Calypso Cooler and SALADettes?

It's almost Memorial Day. Rather than getting preemptively annoyed at the families with 726 sticky, screaming kids who magically appear in every public place (Grocery aisles! Parade floats! And worst of all, in front of me at the Whippy Dip!) during summer holidays, I will instead focus on the happier aspect of nice weather. Today's booklet is "Let's Eat Outdoors" (American Dairy Association, undated, but probably 1960s).

Eating outdoors was not an opportunity to slack off, either! This is quite a spread-- beans, cornbread, grilled spam, grilled hot dogs wrapped in bacon or dough, pickles, cookies, cake, sundaes.... A patio party was not a break from cooking.

Even the pitcher of milk in the foreground might be an exotic adventure! Okay, that really does look like plain milk, but since this booklet was a from the American Dairy Association, it also had to provide exciting milk recipes.

I think Maple Nut Milk was meant as a beverage, but with all that corn syrup and peanut butter, it sounds more like a dessert to me (and way too heavy to have with a plate full of bacon-wrapped hot dogs).

I was really amused by this one...

...not because the recipe sounds particularly exotic, but because my childhood self would have felt so much more sophisticated knowing I was actually preparing "Calypso Cooler" rather than "milk with some Quik in it."

I also love the little guy at the bottom of the page who looks like he has a telescope growing out of his nose. (That would be painful and annoying! But maybe worth it when the neighbors forgot to shut the blinds?) Perhaps he knows that calling Quik milk a "Calypso Cooler" is a real stretch, so he's trying to help sell the island adventure idea. He's just making me wonder what would happen if he sneezed.

The illustrations do have a certain charm-- especially to sell ideas that are a stretch.

I'm sure real cowboys loved digging into hearty plates full of Beanee Weenees with extra onions.

Is it just me, or is his smile more than a little forced? Maybe it's because he's being swarmed by flies while he tries to eat his wretched Beanee Weenees and still maintain some semblance of masculinity?

Of course, no cookbook of this era would be complete without a scary gelatin-based salad.

"Jellied SALADettes" sound pretty scary, what with the lemon-lime gelatin, pickles, and olives, but on top of that, cooks also need a can of "Stokely's SALADettes"-- now a mystery product. When I tried to look it up, all I could find was other bloggers who also have this booklet wondering what the heck a SALADette might be. Feel free to fill in the blank with your own personal nightmare. I'm going to say that SALADettes were pickled tarantulas.

As you may have gathered based on all the brand names listed in this pamphlet, the American Dairy Association does not appear to be the sole sponsor of this puzzling little pamphlet. As the SALADettes recipe suggests, even Dixie Cups were in on the act! Now before you start feeling too scandalized about using disposable cups for an outdoor party, a note about etiquette:

Yep, they even called in Emily Post to reassure you that it's perfectly polite to serve chicken salad from a Dixie Cup...

...even if the chicken salad does look like some kind of sandcastle that's washing away to reveal its inner construction of fish bones and broken seashells. (Mmmm.... Gritty.)

Now go eat something outdoors. Quick! Before all outdoors is taken over by Memorial Day families with their 726 children.

Happy Cookbook Wednesday! As always, thanks to Louise of Months of Edible Celebrations for hosting.