Rare Early Vegetarian Mexican Cookbook, La Cocinera Vegetariana, 1920s

Antonio Blandina

Pamphlets

Blandina, Antonio. La Cocinera Vegetariana: Alimentación para sanos y regímenes dietéticos para enfermos. México, D.F.: Casa Eduardo Murguía / Centro Naturista de México, ca. 1920s. Illustrated vegetarian cookbook, 8vo, later quarter–cloth over decorative boards. A rare early Mexican naturopathic cookbook, subtitled “Extenso recetario ilustrado y con notas, dedicado… a la abnegada mujer mexicana” and framed explicitly as a guide to dietetic reform for both healthy readers and the ill. The text is positioned at the intersection of vegetarianism, women’s domestic labor, and alternative medicine in early 20th-century Mexico, a period when naturalist health movements flourished through private clinics, pamphlets, and community education.
The work is attributed to the naturopath Antonio Blandina, with a prólogo by major Mexican modernist poet Amado Nervo, here titled “Confidencias del natural", lending unusual literary prestige to a culinary manual. An epílogo by Dr. E. O. Aragón reinforces the text’s medical framing and its efforts to rewrite everyday cooking through the lens of digestive health, rationalized dietetics, and the moral value of plant-based eating. The Índice General visible here includes sections such as “Alimentación Racional,” “Régimen Dietético,” “Comparación entre los Alimentos de Origen Animal y Vegetal,” followed by complete vegetarian menus, marginal essays, and themed meal plans, documenting the earliest systematic vegetarian menu structures printed in Mexico. Produced under the auspices of the Grupo de Propaganda del Centro Naturista de México, the book stands as an important artifact of women-centered nutritional reform and a rare primary source for studying early vegetarianism and naturopathy in Latin America. Rebound in vintage quarter cloth over pictorial boards; edge wear, rubbing, and minor staining to margins of some pages not affecting text. Binding sound. Overall good condition. An exceptionally scarce 1920s Mexican vegetarian cookbook, combining naturopathy, women’s health, and Mexican tradition.

Item #22820

Price: $325.00

Status: On Hold