This 1918 Berkeley Cookbook Features Art by Bernard Maybeck and a Recipe from Lou Henry Hoover
The World War One-era collection of recipes by the Mobilized Women's Organizations of Berkeley features a cover design by the celebrated architect and an entry from the future First Lady
Did you know the concept of “Meatless Mondays” can be dated back to over a hundred years ago? Its origins are in World War One, when the United States braced itself against wartime disruptions to food production and distribution.
In response to worrisome domestic supply chain issues, the federal government created the United States Food Administration in 1917. The short-lived agency, headed by Herbert Hoover (who would later become President of the United States), led a national campaign to limit food purchasing to aid the war effort. They also made a stirring patriotic appeal: if households could modify their diets, they would free up more food supplies and help reduce world hunger in areas devastated by the war. Saving food could also boost their armed forces, as better food provisions would give soldiers and sailors the physical advantage to win the war.
Practically, what this meant was that the government urged those on the home front to reduce consumption of certain foods—particularly meat (hence, “Meatless Mondays”) and wheat (“Wheatless Wednesdays”)—that were easier to transport or of especial dietary value to those in combat or at risk of starvation. To shore up popular support, the U.S. Food Administration produced propaganda posters and slogans such as “Wheat Will Win the War” and “Food Will Win the War.”
In response, civic organizations rallied to change the American diet. In Berkeley, California, the Mobilized Women's Organizations of Berkeley published their cookbook Conservation Recipes with tips on how to make do with less food. Containing hundreds of recipes, , the women proposed new ways of cooking that observed U.S. Food Administration guidelines. These included austere condiments such as “War Time Mayonnaise” (an egg and oil emulsion thickened with a cornstarch and milk slurry, to decrease oil use) to modest vegetable plates as “Turnips À La Berkeley” (boiled diced turnips topped with a little melted butter, salt and pepper, and parsley).
On the cookbook’s editorial staff was Annie White Maybeck, wife to noted Bay Area architect Bernard Maybeck who had designed the First Church of Christ, Scientist in Berkeley and the Palace of Fine Arts in San Francisco years prior.
Bernard’s artwork adorns the cookbook’s cover. In the foreground is what looks like the silhouette of a California live oak, while the shadow of eucalyptus trees and the Campanile appear in the back.
Excerpts from Conservation Recipes
In the first few pages of the cookbook is a recipe from Lou Henry Hoover, a scientist and an accomplished linguist, and the wife of Herbert Hoover. Because her husband headed the U.S. Food Administration, Lou became an unofficial spokesperson to housewives and consumers, advising them how to cook in lean times. Her recipe for her steamed “war pudding” is below.
For her part, Annie White Maybeck contributed two recipes to the cookbook’s “Meats” section, which urged reducing meat consumption and, when possible, to choose less desirable cuts such as organ meats. Her recipe for a simple mutton stew (mutton being a tougher cut of meat compared to lamb) is sandwiched between “Calves Liver” and “Brains with Eggs.”
One hundred years later, some of the lessons that emerged from this period—conserving food, eating pantry staples, growing backyard gardens—were remarkably relevant during pandemic lockdowns. Regardless, the knowledge gained from learning self-sufficiency and limiting food waste then, or now, has lasting importance for any era.
Read a digital edition of Conservation Recipes (1918) from the University of California Libraries on the Internet Archive.