The Spirit of Seventy-Six!

In honor of the 250th birthday of the Declaration of Independence, all recipes through July 4, 2026 will be from Centennial and Bicentennial cookbooks and the 1796 first American cookbook. Enjoy this look at the (gastronomic) spirit of ’76 as we head into the sestercentennial.

I’ve also published a Sestercentennial Cookery with recipes and photos!

Eggplant Spaghetti: Frances Wessels’s Eggplant Spaghetti, from the 1975 Our Cookin’ Heritage! 1776-1976, from the Copperas Cove Trinity Lutheran Church.; Texas; seventies; 1970s; Italian; pasta; noodles; eggplant; recipe; America’s Bicentennial

This is a wonderful pasta sauce from Frances Wessels in the Copperas Cove, Texas, Trinity Lutheran Church Bicentennial cookbook. I’ve used it with spaghetti, with tubular pasta, and even as the filling for a French omelet.

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.

Recipe blogging:

Originals:

Inspirations:

Archives:

You have to share some of the preparation in the kitchen with friends. — Jacques Pépin (Essential Pépin)