Vintage Cooking Booklets and Pamphlets

[David Ross]

Over the years I've collected both cookbooks and a large collection of what I call cooking "booklets." These are small booklets that were often mailed or given out free at grocery stores.  Most of them measure 5 1/2" x 8 1/2".  My Mother had a large collection, and I've bought many of them, for a few cents each, at vintage shops and estate sales.  I think my Mother would often clip something out of the newspaper food section or a magazine and send it in to the sponsor for the booklet.  Magazines like Sunset and Better Homes and Gardens printed a series of these booklets. 

 

They're a historical record of the way we cooked and ate at the time, but I also find them a great resource for creating new recipes today.  I'll start by posting the Metropolitan Cook Book printed by the Metropolitan Life Insurance Company.  Often there wasn't a published date in these cook books, but based on the recipes compared to my collection of vintage cook books, I'd say this one dates to around 1915.  Many of the recipes are similar to what I've found in the Fannie Farmer Cookbook of that time.  

 

There is a section of recipes titled "Invalid" recipes, where one could have things like Oatmeal Gruel, Irish Moss Lemonade and a Raw Beef Sandwich.  Under the "Lunch Box" section, there is a suggested cold lunch for "Industrial Workers"-

1 minced ham sandwich with white bread

1 Swiss cheese sandwich with rye bread

1 whole tomato

1 apple dumpling

1 cup coffee (in Thermos)

 

For "School Children"-

1 cottage cheese sandwich on brown bread

1 jelly sandwich on white bread

1 apple

1/2 pint bottle of milk 

[Shelby]

I, too, have quite a few of those types of booklets...I'll go through and take pictures.  Some are quite entertaining lol.

 

Yummmmmmm.....toast soup......   🙃

[Katie Meadow]

@David RossI found the recipe for Toast Water particularly hilarious. You've got to be seriously ill to benefit from that. Like deathbed ill. At that point just spoon-feed me coffee ice cream. It doesn't matter if I can't keep it down. 

[David Ross]

2 hours ago, Katie Meadow said:

@David RossI found the recipe for Toast Water particularly hilarious. You've got to be seriously ill to benefit from that. Like deathbed ill. At that point just spoon-feed me coffee ice cream. It doesn't matter if I can't keep it down. 

Reminds me of the episode of The Little Rascals when all they get for breakfast is milk toast.  I think Aunt Martha also served the Beaver and Wally milk toast when she came to take care of them one weekend. 

[weinoo]

2 hours ago, Katie Meadow said:

@David RossI found the recipe for Toast Water particularly hilarious. You've got to be seriously ill to benefit from that. Like deathbed ill. At that point just spoon-feed me coffee ice cream. It doesn't matter if I can't keep it down. 

 

After all, it is the Metropolitan Life cookbook.

[David Ross]

This is a cooking booklet that either my Mother or a Grandmother saved.  Sponsored by the Knox Gelatin Company, it was during the days with molded salads were wildly popular.  The theme is how they make molded salads for the new media of television. The photos are part of our Cook-Off #61, Gels, Jell-O and Aspics.

[Maison Rustique]

Mom always made milk toast for us when we were sick. We loved it because she made it with cinnamon toast. 🙂  I want to hear about the cottage cheese sandwiches on brown bread. That sounds pretty tasty!

 

I have a lot of these booklets, too. My sister probably has them in the hundreds.

[weinoo]

Hard to see the cover on this first one...

 

 

 

Show You!

 

 

 

Golden Rule...

 

 

 

 

My faves...

 

[IowaDee]

Have to laugh at the Sunbeam Mixmaster booklet;  I don't have one BUT I do have the mixer. It was my Nana's and she gave it to me when she bought a new one.  It is such a workhorse it makes the Energizer Bunny look lazy.  I fully expect it to last long enough to pass on to one of our daughters.

[David Ross]

2 hours ago, weinoo said:

Hard to see the cover on this first one...

 

 

 

Show You!

 

 

 

Golden Rule...

 

 

 

 

My faves...

 

These are brilliant I love it.  

[weinoo]

7 minutes ago, David Ross said:

These are brilliant I love it.  

 

Thank you!

 

That Oriental Show-You Company booklet, with my name on the cover, was bought for me (from what I remember) by my first live-in girlfriend's mom (I was already cooking and even taking Chinese cooking classes!)- at the Santa Barbara flea market, probably around 1977. Both the girlfriend and her mom were flea market/second-hand store/garage sale hounds. As you can see, she valued me highly, and paid all of 10 cents for it.

 

Digging a little deeper...

 

Quote

In 1918 the Oriental Show-You Company was founded in Detroit by Shinzo Ohki, a recent immigrant from Japan. The company began by importing shoyu (soy sauce) and tea from China.  In 1922 Mr. Ohki traveled back to Japan to learn the traditional natural fermentation method of making shoyu.  After returning to the U.S. (later that year) he moved his business to Columbia City, Indiana.  By 1924 he was bottling his own brand of shoyu, along with canned mung bean sprouts, chow mein noodles, chop suey, and Jigg’s corn beef and cabbage (Shurtleff & Aoyago 2012).  The company was making 12,000 gallons of shoyu a year, which was mostly sold in the Midwest and only east of the Mississippi River (Yates 1998:775). At it’s peak the company was making 30,000 gallons of soy sauce per year. The factory closed in the early 1960s when the company was acquired by Beatrice Food Inc, later becoming a part of La Choy food products. (Shurtleff & Aoyago 2012).

 

http://campusarch.msu.edu/?p=5523

 

Quote

Indiana’s own Shinzo Ohki would be one of the few producers of soy sauce in the United States with his company; Oriental Show-You Company. Shinzo Ohki was born south of Tokyo in the seaside town of Kamakura, Kanagawa prefecture, Japan in 1883 or 1884; public records vary on the exact year. He first appears in a list of 1907 graduates of Columbia City High School. Later in December 1907 and in January 1908 he is noted in newspapers giving stereopticon lectures of his 90-day tour of Japan, complete with 150 “magnificent dissolving views.” How he made his way to Indiana is a bit of a mystery. A 1939 column; “The Daily Grist” in the Wilmington News-Journal (Ohio) recalls a dinner party where Shinzo would tell his “100 or so” dinner guests his life story.

 

https://indianahistory.org/blog/the-show-you-sauce-of-columbia-city/

 

These pamphlets, booklets, etc. all have a story to tell!  And obviously, they were well traveled too!

[chromedome]

I have a number of these things kicking around. I'm allegedly working right now, but I'll dig some out for photos later on.

[Katie Meadow]

On 10/26/2020 at 10:23 AM, weinoo said:

 

Thank you!

 

That Oriental Show-You Company booklet, with my name on the cover, was bought for me (from what I remember) by my first live-in girlfriend's mom (I was already cooking and even taking Chinese cooking classes!)- at the Santa Barbara flea market, probably around 1977. Both the girlfriend and her mom were flea market/second-hand store/garage sale hounds. As you can see, she valued me highly, and paid all of 10 cents for it.

 

Digging a little deeper...

 

 

http://campusarch.msu.edu/?p=5523

 

 

https://indianahistory.org/blog/the-show-you-sauce-of-columbia-city/

 

These pamphlets, booklets, etc. all have a story to tell!  And obviously, they were well traveled too!

I don't know what the Indiana state motto is, but they missed the boat: "The show you state." Or "The I'll show YOU state!"

Edited October 28, 2020 by Katie Meadow (log)

[David Ross]

This booklet dates from probably post-war to the early 1950s.  I remember my Mother making a cake similar to the one on the cover. 

[weinoo]

Wow - 60 Hudson Street is a gorgeous Art Deco building; I had no idea the nut association was in there...

 

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/60_Hudson_Street

 

And that pamphlet is weirdly available on Amazon! (eG-friendly Amazon.com link)

 

 

[David Ross]

49 minutes ago, weinoo said:

Wow - 60 Hudson Street is a gorgeous Art Deco building; I had no idea the nut association was in there...

 

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/60_Hudson_Street

 

And that pamphlet is weirdly available on Amazon! (eG-friendly Amazon.com link)

 

 

Wow that is an impressive building.

 

[Shelby]

I have a ton of these things.  Saved from great grandmothers on both sides passed through my grammy--and probably some she saved too.  You might be sorry you asked 🤣  I will make several posts so there aren't a ton of pics in each.

 

Not 100, but 101! uses for salt

 

 

A lot that I have are baking powder and baking soda related

 

 

Flour

 

 

Canning/Pickling salt

 

 

 More baking powder

 

Even more baking powder lol

 

 

Corn (contemplating sending this to @liuzhou--I know he'd adore it.

 

 

No idea who's signature is in it

 

[Shelby]

Help during war time

 

 

More baking powder (who knew there were so many different brands?)

 

 

 

 

This is from the gas stove company

 

With special recipes for when your wife is away...because wives hate Italian spaghetti?????

 

[Shelby]

This is one of my favorites...it's a paper doll, well paper grandma

 

 

I bust this one out when Ronnie is mad at me....I fix him these menus PROVEN that men prefer and POOF! He's not mad any more.

 

Yes, I strive to be the apple of his eye

See? A JURY of men voted that they like meals with FLAVOR.  Who knew?

 

 

 

Yes.  Every night before bed I lay out a platter of sandwich fixings in the fridge so that Ronnie can have fun rustling up a midnight snack.

 

And never forget.  Men prefer Bond Bread.  Except I think they went out of business.......

 

 

 

 

 

[Shelby]

And, in case the above didn't give you enough man pleasing recipes, here's a whole 'nother one

 

 

Thought I'd show some ideas for the upcoming holidays.....

 

 

Also, when the women are away, men broil!

 

 

This one wouldn't be socially acceptable at all these days.  I always loved Aunt Jemima.  When I was little I thought that she must give really great hugs.

 

 

[Shelby]

I'll show just a couple more

 

Wesson oil.  I think the booklet must have taken a dive in the oil at some point.

 

 

 

And finally, the every popular Watkins Cook Book

 

 

[David Ross]

This is both a cooking booklet but also a brochure.  This is from my Maternal Great Grandparents, Max and Jennie Pink, Twin Falls, Idaho.  This dates from about 1920, and was from the Home Comfort Stove Company.  My Grandfather, Ralph Pink, had saved this along with other old kitchen items.  I also have a booklet from the Frigidaire company when my Grandmother Mildred Ross bought a new refrigerator in 1957.  Often these pamphlets and booklets had recipes in the back pages.  Imagine cooking on this stove today. The booklet measures 5 1/2 x 8 1/2.

 

[David Ross]

58 minutes ago, Shelby said:

I have a ton of these things.  Saved from great grandmothers on both sides passed through my grammy--and probably some she saved too.  You might be sorry you asked 🤣  I will make several posts so there aren't a ton of pics in each.

 

Not 100, but 101! uses for salt

 

 

A lot that I have are baking powder and baking soda related

 

 

Flour

 

 

Canning/Pickling salt

 

 

 More baking powder

 

Even more baking powder lol

 

 

Corn (contemplating sending this to @liuzhou--I know he'd adore it.

 

 

No idea who's signature is in it

 

These are fantastic and what a great collection.  It's the history of how folks cooked and ate back then.  

[David Ross]

41 minutes ago, Shelby said:

This is one of my favorites...it's a paper doll, well paper grandma

 

 

I bust this one out when Ronnie is mad at me....I fix him these menus PROVEN that men prefer and POOF! He's not mad any more.

 

Yes, I strive to be the apple of his eye

See? A JURY of men voted that they like meals with FLAVOR.  Who knew?

 

 

 

Yes.  Every night before bed I lay out a platter of sandwich fixings in the fridge so that Ronnie can have fun rustling up a midnight snack.

 

And never forget.  Men prefer Bond Bread.  Except I think they went out of business.......

 

 

 

 

 

Brilliant.  I love the different typefaces and imagine someone at a typewriter coming up with that copy.  Sure was a different time.  And I thought wow a full menu like that on a weeknight?  They had coffee, coffee and coffee. 

[weinoo]

Oh @Shelby I can't imagine Ronnie ever being mad at you! Midnight snacks, however...

 

Amazing, too, how many of these companies had a presence or corporate facilities in NYC.

 

When I was driving a cab in the 70s, the meat-packing district was really meat packing, the nut districts was nuts, etc. etc.