Cover of The Boston Cooking-School Cook Book
The Boston Cooking-School Cook Book
Fannie Merritt Farmer
First printing, 1896 · Little, Brown and Company, Boston
Portrait of Fannie Merritt Farmer
Fannie Merritt Farmer
1857–1915

Principal of the Boston Cooking-School. Author of the first American cookbook to require level, standardized measurements. Published the first printing at her own expense after Little, Brown doubted it would sell.

Hundreds
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Original
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1896
first edition
Card My Recipe

The Boston Cooking-School Cook Book

Fannie Merritt Farmer · 1896

Preserved from a verified first printing and organized as a working browser of recipes, menus, and reference sections. Recipe text remains verbatim to the 1896 book, with Kitchen Notes kept separate from the source text.

The book first appeared in 1896 after Farmer financed publication herself when Little, Brown doubted that a manual built on precise level measurements would find a wide readership. Its success brought the book into regular trade publication and helped fix cups, tablespoons, and teaspoons as the standard language of American recipe writing.

Born in Boston in 1857, Farmer went on to lead the Boston Cooking-School and to codify the level cup, tablespoon, and teaspoon that still structure American recipe writing. Her book is both a practical manual and a record of how domestic instruction was formalized at the end of the nineteenth century.

The book below keeps the table of contents, recipe cards, scanned page links, and menu structure together so the original volume can still be read and cooked from as a whole.

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Articles

Timing and reference page from the 1896 first edition of The Boston Cooking-School Cook Book
History
How Fannie Farmer Standardized American Cooking

Why the 1896 first edition mattered, and how level measurements, sequenced method, and kitchen instruction traveled from the Boston Cooking School into ordinary recipe writing.

Read story
Current live Strawberry Short Cake I. recipe view from the Fannie Farmer collection
Preservation
From Historical Cookbook to Recipe Card

How a dense nineteenth-century cookbook page becomes a readable, source-linked card without quietly rewriting the historical record.

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Salads and salad dressings

Potato Salad.

280 · First Edition, 1896 · Report an issue

Ingredients

  • four cupfuls cold boiled potatoes
  • one-half tablespoon salt
  • one-fourth teaspoon pepper
  • four tablespoons oil
  • two tablespoons vinegar
  • a few drops onion juice
  • one-half tablespoon chives, finely cut
  • whites and yolks of hard boiled eggs
  • cold boiled red beets
  • parsley

Method

  1. Cut cold boiled potatoes in one-half inch cubes.
  2. Sprinkle four cupfuls with one-half tablespoon salt and one-fourth teaspoon pepper.
  3. Add four tablespoons oil and mix thoroughly; then add two tablespoons vinegar.
  4. A few drops of onion juice may be added, or one-half tablespoon chives finely cut.
  5. Arrange in a mound and garnish with whites and yolks of two hard boiled eggs, cold boiled red beets, and parsley.
  6. Chop whites and arrange on one-fourth of the mound; chop beets finely, mix with one tablespoon vinegar, and let stand fifteen minutes; then arrange on fourths of mound next to whites.
  7. Arrange on remaining fourth of mound, yolks chopped or forced through a potato ricer.
  8. Put small sprigs of parsley in lines dividing beets from eggs; also garnish with parsley at base.

Original 1896 Text

four cupfuls cold boiled potatoes one-half tablespoon salt one-fourth teaspoon pepper four tablespoons oil two tablespoons vinegar a few drops onion juice one-half tablespoon chives, finely cut whites and yolks of hard boiled eggs cold boiled red beets parsley Cut cold boiled potatoes in one-half inch cubes. Sprinkle four cupfuls with one-half tablespoon salt and one-fourth teaspoon pepper. Add four tablespoons oil and mix thoroughly; then add two tablespoons vinegar. A few drops of onion juice may be added, or one-half tablespoon chives finely cut. Arrange in a mound and garnish with whites and yolks of two hard boiled eggs, cold boiled red beets, and parsley. Chop whites and arrange on one-fourth of the mound; chop beets finely, mix with one tablespoon vinegar, and let stand fifteen minutes; then arrange on fourths of mound next to whites. Arrange on remaining fourth of mound, yolks chopped or forced through a potato ricer. Put small sprigs of parsley in lines dividing beets from eggs; also garnish with parsley at base.

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