Janet McKenzie Hill was a prominent early practitioner of culinary reform, food science and scientific cooking, author of many cookbooks.

Hill was born in Westfield, Massachusetts

Westfield, Massachusetts

Westfield is a city in Hampden County, in the Pioneer Valley of western Massachusetts, United States. It is part of the Springfield, Massachusetts Metropolitan Statistical Area. The population was 41,094 at the 2010 census. The ZIP Code is 01085 for homes and businesses, 01086 for Westfield State...

, the daughter of Alexander McKenzie, a clergyman, and Nancy (Lewis) McKenzie. In 1873 she married Benjamin M. Hill. Hill took up the study of cooking and its related sciences later in life: she returned to school around age 40, graduating from the Boston Cooking School in 1892. Fannie Farmer

Fannie Farmer

Fannie Merritt Farmer was an American culinary expert whose Boston Cooking-School Cook Book became a widely used culinary text.-Biography:...

 was assistant principal at the time. In 1896 she founded the Boston Cooking School Magazine (later renamed American Cookery). Hill produced several cookbooks promoting the products of a particular company, a practice that began during this period. Alice Bradley, an 1897 graduate of the Boston Cooking School, who later bought Miss Farmer's Cooking school and was cooking editor of the Woman's Home Companion

Woman's Home Companion

Woman's Home Companion was an American monthly publication, published from 1873 to 1957. It was highly successful, climbing to a circulation peak of more than four million during the 1930s and 1940s....

for twenty years, got her start doing cooking demonstrations for Hill.

A small sample of Hill's work is the Baked Bean Sandwich

Baked bean sandwich

The baked bean sandwich is a meal, in its simplest form consisting of baked beans between two slices of bread.- Origins :Recipes for a baked bean sandwich can be traced from as early as 1909 - one book entitled "Cooking For Two" by Janet Mckenzie Hill suggests such a recipe as a "substitute for...

.

Works

• Salads, sandwiches, and chafing dish dainties (1899) Little, Brown and Company.
• Practical cooking and serving (1902) Doubleday, Page & Company.
• A Short history of the banana and a few recipes for its use (1904) (for United Fruit Company)
• Cooking for two: a handbook for young housekeepers (1909) Little, Brown and Company.
• Dainty desserts for dainty people (1909) (for Knox Gelatine)
• Cooking and serving en casserole and things we relish (1910)
• The Book of entrees (1911) Little, Brown and Company.
• The Up-to-date waitress (1914) Little, Brown and Company.
• The American cook book; Recipes for everyday use (1914) The Boston Cooking-School Magazine Co.
• Nyal cook book (1916) (for Nyal Druggists)
• Chocolate and cocoa recipes (1916) (for Walter Baker & Co) (co-author: Maria Parloa)
• Canning, preserving, and jelly making (1917) Little, Brown and Company.
• War time recipes (1918)
• Practical Cooking And Serving (1919)
• Balanced daily diet (1920) (for Procter & Gamble Co.)
• Recipes for everyday (1921)
• Cakes, pastry, and dessert dishes (1930) Little, Brown and Company.
• The Cooks book (1933) (for Jaques Manufacturing Co.)

External links