April is almost here, so there's no better time to post some fun April Fool's Day tricks for the kitchen! Honestly, though, part of me wonders if the editors of Women's Circle Home Cooking (April 1990) didn't really understand the holiday, and part of me wonders if they were just playing a very lame prank with their "April Fool's Fun Recipes" feature.
The headnote really builds the recipes up: "Why not surprise your family and friends with these fun recipes that will fool the 'best' of cooks [Not sure why they needed scare quotes there.] as to what the original ingredients happen to be. Do not tell your secret until they have eaten the last morsel." You might think the recipes will be for things with surprising ingredients, like tomato soup cake, sauerkraut cake, or bratwurst cake. You would be wrong. The surprise is much more lame. Here's a hint: Most of the recipes have "mock" in the titles.
So you could serve up dessert topped with Mock Whipped Cream, for example...
... and then "astonish" (Here, the scare quotes are very much intended!) your family by announcing that it wasn't real whipped cream. And they could respond by saying, "Yeah, we could tell. Skim milk fortified with nonfat dry milk powder isn't really the same thing as heavy cream."
Or you might fill whatever dessert you make with Mock "Twinkie" Filling...
And then "astonish" your family by telling them that it isn't real Twinkie filling... at which point, they could note that they're not even eating Twinkies anyway (There's no mock Twinkie recipe-- just the filling, so the implication is that you can spread this goo on whatever you want), so why would they even think it might be real Twinkie filling in the first place? It's not like they expected you to buy Twinkies, extract the filling, and then repurpose it for some other dessert.
The Mock Chocolate Syrup isn't really even mock chocolate syrup. It's just chocolate syrup, unless you want to get really technical and argue that it's cocoa syrup, not chocolate, since it uses cocoa powder rather than melted chocolate as the flavoring.
So I guess the surprise is supposed to be that this isn't Hershey's syrup? But considering it's stored in sterilized jars and not a Hershey's bottle, I hardly think the family would be shocked by the reveal that this isn't name-brand chocolate syrup.
The lamest entry of all doesn't even bother with "mock" in the title.
Quick Mix is-- as the parenthetical subtitle explains-- like Bisquick. So the trick of this recipe is that you can serve your family biscuits or pancakes or whatever you usually make with Bisquick and then, at the end of the meal, shock them by proclaiming, "That wasn't made with Bisquick!" And the reaction, I imagine, would be slightly baffled indifference. Although maybe, if they have very active imaginations, it could be a feeling of creeping dread. What was in those things....? Am I sure I saw the cook eating these too? Thallium isn't easy to get, is it?
Okay, maybe these tricks are ever-so-slightly better than I give them credit for being.
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Did you fall for that conclusion? Come on! These really are the lamest "joke" recipes ever.
Why did people think that nonfat dry milk could be whipped up like cream? I know that I've seen other retro recipes claim the same thing. It was genius marketing for an almost inedible product. Apparently they weren't content with using it in baked goods as would make sense.
ReplyDeleteAnd by the way. That's not Bisquick, or cream, and I didn't squeeze a bunch of Twinkies on a cake.
The chocolate syrup recipe makes sense coming from a woman in Alaska, but I don't know why she was mocking it unless all chocolate syrup was called Hershey's syrup like Kleenex or Q-tips.
I'm pretty sure you could actually add enough nonfat dry milk powder to skim milk to make it whip up. (Think I had to do it for a 4-H project once.) The trick is that you have to have a high enough concentration of milk solids, so that's why the powdered milk is involved. (Still won't pass as whipping cream, though!)
DeleteThose mock-bisquick recipes always seemed like a bit of a passive-aggressive one-upmanship. "You *buy* Bisquick, Hazel? I only serve homemade biscuit mix in our house!" before going on to claim it's a cinch to make and anyone can find the time once a week.
ReplyDeleteThe Twinkie filling might actually be pretty convincing, though. Isn't it mostly shortening and sugar anyway?
Ha! We have very different mental landscapes, as I always imagined homemade "Bisquick" as a slightly-ashamed admission that the family can't afford brand names!
DeleteI would imagine the Twinkie filling is fairly accurate-- just lacking any of the additives like stabilizers or preservatives. So, healthy! XD