Vintage Cookbooks: Oven Triumphs!

I'm still getting around to sharing stuff from my Junk Jamboree trip a few weeks ago. I've been behind on everything from laundry to bathroom cleaning to yard work since I started this new job. But as far as blog posts are considered, I believe it's like the kids that peel back the gift wrap slowly, slowly on Christmas morning, to make the presents last as long as they can. Or you can call that my excuse. Either way, that's my story, and I'm sticking to it.

Since I enjoy cooking and baking, and vintage things, it's hard to resist those two ingredients in a bin of dollar items at a junk sale. I picked up two recipe booklets at the Junk Jamboree, each for different reasons.

The first one came home with me because of the title: The Calumet Book of Oven Triumphs! Exclamation point! And who wouldn't want a book of oven triumphs? Sign me up!

As a woman who's also had her share of Oven Flops!, I'd say the title has timeless appeal. Maddeningly, the little booklet, a promotional cookbook for Calumet brand baking powder, doesn't identify the cover photo with a recipe inside. I suspect it's the Lady Baltimore Cake, but I'm not sure. Not a fan of raisin filling, but that fluffy frosting looks amazing, doesn't it? I wouldn't even need the cake part. Just hand me the bowl and a spoon. (There needs to be an intervention group for adult frosting addicts).

One of the things I find.....reassuring I guess is the right word, is that these little paper cookbooks with the black and white photography inside and the quaint language, survived all these years (this one from 1937!) to guide yet another homemaker (me). It's even reassuring to me that there's a can of Calumet baking powder in my cupboard too.

I also bought this one ($1) for the recipes. The cakes and biscuits featured in it look really good, and I'm eager to try them. I'm adding Hungarian Cream Cake and the Gingerbread recipe to my list of things to make next time I've got the mixer out.

The second booklet was also product promotional literature, this time for PET brand instant nonfat dry milk, and with no copyright date that I could find. It had to be Midcentury, because get a load of this cover:

I love this cookbook cover. I'm neither young, nor modern (in fact I'm getting more old-fashioned with every day), but the colors and graphics were such an eye-candy treat for so little (75 cents) that I scooped it up too. I'm considering a color copy to frame and work into my kitchen or screen porch lounge area somehow.

Do you collect ephemera or old recipes? What are some of your favorite finds in the dollar bins?