The Golden Rule Cook Book

The Golden Rule Cookbook is not the first vegetarian cookbook to be published in the US. Asenath Nicholson (1792-1855) published in 1832 Nature's Own Book (second edition, 1835) and, according to the Vegan Society, her inclusion of eggs and dairy products (against the consumption of which she advises) is absent from her later, vegan cookbook Kitchen Philosophy for Vegetarians published by William Horsell in 1849. Russell Thacher Trall's The Hygeian Home Cook-Book; or, Healthful and Palatable Food Without Condiments, published in the USA in 1874, is claimed by the International Vegetarian Union as the first “confirmed” American vegan cookbook.

The Golden Rule Cookbook, one of the first to present an entire veg*an menu for such occasions as Thanksgiving or Christmas, was published in 1908 and reprinted in 1910 (Cambridge, MA: The University Press), again in 1912 (Boston: Little, Brown & Co.) and a fourth printing in 1926 (New York: Dodd, Mead and Co.). Openlibrary has made available a version of the 1912 edition. The present excepts are taken from The Project Gutenberg EBook of The Golden Rule Cook Book, by Maud Russell Lorraine Sharpe. “This eBook is for the use of anyone anywhere in the United States and most other parts of the world at no cost and with almost no restrictions whatsoever.  You may copy it, give it away or re-use it under the terms of the Project Gutenberg License included with this eBook or online at www.gutenberg.org.”