jmcquown wrote:
>
> Hate to argue with an historian, but I have a copy of the original
> Fanny Farmer cookbook (obviously a reprint). The book states the
> school was to teach women IMMIGRANTS to cook using ingredients which
> were not necessarily native to their homeland. In that case, I would
> think the students would need measurements in order to know how to
> prepare recipes using foodstuffs foreign to them.
>
You make a good point, but do you remember the site someone posted that
has electronic archives of really old American cookbooks? In browsing
through some of them I was struck by how many recipes offered quite
vague quantities/measurements. I think his point that Fannie was a
major advocate for striving for "scientific" measurements is valid. As
is his implied point that such precision is a false, illusory path to
good cooking. There has never been a measurement as good as your taste
buds. -aem

http://digital.lib.msu.edu/projects/...ml/browse.html