Camped out with the internetz, I started exploring www.gutenberg.org and came across a Crisco cookbook from the early 1900's. It was fascinating because, reading through the recipes, I quickly realized that foods we consider standard comfort food fare, were already in place a century ago. The section on the "logic" behind hydrogenation that led to the creation of Crisco was very interesting. So, of course, I had to scroll down to the section on Fried Chicken. Here is a copy paste of that section. But I highly recommend your checking out the original book at Gutenberg. Note the hot sweet cream and hot roasted peanuts variation below and also the corn croquettes recipe.
Fried Chicken
| Chicken | Crisco |
Select young tender chickens and disjoint. Wash carefully and let stand over night in refrigerator.
A
Drain chicken but do not wipe dry. Season with salt and white pepper and dredge well with flour. Fry in deep Crisco hot enough to brown a crumb of bread in sixty seconds. It requires from ten to twelve minutes to fry chicken. Drain and place on a hot platter garnished with parsley and rice croquettes.
B
Make batter of 1 cupful flour, 1 teaspoonful salt, 2 grains white pepper, 1/2 cupful water, 2 well beaten eggs, and 1 tablespoonful melted Crisco. Have kettle of Crisco hot enough to turn crumb of bread a golden brown in sixty seconds. Drain chicken but do not dry. Dip each joint separately in batter and fry in the Crisco until golden brown. It should take from ten to twelve minutes. Serve on a folded napkin garnished with parsley.
C
Drain chicken but do not wipe dry. Season with salt and white pepper and dredge well with flour. Put three tablespoonfuls Crisco in frying pan and when hot place chicken in pan; cover, and allow to steam for ten minutes. Uncover, and allow chicken to brown, taking care to turn frequently. Serve on hot platter, garnished with parsley and serve with cream gravy.
D
Select medium-sized chickens and wash well, then cut into neat pieces and season them. Mix 1 cupful cornmeal with 1 cupful flour, 1 tablespoonful salt and 1 tablespoonful black pepper. Dip each piece in mixture and fry in hot Crisco twelve minutes. Drain and serve with cornmeal batter bread.
E
Wash young chicken, cut into neat pieces, dust with salt, pepper, and flour, and fry in hot Crisco twelve minutes. Drain, place on hot platter, pour over it 1/2 pint hot sweet cream, sprinkle over with chopped hot roasted peanuts, little salt and pepper.
Fried Chicken, Mexican Style
| 1 tender chicken Salt and pepper to taste 1 clove garlic | 1 seeded green pepper 2 large tomatoes 5 tablespoonfuls Crisco |
| Corn croquettes | |
| For Croquettes | |
| 2 tablespoonfuls Crisco 1 can or 14 ears corn 2 tablespoonfuls flour 2 cupfuls milk | 1/2 teaspoonful sugar Pepper and salt to taste 1 egg Breadcrumbs |
For chicken. Draw, wash and dry chicken, then cut into neat joints, sprinkle with salt and pepper. Heat Crisco in frying pan, add clove of garlic and pepper cut in small pieces. When garlic turns brown take out, put chicken in, fry till brown, then cover closely, allow to simmer till ready. A short time before covering chicken, add tomatoes peeled and cut in small pieces.
For croquettes. Drain liquor from can of corn, or grate ears, and chop kernels fine. Blend Crisco and flour together in pan over fire, add milk, stir till boiling and cook five minutes, stirring all the time, add seasonings, and corn, and cook five minutes, then allow to cool. When cold, form lightly with floured hands into neat croquettes, brush over with beaten egg, toss in crumbs and fry in hot Crisco to a golden brown. Drain. Place chicken on hot platter, garnish with croquettes and serve hot.
"Man's most important food, fat."
"Man's most important food, fat."
"Those who say—'The old fashioned things are good enough for us.'"
"The difference between substitute and primary."
"That 'Lardy' taste."
"Fry fish, then onions, then potatoes in the same Crisco."
"We all eat raw fats."
"A woman can throw out more with a teaspoon than a man can bring home in a wagon."
"Hidden flavors."
"Keeping parlor and kitchen strangers."
"Kosher."
"Recipes tested by Domestic Scientists."
INTRODUCTION
The word "fat" is one of the most interesting in food chemistry. It is the great energy producer. John C. Olsen, A.M., Ph.D., in his book, "Pure Food," states that fats furnish half the total energy obtained by human beings from their food. The three primary, solid cooking fats today are:
There are numbers of substitutes for these, such as butterine, oleomargarine and "lard compounds."
The following pages contain a story of unusual interest to you. For you eat.
See Page 233
The Story of Crisco
The culinary world is revising its entire cook book on account of the advent of Crisco, a new and altogether different cooking fat.
Many wonder that any product could gain the favor of cooking experts so quickly. A few months after the first package was marketed, practically every grocer of the better class in the United States was supplying women with the new product.
This was largely because four classes of people—housewives—chefs—doctors—dietitians—were glad to be shown a product which at once would make for more digestible foods, more economical foods, and better tasting foods.
Cooking and History
Cooking methods have undergone a marked change during the past few years. The nation's food is becoming more and more wholesome as a result of different discoveries, new sources of supply, and the intelligent weighing of values. Domestic Science is better understood and more appreciated.
People of the present century are fairer to their stomachs, realizing that their health largely depends upon this faithful and long-suffering servant. Digestion and disposition sound much the same, but a good disposition often is wrecked by a poor digestion.
America has been termed a country of dyspeptics. It is being changed to a land of healthy eaters, consequently happier individuals. Every agent responsible for this national digestive improvement must be gratefully recognized.
It seems strange to many that there can be anything better than butter for cooking, or of greater utility than lard, and the advent of Crisco has been a shock to the older generation, born in an age less progressive than our own, and prone to contend that the old fashioned things are good enough.
But these good folk, when convinced, are the greatest enthusiasts. Grandmother was glad to give up the fatiguing spinning wheel. So the modern woman is glad to stop cooking with expensive butter, animal lard and their inadequate substitutes.
And so, the nation's cook book has been hauled out and is being revised. Upon thousands of pages, the words "lard" and "butter" have been crossed out and the word "Crisco" written in their place.
A Need Anticipated
Great foresight was shown in the making of Crisco.
The quality, as well as the quantity, of lard was diminishing steadily in the face of a growing population. Prices were rising. "The high-cost-of-living" was an oft-repeated phrase. Also, our country was outgrowing its supply of butter. What was needed, therefore, was not a substitute, but something better than these fats, some product which not only would accomplish as much in cookery, but a great deal more.
When, therefore, Crisco was perfected, and it was shown that here finally was an altogether new and better fat, cookery experts were quick to show their appreciation.
In reading the following pages, think of Crisco as a primary cooking fat or shortening with even more individuality (because it does greater things), than all others.
Man's Most Important Food, Fat
No other food supplies our bodies with the drive, the vigor, which fat gives. No other food has been given so little study in proportion to its importance.
Fat contains more than twice the amount of energy-yielding power or calorific value of proteids or carbohydrates. One half our physical energy is from the fat we eat in different forms. The excellent book, "Food and Cookery for the Sick and Convalescent," by Fannie Merritt Farmer, states, "In the diet of children at least, a deficiency of fat cannot be replaced by an excess of carbohydrates; and that fat seems to play some part in the formation of young tissues which cannot be undertaken by any other constituent of food...."
The book entitled "The Chemistry of Cooking and Cleaning," by the two authorities, Ellen H. Richards and S. Maria Elliott, states that the diet of school children should be regulated carefully with the fat supply in view. Girls, especially, show at times a dislike for fat. It therefore is necessary that the fat which supplies their growing bodies with energy should be in the purest and most inviting form and should be one that their digestions welcome, rather than repel.
The first step in the digestion of fat is its melting. Crisco melts at a lower degree of heat than body temperature. Because of its low melting point, thus allowing the digestive juices to mix with it, and because of its vegetable origin and its purity, Crisco is the easiest of all cooking fats to digest.
When a fat smokes in frying, it "breaks down," that is, its chemical composition is changed; part of its altered composition becomes a non-digestible and irritating substance. The best fat for digestion is one which does not decompose or break down at frying temperature. Crisco does not break down until a degree of heat is reached above the frying point. In other words, Crisco does not break down at all in normal frying, because it is not necessary to have it "smoking hot" for frying. No part of it, therefore, has been transformed in cooking into an irritant. That is one reason why the stomach welcomes Crisco and carries forward its digestion with ease.
Working Towards an Ideal
A part of the preliminary work done in connection with the development of Crisco, described in these pages, consisted of the study of the older cooking fats. The objectionable features of each were considered. The good was weighed against the bad. The strength and weakness of each was determined. Thus was found what the ideal fat should possess, and what it should not possess. It must have every good quality and no bad one.
After years of study, a process was discovered which made possible the ideal fat.
The process involved the changing of the composition of vegetable food oils and the making of the richest fat or solid cream.
The Crisco Process at the first stage of its development gave, at least, the basis of the ideal fat; namely, a purely vegetable product, differing from all others in that absolutely no animal fat had to be added to the vegetable oil to produce the proper stiffness. This was but one of the many distinctive advantages sought and found.
Not Marketed Until Perfect
It also solved the problem of eliminating certain objectionable features of fats in general, such as rancidity, color, odor, smoking properties when heated. These weaknesses, therefore, were not a part of this new fat, which it would seem was the parent of the Ideal.
Then after four years of severe tests, after each weakness was replaced with strength the Government was given this fat to analyze and classify. The report was that it answered to none of the tests for fats already existing.
A Primary Fat
It was neither a butter, a "compound" nor a "substitute," but an entirely new product. A primary fat.
In 1911 it was named Crisco and placed upon the market.
Today you buy this rich, wholesome cream of nutritious food oils in sanitary tins. The "Crisco Process" alone can produce this creamy white fat. No one else can manufacture Crisco, because no one else holds the secret of Crisco and because they would have no legal right to make it. Crisco is Crisco, and nothing else.
Finally Economical
At first, it looked very much as if Crisco must be a high-priced product. It cost its discoverers many thousands of dollars before ever a package reached the consumer's kitchen.
Crisco was not offered for sale as a substitute, or for housewives to buy only to save money. The chief point emphasized was, that Crisco was a richer, more wholesome food fat for cooking. Naturally, therefore, it was good news to all when Crisco was found also to be more economical.
Crisco is more economical than lard in another way. It makes richer pastry than lard, and one-fifth less can be used. Furthermore it can be used over and over again in frying all manner of foods, and because foods absorb so little, Crisco is in reality more economical even than lard of mediocre quality. The price of Crisco is lower than the average price of the best pail lard throughout the year.
Crisco's Manufacture
It would be difficult to imagine surroundings more appetizing than those in which Crisco is manufactured. It is made in a building devoted exclusively to the manufacture of this one product. In sparkling bright rooms, cleanly uniformed employees make and pack Crisco.
The air for this building is drawn in through an apparatus which washes and purifies it, removing the possibility of any dust entering.
The floors are of a special tile composition; the walls are of white glazed tile, which are washed regularly. White enamel covers metal surfaces where nickel plating cannot be used. Sterilized machines handle the oil and the finished product. No hand touches Crisco until in your own kitchen the sanitary can is opened, disclosing the smooth richness, the creamlike, appetizing consistency of the product.
The Banishment of That "Lardy" Taste in Foods
It was the earnest aim of the makers of Crisco to produce a strictly vegetable product without adding a hard, and consequently indigestible animal fat. There is today a pronounced partiality from a health standpoint to a vegetable fat, and the lardy, greasy taste of food resulting from the use of animal fat never has been in such disfavor as during the past few years.
So Crisco is absolutely all vegetable. No stearine, animal or vegetable, is added. It possesses no taste nor odor save the delightful and characteristic aroma which identifies Crisco, and is suggestive of its purity.
Explanation of "Hidden" Food Flavors.
When the dainty shadings of taste are over-shadowed by a "lardy" flavor, the true taste of the food itself is lost. We miss the "hidden" or natural taste of the food. Crisco has a peculiar power of bringing out the very best in food flavors. Even the simplest foods are allowed a delicacy of flavor.
Take ginger bread for example: The real ginger taste is there. The molasses and spice flavors are brought out.
Or just plain, every-day fried potatoes; many never knew what the real potato taste was before eating potatoes fried in Crisco.
Fried chicken has a newness of taste not known before.
New users of Crisco should try these simple foods first and later take up the preparation of more elaborate dishes.
Butter, Ever Popular
It is hard to imagine anything taking the place of butter upon the dining table. For seasoning in cooking, the use of butter ever will be largely a matter of taste. Some people have a partiality for the "butter flavor," which after all is largely the salt mixed with the fat. Close your eyes and eat some fresh unsalted butter; note that it is practically tasteless.
Crisco contains richer food elements than butter. As Crisco is richer, containing no moisture, one-fifth or one-fourth less can be used in each recipe.
Crisco always is uniform because it is a manufactured fat where quality and purity can be controlled. It works perfectly into any dough, making the crust or loaf even textured. It keeps sweet and pure indefinitely in the ordinary room temperature.
Keep Your Parlor and Your Kitchen Strangers
Kitchen odors are out of place in the parlor. When frying with Crisco, as before explained, it is not necessary to heat the fat to smoking temperature, ideal frying is accomplished without bringing Crisco to its smoking point. On the other hand, it is necessary to heat lard "smoking 
hot" before it is of the proper frying temperature. Remember also that, when lard smokes and fills the house with its strong odor, certain constituents have been changed chemically to those which irritate the sensitive membranes of the alimentary canal.
hot" before it is of the proper frying temperature. Remember also that, when lard smokes and fills the house with its strong odor, certain constituents have been changed chemically to those which irritate the sensitive membranes of the alimentary canal.
Crisco does not smoke until it reaches 455 degrees, a heat higher than is necessary for frying. You need not wait for Crisco to smoke. Consequently the house will not fill with smoke, nor will there be black, burnt specks in fried foods, as often there are when you use lard for frying.
Crisco gives up its heat very quickly to the food submerged in it and a tender, brown crust almost instantly forms, allowing the inside of the potatoes, croquettes, doughnuts, etc., to become baked, rather than soaked.
The same Crisco can be used for frying fish, onions, potatoes, or any other food. Crisco does not take up food flavors or odors. After frying each food, merely strain out the food particles.
We All Eat Raw Fats
The shortening fat in pastry or baked foods, is merely distributed throughout the dough. No chemical change occurs during the baking process. So when you eat pie or hot biscuit, in which animal lard is 
used, you eat raw animal lard. The shortening used in all baked foods therefore, should be just as pure and wholesome as if you were eating it like butter upon bread. Because Crisco digests with such ease, and because it is a pure vegetable fat, all those who realize the above fact regarding pastry making are now won over to Crisco.
used, you eat raw animal lard. The shortening used in all baked foods therefore, should be just as pure and wholesome as if you were eating it like butter upon bread. Because Crisco digests with such ease, and because it is a pure vegetable fat, all those who realize the above fact regarding pastry making are now won over to Crisco.
A hint as to Crisco's purity is shown by this simple test: Break open a hot biscuit in which Crisco has been used. You will note a sweet fragrance, which is most inviting.
A few months ago if you had told dyspeptic men and women that they could eat pie at the evening meal and that distress would not follow, probably they would have doubted you. Hundreds of instances of Crisco's healthfulness have been given by people, who, at one time have been denied such foods as pastry, cake and fried foods, but who now eat these rich, yet digestible Crisco dishes.
You, or any other normally healthy individual, whose digestion does not relish greasy foods, can eat rich pie crust. The richness is there, but not the unpleasant after effects. Crisco digestsreadily.
The Importance of Giving Children Crisco Foods
A good digestion will mean much to the youngster's health and character. A man seldom seems to be stronger than his stomach, for indigestion handicaps him in his accomplishment of big things.
As more attention is given to present feeding, less attention need be given to future doctoring. Equip your children with good stomachs by giving them wholesome Crisco foods—foods which digest with ease.
They may eat the rich things they enjoy and find them just as digestible as many apparently simple foods, if Crisco be used properly.
They may eat Crisco doughnuts or pie without being chased by nightmares. Sweet dreams follow the Crisco supper.
The Great Variety of Crisco Foods
There are thousands of Crisco dishes. It is impossible to know the exact number, because Crisco is used for practically every cooking purpose. Women daily tell us of new uses they have found for Crisco.
Many women begin by using Crisco in simple ways, for frying, for baking, in place of lard. Soon, however, they learn that Crisco also takes the place of butter. "Butter richness without butter expense," say the thousands of Crisco users.
Tasty scalloped dishes, salad dressing, rich pastry, fine grained cake, sauces and hundreds of other dishes, where butter formerly was used, now are prepared with Crisco.
"A Woman Can Throw Out More with a Teaspoon Than a Man Can Bring Home in a Wagon"
Kitchen expense comes by the spoonful. Think of the countless spoonfuls of expensive butter used daily, where economical Crisco would accomplish the same results at one-third the cost.
It should be remembered that one-fifth less Crisco than butter may be used, because Crisco is richer than butter. The moisture, salt and curd which butter contains to the extent of about 20 per cent are not found in Crisco, which is all, (100 per cent) shortening.
Remember also that Crisco will average a lower price per pound throughout the year than the best pail lard. And you can use less Crisco than lard, which is a further saving.
Brief, Interesting Facts
Crisco is being used in an increasing number of the better class hotels, clubs, restaurants, dining cars, ocean liners.
Crisco has been demonstrated and explained upon the Chautauqua platform by Domestic Science experts, these lectures being a part of the regular course.
Domestic Science teachers recommend Crisco to their pupils and use it in their classes and lecture demonstrations. Many High Schools having Domestic Science departments use Crisco.
Crisco has taken the place of butter and lard in a number of hospitals, where purity and digestibility are of vital importance.
Crisco is Kosher. Rabbi Margolies of New York, said that the Hebrew Race had been waiting 4,000 years for Crisco. It conforms to the strict Dietary Laws of the Jews. It is what is known in the Hebrew language as a "parava," or neutral fat. Crisco can be used with both "milchig" and "fleichig" (milk and flesh) foods. Special Kosher packages, bearing the seals of Rabbi Margolies of New York, and Rabbi Lifsitz of Cincinnati, are sold the Jewish trade. But all Crisco is Kosher and all of the same purity.
Campers find Crisco helpful in many ways. Hot climates have little effect upon its wholesomeness.
It is convenient; a handy package to pack and does not melt so quickly in transit. One can of Crisco can be used to fry fish, eggs, potatoes and to make hot biscuit, merely by straining out the food particles after each frying and pouring the Crisco back into the can to harden to proper consistency before the biscuit making.
Practically every grocer who has a good trade in Crisco, uses it in his own home.
Crisco is sold by net weight. You pay only for the Crisco—not the can. Find the net weight of what you have been using.
Bread and cake keep fresh and moist much longer when Crisco is used.
Women have written that they use empty Crisco tins for canning vegetables and fruits, and as receptacles for kitchen and pantry use.
Crisco's Manufacture Scientifically Explained
To understand something of the Crisco Process, it is necessary first to know that there are three main constituents in all the best edible oils.
Linoline, Oleine, Stearine.
The chemical difference between these three components is solely in the percentage of hydrogen contained, and it is possible by the addition of hydrogen, to transform one component into another.
Though seemingly so much alike, there is a marked difference in the physical properties of these components.
Linoline which has the lowest percentage of hydrogen, is unstable and tends to turn rancid.
Oleine is stable, has no tendency to turn rancid and is easily digested.
Stearine is both hard and indigestible.
The Crisco process adds enough hydrogen to change almost all the linoline into nourishing digestible oleine.
Mark well the difference in manufacture between Crisco and lard compounds. In producing a lard compound, to the linoline, oleine and stearine of the original oil is added more stearine (usually animal), the hard indigestible fat, in order to bring up the hardness of the oil. The resultant compound is indigestible and very liable to become rancid.
The following pages contain 615 recipes which have been tested by Domestic Science Authorities in the Cooking Departments of different colleges and other educational institutions, and by housewives in their own kitchens. Many have been originated by Marion Harris Neil and all have been tested by her.
We have undertaken to submit a comprehensive list of recipes for your use, which will enable you to serve menus of wide variety.
We hope that you have enjoyed reading this little volume and that you will derive both help and satisfaction from the recipes.
We will go to any length to help you in the cause of Better Food. We realize that women must study this product as they would any other altogether new article of cookery, and that the study and care used will be amply repaid by the palatability and healthfulness of all foods. A can of Crisco is no Aladdin's Lamp, which merely need be touched by a kitchen spoon to produce magical dishes. But any woman is able to achieve excellent results by mixing thought with Crisco.
Let us know how you progress.
Yours respectfully,
Things to Remember in Connection with These Recipes
No need for Crisco to occupy valuable space in the refrigerator. In fact, except in most unusual summer heat, it will be of a better consistency outside the refrigerator. Crisco keeps sweet indefinitely, summer and winter, at ordinary room temperature.
In making sauces, thoroughly blend the flour and Crisco before adding the milk.
In using melted Crisco in boiled dressing, croquettes, rolls, fritters, etc., be sure that the melted Crisco is cooled sufficiently so that the hot fat will not injure the texture of the foods.
When using in place of butter, add salt in the proportion of one level teaspoonful to one cup of Crisco.
Remember that Crisco, like butter, is susceptible to cold. It readily becomes hard. In creaming Crisco in winter use the same care as when creaming butter. Rinse pan in boiling water and have the Crisco of the proper creaming stiffness before using. Unlike butter, however, Crisco's purity is not affected by weather. It remains sweet and pure indefinitely without refrigeration.
In deep frying, do not wait for Crisco to smoke. (See page 35.)
Remember That—
When pie crust is tough: It is possible you have not used Crisco properly. Perhaps the measurements were not correct. Perhaps the water was too warm, or the dough was handled too much. Shortening cannot make pastry tough.
When fried foods absorb: It is because Crisco is not hot enough, or because you have not used enough Crisco. Use plenty and the raw foods, if added in small quantities, will not reduce the heat of the fat. The absorption in deep Crisco frying should be less than that of another fat.
When cake is not a success: It is not the fault of the Crisco. Either too much was used, the oven heat not perfectly controlled or some important ingredient was used in the wrong proportion. Crisco should be creamed with the sugar more thoroughly than butter, as Crisco contains no moisture to dissolve the sugar.
When cake or other food is not flavory: Salt should have been added to the Crisco, for Crisco contains no salt.
When there is smoke in the kitchen: Crisco has been burned or heated too high for frying. Or some may have been on the outside of the pan or kettle.
When Crisco is too hard: Like butter, it is susceptible to heat and cold. Simply put in a warmer place.
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