Old Recipes
 

I have notice that the old ones call for Crisco. I do not use that for baking anymore.. Could I substitute butter in those recipes? Today I made a pecan bar and It was in a book my daughter put together. It did not say to grease the pan and that was a mistake. It stuck so bad my HB cut it and use a spatula to get the bars out.I am going to continue tomorrow and make some sugar cookies. I have a recipe that I made when I was 11 yrs old and I had 4 brothers and the writing was still there were I wrote down the measuements how to double.. My HB said they tasted like his grandma made. The book was for children and we did not have mixers then and it would have notes to ask your brother to mix it a few times when you got tired. The book is falling apart and I figured it is 68 yrs old. It sure brings back memories looking at that book. It would not be Christmas if I did not bake some candy and cookies. My friends and my mom love when I give them a can or box.

Here is a link to the King Arthur flour company blog. It is about their take on the differences between butter and shortening.

Also have found that in using old recipes that call for specific ingredients like one can of something, or one box of of something, to be careful because the weight and measurements of those ingredients have changed over the years. For example, an" old" recipe I have calls for an 18 oz box of cake mix ( this is from the 80's). Well, found that all current cake mixes are 15 oz. In my recipe it didn't matter as I was cutting the recipe in half and only needed 9 oz anyway. Threw the rest away.
Good luck with your baking.....still trying to decide if I am going to or not this year and how I would mail them off if I did.
https://www.kingarthurbaking.com/blo...tter-in-baking

Very interesting. In my working days, I my office was near the folks who taught Dietetics. When students in the Experimental Foods class were adjusting recipes to make them more healthy. They did this by reducing or changing fats, calories, sugar, sugar substitutes, different flours and so on I got to see and taste the different comparison foods. Grand differences. The info in the King Arthur article is spot on.

Happy baking, Sewingsuz. I also have a dear little pictured cookbook given to me from my grandmother, about 65 years old but it has some of best recipes. I shall take a peek to see if I should be adjusting recipes for changes in foods and measurements.

I know, some recipes ask for lard and i think-what? I only have olive oil in the house. sigh.

I substitute butter for Crisco now. The only thing I use Crisco for is pie crust. It always comes out nicely.

Thanks Susie, I also will substitute with butter.
Murphy, thanks for the link to get it all fixed in my book.

just did a search...turns out a lot of things can be a substitute for shortening....but....you need to also consider what you are baking or making. Things I found listed are butter, coconut oil, margarine, lard, vegetable oil, applesauce, prunes, bananas. But some of these things work better in some things like vegetable oil does not work as well for things that need to be flaky like pie crust, applesauce works well in cakes. So you need to be aware.

I looooovvve butter...to a fault. I swear it is going to be the death of me. But the thing is about butter is that it has milk solids in it, (casien.) Casien has now been shown in many studies to cause cancer, but that is not my main point. My point is that milk solids are just that...solid, very solid...like in cheese solid. That is why pie crust recipes call for Crisco instead. Milk solids can make the pie crust tough. So if you are using it in a recipe that is for a tender cookie, pastry, etc., it's best to cut it with some other, non-hydrogenated shortening, or eliminate it altogether.

I have a can of Crisco in my freezer...lemme go check to see if it is still hydrogenated...BRB.

OK...here's what is in Crisco:

Soybean Oil, Fully Hydrogenated Palm Oil, Mono and Diglycerides, TBQH, citric acid.

Total Fat: 12g, 15%
Saturated Fat: 3.5g, 16%
Trans Fat: 0
Polyunsaturated Fat: 6g
Monounsaturated Fat: 2.5g
Cholesterol: 0
Sodium: 0
Total Carbohydrates: 0
Protein: 0

Spray for baking pans
 

I use Baker's Joy to spray all my cake/cookie pans. No sticking at all. I wouldn't be without this wonderful item.

It's even worse when it's a "grandma" recipe that says "Mush up a 50-cent box of vanilla wafers, put them in the blue bowl and add milk up to the bottom of the crack."

Lard seems to react differently than shortening. My daughter makes my MIL's Xmas cookies every year for DH, and always used shortening as the recipe called for. The cookies never came out quite right, crumbly and breaking easily. This year she tried lard. No breakage at all, not crumbly, every one looked perfect, and DH says they tasted like the ones from his childhood. (Yes, MIL was the type to change her "secret family recipes" so that only she could make them right.)

OMG that is so true! My grandma made some delicious things and I watched her as a little girl. Then I grew up and asked her for recipes. “Cook some rice and add water and then when it looks right add some of something else” - looks right and some. I never got the hang of making her recipes. I don’t use crisco - I don’t bake much and use premade
crusts the rare times I make a pie

LOL!!! I have so many grandma recipes that are a hit and miss trying to translate. Her yeast roll recipe is the death of me..”pat it with scraper (what is a scraper?)...”pinch and pull till springy”. (What does springy look like?) .... and her dumplin’s recipe just has a list of ingredients.....not the measurements. I finally just framed that recipe and hung it on kitchen wall. Lol..

Those Grandma recipes are so cute!!!

I once made a pie crust with Coconut Oil- once I said. it was a complete disaster, as in "had to toss out" haha!

Re: butter. We bought Kerry's Gold and now that's the only one we buy. It's fantastic.

I think everything now causes cancer. The covid virus is in the air. Anything we eat that is already canned is not good for us. Not all of us can have gardens any more like we used to.

Right, I am not worrying about casein, lol. You have to use common sense.

I just made my mom's Christmas cookie recipe, calls for butter. Yummy. You can't go wrong with butter in cookies if you ask me. I once saw a 1950's recipe for shortbread, which called for shortening instead of butter. Ugh. Butter is what gives it flavor.

What a beautiful story. Could you post some pictures and recipes? I did not bake anything yet.

I'll take lard any day over this.

My grandma sent recipes to my mother when she was a young bride. Following the ingredients and directions was a note, "maybe not so much milk". Having hand written the recipe, my mother never understood, why not edit early on. 😆 just the way my grandma rolled!!

I have been using organic shortening that isn't hydrogenated for pies - with a little butter for flavor. It seems to work up as well as Crisco, but hopefully healthier. I have been looking for an organic lard, but so far, no luck.

My favorite - from a 1937 Rumford baking powder cookbook - "butter the size of an egg". Eggs come in many sizes, especially fresh off the farm eggs.

Amazon carries organic lard, but it is easy to make your own. My folks used to save scraps of pork fat and render them over very low heat. The lard was pure white. Store brands of lard are often hydrogenated to be longer lasting.

Peppernuts are a Christmas tradition in my family. The recipe is rather involved with boiling and then cooling the sugar, corn syrup and margarine. Then the rest of the ingredients are added--including 8 cups of flour!!. Then the dough is chilled. Then one rolls the dough into ropes about the diameter of a nickel and freezes them. Finally the frozen ropes of dough are sliced about 1/8 inch thick and baked.

It is a lot of work and makes a huge recipe. My DD tried substituting butter for the margarine one year. Total disaster!!! I buy a pound of margarine once a year--just for this recipe.

I grew up on a farm where we butchered our own pigs and rendered the fat for lard. We used lard in all our baking. I still use lard for my pie crusts.

Irishrose2, what brand is your organic shortening and what are the ingredients?

I have a recipe from my grandmother that reads :"Use butter the size of egg"! Guess chickens I only laid one size egg back then! 😆

I found this site for very old recipes, maybe it will give some one a taste of the past. They publish a book each year, get out the butter and real ingredients.

https://www.we-energies.com/recipes/...oks/index.htm?

How do you define shortening as organic?

Organic shortening
 

According to https://www.amazon.com/Spectrum-Natu.../dp/B000WDPBV8
Made from palm oil
Organic Shortening has no hydrogenated fats
0g trans fats per serving

Janey - Neat people never make the exciting discoveries I do.
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"Organic Shortening has no hydrogenated fats
0g trans fats per serving"

Thank you. That definition of organic is different than the one I know. Learned something today.https://cdn.quiltingboard.com/images/smilies/boy.gif

I've always heard that lard makes the best pie crust but I've never tried it. Never heard of organic shortening, thanks!

I replaced Crisco years ago. Hydrogenated fat is the very worst and at a nutritionalist advice, we have eliminated all hydrogenated fats from our shopping, cupboards, and pantry. We switched to Spectrum Organic Shortening. I swear it makes better pie crusts and better cookies than shortening - Crisco - ever did. You can order from Vitacost - online. We really don't use much shortening anyway, and one container lasts us quite awhile.

Here is an *old* recipe! This one is in Middle English, but nearly identical recipes go back to the Roman Empire. See if you can figure out the modern version.

79. Payn purdeuz. Take faire yolkes of eyren, and try hem fro the white, and drawe hem thorgh a streynour; and then take salte, and caste thereto; And then take manged brede or paynman, and kutte hit in leches; and then take fair buttur, and clarify hit, or ellses take fresh grece and put hit yn a faire pan, and make hit hote; And then wete the brede well there in the yolkes of eyren, and then ley hit on the batur in the pan, whan the buttur is al hote; And then whan hit is fried ynowe, take sugaur ynowe, and caste there-to whan hit is in the dish, And so serue hit forth.

Harleian MS 4016 (English 15th c.)



Translation

Lost Bread. Take fair yolks of eggs and separate them from the whites, and draw [put] them through a strainer and then take salt and cast thereto [add it]. And then take manchet bread or paindemaine [good white bread] and cut it in slices, and then take fair butter and clarify it, or else take fresh grease, and put it in a fair pan and make it hot. And then wet the bread well there in the yolks of egg and then lay it on the butter in the pan when the butter is hot. And then when it is fried enough take sugar enough and cast thereto when it is in the dish. And so serve it forth.

Oh I love this and can relate!!