Not a ringing endorsement...

After Wednesday's Yule Log, I was super-excited to learn that Miracle Whip had a mid-'70s tradition of advertising ludicrous Dole-canned-pineapple-and-gelatin-based holiday recipes. For your holiday pleasure, may I present 1974's entry:

Here we have the Holly Berry Wreath, The wreath is one of those fancy two-tiered creations, with pineapple rings and maraschino cherries arranged in lime gelatin to make the decorated wreath on the top layer, and cranberry sauce with strawberry gelatin to make the festive red bottom layer. I have to admit that this one doesn't sound too bad, really, and it's got a certain alien beauty in its shiny, coiled form.

Where does the Miracle Whip come in? This recipe surprisingly leaves it in an easily-ignored form, mixed with whipped cream and plunked down in a bowl in the "wreath's" center, for those masochistic souls who just can't imagine eating fruited gelatin without fluffy Miracle Whip on top.

The offering for 1976 suggests Miracle Whip learned its lesson and made the secret ingredient a lot harder to ignore:

Revelers were supposed to ring in the season with Winter Sunshine Mold-- apparently a cross-section of a tentacle, complete with suckers and full to the brim with festive little blood clots. Yum!

Well, I guess there are are worse green-slime-spewing, tentacled creatures with whom to share a cold winter night than this this concoction that mostly made sense in a Miracle Whip marketer's mind... but at least Kurt Russell comes with them. The only thing that comes with Winter Sunshine Mold is Aunt Brenda. And she wants the plate back, so don't get it mixed in with your dishes, whatever you do. She's serious guys. She still doesn't have the pie-saver back from last year, and she will not let us forget about it.

Happy Miracle Whip and Ring Mold Saturday, everyone!