# Old Cookbooks Online



## jenyfari (Jan 19, 2007)

This is interesting. A site where you can download old cookbooks (as old as 1798).

http://digital.lib.msu.edu/projects/...oks/index.html


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## joyfull (May 24, 2006)

Thanks for posting the link. Looks like some fun reading!


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## mezzaluna (Aug 29, 2000)

What a great site! I have one of them: The Settlement Cookbook. It's a Milwaukee original.

It's not on the site, but I also have Poetry in Cookery: A German American Cookbook, by Lille W. Eliel. My copy is an 1897 edition with lots of spots and stains on it. It has a surprising array of recipes (koumiss, green corn fritters) as well as hair tonics and sachet powders, laundry necessities (bluing, how to boil starch) and diets for various ailments. Very interesting reading, especially the part explaining the page-long description on dishwashing and elaborate meal service: "After the claret is poured serve first olives and then the almonds." It's quite an education in late nineteenth century etiquette.


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## myron (Jan 18, 2007)

I was a little disappointed when I didn't find The Prudence Penny Regional Cook Book (http://www.vintagecookbook.com/ecb301.html) on the site. Probably because, among my collection of cook books, that one is my favorite. Perhaps if it were a 19th century publication (it first published in 1939) it might qualify. But it's been a tremendous source of inspiration for me throughout the years.


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