Do I smell beaver for dinner?

My grandfather just gave me my great great aunt’s cookbook: Modern Encyclopedia of Cooking. It is a seventeen hundred page gold mine. It has recipes AND life lessons.

“Adequate cupboards will be one of your first considerations in planning your kitchen. … Doors should be easy to open and a joy to clean.”

“A child who is never hungry for breakfast will find his appetite stimulated by getting up half an hour earlier than usual and taking some brisk exercise.”

“Dishwashing made easier: Dishwashing can be made practically painless even during those long years between the honeymoon when the man of the house helps with the supper dishes and likes it, and the time when the children are big enough to do them alone without casualties.”

Note to self, have children immediately so I can stop washing dishes sooner. And I should’ve broken more dishes when I was younger.

And before you go thinking that this cookbook is worthless, there are some serious instructions in here:

“Raccoon Pie: skin the raccoon, remove all scent glands and surplus fat. Cut into pieces.”

“Turtle Soup: Skinning a turtle is simpler than killing and plucking a chicken.”

“Squirrel Pot Pie: this is an excellent way to cook old squirrels which are too tough for frying.”

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