Cookbooks from the Past

I like to collect older cookbooks. I don't cook from them -- I don't cook, period. But I love reading the older ones so I was happy to find this one the bookshelf at the Goodwill store last week.

It was written in 1984 -- which isn't old enough to attact my attention. These authors had gone through a great many old cookbooks to compile this one. At the beginning of each chapter there was a story behind why they chose the receipes that they did.

I've always been interested in the way women cooked during World War II with the different food rationing restricting their choices from one week to another. This book had a chapter on cooking during the early 1940s so home it came with me.

Most of the recipes had ingredients that not many of us would eat today. In older cooking manuals there is always a chapter that instructed the women on how to feed their children in order to for them to have all the nutrients necessary for proper growth. And a chapter on feeding the ill and infirmed. In fact, a book I picked up a few months ago had an entire chapter on how to equip the sick room. Items that increased the comfort of the sick that could be adapted from common household items. For an example, making a pair of slippers out of newspaper.

But back to the topic -- I did want to share with you the following recipe. When was the last time you ate this? If you are young enough -- lucky you -- you may never have had to choke this stuff down. Double click on the photo and you will see that the recipe came from an Army cookbook dated 1942.

Chow down, friends.

Mrs.RGS