Posts by Jacqueline L Jacobson

Showing 1 - 10 of 14
Brewing tanks at the Bergner & Engel Brewing Co., Philadelphia, 1880's
  • Jacqueline L Jacobson
The University of Michigan presents a new online exhibit: The Reflection of Technology in Brewing. This exhibit focuses on the swift changes that the brewing industry underwent from the late eighteenth century to the mid-twentieth century.
The words “Choice Recipes” with an ornate red capital R
  • Jacqueline L Jacobson
This month’s recipe is a lemon cake from Culinary gems : a collection of choice recipes gathered with care from the treasures of culinary experts, published in Westfield, Massachusetts in 1884.
Lemon was an extremely common flavor for desserts and pastries in the 19th century -- almost the default neutral flavor, the way vanilla is now. Although vanilla was known in Europe as a flavoring by the 16th century (there’s an article on it in Diderot’s Encyclopédie of 1765) and a commercial extract was available in the US from at least 1847, it overtook lemon in cakes and pies only slowly
The cover of an issue of the Boston Cooking School Magazine: the stylized figure of a woman in a red gown cooing over  achafing dish
  • Jacqueline L Jacobson
American Culinary History materials are full of representations of women and femininity These images are occasionally realistic, often absolute fantasy, and and sometimes somewhere in between.
Book Cover with an image of Uncle Sam weighing a man and a woman in an old-fashioned scale.
  • Jacqueline L Jacobson
Every year, March the 14th, 3/14 or 3.14, is Pi Day. Once century, however, the date is 3/14/15, making it an extra special Pi Day. Tomorrow is such a day. In celebration, we present a Suffragist pie recipe from a 1915 suffrage charity cook book.
African American woman holding a frying pan
  • Jacqueline L Jacobson
One thread that runs through Southern cookbooks is the figure of the African American in the kitchen.
A plate of chocolate macaroons on a wooden table
  • Jacqueline L Jacobson
Historic American recipes for chocolate baked goods are much less intense than modern ones.19th and early 20th century American recipes for chocolate cakes and cookies, such as this month's recipe from Emma Francis Voris' ca.1893 New Columbian White House Cookery are quite mild.
A loaf of bread on a plate.
  • Jacqueline L Jacobson
This month's recipe is "the Golden Loaf of South Carolina" from Sarah Tyson Rorer's 1899 _Bread and Bread-making: How to Make Many Varieties Easily and with the Best Results_ Rorer was involved in the Cooking School Movement, which advocated for standard measures and exact directions in recipes. While the recipe below is not as explicit as what a 21st century cookbook reader is used to, it goes into considerable detail compared to the average late-19th c. bread “receipt”
Mother and child with a loaf of bread, in an style that draws both from Art Deco and Art Nouveau
  • Jacqueline L Jacobson
American Culinary History materials are full of representations of children and childhood: sometimes realistic, sometimes wholly fantastical, with adults present or without them.
Three women sit on a carpet around a low table sharing Turkish coffee and pastries, The women form a circle, which is visually mirrored by the Chocolate Walnut Jell-O dessert below them
  • Jacqueline L Jacobson
Talk and reception to celebrate the upcoming online exhibit "Jell-O: America’s Most Famous Dessert At Home Everywhere." Dr. Nicole Tarulevicz of the School of Humanities at the University of Tasmania speaks at 5:00 p.m. Using materials drawn from the culinary ephemera holdings of the Janice Bluestein Longone Culinary Archive at U-M Library, the exhibit explores how the Jell-O company’s early 20th century advertising used depictions of the exotic to sell the product to Americans.
Image of Eve picking an apple from a Jell-O advertisement
  • Jacqueline L Jacobson
Early 20th century advertising materials for Jell-O contain striking representations of age, race, class, gender, nationality, regionality, and other vectors of identity; whether self-defined or other-imposed. In January, we’ll unveil a digital exhibit, guest curated by Dr. Nicole Tarulevicz, on depictions of the exotic in early 20th century Jell-O advertising. There will be an exhibit opening and reception, with a talk by Dr. Tarulevicz, January 12th, 4:30-6pm, in the Hatcher Gallery