Krispies everywhere except the green beans

I always love to find extras from the original cooks in my cookbooks! What was the original owner like? What did they think about? I got a little insight into the previous owner of Guide to Microwave Cooking and Recipe Book (Hotpoint/ General Electric, 1979) on the last two pages.

I kind of laughed when I saw the recipe for Krispy Bars (aka Rice Krispies Treats) handwritten at the end. Did anyone really need this recipe? I mean, even in the days before you could look up the recipe on the internet, it was on Rice Krispies boxes, on marshmallow packages, in community fundraiser cookbooks, taped inside everyone's grandma's cupboard (The one next to the stove.), etc. I thought every kitchen was legally required to be equipped with a Rice Krispies Treats recipe, but this previous owner hand-copied one.

I can hear you yelling, "Maybe the cook needed the microwave instructions since they were harder to find than the stovetop ones!" Yes, the original recipes called for melting the butter and marshmallows on the stovetop, and this is a microwave recipe (presumably-- it's in a microwave cookbook and gives times congruent with microwaving). The thing is, the cookbook already has this recipe. It's clear from the smear, though, that the hand-copied page got more use than the (mostly pristine) inside pages did. I'm not sure the person who owned this book ever looked at much other than the blank pages in the back with the hand-copied recipes.

I was also intrigued to find perhaps a cousin of the Thanksgiving classic green bean casserole.

Green Beans French Style must be fancier because it uses cream of celery soup and Lipton onion soup mix instead of cream of mushroom soup and French's fried onions. Plus there's cheese! And presumably some amount of canned or frozen green beans! The recipe is not too specific about the main ingredient, which is perhaps a bit odd considering that this cook needed explicit instructions for microwaving butter with marshmallows. I guess we've all got our blind spots, which is what makes it so much fun to find these little bonus recipes from cooks past.