Mary Ann Pans

This post could alternately be called "Fun with baking and meat jelly".

Besides gardening, one of my interests is collecting vintage kitchen items.  I like old tins and boxes, various useful items, cookware etc.  I love lithographed, illustrated, advertising and recipe booklets.  I like things that modern trends have left behind.  I like tinware.  I like things from the 1920s.  Sometimes I run into an item that checks a lot of boxes.  And they're usually pretty cheap too.  A few years ago, while searching Etsy for tin pans I came across this little box of Mary Ann Shell Pans.  I loved it for the colorful box and for its completeness so I snapped it up for a few dollars.

Mary Ann Shells are any pans that create a cake with a sunken center for adding a topping.  They came in many shapes and sizes.  

This is the back page of the booklet that came with it.

I love this modern heart shaped pan. Who wouldn't want to create a dessert like this?

Creating it may even be more fun than eating it.

I bought this pan on Amazon.

These Mary Ann Shells with their colorful box were produced by Ekco starting in 1921

Below are the pans which came in my box.

Ekco, whom many of you will be familiar with since they made metal kitchenware well into the 1980s, was originally called the E Katzinger Company.

The E Katzinger Co became Ekco 

Here is an in depth and interesting History of the Ekco Company.  

Patent 1,388,364

They used this patent for the Mary Ann Shells.  

**Footnote:  I think I just realized where the name Mary Ann came from.  

The patent was held by Mary A. Miller.  

Eureka!

My vintage pans came with a little square booklet of recipes which was wonderfully illustrated.  The booklets aren't very common, no doubt due to the fact that they are perforated to let you put the recipes into your recipe box.  While I think of Mary Ann Pans as being cake pans, at least half of the recipes are for molding other foods.

Upper right: Spinach with creamed mushrooms and eggs

Upper left:  Rice ring with veggies

Recently, I scored another booklet on eBay which featured more recipes.  It was produced in 1929 and obviously done by the same artist.  So many options!

You could make a larger dish for your family, or break them into smaller portions to serve to the ladies when they came to play Bridge.

Some of the recipes are quite fancy like Salmon Mousse.

Other recipes feature foods we have left behind like Jellied Bullion (Aspic).

I wouldn't want to try a meat loaf in one of these pans either.  Its hard enough to get it out of a rectangular pan without making a mess.  That's the thing about using these old fashioned pans.  We've become accustomed to non-stick cookware or a shot of Pam Baking Spray.  These pans call for greasing them well in every nook and cranny.

Jellied Tuna Fish or Ginger Ale Salad

Gee, no one uses Aspic any more.  

In fact, America has lost a lot of imagination when it comes to gelatin molds.  They used to be a staple of all Holiday meals.  I sort of miss them.

So that is our little trip through late 1920s party preparation,

There is a winter storm building up.  The winds are blowing and the branches are falling.

Stay warm.

A Tale of Four Chairs

 

Remember how I said that I routinely run into these Eastlake style chairs?   Our table seats six people when all of the leaves are in it.  The seventh chair, being ruined, had resided in the attic since before we arrived.  We do have a side table and an empty spot in front of a window.  We have room for eight chairs,  I once saw a complete set of eight.  My husband and I are what collectors call "completists".  We want the whole set.  It was actually my husband who said he thought I should find an eighth chair to round out our set.

It is surprising the number of chairs you run into when you are actually looking for chairs. The nearest Antique Mall has about three dozen that I never noticed before. The Monday night auction house in the next county hauled a few dozen old project chairs out of a barn last week.  Somewhere in Northwestern PA there was a person who got it in their head to repair chairs.  And the project outlived them.  From the vague online photos I saw that one or two may be exact matches for our seven dining chairs.  To the average person, these all sort of look alike.  

Can you spot the one I'm looking for?

How about here?

As a newly minted ChairNerd I should round out my set of eight. Right?  Especially when a golden opportunity such as this presents itself.  A couple of years ago my husband was looking for a pair of oak arm chairs like you see in courtrooms, bank offices etc.  We checked this auction house's auction pics, and there were the perfect chairs.  And as I told him then I repeated now:  "when you send out a request to the Universe for chairs.  And the Universe gives you chairs.  You don't mull over whether you really need chairs or not.  You just go get the danged chairs."

 So off we went.  They were running two auctioneers in two rooms so my husband and I split up.  I figured I could get one or both chairs for under $10.  Chair #1 was in a lot of a dozen which appeared to have solid seats (after a hundred years they are all at their breaking point). We had to pay $7.50 for choice. Mission accomplished.  Chair #2 was in a pile of a dozen chairs in various states of ruin.  My husband paid $2 for choice on the ruined chairs.  

Chairs #1 and #2 are exact matches for our seven

And by the time he met back up with me and told me what he had been up to, he had also paid $1 a piece on single chairs #3 and #4 because he "felt sorry for them" and didn't want them to go on the burn pile with the other unwanted chairs.  

Chair #3 is very similar but has a perfectly round seat
#4 we call "Plane Jane" because she doesn't match anything

Chair #3 may be made of Black Walnut and has a round seat that is and inch and a half wider than our chairs.  Maybe good for larger people to save our "good" chairs?  I think I will try a different weaving pattern on it.  Plane Jane is going in our garage sale free to a good home.

And so it begins...

One Ugly Chair

 You know those things you've ignored for twenty years.... when you are retired, you kind of run out of excuses.  I've always got a list going of projects that need to be done and I've been working through them lately as winter is sure to be over soon and gardening will consume most of my time.  The dining room drapes was a big one, but there are always more.  Wash the sheers, clean the oven, dust the ceiling fixtures.  One thing that gets done once a year is I put all of the dining chairs up on the table and wipe down the rungs.  They don't get too dusty but they could always use a little oil.

Our dining table was here in the house when we got here.  It was the previous owners' mother's.  I date it to at least 1910 or older depending on whether she got it new or used.  It is American Chestnut, with a variety of leaf widths from a few inches to over a foot wide.  Its covered in character marks like burns and knife slips and I absolutely love it.  

The chairs are walnut with a burl inlay and date maybe as far back as 1890.  They are a common Victorian style and I run into very similar ones all the time when antiquing and once saw a complete set of eight which were dead ringers for these chairs.  For one hundred (or 130!) year old chairs they are extremely well preserved.  They creak and groan a bit but they are sturdy and all of their joints are tight.  However one of them has a dirty little secret.

All of the chairs have seat pads to protect them, but this one also had a piece of cardboard under the pad.  We always kept it on the far end which is hard to squeeze into and if we get that many people at our table, either my husband or I would sit in it mostly to protect it from further harm.   When we arrived twenty years ago, he took the time to weave it together with string and did a very fine job.  And guess what?  We have another one just like it stashed in the attic.

A couple of weeks ago when I cleaned and oiled the chairs I noted that two more are beginning to tear.  I made mention of this at the dinner table and my husband asked me  "What are you going to do about it?"  Well, what I had planned to do was nothing.  I figure they've lasted this long they'll probably outlast me, and with seat cushions you don't actually notice the condition of the seats.  Years ago I got a quote on how much it would cost to have someone else recane them for me.  Back then it was a dollar a drilled hole plus materials.  Now that doesn't sound like much until you start counting.  72 holes.  A quick Google trip through caning websites tells me the going rate is now between $2 and $4 a hole.  Plus materials.  Let's call it a 150 bucks a chair on the low side.  But I'm retired now and when you are retired you are supposed to pick up new hobbies right?  Like hand caning chair seats.  Hmmm.  What if I just fixed them myself?  

Now there are at least two kinds of caned chairs.  There is the kind where you buy a sheet of woven cane, cut it to size, and wedge it into a channel and secure it with a spline.  These are not that kind.  These are "hand caned".  Sort of like basket weaving in a tight space.  How do you even do that?  Inquiring minds want to know. I turned to my usual How-To information source: YouTube.  There were some very informative videos with links to online stores.  Before the day was over I had made up my mind and a simple caning starter kit for one chair was on its way.

My garden snips come in handy

That's a scary first step - cutting out the old seat.  

Now we are past the point of no return.

It doesn't look it, but that's a long reach way down inside those legs.

 Another chair lends a hand propping up my work and using an awl, I break through each loop of cane.  Just this level of inspection shows me that these chair seats were works of art.

Again with the awl, I pry the old finishing strip up and the remaining cane comes out easily

A rat-tailed file cleans the holes out
There is a hundred years of dirt and mildew in there.

All cleaned and oiled and ready for a new seat.
One hour in...

The chair already looks better.  These really are pretty little chairs.  They weren't really built for the modern day person's frame but they sure are well made.  They have withstood the test of time.

Steps one and two are easy and fun.  Step three involves just laying down one more layer with no weaving involved.  The pegs hold the loose ends and train them into the hole.  I could do this all day!

The first three steps just involve lacing the cane across and minding your holes so everything is evenly spaced.  It is sort of like those sewing cards I had as a kid.  It took a couple of hours of crouching over the chair.  I started to get tired and my lower back spasmed.  About six rows into the fourth layer, which involves actual weaving in and out of two closely spaced layers, my cane snapped and so did my patience.  Shit just got real.  There are obvious stopping points in this project where you need to regroup and compose your thoughts.  I had just found the first one.

 I moved everything from the dining room out to our workshop and took a day off to rest my back and organize my brain.  Returning refreshed, I worked through the next eleven rows in about half the time that the first six rows took.  Since that day I have found a caning needle made of spring steel which should make the intense step four much less painful.

Step 4 involves weaving through steps two and three.
My fourth layer is not as flat as I would like it to be.

The day after step four I took another break. This could not possibly be the way factory workers mass produced these chairs!  There had to be some tricks. I began digging deeper into YouTube videos and caning websites.  Turns out there is more than one way to skin a cat.  I ordered some tools and waited for them to arrive.  

Dental pick, Shell Bodkin and a wire caning tool

The new tools made a BIG difference.  The first videos I watched taught you to weave in a very basic way using only an awl and your fingernail.  Other caners whip through it with needles and picks, with reckless abandon even breaking and replacing canes in the process (not my sort of thing). And they soaked their canes for a much shorter time.  Armed with my simple yet revolutionary wire caning tool, a shell bodkin and a dental pick from my husband's tool stash, I set aside my simple awl and the needle nose pliers I had resorted to, and started on my first diagonal quicker and with less frustration but still carefully and methodically.

Its not perfect.  I can see my shortcomings,
but I catch my actual errors before they are irreversibly woven in.

Close up after step 5
Still a ways to go before those holes become octagons.

 At some point you start to wonder how you can get any more cane into the pattern.  The edge holes must fill up sometime.  The seat gets stiffer with each layer.  But the cane is flat and lays in with only a little wriggling and fighting.  The canes, like any natural substance, have variations.  Now and then you will get one that wants to shatter or twist or shred, others are pliable, smooth cane that goes in like a dream and you feel like you are flying through it.

Step 6 complete. Twelve hours of weaving.
Ready for binding (to cover the holes) and tying off.

Nice little octagons.

Much like needlepoint, of which my MaMaw taught me a little when I was a child, you have to be mindful of what is going on underneath and try to make that look just as tidy as the top work.  This is where I know my lack of experience shows.  My one remaining error is under here in a loose loop.  I had a lot of ends to tie.  I have been cutting the 15 foot strands of cane in half which makes it easier to weave, but gives you twice as many ends to tie off.  There is a way to hide many of your ends without knots and I plan to try that method on the next chair.

A wider strand is sewn over the holes to finish it.
This looked a lot easier on YouTube.  I was right to think the holes were filling up.

This has been the most instantly gratifying and useful skill I have ever taught myself.  Even more so than the time YouTube helped me rebuild the carburetor on our 1930 Ford.  I have two more chairs at the table that need to be done and the totally ruined one that is stashed in the attic that I have a spot for.  I am eager to start the next one so I can do even better than I did on my first chair.   I have spent fifteen hours over three weeks only working on it on days when I could set aside four hours to get into the project. 

When people have asked what I've been up to lately, it is so satisfying to show them a photo on my phone and have them say "where did you learn to do that?"  The chair looks pretty spiffy sitting at the end of the table in a place of honor, and it should be useful for another hundred years or so,

And finally..... I sat in it!

Chain Reactions - also referred to as "collecting"

Collections start with a chain reaction don't they?  You see something you like so you buy it and take it home because its so neat that you want to look at it some more.   And then you see another one that is exactly like the first, or just slightly different, and the novelty of that discovery leads to you buying that one too so you can take it home, set them side by side and look at them some more.  That's how I ended up with several hundred year old marshmallow cans. Of course there are those of us who collect still useful items and defend our collection with "but I use those".  Of course.  But how many can you use at one time?

Take for instance enamelware roasters.  Years ago I bought a small oval roaster for my kitchen collection.  I thought it would be nice to display in my 1920s Even-Heet oven.  I love the oval shape which is a bit different than the squarish, flat topped, rounded end roasters that look big and clunky and it was small so it wouldn't take up too much room in our little house.

I've used the oval roaster many times.  The double walled construction makes the best roast chicken ever.  I liked it so much that I thought I'd keep an eye out for a larger version so I could try roasting a turkey in it.  I still haven't found one because I haven't found one in the right color with a domed top (as opposed to flat) and  dimples (instead of rings).  I love these dimples.  This attention to detail, while it may sound a little obsessive, is the only thing that keeps a collection in check.  If I weren't so picky I would have too many pieces of enamelware.  Like more than 90.   Ahem.... so...

I have seen a few round roasters, and I thought they were kind of interesting.  I liked their proportions.  But I have a roaster.  If I needed another roaster, and that's a big if, it would be a large roaster.  And then I saw ~ dimples.

The two roasters will now have to share display space

And that's how I've ended up with so many enamelware pieces.  When I started out my intent was to fully accessorize my Hoosier cabinet, gas oven, and refrigerator.  I found an article in a 1933 Good Housekeeping Magazine which listed the inventory of a well equipped kitchen.

There is only one piece of enamelware in this ad.
The tea kettle on the stove.  It was all down hill from there.

So I started with the basics.  One tea kettle, one coffee pot, one milk pitcher...  And then I became what collectors call a "completist".  Which translates to "I have to have every variation they made".  That's not really possible with enamelware because of the very wide range of products.  But you can get most of the way there.

If you like Cream City Jello molds, you need both the round one and the oval one.

Cream City Jello Molds

Creamers?  Did you know some of them come with lids?  I didn't.  I love things with lids.  So I needed another creamer.

And while I'm at it, I decided I'd collect a whole bunch of creamers.

A small assortment of creamers

To go with my tea...

This tea kettle was the first or second piece I bought.

...and Coffee.

The tall coffee "bigguns" were harder to find.
Then I found two at once.

Large and small Preserving Kettles

An assortment of refrigerator dishes

And that's how a collection starts.  I collect several different things.  Old print blocks, playing cards, horse anchors, bits, trophies, chicken stuff, farm stuff etc.  But the enamelware is my favorite and at least its still useful, besides being decorative.  What sort of neat stuff do you all collect?

1936 apartment sized Frigidaire