Now that the leaves are turning vivid shades of red and yellow, grocery stores are displaying their finest pumpkins, and I've started complaining about my hands being cold all the time (and I won't stop until spring because I am a delight!), let's see what The Vegetable Protein and Vegetarian Cookbook (Jeanne Larson and Ruth McLin, 1977) suggests serving for a fall dinner.
Ah, yes, the good old Special K Roast! What does that entail?
Unsurprisingly, it's got a lot of Special K cereal-- I guess because it was known as the high-protein cereal. (God, I hate the jerk at the end of that commercial saying "Good for me!" as if he owns the skinny woman and as if it's impossible to care about anybody who's not skinny.) It's also full of chopped nuts, cottage cheese, and eggs, so it should be loaded with protein. I'm more interested to see that it's also got onion soup mix, MSG, and poultry seasoning, so it might even have a flavor! Most of the old vegetarian loaf or roast recipes sound like they would taste like damp cardboard at best.
I'm not sure why this is listed as an autumn menu, as the corn on the cob and zucchini crisp sound much more like summer dishes than fall ones, but I was intrigued by the notion of a zucchini crisp. "Crisp" usually means a fruit dessert with a buttery oat-and-sugar topping, so is this version a fall-spiced semi-dessert, or does it have some kind of a savory, crispy, oaty topping?
Answer: Neither. In fact, I have no idea why this is called a crisp at all, as it appears to be just zucchini in a creamy sauce. It doesn't sound terrible, but the name seems incredibly misleading.
Does that mean the dessert of Apple Delight isn't delightful?
Well, I'm not a fan of cooked apples, so I would definitely not call this apple cake (maybe with walnuts and/ or dates!) delightful, but your mileage may vary.
Happy fall! May this random illustration of kohlrabi(?), zucchini(?), and lettuce from the end of the menu bring you good luck (or at least warmer hands)!
Special k roast? I mean it does use the cereal. Over the years (long before I went low carb) I became very annoyed with foods that claimed to be high protein if they had 5 grams or more, especially if you had to eat 40 grams of carbs to get it.
ReplyDeleteThat's still pretty rampant. The other day, C and I were laughing at some cereal we saw that claimed to be high protein and had only marginally more (like, maybe 2 grams) than the regular version.
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