Get the ketchup! It's international night!

 Even as the vaccine begins to roll out, it's going to be a while before there's too much world traveling. Today, we'll do our traveling 1950s style with A World of Good Eating (Heloise Frost, 1951).

And of course, traveling 1950s style means not leaving home at all if you're poor and/or a woman, pretending that the entire rest of the world consists of Europe and maybe China if you're feeling generous, and assuming that any representation of those other countries is close enough, as long as it comes through the authority of "a New England Housewife," as the title page assures readers.

This book seems to suggest that the Bratwurst Cake from my Ohio Celebrity Cookbook has its roots in Ireland rather than Germany.

Or maybe all of Europe was really into spice cake with coffee, ground meat, and raisins. Either way, it looks like the recipe came over with the immigrants.

I always associated oatmeal recipes with Scotland, but this next one is attributed to Poland (as you might guess from the surfeit of zs).

I'm impressed with a recipe that uses (apparently) three quarts of water to boil just a cup of oats for an hour so there will be sufficient "oatmeal water" (with the oats strained out) to boil beats into a soup. I assume the onion and spare ribs are added to the soup too (and the super-mushy oatmeal is not), but the recipe is not entirely clear on what to do with the various components. That means my idea of how to make this is only slightly clearer than  my idea of how to pronounce Barszcz.

As the holidays approach, maybe you're interested in hearing about a nice Swedish goose recipe.

A roast goose sounds a lot more festive than a boiled goose (though it is less likely to come with the timely reminder that a boombox is not a toy). What really interests me about the recipe is the instructions for using up the fat.

Simmer apple and onion in the fat, strain, chill, and use "as a spread on dark bread." I've got to admire the commitment to using up everything, even if the thought of congealed apple-onion-fat makes me gag just a little. (And I am sure it's a treasured delicacy for those with broader palates than mine...)

A World of Good Eating does recognize that one area outside of Europe exists: China! Unlike a lot of the church cookbooks I have, this book does not feature "Chinese" dishes bound with cream of mushroom soup and hidden under a blanket of cheese.

Instead, it offers canned shrimp in thickened ketchup water! At least this seems like it might be moderately closer to Chinese cuisine than the midwest's casserolified versions.

The book did not confine its mistreatment of ketchup to the China chapter, either. From the brief American chapter, here's a recipe that I think was meant to evoke California.

Yep! Drown some avocadoes in ketchup and enjoy. Sounds like California to me.

All the words except a and of in the title A World of Good Eating are often a bit questionable, but hey, at least it got my mind out of the house for a few minutes.

Bonus Feelie: If you were wondering why the page for Mandarin Shrimp was discolored, the book came with an extra recipe:

Bonus feelies found inside a book with hand-lettered pages: just a couple more reasons I 💓💓💓 old cookbooks!