Food History

Many cookbooks and household guides from the 19th century contain instructions for how to spot adulterated food or explanations of why problems can’t always be spotted. One of the driving forces behind certain cookbooks was protection against dangerous food practices. This is a statement by a manufacturer, explaining why their products were reliable and safe. It also shows us why US legislation on the subject was so very important (and one way in which was used).

“This House has grown to be the largest of its kind in the world and it has achieved that result by always maintaining the highest standard in the quality of its cocoa and chocolate preparations and selling them at the lowest price for which unadulterated articles of high grade can be put upon the market. Under cover of a similarity in name, trade-mark, label or wrapper, a number of unscrupulous concerns have, within recent years, made attempts to get possession of the great market won by this House, by
trading on its good name - selling to unsuspecting consumers goods of distinctly inferior quality by representing them to be the products of the genuine “Baker’s.” The quantity of goods sold in this way is not so much of an injury to us as the discredit cast upon our manufactures by leading some consumers to believe that these fraudulent articles are of our manufacture and that we have lowered the high standard maintained for so many years. It is difficult to bring the fraud home to all consumers, as those who are making use of it seek out-of-the-way places where deception will the more easily pass.

We have letters from housekeepers who have used the genuine Baker goods for years, expressing their indignation at the attempts of unscrupulous dealers to foist upon them inferior and adulterated articles by fraudulently representing them to be of our manufacture.

Statements in the press and in the reports of the Pure Food Commissioners show that there are on the market at this time many cocoas and chocolates which have been treated with adulterants, more or less injurious to health, for the purpose of cheapening the cost and giving a fictitious appearance of richness and strength. The safest course for consumers, therefore, is to buy goods bearing the name and trade-mark of a well-known and reputable manufacturer, and to make sure by a careful examination that they are getting what they order.

Our Cocoa and Chocolate Preparations are ABSOLUTELY PURE - free from coloring matter, chemical solvents, or adulterants of any kind, and are therefore in full conformity to the requirements of all National and State Pure Food Laws.

We have behind us one hundred and twenty-nine years of successful manufacture, and fifty-two highest awards from the great industrial exhibitions in Europe and America. We ask the cooperation of all consumers who want to get what they order
and what they pay for to help us − as much in their own interest as ours − in checking these frauds.

WALTER BAKER & CO., Ltd.
Our registered guarantee under National Pure Food Laws is Serial No. 90.
WALTER BAKER & Co.’s Cocoa and Chocolate Preparations”