Retaining all the best features of the original edition, the revised Rumford Cook Book covers many developments undreamed of by home economists when the first book was compiled in 1908. (From the Preface) 

{HISTORY}

This vintage cookbook is fun on so many different levels, for it tells the story of five unique aspects of culinary history. Let's look...

First, there is the story of  Count Benjamin Thompson Rumford (1753-1814) who revolutionized cooking in terms of ability and efficiency. He invented the first oven, tea kettle, and boiler. He was the first to recommend that holes be drilled in the handles of pots and pans for hanging storage and he created an air-tight oven door through scientific studies of heat, airflow, and fuel analysis. 

Then there's the story of Eben Norton Horsford (1818-1893) who reconfigured the components of baking powder to include calcium biphosphate in place of the previously used cream of tarter. Eben opened his own baking powder factory in Providence, Rhode Island in 1854 called Rumford Chemical Works, which was named after Count Rumford. 

Rumford Complete Cook Book was first published in 1908 - a combined effort of Boston Cooking School founder Fannie Merritt Farmer (1857-1915) and British-American Home Economics Writer and Lecturer Lily Haxworth Wallace. Just like Eben Horsford and Count Rumford, Fannie and Lily took a scientific approach to cooking and household management thinking of both in hygienic, professional, and nutritious terms. 

You might suppose that a cookbook published by a food product company would solely focus only on recipes that called for their specific brand of food. Not so in the case of the Rumford Complete Cook Book. It includes recipes for all meals of the day, the majority of which do not call for baking powder.  Rumford was a forerunner in producing cooking booklets that taught American home cooks how to prepare better meals. Whether that was regarding equipment, nutrition, products, or cooking efficiencies, Rumford cooking booklets became a trusted reference for 19th and 20th-century households. In 1908, they combined many recipes and helpful advice into one hardbound book - the Rumford Complete Cook Book. By the time this edition was published in 1936, the cookbook was in its 8th printing and would continue on for dozens more printings after that, eventually selling millions of copies. 

Each of the Rumford Cook Book reprints features slight changes depending on world events surrounding the year it was printed and the evolution of the kitchen as it modernized.  This 1936 edition was the first revision of earlier editions published in 1908, 1918, 1929, 1930, 1931, 1932, and 1936. This edition includes some new recipes tucked in with the reliable favorites of past editions, and no longer features the blank memoranda pages that were helpful places to record additional recipes in previous versions.  This edition also contains a series of black-and-white food photographs and a change in font to reflect more modern style. Also, mention of cooking over a cast iron range, which involved heating via coal or wood, is still assumed as most recipes call for a "hot" oven or a "moderate" oven. Our modern-day oven temperatures (like heating to 350 degrees or 425)) are not part of standard cooking instructions yet. 

A lovely throughline to each cookbook edition though, most notably in the baking section, is the appearance of Rumford Baking Powder.  A tried and true staple since 1857, when it was discovered that calcium biphosphate replaced natural minerals lost in the process of milling flour, Rumford Baking Powder was deemed a more nutritious product. 

So much interesting history lives inside this unassuming book!

Photo of Lily Haxworth Wallace courtesy of the Brooklyn Daily Eagle, Jan 11th, 1937

{SPECIAL FEATURES}

- 1936 edition 

- 210 pages

- All recipes call for whole food ingredients and from-scratch food preparation

- Interesting recipes include Nesselrode Pudding, Pickled Peaches, Marshmallow Cake, Chocolate Loaf Cake, King George's Pudding, Creole Rice Cakes, Chicken Pot Pie, Beef Olives, Cranberry Sponge Pudding, Fairy Cones, Blushing Bunny, Welsh Rarebit (misspelled as Welsh Rabbit), Iced Coffee in Perfection, January Thaw Candy and French Nougat

{CONDITION}

In lovely vintage condition. Clean and bright throughout, this cookbook is free of cooking spots and stains. There is a notation written in pencil on the inside front endpaper referring to scrambled eggs.  The coverboards are a little bit frayed around the edges at the corners and at the top of the spine. The spine is tight and all pages are intact.  Please see photos.

{SIZE}

Measures 7.5" inches (length) x 5" inches (width) x .75" inches (thickness) and weighs 10 oz

{FOR THE 1930s KITCHEN LOVER}

Find more vintage kitchen heirlooms from the 1930s era in the shop here.