cup brown sugar, packed
1 cup light molasses

In a separate bowl, mix:
2 3/4 c. flour
2 1/2 tsp. ginger
1 tsp. salt
1 tsp. soda
1/2 tsp. cinnamon
1/2 tsp. nutmeg
1/2 tsp. cloves

Mix in a measuring cup:
3/4 c. buttermilk or sour milk
1/4 c. orange juice

Alternately add the flour mixture and the milk/juice mixture to the butter/sugar/molasses mixture, stirring after each addition.

Lightly beat:
2 eggs. Add to above mixture, folding in gently.

Bake in a greased and floured 8: x 8" pan in a 350 degree oven.
How long? No times are noted on the recipe card but probably at least 30 minutes or longer, until a toothpick comes out clean.

_______________________________________________________________

This gingerbread recipe is almost as good as chocolate.

Quince Honey & Jelly Roll or Sponge Cake - Family Recipe Friday

Walking home from school with my daughters one autumn day many years ago, we came upon some beautiful golden yellow fruit on the ground near the sidewalk. It was a kind we had never seen before. We took one home with the hope that we could discover what it was. When we cut it open both its fragrance and flesh made us think of apples -- and other fruits, too, though we couldn't decide which ones. We chose not to taste it fearing that it might be poisonous. We asked others if they knew what it was but no one did.

Our search for the identity of the fruit took place before the internet was available and in the days after the fruit's popularity had declined. Not even a book about fruit told us what it was. Only in the past several years did I learn that we'd found a quince. One rarely hears about quinces these days. Our local stores don't sell them nor do the farmers' markets.

Have you eaten quinces before? Did my grandmother or one of her relatives have a quince tree and is that why she has a recipe for Quince Honey?

This is another page from my grandmother's Webster's Spelling Recipe Book. You'll notice how faded the penciled recipes are on this page. The photo is contrast-enhanced and yet it is still light, but if you click on the image to enlarge it you'll be able to clearly see the handwriting.

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Quince Honey
6 lbs sugar
3 pints water boil 10 min
Add 6 large quinces which have been pared and grated
Cook 30 min then pour in glasses
cover when cool

Jelly Roll or Sponge Cake
yolks of 4 eggs
3 tablespoons waterhttp://www.blogger.com/img/blank.gif
beat add 1 cup sugar
1/2 tablespoon corn starch in 1 cup and fill with flour
2 teaspoon B. Powder sifted with flour
1/4 teaspoon salt
1 [teaspoon] " vanilla
fold in whites of eggs beaten

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The image of the quince came from Creative Commons and tells this information about it: Champion quince, Cydonia oblonga, Watercolor by Amanda A. Newton (12/03/1909) From: http://www.ars-grin.gov/cor/pwc/cydonia-art.html