1950's Retro Classic

1950
-The Cookbooks of the 50's are great for the retro lovers in all of us. With the 50’s comes images of kids with slingshots in their back pockets and happy families around the breakfast table, they make you happy and smile just thinking about them. At least to younger generations, talk to someone straight out of the 50’s and they’ll probably paint you a different picture but great covers of dancing hotdogs and women in pearls standing over stoves came out the era. I'm personally not a big fan of the recipes, Jello salads and americanized chop suey all over the place, they’re usually very creative, shall we say with ingredient pairings but great nontheless. At this time there was a huge explosion of pan-am and latin culture love, think Ricki Ricardo ( I Love Lucy). From that comes Chiquita Bannana and Brazil Nuts and etc. in a lot of the advertising and recipes.

1930's The Great Depression Years

1930
- The cookbooks of the 30’s are gems for the obvious reasons. These women had to do it all, maintaining life as normally as possible, but with the drastic decrease to incomes that literally happened overnight due to the Great Depression. Another reason that these cooksbooks are a rare treat is due to the fact that there weren't alot of companies and publishing houses printing any new books for obvious reasons. The cookbooks that were published are usually budget-minded and very practical. Money saving tips and stretching your dollar themes are common.

This is where the glamorous and excessive recipes of the roaring 20's came to dead stop and the start of practical and miserly recipes of the 1930s started. Hostessing large, grand parties stopped. There was still entertaining but in more of a small and intimate setting with close friends, think bridge clubs and church luncheons These are where some amazing stories and recipes can be found. Makes you humble and grateful!

1900-1910 Cookbooks Part 3 of 3

Part 3
A truly great antique and vintage cookbook collector should be able appreciate what cookbooks from different eras have to offer and should learn what makes each decade special. A great deal of history can be learned from each decades own collection of cookbooks to point it's almost overwhelming, so to make it easier let's break it down into years and highlight what makes each decade special:

1900-1910- Cookbooks from the early 1900's are great for the reason that women and views of them were changing, women wanted acknowledgement and recognition. They started to make cooking more of a scientific accomplishment than it had been in the past. That's when exact measurements came out and sanitation and cleanliness facts were made available to the masses in a way it hadn't before and how did they accomplish such a huge endevor? How did they get the information to the masses? In cookbooks! The majority of books that were published were authored by women FOR women. They were generally the only non-fiction books that were controlled by women and a great way to promote values and lifestyles. They were the descision makers of the home and cookbooks were a way to change how society as whole thought, as their choices filtered to the next generations through their children.

So how do you collect Vintage Cookbooks? Part 2 of 3

Part 2
The best place to start is to research cookbooks of value and find out why it is they're so high priced. There are so many informative articles that go into the history of what makes a book so valuable. Maybe it's the illustrations and cover art or it's the 1st printing of a recipe classic.
Research the authors and who they are. It makes it easier looking for them than memorizing titles and covers that’s for sure. Did they write a lot or for a certain company? Which are valuable? Is it because of writing styles or was it because of the recipes themselves?
Most of the time vendors don't do the research on all the books they have for sale, but you can walk in and know exactly what you're looking for and know that your paying for something valuable and rare that’s WAY underpriced! It's a good feeling and oh so addicting!
You should narrow your collection to a smaller catagory like certain decades, specific authors or your personal nationality’s cookbooks but whatever your niche is, FIND IT. It makes finding what you're looking for so much easier because "you can't collect EVERY cookbook in the world" -my sometimes very nervous husband. I laugh every time he says that by the way!
Appreciate what cookbooks from different eras have to offer and what makes each decade special. A great deal of history can be learned from each decade's cookbooks so let's break it down:

Why Collect Vintage and Antique Cookbooks? Part 1 of 3

Part 1

People collect vintage cookbooks for so many different reasons, it would impossible to name them all here. Speaking for myself, they're a great peek into the personal side of history. We were all taught the names of the famous generals, kings and dates of all of the important wars and events, generally speaking, things the majority of us have nothing in common with. Nothing to makes us feel connected to the past. But what about the other 95% of the days and people that weren't important or dramatic enough to make it into the history books? People like myself? I feel that cookbooks are a great way to expierience that personal connection with people that have been through the same things. What to make for dinner? On a budget? How to keep a nice home and manage your family? All have been done before and written endlessly about. A great thing about older cookbooks compared to current is that it's delicious real food made with things you already have in your pantry. Simple, great tasting food, no exotic spices here You know the recipes I'm talking about, the ones you realize you have to run to the store for half way through completing. There're no egos getting in the way of the food either like some of the celebrity chefs of today. They're also a great investment. Financially and personally. Not to mention, let's say you never plan on selling it or try ing to make a profit from them, cookbooks usually saves you way more than what you paid for it in the tips alone and what a great family keepsake to one day hand down!

Super Special Vintage Cook Book of the Week

My Vintage Cookbooks Store will now be posting a feature cook book each week and explaining who the author is, why the book is special, rarity and current market values. I have decided that this week the Super Special Book OF THE WEEK IS .............