Vintage Household Hints from 1909 to Use Today

I collect old books of household advice and manners. Sometimes the vintage advice seems quaint and outdated, but often the methods are still useful today, 100 years later.

The tips I'll share here come from a slim red pamphlet called Facts Every Housekeeper Should Know. It was published in Detroit, Michigan by the Pohl Printing Company in 1909.

The graphic is a card available from Zazzle: Doing Dishes by lostlit. It shows a housewife washing dishes in her kitchen in the early 1900s.

Having a cabinet like this gave the housewife of that era a place to store pots and pans (see the bottom section). There was storage for her dishes which in the past might sit on open shelves getting dusty.

The flour bin had a built-in sifter so when she made her bread, it could be kneaded and rolled out on the enamel counter-top that was part of the Hoosier cabinet. Everything was close at hand and convenient. Quite an improvement over the kitchens of the 1800s.

On the left-hand door, you see a slim rack with spice containers. Down the right side of the lower section were handy drawers to store supplies or cooking equipment.

1. Sprinkle the top of a cake with flour as soon as it is turned from the pan. Wipe most of the flour off before icing. The icing will spread more easily and will not be likely to run.
2. Pumpkins should be kept in a dry part of the cellar, apples in a moderately dry part; turnips should be kept in a damp part of the cellar.
3. When making pastry, roll in one direction only if you want it to be light. Rolling first in one direction and then in another is almost sure to make it tough.
4. In making sponge cake, if you desire it to be yellow, use cold water; hot water makes it much whiter.
5. Add a piece of baking soda the size of a pea when cooking gooseberries. Used with a quart of the tart fruit, it will materially reduce the amount of sugar required to sweeten.
6. Save the excess water from boiling rice. It forms sort of a jelly which you can use in a recipe instead of milk. For the 1909 cook who couldn't run out to the store for more, this was a great help. For today, this would be good for gluten-free cooking.

You can't use a cast iron skillet on a glass top cook stove but if you have gas or electric burners they are fine.

We even got one of these to use on our BBQ grill. It's great when we cook fish like salmon. Cast iron is great for baking too. You can get cast iron forms for baking cornbread.

An important tip for cleaning your cast iron skillets and other cookware. It needs to be seasoned before the first use. When washing these, dry them immediately and thoroughly to prevent rust.

Recipes from 1909

• Corn Bread Recipe (1909)

  Recipe for Corn Bread, 1909

• Ginger Pop Recipe (1909) - Beverage Recipes Recipe for Ginger Pop made the old-fashioned way with ginger root, 1909

It's Important to Know How to Care for Cast Iron Cookware

• How to Clean a Cast Iron Pan - Cleaning cast iron cookware should not be intimidating! Find out how to clean cast iron properly and maintain your cast iron pan or skillet for generations.
• How To Take Care of Your Cast Iron and the History of Cast Iron Cookery - This gives the care and cleaning of cast iron. Cast iron is the first non-stick cookware. How you care for it will affect how non-stick it is.
• Seasoning a Cast Iron Skillet - How to Season or Re-Season It - Cast iron is one of the most versatile tools you can have in the kitchen. If taken care of properly, it will last a lot longer than you will. And unlike you or me, it will achieve a nearly perfect non-stick surface.

Every cook kept a jar or tin near the stove to put the grease in after cooking bacon. How did she use it? Here are some tips from the Evansville Press of Evansville, Indiana (01 Sep 1909, Wed • Page 3)

• Season boiled string beans with it. It is a substitute for cooking bacon with them. Two or three tablespoons will give the proper flavor.
• Put it in potato salad. It beats olive oil. Melt and pour over the potatoes.
• Fry onions in it. They will taste like something, then.
• Fry liver in it. You won't have to fry bacon with the liver.
• Season potato soup with it. The finest soup that can be made without soup stock.
• Fry apples in it. Yes, apples. It's great.
• Use it for German fried potatoes. They will get nice and brown.
• Flavor stewed cabbage with it.
• Fry green corn with half butter and half bacon grease. Oh, the aroma of this dish!
• Fry mashed potatoes in it, and with one-half butter get that much desired, appetizing crust.
• Season mashed parsnips with it.
• It is Just the thing for frying cornmeal batter cakes. It is the thing to shorten Johnny-cake with.
• Grease the tins with it when baking cornbread.

"Let other misguided persons throw away their bacon grease but you hang on to it. It is 100 percent, pure and wholesome."

A little washing soda mixed in the black-lead will remove all grease and give grates and stoves an excellent polish.

(CAUTION: this tip is intended for a vintage black cook stove, not for a modern enamel stove.)

Here's How to Light a Fire in a Cook Stove Like These

How to Light or Start a Fire in a Wood Burning Stove. - Tells you everything you need to know about Lighting and maintaining a fire efficiently in a wood burning stove.

I use granite ware for my roasting pan. The Thanksgiving turkey wouldn't be the same without that great roasting pan. My mom had the big pots for canning, and I have the same kind for cooking lobster in at my summer cottage in New Hampshire.

Make Good Use of a Granite Ware Roasting Pan

• So many ways to use the Granite Ware Oval Roaster - My Granite Ware oval roaster is one of my go-to pans in my kitchen for all sorts of cooking and reminds me of my own mom and my husband's grandmother - they used them to cook when my husband and I were growing up. I love that it doesn't chip

from 1909

Use a little ammonia in the dish water when washing glassware. It will make it sparkle like cut glass.

When a tea or coffee pot becomes stained inside, fill with cold water, add a teaspoonful of soda. Boil it for three-quarters of an hour, the inside will become as bright and clean as new.

Sprinkle some black pepper in the bottom of dresser drawers and then place newspaper over that. The clothes are protected from mice and moths this way. (March 14, 1909 - Chicago Tribune "Practical Housekeeper's Own Page")