Gilded Age Dining
Jane Cunningham Croly (1829-1901)
Jennie June’s American Cookery Book
New York: American News Co., 1870
Jane Cunningham Croly was an author and journalist who wrote under the pen name Jennie June. She founded multiple women’s clubs and edited women’s magazines and newspaper columns. Her columns provided advice on women’s fashion and household management, and advocated for women’s legal and economic equality.
TX715.C924 1870
Maria Parola (1843-1909)
Choice Recipes
Dorchester, Mass.: Specially prepared for Walter Baker & Co. Ltd., 1900
Maria Parola was an orphan who began her career as a private chef for hotels and families along the East Coast. She trained at a cooking school in the early 1870s, and began teaching the following year. She opened her first cooking school in 1877, and published her first cookbook in 1878. By the late 1880s she had achieved enough fame to begin endorsing food products, leading to her reputation as America’s first celebrity chef.
Click to cover to read to book
TX767.C5 P37 1900
Central Union Church Ladies’ Society; Hawaiian Gazette
Hawaiian Cook Book
Honolulu: Hawaiian Gazette Company Print, 1896
Unlike contemporary cookbooks, 19th century recipe collections tended to cover a broad array of recipes, from breakfast to fine dining, without specialized focus on courses or ingredients. Some cookbooks did touch on regional cuisine, such as the Hawaiian Cook Book. Like many other regional cookbooks of the period, this recipe collection was gathered by a woman’s organization, and features mostly recipes that were popular nationally (Charlotte Russe cake, potato salad, tomato jelly) with occasional regional recipes—in this case fried kalo (the Hawaiian name for taro), haupia (coconut pudding), breadfruit pudding, and more.
TX715.H38 1896
Sarah Tyson Rorer (1849-1937)
Home Helps: A Practical and Useful Book of Recipes, with Much Valuable Information on Cooking and Serving Breakfasts, Luncheons, Dinners, and Teas
Chicago: N.K. Fairbank Co., 1900
Sarah Tyson Rorer was a food writer and leader in the emerging domestic sciences field who is seen as America’s first dietitian. She founded the Philadelphia School of Cookery in 1884, and gave notable cooking demonstrations at the 1904 St. Louis World’s Fair. Rorer encouraged diets that were high in leafy greens and low in pork and rare beef.
TX715.H664 1900
Lydia Maria Child (1802-1880)
The American Frugal Housewife: Dedicated to Those who are not Ashamed of Economy
Boston: Carter Hendee, 1835
Lydia Maria Child (1802-1880) was a writer notable for her avocation for abolition, Native American rights, women’s equality, and stance against American expansionism. A Unitarian, her earliest and most successful book was The Frugal Housewife, which went through 33 editions in 25 years. Child explicitly stated that her book was written for “persons of moderate fortune.” The success of this book gave her a platform to publish her fictional stories that tackled white supremacy.
TX147.C53 1835
The Health Reform Institute
The Health Reformer’s Progressive Cook Book and Kitchen Guide
Battle Creek, Mich.: Published at the Health Reform Institute (Review & Herald Steam Press), 1870
Published six years before the Kellogg brothers took over the Battle Creek Sanitarium, this book lays out the healthy eating philosophy of the famous health resort, founded in 1866 on principles put forward by the Seventh-day Adventists church. Their cookbook advocates ‘hygienic eating’ by avoiding meat, sugar, bleached flour, dairy, salt, butter, and spices.
TX714.H33 1870
Mary F. Henderson (1842-1931)
Practical Cooking and Dinner Giving
New York: Harper & Brothers, 1877
Mary Foote Henderson was a notable supporter of women’s suffrage and temperance, as well as a senator’s wife and celebrated hostess. Practical Cooking offers a standard collection of recipes, as well as advice on table setting and proper serving etiquette, a guide to successful dinner parties, predesigned multicourse menus, and more.
TX715.H498 1877