Promotional cookbook archive
Merry Vintage Christmas!
If you’re a fan of vintage cookbooks, I have a Christmas present for you. Since writing the searchablePDF script that I used on The Baker’s Dozen, I’ve started scanning in more of my old promotional pamphlets that don’t appear to be available online.
The Baker’s Dozen is the reason I wrote the script. Afterward, I went back and recreated Franklin Golden Syrup Recipes and the Directions for Operating [a Dominion] Waffle Iron so that they take advantage of the new capability as well. They are now searchable and they have a table of contents. I’m about to do another sweetened condensed milk pamphlet and have finally delved into the mysteries of evaporated milk.
This page will automatically update whenever I upload a new vintage pamphlet. I have some neat ones ready to go. There are some fascinating recipes in them, as well as strange terminology. Rather than force you to go searching the site, I’m going to archive them here automatically whenever I post a new book. This page will also include any of the missing indexes when I make more—and I have at least one more I want to make. It’s going to be a big one, and very cool, so stay tuned.
I’m looking forward to making more old recipes and writing about them over the next year.
Enjoy, and Merry (Vintage) Christmas! If you enjoy vintage cookbooks, this is a gift that will keep on giving.
It’s nice, occasionally, to be able to use these pamphlets in their original format on a portable device.
If I’ve retyped a pamphlet it will be available both as an ePub and as a PDF. You can read an ePub in any ebook reader, and it will format itself automatically to fit your mobile (or desktop) screen.
I generally don’t retype these old books because part of their charm is how they were presented. I made an exception for Franklin Golden Syrup because I specifically wanted to present it in an easier-to-read format. For the rest, they’ll all be PDFs that preserve that original graphics and text, while still making the text searchable in the background. You can read PDFs in any PDF reader, such as Preview on macOS and Adobe Acrobat on most operating systems.
Even when I do retype something, I try to also provide a facsimile of the original. It’s usually a PDF, which is why I wrote the searchablePDF script in the first place.
Most of these documents will have a signature either on the last page or along the margin with the most free space pointing to The Padgett Sunday Supper Club. If you’re interested in vintage recipes, check it out. There’s currently a new recipe every Sunday, and I make an effort to provide recipes appropriate with upcoming holidays.
At the moment I’m writing this, the recipe I’m planning for the lead-up to Christmas is an Ethiopian Honey Bread. It’s a great holiday bread, very easy in a bread machine. It’s perfect for breakfast toast and great for lunch sandwiches or to accompany a holiday dinner. Go take a look!
Christmas Day’s recipe is going to be an amazing popcorn confection (PDF File, 1.8 MB) from the 1972 Southern Living Cookies and Candy book. Enjoy your sneak peak! It’s one of my favorite caramel corns.
- 2023 Old Recipe Calendar (PDF File, 9.4 MB)
- A 1950 recipe calendar repurposed for printing and hanging in 2023. (More information at A 1950 recipe calendar for 2023)
- The Baker’s Dozen (PDF File, 3.3 MB)
- A 1976 baking pamphlet from General Foods and Baker’s Coconut, in McCall’s magazine. Focused on coconut and chocolate. (More information at Baker’s Dozen Coconut Oatmeal Cookies)
- Directions for Operating Waffle Iron (PDF File, 80.4 KB)
- “The following instructions apply to automatic, non-automatic, twin or single waffle irons.” From Dominion Electric Corporation. (More information at Dominion Electric Corporation Wafflemaker Manual)
- Directions for Operating Waffle Iron (ePub ebook file, 217.5 KB)
- Instructions for the waffle iron for use in an ebook reader. (More information at Dominion Electric Corporation Wafflemaker Manual)
- Directions for Operating Waffle Iron (facsimile) (PDF File, 1.6 MB)
- Scans of the Dominion waffle iron instructions. (More information at Dominion Electric Corporation Wafflemaker Manual)
- Eddie Doucette’s “Home Cooking” Recipes (PDF File, 2.9 MB)
- Five pages of recipes typed from Eddie Doucette’s long-lost Chicago-area television show, Home Cooking. (More information at A home-cooking handful from Eddie Doucette)
- Franklin Golden Syrup Recipes (PDF File, 484.4 KB)
- A retyped PDF of the Franklin Sugar Refining Company’s Franklin Golden Syrup Recipes pamphlet/cookbook. (More information at Franklin Golden Syrup Recipes)
- Franklin Golden Syrup Recipes (ePub ebook file, 582.8 KB)
- A retyped ePub of the Franklin Sugar Refining Company’s Franklin Golden Syrup Recipes pamphlet/cookbook. (More information at Franklin Golden Syrup Recipes)
- Franklin Golden Syrup Recipes (facsimile) (PDF File, 4.1 MB)
- The original format of the Franklin Sugar Refining Company’s pamphlet, Franklin Golden Syrup Recipes, rearranged from a pamphlet to a book. (More information at Franklin Golden Syrup Recipes)
- Hope Lutheran 1950 calendar of recipes (PDF File, 11.7 MB)
- A calendar of recipes for 1950, courtesy Hope Lutheran Church of Milwaukee. (More information at A 1950 recipe calendar for 2023)
- The Missing Index for the Southern Living Recipe Library (PDF File, 2.5 MB)
- An index by recipe, state, city, and contributor for the seventies-era Southern Living cookbook collection. (More information at The Missing Index for the Southern Living Cookbook Library)
- Missing Index to the Deplorable Gourmet (PDF File, 221.8 KB)
- This is the missing index to the Cookbook of Cookbooks, the Deplorable Gourmet. (More information at The Deplorable Index)
- St. Mary’s Missing Index (PDF File, 1.7 MB)
- Index for the St. Mary’s Altar Society cookbooks. (More information at St. Mary’s Altar Society Cookbooks)
In response to Vintage Cookbooks and Recipes: I have a couple of vintage cookbooks queued up to go online.
- Dominion Electric Corporation Wafflemaker Manual
- Dominion Electric Corporation waffle irons are ubiquitous on eBay and in antique shops, but the manuals for them are not. Here’s one that came with the Model 1315A.
- Franklin Golden Syrup Recipes
- Golden syrup has a wonderful caramel flavor. This ca. 1910 promotional cookbook from the Franklin Sugar Refining Company really shows off that flavor.
- The missing indexes
- Whoever decided that cookbooks don’t need indexes was never stuck hungry at one o’clock in the morning with nothing but a pepper, a tomato, and a couple of cloves of garlic, and a craving for brownies.
- Padgett Sunday Supper Club
- Lost recipes from a gone century.
- The Southern Living Cookbook Library
- One of the best magazine-related cookbook series is also the one of the hardest to find. The Southern Living Cookbook Library appears to be under the radar of food writers online, but it either had a very low print run or few people want to get rid of their copies.
- Three from the Baker’s Dozen
- Three recipes from a Baker’s Coconut pamphlet once included in McCall’s magazine: coconut squares, chocolate cheesecake, and broiled coconut topping.
More cookbooks
- My year in food: 2022
- From New Year to Christmas, from ice cream to casseroles, from San Diego to New Orleans, from 1893 to 2014… and beyond!
- A 1950 recipe calendar for 2023
- In October, a friend gave me this cool calendar of recipes from 1950. It turns out, 1950 is the same as 2023, right down to the date of Easter. Print it out and hang it if you wish, and happy New Year!
- Club recipe archive
- Every Sunday, the Padgett Sunday Supper Club features one special recipe. These are the recipes that have been featured on past Sundays.
- The Deplorable Index
- The greatest movie review of all time… and it’s a cookbook. A cookbook!
- Franklin Golden Syrup Recipes
- Golden syrup has a wonderful caramel flavor. This ca. 1910 promotional cookbook from the Franklin Sugar Refining Company really shows off that flavor.
- 53 more pages with the topic cookbooks, and other related pages
More food history
- A home-cooking handful from Eddie Doucette
- A glimpse at a long-lost 1954 Chicagoland television cooking show, including recipes. Some of them require creative interpretation.
- Club recipe archive
- Every Sunday, the Padgett Sunday Supper Club features one special recipe. These are the recipes that have been featured on past Sundays.
- Ice cream from your home freezer
- You can make great ice cream with whole eggs, egg yolks, and egg whites. You can even make it without eggs at all. All you need is syrup and cream—and a refrigerator with a freezer or a standalone home freezer.
- A Decade of Jell-O Joys: 1963-1973
- What changes a decade brings! I have the 1963 Joy of Jell-O and the 1973 New Joys of Jell-O. What happened to Jell-O and gelatin between the sixties and the seventies?