Foods That Will Win the War and How to Cook Them (1918) – WWI Cookbook for American Home Front Conservation

Foods That Will Win the War and How to Cook Them (1918) – WWI Cookbook for American Home Front Conservation

Author: C. Houston Goudiss and Alberta M. Goudiss

Year: 1918

Goudiss, C. Houston and Alberta M. Goudiss. Foods that will Win the War and How to Cook Them . New York: Forecast, 1918. Contextual Background Published during the final year of World War I, Foods That Will Win the War and How to Cook Them was a direct response to the wartime food conservation campaign led by the United States Food Administration under Herbert Hoover. With Allied troops fighting on multiple fronts and agricultural output in Europe devastated, the burden of food supply fell heavily on the United States. The U.S. government mobilized civilians on the home front to conserve wheat, meat, sugar, and fats so that more could be exported to soldiers and civilians overseas. The Goudisses—a food expert and a domestic science educator—wrote this book to provide practical support for that campaign. The work is not merely a cookbook but a tool of civic and patriotic education. It exemplifies Progressive Era values of scientific management, home economics, and collective national effort. Recipes were designed to align with federal guidelines, such as wheatless and meatless days, and were tested under the supervision of domestic science experts. The text contains charts, substitu