Initially, I was distracted by the many ads throughout the book for long-defunct Baltimore businesses. I photographed many of the ads and came home to realize I had not documented the recipes. When I made Hallie A. Shinnamon’s Christmas Cookie recipe from the book, I became intrigued by the realization of how many of the recipes belonged to former residents of the Waverly, Charles Village and Remington neighborhoods that I have lived in since 2007. I located these addresses using old censuses and city directories from around the time the book was published.
In my library, I have a facsimile reprint of the book that was made some time in the 1970s or 80s. A full scan of this cookbook is available on archive.org. The map below shows corresponding page numbers to locate the recipes. As always, I would love to hear from you if you find a recipe from your house!
There has probably been no greater force for the dissemination of recipes developed by home cooks than recipe contests.
State and county fairs in the 19th century hosted many cooking contests as a part of their “ladies” programming. These fairs were an opportunity for women gather and to show off their “domestic arts”, from needlework to baking and cooking. In my research about White Potato Pie, I came across a “white potato custard pie” category at the 1880 Cecil County Agricultural Society exhibition. The level of specificity suggests a large amount of prizes to be awarded. The other pie categories that year were Green Peach, Dried Peach, Green Apple, Dried Apple, Grape, Cherry, Gooseberry, Currant, Pumpkin, Cocoanut, Lemon, and Apple – and that is just for pies. There were contests for preserves, cakes, breads, cheeses, and more. The dollar prize adjusts to about twenty dollars in “today money.” Considering the amount of effort to just travel to these events, it was clear that the glory of winning was an incentive as well.
It wasn’t long before companies selling ingredients and kitchen appliances figured out that they could use contests as a way to get publicity – and to crowdsource recipes to promote their products. Companies like Heinz, Borden, and Kraft have held recipe contests over the decades. Sometimes, the winning recipes ended up published in promotional cookbooks and advertisements. Newspapers used recipe contests as a way to engage women readers. Home economists and cooking teachers were often employed as judges.
In November 1910, hundreds of women showed up to the Bernheimer Brothers store in downtown Baltimore to enter their bread loaves, biscuits, pies, doughnuts, and cakes to be judged by “representatives of local newspapers.” The Baltimore Sun described some of the cakes as “ornamental in the extreme” and touted the “skill shown by Baltimore women” but did not print the names of any of the winners or the names of the winning items.
Perhaps the Sun was inspired by the success of this contest to hold their own contest in early 1911.
Advertisement for the recipe contest in the San Francisco Examiner, 1901
The 725 recipes in “Maryland’s Way” were gathered from a variety of manuscripts and old cookbooks as well as from personal recipe collections of friends and colleagues of Mrs. Frances Kelly and Mrs. Hope Andrews (which is why they are concentrated in Anne Arundel County). Many of the recipes were adapted and adjusted by Alice Brown.
I’ve been able to determine the origin of most of the documents mentioned in Maryland’s Way – items kept in the Maryland Historical Society Library or Maryland State Archives. There are still a few that stump me – not to mention the identity of the various mononymously credited servants or relatives mentioned alongside the recipes.
This map attaches the book’s recipes to the manors and locations mentioned. When none is given, I defaulted to the main home of person who is listed alongside the recipe.
These maps are less an indication of any type of geographic culinary trends and more just a fun visualization of the culinary legacies of Maryland’s elite families at the turn of the 20th century.
Hopefully the first of several recipe maps on Old Line Plate, I’ve put the 512 recipes in “Eat, Drink & Be Merry in Maryland” on a map. A lot are just pinned to counties, but if you zoom in you can also view recipes connected to specific locations like hotels, steamship ports, and manors. The Maryland Historical Trust Medusa map has been instrumental in locating some of these places. Links to MHT documents included when possible.
Let me know what you think – the eventual plan is to map all of the recipes posted on this site but it could take awhile to pinpoint some of the locations!
