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Stuffed Beets
2 tablespoonfuls Crisco 6 beets 2 green peppers 2 tablespoonfuls breadcrumbs 1/2 teaspoonful onion juice Salt and pepper to taste
The book gives only the ingredient list; the method has to be inferred from the way stuffed vegetables were handled in this period. Everything below is about filling that gap and translating the pantry.
- No method is printedThis entry lists quantities and nothing else. A plausible reconstruction, based on how stuffed vegetables are handled elsewhere: cook the beets whole until tender, hollow them, chop the scooped-out centres with the peppers, bind with crumbs and seasoning, refill, and bake until heated through and lightly browned. None of this is stated in the original.
- CriscoAn all-vegetable hydrogenated shortening, sold from 1911 and still available, though the modern formula is reformulated to remove trans fats. Any neutral solid or liquid fat behaves the same way here; butter would add flavour the original does not have.
- Cooking the beets firstBoil or roast them whole with the skins on and about an inch of stem left, so they do not bleed out. Skins slip off under cold water once tender. Medium beets take 40-60 minutes boiled, longer roasted.
- Green peppersAn unripe bell pepper. Softening the chopped pepper in the Crisco before mixing improves both texture and taste.
- Onion juiceA common shortcut of the period: grated onion pressed through a sieve, used where visible pieces were not wanted. Finely grated onion works in its place.
- BreadcrumbsDry crumbs from stale bread, not the fine commercial kind. Two tablespoons is a binder, not a bulk filler, so keep the mixture on the moist side.
- OvenThe book gives no cooking instruction of any kind. If baking the refilled beets, a modern moderate oven of about 350F for 20-25 minutes will set the filling and colour the tops; a little fat dotted over the surface helps them brown.
- YieldSix stuffed beets serve three to six as a side, depending on their size.
The Story of Crisco was a promotional cookbook issued by Procter & Gamble to teach cooks what to do with a product nobody had needed before: a shelf-stable, all-vegetable shortening that behaved like lard but carried no animal fat and no religious dietary restrictions, both points the company pressed hard in its advertising. Recipes like this one exist chiefly to show that Crisco belonged in every part of the meal, vegetables included, and not merely in pastry. Stuffed vegetables themselves were fashionable in American cookery of the 1910s, and beets were a cheap winter staple.