Old-fashioned microwave cooking

It's really starting to heat up. The (dusty!) dinosaurs that live on top of my desk are starting to come out of hibernation, so I'll probably have to stop being cheap and turn on the air conditioning to cool them back into submission. All that roaring gets distracting when I'm trying to write.

Maybe I'll also keep the house cool by switching to some nice microwave recipes. To that end, we'll look at Toshiba's 1978 Everyday Microwave Cooking for Everyday Cooks.

Now remember, in 1978 it's a waste of money to buy a microwave just to reheat things. This is an expensive piece of equipment. You've got to be able to cook in it, too. How about a nice main course?

Lovely beige, flabby chicken skin with beige, flabby mushrooms in some kind of a orangey-beige slime! The spring flower print on the serving platter tries to distract from the beige-on-beige action, but it's not exactly a fair fight. Some food stylist noticed and dumped a bit of reddish powder (probably paprika-- the garnish is not named in the recipe) on top, but it's just as ineffective as the pink and yellow flowers at making this pile o' slime seem attractive.

Yes, chicken with mushrooms and wine will remind you that you can have a lovely, golden-skinned chicken with seared mushrooms OR you can have a cool house, but microwave cooking ain't gonna give you both.

Now, how about a side to go with the chicken?

And this is...? Some weird variety of mold-veined cheese? Natural sponges accidentally left on a serving platter? A selection of exceptionally dirty artgum erasers?

Nope! It's old fashion pumpkin bread. Deliciously gummy and chewy, just like no one used to make. Ever. Because they didn't have the "advantage" of cooking in microwaves.

But you know, maybe I should try making a batch anyway. If I fed it to the dinosaurs, it might gum up their mouths enough that they would quiet down, and I could continue being a cheapskate and leave the air conditioning off. Win-win! Well, except for my poor dinosaur friends. I'll just tell them that they should be grateful. Old fashion pumpkin bread is better than a meteor! (That would be an excellent advertising slogan.)

Have a good old-fashioned weekend!

Recipes for fun-controlled, low taste meals

After a weekend of creme de cacao and whipped cream, it's time to atone. Another of the pamphlets my grandma sent a few weeks ago is the perfect antidote:

"Recipes for Fat-Controlled, Low Cholesterol Meals" (1972) is from the American Heart Association.

The cover is mind blowing if you pay attention, what with the monstrous chicken perched atop the petite cow who happens to be standing on an enormous fish that does not seem to mind its cow-and-chicken hat one bit. Maybe it's mesmerized by the enormous cruet of oil. I'm hoping those are kidney beans under the fish.

Meanwhile, the turkey stares down some massive broccoli and cabbage while the pot of mustard sidles away from the ketchup and considers committing some infidelities with the apples, pineapple, and just maybe the angel food cake. Yum.

I'll bet you won't be surprised to learn that the cover is more interesting than a lot of the recipes.

Oven "fried" chicken is nothing particularly shocking, but this version manages to be even more boring than usual:

Were you thinking of adding something for flavor? The last line of the ingredients promises, "Seasoning is not necessary, as crumbs are tasty."

When you're eating, just repeat that line quietly to yourself, as often as necessary, while secretly hoping that at least your tears will give it a little flavor. "Seasoning is not necessary, as crumbs are tasty. Seasoning is not necessary, as crumbs are tasty. Seasoning is not necessary, as crumbs are tasty."

Part of me suspects that I'd be better off with the super-bland than with the recipes they TRY to add some flavor, though:

Okay, maybe scallops painted up with a honey-mustard-curry slurry sounds perfectly reasonable to some of you, but my hatred of sweet-and-savory combined with my fear of condiments makes this sound like another candidate for dinner in hell.

Apparently my grandmother actually used this booklet. Here is the one "comment" (if I may call it that) she wrote:

Apparently grandma was not impressed with seasoned broccoli. It looks innocuous enough (if you don't mind dry mustard)-- just broccoli steamed with a bit of oil and a few simple seasonings-- but grandma didn't want to make the mistake of cooking this again!

Ah, well. How about dessert? I found one that combines two types of desserts that I've been writing about lately. Can you guess which ones?

If you guessed prunes and meringues-- DING DING DING! You won Cookbook Wednesday.

Thanks again to Modern Day Ozzie and Harriet for hosting.

In which your humble writer amuses a liquor store clerk and a criminally insane guest

I was so excited to sign up for the Pieathalon again this year! I couldn't wait to see what wonder recipe I would get. Then I was terrified when this appeared in my mailbox:

There is no objective reason to be terrified of Brandy Alexander Pie. It's mostly whipped cream, sugar, and booze-- sure to be tasty. It's from a blogger I read and adore-- Erica Retrochef at Retro Recipe Attempts. Plus, it's from one of the types of regional cookbooks I love to peruse: The Sampler: A Collection of Recipes by the Woman's Club of White Plains (1976).

I was terrified because I'd have to go to a liquor store. I'm super shy. I like mixed drinks at a friend's house, but at home I stick to cheap wine because I can pick it out at the grocery store based on the picture on the label. (I go for something with a cute animal or a sexy person, depending on my mood.) Now I would have to go to a liquor store and actually ask another human being for what I wanted. That's no obstacle for most people, but I am ... uh ... special.

So I went in and got the cognac with no trouble. The creme de cacao was a different story, though. I mumbled and initially ended up with a bottle of Curacao! That would have made for a shockingly blue pie! Then when I finally got the clerk to understand I meant creme de cacao, he asked which kind. I didn't know there was more than one! "One's clear, and one looks like chocolate," he said. I figured chocolate is always the right answer, so that's what I left with. I hope I was right.

Here are the painstakingly assembled ingredients:

Once I had the ingredients together, I got to work. First, I had to mix an envelope of gelatin, 1/2 c. cold water, 1/3 c. sugar, three egg yolks, and 1/8 of a teaspoon salt in a saucepan and thicken over low heat:

The egg yolks made this look lemony, so I kept absentmindedly sniffing it, expecting a burst of lemon. It mostly smelled like ... eggs. With gelatin. Not really what my nose was hoping for!

Then I had to stir in 1/2 c. creme de cacao and 1/4-1/2 c. cognac. I wasn't sure what "to my taste" would be once all the other ingredients were added, so I went with 1/3 of a cup of cognac. Then I whipped a cup of cream while the mixture chilled. Once the gelatin barely started mounding when dropped from a spoon, I whipped the egg whites with 1/3 c. sugar in my awesome '70s-orange mixer.

The gelatin mixture set up FAST, though. In just the few minutes it took for me to whip the egg whites, it went from barely beginning to set to pretty well set at the edges and only loose in the center! I folded in the egg whites and 1 c. of the whipped cream as well as I could, but there were little lumps of jiggly booze throughout the filling as I poured it into the graham cracker crust.

Once it had chilled for several hours, I called in a friend to help with the cutting.

"My, Poppy, this is an... interesting... concoction. What are those brownish lumps?"

"They're little lumps of jiggly booze, of course."

"And you would think of serving this to guests? Perhaps you are more sadistic than my initial assessment seemed to suggest."

"Uh... Thank you, I guess, Doctor Lecter. Would you be so kind as to cut the pie?"

When he got to work, I realized my chocolate was too melty to make the suggested garnish of chocolate curls. I pulled out the leftover whipped cream and some cocoa powder instead.

Once he sliced the pie and I had garnished it to the best of my ability, I offered him the first slice.

He stared at it for a moment, as one mesmerized by a car wreck.

"Won't you try at least a bite?" I implored.

"I've brought a friend who might enjoy it more than I would. This is sure to be better than what they serve at the Baltimore State Hospital for the Criminally Insane."

"But I forgot about the mask. Poor Will.... It looks as if he won't be able to partake after all."

Since it looked like my guests wouldn't help out, I tasted this myself. I've never had pie that burned before. I definitely knew it when I hit a gelatin lump! Still, this is pretty tasty. It is sugar, whipped cream, and booze, after all. The cocoa powder sprinkle adds a nicely bitter counterpoint. If you want relaxation and a dessert all in one, this is worth a try if you can brave the liquor store.

A big thank you to the always-entertaining Yinzerella of Dinner Is Served 1972 for organizing the Pieathalon! Be sure to visit the other Pieathletes:

Yinzerella of Dinner Is Served 1972   PIEATHALON: Melton Mowbray Pie

The Velveteen Lounge Kitsch-en Web Series   Piathalon!

Saucy Cherie at Cookbook Cherie

Dr, Bobb at Dr. Bobb's Kitschen     Mincey Peach Pie

Yesterday's Menus     Piathalon!

Ashley at A Pinch of Vintage     Red Magic Pecan Pie

Bittersweet Susie     Piathon! Vintage Recipe Swap

Battenburgbelle    Who Ate All the Pies?

Kelli from Kelli's Kitchen     White Christmas Pie

Erica Retrochef from Retro Recipe Attempts

Taryn from Retro Food for Modern Times     My, My, Belgian Onion Pie

Jenny of Silver Screen Suppers     Piathalon 2: (George Burns and Gracie Allen's) Magic Cream Pie

Clara at Heritage Recipe Box     Finish Line of the Pieathalon with Cottage Cheese Apple Pie

S. S. of A Book of Cookrye     Piathlon the Second! Or, What is Rhubarb?

RetroRuth from Mid-Century Menu   Cheese Pie, 1930  (She endured the recipe I sent in! She deserves a prize.)

Sarah at Directionally Challenged Cooking

Mandee from Vintage Recipe Cards      Lookit! I'm a Piathlete!

In which my collection is judged to be in rather poor taste

My next post will be for the Pieathalon! Just as I did last year, this year I have invited a special guest to help me. This guest was notably less enthusiastic about the prospect. I'm not sure why he agreed, but I suspect his interest in food and morbid curiosity drew him to my little project despite his better judgment. When I promised he could choose the recipes for the last post before the Pieathalon, his eyes briefly brightened.

Then he saw my collection. "I didn't expect you to have Modernist Cuisine, but really.... I would hope at the very least for an English translation of Larousse Gastronomique. This collection is appalling! The recipes aren't fit to feed even a child."

"The point of my blog is not usually to make the food," I countered. "I'm just interested in food history. Well, that and making fun of really terrible recipes."

"Your collection seems ideally suited for that," he sniffed. Thoughtful pause. "So tell me, what is your interest in making fun of recipes? Were you teased as a child? Who are you really trying to hurt, Poppy, by making fun of these books that you clearly love?"

"You don't have to look if you don't want to," I countered, not wanting to play his game. "You'll either help me or you won't."

In the end, he wouldn't. I couldn't entice him to so much as touch my books, so I promised to pick the recipes for him. My visitor just asked me to emphasize that he didn't choose the recipes himself. "I wouldn't want to be associated with that kind of butchery," he explained.

Perhaps he won't be too disappointed. I dug out one of my classier books (House & Garden's New Cook Book, 1967) and searched for something suitable. These are for you, my friend. At least they have fresh herbs in them, so they are about as sophisticated as recipes get on this blog.

We will see you on Monday! Be ready for some pie.

Budget pies that will save your life!

It's less than a week to the Pieathalon, so I wanted to show some more pies. I thought about featuring a dessert book, but I actually don't have all that many. I'm more interested in terrifying/ disgusting recipes, and their presence in desserts is statistically lower than in, say, casseroles. (That's a long-winded way of saying I don't have all that many dedicated dessert cookbooks, and the ones I do have are short on weird pies.)

Instead of a dedicated dessert cookbook, we'll look at the dessert section of a cookbook with advice from one of our most questionable recipe sources: '70s home ec teachers.

This "Life-Saver" Cookbook (1976) is from teachers who thought of "life-saver" as a more positive way to say "cheap."

Surely there are some interesting cheap pies! One of my first thoughts when I think of budget recipes is crackers. Are there cracker pies?

Yep! Graham cracker crumbs are not just for the crust anymore. Fold 'em into meringue with a few pecans, spread in a pie pan, and bake, then call it a pie (even though it's really just a giant graham cracker meringue in a pie pan). I'd really like to see this in a graham cracker crust, but I guess a double graham cracker pie just isn't in the budget.

If you can afford to be a little Ritz-ier, you can try this one:

I'll bet you thought it was going to be one of those mock apple pies made with Ritz crackers! Nope. "Miracle Pie" is also just a giant, cracker-strewn meringue in a pie plate. I'm not sure what the miracle is. Maybe it is that people considered these things pies at all?

What other ingredient might I expect in vintage pies for pennies? If you're thinking "cottage cheese," then you have been paying attention.

Yes, cottage cheese was in everything, including lemon pudding mix for a pie, apparently. Why it was better to throw a carton of cottage cheese and some extra sugar into instant lemon pudding than it would have been to just make two packages of pudding, I don't know.

I was hoping to find a cracker and cottage cheese pie for the ultimate budget dessert, but this is as close as I got:

More instant lemon pudding! More cottage cheese! I'm calling Grape Nuts honorary crackers in this case... and I know it's not a pie, but neither  are the first two "pies." We could throw it in a pie plate and pretend! Home ec teachers wouldn't be able to tell the difference.

Happy Cookbook Wednesday! Thanks to Marjie of Modern Day Ozzie and Harriet for hosting, as always.

Eyes on the Pies!

It's time to start sending out teasers. Remember last year when I participated in the Pieathalon? There's a new one this year, and I'll be making another vintage pie, sent from another food blogger! You won't see the results until June 8, but I'm starting to get excited about this.

That's why today we're looking at the "Party Pie Book" from Good Housekeeping's Cook Books (1958).

I almost sent this recipe for another blogger to make just because it seems soooo very '50s:

Not only does it contain "gelatine," but also a No. 2-1/2 can of fruit cocktail. (That is a LOT of fruit cocktail: 27 ounces. It's still less than a No. 2-1/2 square can, though, which is 31 ounces. I enjoy looking up can sizes.) 

Toss in a banana, fold in some whipped cream, and you have pure '50s "goodness." (I didn't pick this recipe though. This post doesn't have any spoilers.)

I was interested in the next recipe because I'd heard of fried green tomatoes, but I'd never heard of this:

I'm not sure, but I'll bet "Green-Tomato Pie" tastes a lot like apple pie with its cinnamon, nutmeg, and lemon juice.

I just love the little drawing with the fancy designs in the top crust. I would NEVER have the patience for that kind of thing.... I'm lucky if I can make a pastry that doesn't fall apart on every single one of my 513 attempts to put it in the pie plate.

Most of the pies looked pretty good, but I did see one picture that scared me a little:

What is this? It looks like a crust filled with canned mandarin oranges. Some kind of alien pods with exposed brains are gathered on a pastry ledge to feed on the juices below.

I'm wrong on all counts. This is...

..."Walnut-Prune-Cot Pie." Loaded with dried apricots and prunes, this pie once again hints at Good Housekeeping recipe writers' obsession with regularity. I'll bet they were no fun to talk to once they were in nursing homes (and probably for years before that, too)!

Now you know what I didn't send for the Pieathalon... Keep tuning in and eventually you will find out what I sent and received! Have a suspenseful weekend.

A woman's glory?

I picked up Woman's Glory-- The Kitchen by the Slovenian Women's Union of America (1968) because the title alone makes me want to laugh and cry at the same time. Not too many things can have that effect, so when I saw a one-two punch like that, I had to have it.

The title got my interest, but once I opened this and started looking at the recipes-- well, the title might be the least interesting thing about the book!

Maybe part of my fascination is that I have no frame of reference for this at all. I'm not Slovenian and I'm not familiar with the cooking, so I've never even heard of things that seem extremely popular based on the number of variations in the book. There's a whole chapter on Poticas, for instance. Apparently, they are filled rolls that look kind of like this:

And yes, those poticas say "Good Luck President Kennedy from Mrs. Anton Lenich." Apparently this woman from Minnesota made them and sent them to the White House on the occasion of Kennedy's inauguration. (That sweet little detail by itself makes me fall in love with this book. Who decides to send homemade goodies to the presidential inauguration?)

Poticas are so popular that there are dozens of variations, most involving walnuts, raisins, and/or honey. (Kennedy got the "Special Walnut Potica" filled with butter, cream, honey, and of course, walnuts.)

I'm not going to show you that recipe, though, because I like to scare you. This is the only potica recipe that made me shiver:

Pork fat potica features not just "pork fat sediment" (I'm not sure what that means and I don't think I want to find out...), but three whole cups of it! Will the sugar (a teaspoon of it) and cinnamon help make it palatable? I would not want to find out. Considering the amount of work this would take to make, someone must have thought it was really good, though. Remember, this is only half of the recipe because the cook had to get the dough ready first.

What went into the dough? Well, pork fat potica takes dough Number 4 (and the fact that there are four whole variations of the dough gives you an idea of the food's popularity):

A tricky dough that requires a special yeast preparation to be made ahead of time:

Logically, then, pork fat potica must be pretty special if it's worth all this trouble.... It's hard to convince myself of that, though.

The completely unfamiliar recipes often come with stories too...

...stories that transport me to a realm where people are willing to put a lot of work into watering down beer, mixing it with milk and beaten egg, and having it for breakfast or serving it to the kiddies as an after-school snack. It makes me feel like I'm peeking into a surreal landscape. If I'm not careful, the clocks will start melting.

And then I will land on a recipe that seems familiar enough. How about orange cake? The recipe title cracks me up:

Fresh orange juice goes into cake! That title is funny no matter what noun you start with. "Flour goes into cake." "Almonds go into cake." (Of course, I would have to add some completely nonsensical titles as well. "Termites go into cake." "Sadness goes into cake." "Mustaches go into cake.")

The title got even better when I read the ingredient list, though. Do you see fresh orange juice on that list? Frozen concentrate is the closest you'll get, so the recipe writer must have had a sense of humor or a very loose definition of fresh orange juice.

This is definitely a cookbook you will see again, as it is packed with a mix of charm and weirdness that makes me want to put termites into a cake. (I have a very loose definition of termites, though. I might actually mean chocolate.)

Happy Cookbook Wednesday, and thanks to Modern Day Ozzie and Harriet for hosting!