I am extremely excited to share with you a great link to a book I have just discovered (it is a scanned “ancient cookbook” published in 1869). Sometimes in life we may need some grandmotherly guidance and wisdom. It seems since the invention of televisions and just over scheduled lives, the art of housekeeping and cooking have been lost. We don`t spend time in the kitchens with our mothers or grandmothers anymore.

A lot of us just don’t have any  kind of motherly resource and just end up lacking. We may learn the hard way with trial and error or never learn these necessary skills at all. I don’t know about you, but I was thrust into marriage and parenthood without knowing how to cook and sew and once my girls arrived I needed some major help!

If you have a close grandparent, I encourage you to find some of their old cookbooks. You will be shocked at how different the recipes are compared to today’s cookbooks. A lot of traditional ways have been lost in the modern age of convenience.

So here are some ancient recipes that you won’t find in a modern cookbook from Domestic Cookery, Useful Receipts, and Hints to Young Housekeepers.

How to Boil A Calf’s Head

How to Brown a Calf’s head with the Skin On

How to Bake a Beef’s Heart

How To Cook Rabbits and Squirrels

How To Make Brain Cakes
(We are of Polish Heritage and my mother said that eating Brain was a delicacy in her youth!)

How To Make Giblet Pies and Soups

There are 5 pages dedicated on how to eat oysters (just keep hitting the *next* button at the top of the page)

How To Make Milk Yeast

Blackberry Cordial
“This is valuable medicine for children in summer”

How to Make Vinigar

And how to pickle, preserve, make catsup (just keep hitting the *next* button at the top of the page)

How to make liver sausage and head cheese

How to Render Lard and Tallow

The rest of the book deals with how to keep house, herbal and medicinal food remedies (butter oil was used for soothing the stomach for violent vomiting and dysentery)

Take note at all the simple and plain recipes there are in this book. Yet they are so extremely nutritious and loaded with fat, milk, eggs, gelatinous stocks, brains, liver and feet. I also saw tongue amongst the recipes but did not link. I remember having had cows tongue as a kid and it being extremely chewy but tasting good nevertheless.

There are recipes in there that are good for the “delicate persons”. These recipes are high in fats from “rich milk” and eggs, butter and highly gelatinous from boiled pig’s feet. Calf’s foot gelatin with cream is “nice for the sick person”. And note that this milk and cream would be raw and unpasteurized.

Spend some time exploring this book and hopefully try out some recipes and remedies.

Note what ingredients are not included in this book:

1. Canola oils, corn oils, soy oil and other “new” industrial vegetable oils.
2. Skinless, boneless chicken.
3. 1% and 2% milks.

Animal fats, bones and organs where used for medicine and good health. This is how our great grandparents and grandparents ate before heart disease, cancer, and obesity became epidemic.

Share your thoughts!

This post is part of Fight Back Fridays hosted by Food Renegade.

To your health,

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Sometimes it takes a health issue to turn our unhealthy habits around. About four weeks ago I got a seriously uncomfortable Candida reaction. Now I have had a systemic Candida problem for more than half my life – approximately sixteen years. Most of this time I had no idea what my problem was. I was vegetarian/vegan and was going through a young adult life, eating lots of white carbohydrates, sweets and alcohol. Before I new it my problem became systemic. I got pregnant with my first daughter, so the alcohol stopped but the carbohydrates didn’t. After my daughter was born, nursing was extremely painful. I was certain that she had thrush. My nipples were red sore and sometimes even bleeding. This is when I educated myself on candida. I cut out sugars, but since I was vegetarian I could not cut out carbs. My daughter showed sensitivity to milk and eggs so then we became vegan.

My daughter became sick and started to show signs of  dental decay. The doctor told us that my daughter at 18 months was classified as failure to thrive. That shocked me and I took it personally that I was being a bad parent. It put the fire under me and I started to do research on dental decay and nutrition. I found the Weston A. Price Foundation and the book that was written on Dr. Weston Price’s research called Nourishing Traditions: The Cookbook that Challenges Politically Correct Nutrition and the Diet Dictorats by Sally Fallon and Mary G. Enig Phd. This is the book that ended twelve years of vegetarianism. My daughter started on probiotics and yogurt and her milk and egg sensitivity went away. Her dental decay did not worsen and to this day she is almost six years old and has no cavities. This book teaches the importance of enzymes, beneficial bacteria, culturing and fermentation for the importance of digestion and nutrient assimilation.

I got pregnant again with my second daughter and had a blast working with this cookbook. However, I found out that I still had a very bad case of candida. Not to mention all of the sweet cravings that I was having and my hormones going wild. After the birth I did not have a reoccurance of thrush and I was very thankful. I did continue to follow the cookbook and its nutrition. But I could not get rid of the candida. I stay away from sugar and sweetners and the main sweet things I would eat was fruit.

So back to four weeks ago and my candida reacion… I have had enough! I cut out the only sweet things I eat. Fruit! I researched the Atkin’s diet a bit. I cut out sprouted breads, fruits, and grains. And it took a while but I am in the middle of a “yeast die-off” Not fun, but I have had my worst day and I am now on the road to healing. I know I can do this diet in combination with the Nourishing Traditions diet. I have no cravings at all for sweets or fruits. I feel SATISFIED after eating and I am not hungry.  Another big bonus is that I have lost 10 pounds in four weeks!

So I ask for help and advice.. How did you cure your Candida?

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