Saturday, August 19, 2017

Six Cups of Coffee (1887)


Six Cups of Coffee: Prepared for the Public Palate by the Best Authorities on Coffee Making

When I went to the Project Gutenberg website and searched for more Catherine Owen, it offered this up to me. Listed as being by Marion Harland, Maria Parloa, Helen Campbell, Catherine Owen, Mary J. Lincoln, Juliet Corson and Hester M. Poole, it immediately made me go "Hmmmmm...". Most of those names are VERY recognizable to me as cooking experts of the day.

Initially I assumed that this was made up of sections from books by each of them, the coffee-making portions being excerpted for this. I haven't checked, and I may be wrong.

The publisher is listed as Good Housekeeping Press, Clark W. Bryan & Co., Springfield, Mass. A trip to Wikipedia tells me that Good Housekeeping magazine was founded in 1885 by one Clark W. Bryan. So far, so good. Among the multitudes of ads at the end of the book (which remind me that the Good Housekeeping Seal of Approval is still in the future -- quackery abounds!) I find an advertisement for the magazine itself, which includes a long list of contributors to its pages. Included in that are the seven ladies whose work was brought together for this book.

To the book itself! It's not very long and I suspect this was a stapled booklet. The preface, written by someone at Good Housekeeping explains that there is a lot of bad coffee out there, and given how much of it America drinks, it really should be the best. It also says of the "six cups of coffee", "They are not made from old grounds re-heated for the occasion, but are as fresh as the intelligence and the experience which have produced them." I guess that told me!

While this booklet may have really been too much information for anyone who wanted to make a simple pot of coffee, it is very interesting in how it illustrates the ways the different authors went about it. Maria Parloa probably does the best overall summary. Beginning with a plug for Guatemalan coffee (?), she quickly explains the different types of coffee, how to buy and store them, how to roast your own, and four different ways of making coffee, depending on whether you wanted to start with cold or boiling water, and if you were going to filter it or not.

Marion Harland is next, and she very briskly explains to you the one and only best way of making coffee. As a small concession, she does give you instructions for two different pots.

Helen Campbell takes a different tack, and uses two stories to illustrate the bad way and the good way to make coffee.

Juliet Corson gives several ways of making coffee, but gives special attention to the coffee's effects on one's digestion.

Mrs. D.A. Lincoln explains that bad coffee is a very slapdash affair, then gives exceedingly precise instructions how to make good coffee. Think parody hipster barista.

Catherine Owen gives recipes and expands on them, then explains how to troubleshoot your coffee problems.

After our six cups, we get 'The Story of Coffee' by Hester M. Poole which is what it says it is, a nice overview of the history of coffee, plus a look at the coffee industry "today".

We finish with a section of advertisements. The first spot is, of course, given to The Schnull-Krag Coffee Co., advertising their coffee and the "QQ common sense condensing coffee pot". A quick look for Schnull-Krag on the internet today finds me only ephemera for sale, all of it suggesting that the S-K Coffee Co. never made it into the 20th Century.

Saturday, August 12, 2017

Gentle Breadwinners: The Story of One of Them by Catherine Owen (1888)



Yes, that's a screenshot. This lovely little book I have found (so far) only as a free e-book online, and I can't even find a picture of the cover.

The two young Misses Fortescue -- Dorothy, 25 and May, 20 -- find themselves in dire straits upon the death of their father. They move to the country where their elderly aunt and uncle, well-bred but horribly poor, have a house.  But how will they make a living? They try their hands at one thing and another, then the eldest discovers that her former hobby of baking can be more useful than she realized. Not only that, she seems to have a talent for it, and the business that ensues. At the very end, however, she is tendered a marriage proposal, seemingly to assure the gentle reader that even an old maid of 25 who lowers herself to cooking for other people and becoming a businesswoman can still get a man. In the author's defense, there is no suggestion that marriage will make her quit the business. (Whether that would be the assumption of the day or not is something else.)

I love this sort of book. It's a cozy read with nice characters and a message of "if she can do it, so can you". I'm not likely to cook from it at any point soon. Trying to do that would be a project, and require a bit of research on my part. Some of it would be translating the recipes (What is that temperature? What is that measure?), some would be translating terms. For example, what she describes as "marzipan" sounds different than what I am used to. And then there's ingredients. Can you still get "bitter almond oil"? And if I tried it, would my husband move out immediately, assuming I was trying to poison him?

The recipes in the main portion of the book are primarily baked goods, but also candied fruits and other confections as she branches out. There is an added section at the back, "The Contents of Dorothy's Notebook", which contains recipes of the Aunt, and are therefore recipes that can be made on very little money (in 1888).

Friday, August 4, 2017

Cooking With the Dead by Elizabeth Zipern (1995)


This is not a zombie cookbook. This is a cookbook made up of the stories and recipes of the folks who followed the Grateful Dead around from show to show, and frequently acted as food vendors to pay for their travel.

Me, I'm not much of a Grateful Dead fan. Their music was okay, but I never sought it out. I picked up this cookbook because I found the fan culture interesting, the way people would travel on the road with them and feed each other. I keep it because of the stories of the people. They talk about how and why they do what they do. Some are constantly on the road, some hit half a dozen shows in the summer, and all of them talk about what they make and why and how they make it. There's usually a picture of the person who contributed the story and the recipe.

The recipes are all vegetarian. They sound like perfectly good, way-too-healthy recipes.  I have made none of them. I have no problem with vegetarian recipes, but these hit a slight phobia of mine: that of "happy hippie food". I have no problem with hippies either, but when I come across a lot of recipes with tofu, hemp seed, "vegan", I flash back to my earliest experiences with hippie/vegan food in my youth.  It took me a long time after to believe that lentils could be enjoyable things. I have no problem with hippies or vegans, but LEARN TO COOK BEFORE YOU FEED OTHER PEOPLE.
Bleah.  Brown rice and lentils are both wonderful ingredients, but when cooked in plain water with no other items they can taste like wet cardboard.

I got way off topic there. There is nothing about this cookbook to suggest that the recipes would taste like wet cardboard. They look delicious. But it is the stories of the people that keeps this one on my shelf.

Wednesday, July 26, 2017

Dad's Own Cookbook (1993) by Bob Sloan


At first glance, this comes across as a slightly more sexist (but possibly less obnoxious) version of "Cooking For Dummies". I hate being called a dummy. But by the time I started to dig into it, I was going "Hey! My mother never taught me most of this either! Why single out the guys? I want this too!"

Yes, it's a starter cookbook. But it's a starter cookbook that is simple and has nice friendly pictures (by Paul Hanson) that never talks down to you. It has pages to discuss ingredients in detail, it talks about tools and techniques, and gives shopping tips. There are also suggested menus for special occasions. And unlike some starter cookbooks, these are foods you *want* to eat.  Yes, he will tell you how to fry an egg and make a grilled cheese sandwich (nothing wrong with those). But he will also tell you how to make Pasta Puttanesca, Jambalaya and Grilled Swordfish. *And* give wine tips to help you decide what you want with them!

Bottom line -- while it's not a book I'm going to curl up with for a nice read, if you're looking for a good starter cookbook, whether you be Dad, Mom, or a starving college student, this is a good one.

Now, as I am not the target audience, I pestered my husband (a better cook than I am) into giving me a few words about it.

"The dad part is a little hokey, but it's a fine intro to cooking cookbook. Mix of base techniques (each veg or protein gets an intro and a quick how to broil, pan fry, steam, bake, etc. overview) along with recipes that look good but aren't too challenging skill wise.

I'm not big on how they organized some parts (e.g. section on Lunch while others are by food), but nothing bad.

So overall o.k. intro cook book."

Monday, July 17, 2017

Aquavit (2003) by Marcus Samuelsson



Ouch. Okay, first of all, let me apologize for the photo. I thought the worst thing about it was going to be the lighting. But since I have downloaded it onto my computer, every method by which I look at is has it oriented normally...except this. For some reason, it wants to stay rotated 90 degrees.  But enough of that.

So...Aquavit.  I like Marcus Samuelsson on TV, and I had the good fortune to eat at Aquavit here in Minneapolis a couple of times.  The food was delicious.  But I have to admit to not being a big fan of the coffee-table book cookbooks, with lots of expensive glossy photos and not a lot of text. So when our cookbook dinner group (every two months someone hosts and picks the cookbook) chose this as our cookbook for this month, I didn't have it and had to get it from the library.  It's big, it's beautiful, and I have to admit that the food was all quite good.

Our menu (if I remember everything): Cured Tenderloin of Beef with Mango Ketchup and Fruit and Berry Chutney
Gravlax Club Sandwiches
Swedish Meatballs
Honey-Glazed Pork Ribs
Roasted Caramelized Root Vegetables
Quick Pickled Cucumbers
Spicy Sauerkraut
Garlic Mashed Potatoes
Blueberry Soup
Carrot Parsnip Cake

Delish. And while I love my mother's not-terribly-Swedish Swedish Meatballs recipe*, I thought these were great and could have made a whole meal out of the mashed potatoes and meatballs. Much better than Ikea. I haven't decided yet whether or not I'm going to buy us a copy of this cookbook (originally $45, but I think it's OP), but I'm definitely copying a few of the recipes for later use.

*I don't know the origins of my mother's meatball recipe, but I'd love to find out. Have any of you run across an all-beef meatball recipe that includes chopped up dill pickle? Let me know!

Monday, July 10, 2017

Attempting to turn my Facebook page into a proper shop, but it's slow. If you see anything you're interested in, just drop me a line there, here or fridayschildbooks@gmail.com

Thanks for reading!

Friday, July 7, 2017

The Diners' Club Cookbook by Myra Waldo (1959)


The Diners' Club Card was the first independent credit card in the world, created in 1950. It started as a group that allowed patrons to charge a meal at a participating group of restaurants. It had 20,000 members by the end of 1950, and more than doubled in 1951. It wasn't until the late 1960's when the cards that would become VISA and MasterCard challenged its dominance.

It makes sense then that in 1959 they would come out with a Diners' Club Cookbook. Advertising and product both! Myra Waldo was an experienced cookbook author (her Pan American's Complete Round-The-World Cookbook had come out in 1954), and they pulled in recipes from Diners' Club restaurants all over the US.

As a cookbook...well, it really is a classic list-of-recipes cookbook. There is a long introduction from the Vice President of Diners' Club, Inc., and then a short author's note, and then the recipes. "Great Recipes from Great Restaurants."  They sound just fine. Myra Waldo did her job and made sure that they are laid out correctly and are easy to follow. But that's it.

Personally, I like cookbooks that give me a little more to chew on. The restaurants are credited -- what kind of restaurants were they? Why this recipe?  I can understand why the recipe that represents Pea Soup Andersen's is the Pea Soup, but why is Michael's in Minneapolis represented by Curried Shrimp?  This may be best as a history reference. I don't believe that the two restaurants mentioned as being in Minneapolis, Michael's and Country House, were still here when I arrived in 1987.  Searching online I can find a Michael's in *Rochester* that was old enough but closed in 2014. The only reference I can find to Country House is in a comment to an MPR News blog in 2011.

It's a nice little cookbook, and I might even try a recipe or two. But it doesn't have enough going for it for me to put it on a "Must Have" list.

Wednesday, May 17, 2017

Open letter to the asshat on eBay (yes, language warnings)

I collect cookbooks. And sometimes as well as trying to sell them on eBay I look at big lots of cookbooks, mostly for fun. So one day I see someone selling a lot of 50 cookbooks, and I decide to look. That's a huge lot.

At first look, it wasn't impressive. A lot of books, sure, but the photos make it look like somebody was going to estate sales and buying them in bulk, or cleaning out old houses. A lot of them address specific dietary issues, most of them aren't that old, and at least one of them clearly isn't a cookbook at all. But then, looking at the more detailed photos, I spot two words....  Crap. Do I really want to get 49 books I don't want for one I do? How much is this going to cost me? And it's an auction....

I win the auction. One person bidding against me, price (+shipping) got kind of high, but I wanted that book. They notify me, I respond via PayPal, all is copacetic. They send me the tracking number, which I check every day. A week goes by and the package finally makes it to the post office. Eventually a very unhappy postman delivers a very large box to our door. I make a note as to why most book lots are not this large. HEAVY box!

I open it up to see with some dismay that the box is probably 20% larger than the stack of books inside, and no packing material was put in with them to keep them from bouncing around. I start taking them out and realize that they all feel cruddy. Not "30 years in a basement" cruddy, more like "a week in an open box in the back of a pickup truck" cruddy. But I dig down and find the book. Hurrah! It's intact. And it's what I thought it was. I clean up all the books so I can evaluate them and give the makeup book to a friend of my daughter's.  Yay. 48 cookbooks of varying sorts to get rid of.

Oh -- eBay wants me to give feedback on the transaction. Hmmm. Yes, the one item out of 50 that I had been wanting came through okay, but the whole box was cruddy and it was a bad way to treat the books. I decide to give neutral feedback.  I get a response from the seller that they wish I had contacted them before doing the feedback, and that they'd "ate ten dollars on the shipping". Okay, not my fault, wasn't complaining about the price.

So while we are exchanging e-mails on that, they order something from me. Cookbooks, just a couple of bucks. A little voice in the back of my head wonders about this, but I decide to send off the order anyway.  A few days letter they lodge a complaint, saying that there were pages missing from one of the cookbooks. Now that little voice is yelling at me. I am human, I can miss things, but I really doubt there were pages missing when it left here.  I call eBay and talk to them about it. The woman I talk to suggests I report the other person. I'm too nice. Instead, I do a full refund of their money, but block them so that they can no longer do transactions with me. Done.

Or so I thought.  *Six weeks later* they leave feedback on the transaction. Negative, of course. "Never inspected the item just assumed it was in good condition poor".  This from the guy who included a makeup book in a cookbook lot.  I responded with "This is incorrect. However, I issued you a full refund on March 15th." (a.k.a. six weeks ago)  Sadly, eBay doesn't give you much room for response.

I HATE all of this. I like everything to run smoothly, and for people to be nice to each other. I don't like the rating system on eBay. Some folks getting their money back for an error and getting to keep the books would actually give a positive rating as I responded promptly and dealt with it. I feel this is a spiteful response because I gave them neutral feedback on the other order. But this time I contacted eBay and reported the guy. I still have the e-mails, and I hope they have some record of my call. And I really hate to say this, but I hope I'm not the only person he's done this to because guy, fuck you and the horse you rode in on. This sort of dickish behavior is why I am hesitant to post things on eBay, because it opens me up to having to deal with assholes. Seven weeks I was off eBay after the initial exchange, and I come back only to find his feedback. 

I'm done with you, asshole. I'm writing this to put it behind me. I'm going to HTFU and go back on eBay. I'm going to keep that book next to my desk and smile at it every day, knowing that I have a thing of beauty and that you are stuck being an asshole. And even if I had nothing to do with it, some day your asshole ways will get you kicked off of eBay and I still have a book that was worth all of this...in more ways than one.

Besides, I still have 48 cookbooks to get rid of. *groan*

Monday, May 15, 2017

Cookery For Men Only by Wilson Midgley, 1948


More filler, I'm afraid. Consider this part of my wish list. Image from a box of 100 Cookery Postcards, from Penguin Books.

Sunday, May 14, 2017

Good Food From Sweden by Anna Olsson Coombs, 1955


More filler, I'm afraid. Consider this part of my wish list. Image from a box of 100 Cookery Postcards, from Penguin Books.

Saturday, May 13, 2017

Catherine Ives' Cookery Book by Catherine Ives, 1951


More filler, I'm afraid. Consider this part of my wish list. Image from a box of 100 Cookery Postcards, from Penguin Books.

Friday, May 12, 2017

Epicure and Charcoal: A Selective Guide to Outdoor Cookery by Ashley Simms, 1955


More filler, I'm afraid. Consider this part of my wish list. Image from a box of 100 Cookery Postcards, from Penguin Books.

Thursday, May 11, 2017

Mrs. Balbir Singh's Indian Cookery by Mrs. Balbir Singh, 1961


More filler, I'm afraid. Consider this part of my wish list. Image from a box of 100 Cookery Postcards, from Penguin Books.

Wednesday, May 10, 2017

Love and Knishes; An Irrepressible Guide to Jewish Cooking by Sara Kasdan, 1956


More filler, I'm afraid. Consider this part of my wish list. Image from a box of 100 Cookery Postcards, from Penguin Books.

Tuesday, May 9, 2017

The Art of Charcuterie by Jane Grigson, 1968


Looks like 1968, doesn't it? More filler, I'm afraid. Consider this part of my wish list. Image from a box of 100 Cookery Postcards, from Penguin Books.

Monday, May 8, 2017

Cook-Book Note-Book by Magda Joicey, 1946


More filler, I'm afraid. Consider this part of my wish list. Image from a box of 100 Cookery Postcards, from Penguin Books.

Sunday, May 7, 2017

Almanach de Cuisine by Francoise Nolle, 1959


More filler, I'm afraid. Consider this part of my wish list. Image from a box of 100 Cookery Postcards, from Penguin Books.

Saturday, May 6, 2017

Abalone to Zabaglione: Unusual and Exotic Recipes by Edna Bellenson, 1957


More filler, I'm afraid. Consider this part of my wish list. Image from a box of 100 Cookery Postcards, from Penguin Books.

Friday, May 5, 2017

American Cooking for English Kitchens by Grace Hogarth, 1957


More filler, I'm afraid. Consider this part of my wish list. Image from a box of 100 Cookery Postcards, from Penguin Books.


Thursday, May 4, 2017

Why so much filler? (Actual WORDS!)

Why so much filler? Two reasons.  1)  I want to keep this blog. I want to do something with it. Sometimes I am incredibly enthusiastic, and can write multiple paragraphs on a lovely cookbook I have.

Sometimes.

And 2)  I am not organized. I am not focused. And sometimes I can't write more than a few, fragmented, stream-of-consciousness sentences.  Admittedly, I have seen whole blogs that sound like that.  That's not what I want to do.  (This post, though?  Heh.)  Since January I have been telling myself that the new job is messing with my schedule, which it is. But most of it is just me not being able to focus.

We'll see.  Step 1 is convincing myself to get SOMETHING on here, even if it is just photos of cookbooks I don't have.  (It is a lovely set of postcards, though. I got it for Christmas.)  And I put some $2 cookbooks over on my Facebook sale page.  That's not organized either.

I need to get myself a routine...thoughts whirl in my brain. We'll see.

Good Dishes From Tinned Foods by Ambrose Heath, 1939


More filler, I'm afraid. Consider this part of my wish list. Image from a box of 100 Cookery Postcards, from Penguin Books.

Wednesday, May 3, 2017

A Book of Mediterranean Food by Elizabeth David, 1950


More filler, I'm afraid. Consider this part of my wish list, although I have a different edition. Image from a box of 100 Cookery Postcards, from Penguin Books.

Tuesday, May 2, 2017

A Cook's Quiz, by Antoinette and Francois Pope, 1952


More filler, I'm afraid. Consider this part of my wish list. Image from a box of 100 Cookery Postcards, from Penguin Books.

Monday, May 1, 2017

Mrs. Beeton's Cold Sweets, undated


More filler, I'm afraid. Consider this part of my wish list. Image from a box of 100 Cookery Postcards, from Penguin Books.

Sunday, April 30, 2017

British Recipes by Countess Morphy, 1948


More filler, I'm afraid. Consider this part of my wish list. Image from a box of 100 Cookery Postcards, from Penguin Books.

Friday, April 21, 2017