Selections from '70s Americans in Saudi Arabia

I don't mind that I've largely been confined to my apartment and the nearby walking trail for a few months now, but some people prefer just a little more travel, so today we're going to Saudi Arabia!

This is the Al Hasa Cookbook (1976). The origin of the cookbook is not well explained, as the introductory pages give the names of various committee members, but I could never find a name of the actual organization. Most people listed seen to be affiliated with Aramco, which is a Saudi Oil company, so my guess is that this was put together by various groups of American women (as the title page credits "Associated Women's Groups Presidents") who were in Saudi Arabia because they or someone in the family worked for Aramco. I could be wrong, though, as the introductory information seems to be written for people who are already familiar with the background.

One thing that struck me was how much work it seemed to be for the cooks to find/ cobble together the ingredients they needed to make recipes similar to what they were used to making at home. The Mexican Cheese Dip had to specify where Velveeta cheese and canned tomatoes with jalapenos could be found. (If you weren't in Khobar, you might be out of luck!)

Tortilla chips were apparently not widely available either, as the dip should be paired with "crackers made from taco shells available in the Commissary."

Sour cream proved to be a bit of challenge too.

If sour cream proved elusive, vinegar or lemon juice plus Avoset would work. (I had no idea what Avoset was, but it's apparently a creamer that's still made in Australia.)

Some American ingredients needed a bit of explanation for this group, too. Maybe some cooks had been away from America for a while?

Yes, the Mexican Chef Salad had to explain Doritos. (And diners had their choice of two very Mexican dressings: 1000 Island or French!)

Despite the limitations, the cooks still found plenty of ways to evoke mid-'70s Americana, like the Jell-O "salads" that didn't even bother with fruits or vegetables (unless you count a bit of lemon rind and juice divided among 12-15 servings).

Of course, this was much preferable to the salads loaded up with crushed pineapple, cottage cheese, mayo, green peppers, and pimiento.

Or to the non-jellied salads tossing ham, celery, mayo, rice, and green onions in with pineapple, oranges, marshmallows, sour cream, and coconut. (This seems like an accidental fusion of savory salad with a sweet one. I mean, green onions and miniature marshmallows?)

People who really missed home could sit down to a big dish of American Chow Mein.

Here, chow mein means boiled noodles, tuna fish with corn, mushrooms, green peppers, and onions in a tomato sauce topped with cheese. (I'm not sure whether the families stationed in Saudi Arabia didn't realize that Chow Mein usually meant beef, bean sprouts, water chestnuts, and soy sauce over rice or chow mein noodles in America, or whether this approximation was as close as they could get to "traditional" American chow mein with the ingredients they could find.)

Maybe the unusual conditions made cooks innovative enough to catch a glimpse of America's food future, though, as I found a dish that predated the bacon-in-everything trend that is just dying down now.

Yes, Kooky Breakfast Cookies were a way to get bacon (and corn flakes! It's breakfast!) in a dessert-y form before maple-bacon cupcakes and donuts were a thing.

I hope you've enjoyed the trip! Maybe seeing how these families managed to substitute ingredients so they could still make the crazy recipes '70s families... loved? Ate? Tolerated? ... will help inspire us to do our best with whatever is left in the pantry before the next grocery trip (and/or after that grocery trip fails to supply a third of the ingredients on the list).