The Spirit of Seventy-Six!

In honor of the 250th birthday of the Declaration of Independence in the United States, all recipes through July 4, 2026 will be from bicentennial community cookbooks. Enjoy this look at the (gastronomic) spirit of ’76 as we head into the sestercentennial! I’ve also published the Sestercentennial Cookery with food from 1976, 1876, and the first American cookbook in 1796.

Madam B’s Molasses Gingerbread: Madam B.’s Molasses Gingerbread, from the 1875 Mrs. Winslow’s Domestic Receipt Book for 1876.; nineteenth century; 1800s; recipe; America’s Centennial; 1876; molasses; gingerbread

The original recipe doesn’t mention any amount of flour; the only instructions are to “stir in as much flour as you conveniently can with a spoon.” They would almost certainly have been using white flour at that time, but I suspect a combination of whole wheat and white would make for a very good texture.

And if you can find sorghum molasses, the bread will benefit muchly!

Drop in again soon for another vintage recipe! I’ll have a different recipe every Sunday afternoon throughout the year. Keep an eye on this page or subscribe to the RSS feed for further details. You can also browse past featured Club recipes as well as some of the vintage promotional cookbooks I’ve used as sources. And I collect many of these recipes in A Traveling Man’s Cookery Book.

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Happiness is macaroni. — Eddie Doucette (Macaroni Menu Magic)