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
of recipes
Original
page scans
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.

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Portrait recipe card preview of Strawberry Short Cake I. 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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Beef

Braised Tongue.

184 · First Edition, 1896 · Report an issue

Ingredients

  • fresh tongue
  • boiling water
  • one-third cup each carrot, onion, and celery, cut in dice
  • one sprig parsley
  • four cups sauce
  • one-fourth cup butter
  • one-fourth cup flour
  • four cups water in which tongue was cooked
  • salt
  • pepper
  • one teaspoon Worcestershire Sauce
  • one and one-half cups caper juice

Method

  1. A fresh tongue is necessary for braising.
  2. Put tongue in kettle, cover with boiling water, and cook slowly two hours.
  3. Take tongue from water and remove skin and roots.
  4. Place in deep pan and surround with one-third cup each carrot, onion, and celery, cut in dice, and one sprig parsley; then pour over four cups sauce.
  5. Cover closely, and bake two hours, turning after the first hour.
  6. Serve on platter and strain around the sauce.
  7. Sauce for Tongue. Brown one-fourth cup butter, add one-fourth cup flour and stir together until well browned. ( Sauce for Tongue. )
  8. Add gradually four cups of water in which tongue was cooked.
  9. Season with salt and pepper and add one teaspoon Worcestershire Sauce.
  10. One and one-half cups stewed and strained tomatoes may be used in place of some of the water.

Original 1896 Text

fresh tongue boiling water one-third cup each carrot, onion, and celery, cut in dice one sprig parsley four cups sauce one-fourth cup butter one-fourth cup flour four cups water in which tongue was cooked salt pepper one teaspoon Worcestershire Sauce one and one-half cups caper juice A fresh tongue is necessary for braising. Put tongue in kettle, cover with boiling water, and cook slowly two hours. Take tongue from water and remove skin and roots. Place in deep pan and surround with one-third cup each carrot, onion, and celery, cut in dice, and one sprig parsley; then pour over four cups sauce. Cover closely, and bake two hours, turning after the first hour. Serve on platter and strain around the sauce. Sauce for Tongue. Brown one-fourth cup butter, add one-fourth cup flour and stir together until well browned. Add gradually four cups of water in which tongue was cooked. Season with salt and pepper and add one teaspoon Worcestershire Sauce. One and one-half cups stewed and strained tomatoes may be used in place of some of the water.

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