‘Good price, reliable recipes, great photos’: the Australian Women’s Weekly cookbooks and their influence on Australian food culture

The Australian Women’s Weekly’s cookbooks were (and still are) remarkably popular. The Weekly, Australia’s most popular women’s magazine, started publishing a range of cookbooks from the late 1930s, but it was during the 1970s when their cookbooks became incredibly popular. Many of the Weekly’s cookbooks, whether the Children’s Birthday Cake Book or the Chinese Cooking Class Cookbook, have become ‘bibles' in the Australian kitchen. This talk will investigate how these books came to be, why they were so popular, and how they helped shape Australia’s food culture.

Dr Lauren Samuelsson holds a PhD in history and is an Honorary Fellow at the University of Wollongong, Australia. Lauren’s research interests include cultural history, the history of food and drink, the history of popular culture and gender history. Her PhD thesis considered the influence of the Australian Women’s Weekly magazine and cookbooks on the development of Australian food culture from the 1930s to the 1980s. She has also worked on the social and cultural history of liquor legislation in mid-twentieth century New South Wales.