Nineteenth century breads often called for “a teacup of yeast,” a huge amount compared to today’s recipes. Victorian-era housekeepers (e.g. wives) made their yeast. And continued to whip up fresh batches of yeast (with a touch of the last batch as a starter) well after commercially prepared yeast waited on grocer’s shelves.
Advertisements from vintage newspapers and periodicals shed much light on the tobacco habits of our nineteenth century United States ancestors. Each ad cites sources, dates, and provides everything from brand names to prices to general categories to help us draw conclusions about tobacco use in the Victorian United States.
Why? Because accurate backdrops make for exciting fiction!
Cake tins are often mentioned in Victorian-era Cook Books (as spelled in nineteenth century publications). This post provides historic images of this era’s baking pans from both newspaper advertisements and catalog ads (such as Sears and Montgomery Ward’s catalogs).
Many of the shapes and sizes are familiar to today’s baker’s options, and several have disappeared in the intervening years. My greatest surprise is the SIZE of Victorian cake pans. Compare to today’s, and see what I mean!
Flour sifters are an important part of baking–today, and in the Victorian Era. Would you be surprised to learn the first flour sifter was patented by an American? See a timeline of Victorian-era advertisements for sifters and flour sieves, flour bins (canisters or extraordinary sizes) with built-in sieves, patents for early sifters and sieve holders, and a perspective of price. The advertising, alone, sheds light on why 19th century cooks were persuaded to purchase and use these devices.
A bicycle built for two plays a role in my new release, Sophia’s Leap-Year Courtship. Such bicycles are romantic–and they’re making a resurgence. I see them in romantic bridal photography, all over Pinterest, and the research for the book showed me just when they were originally “a thing” and how they could fit into this book. Come see!
