Fluffy Mackerel Pudding

OK, here is another classic, I think, from Weight Watchers 1974. The idea of loosing weight comes from the fact that no one would really eat this. I am curious about the mackerel. What exactly is that and do people eat this fish now days? I eat alot of fresh fish and have really never seen this at the market. Why would anyone make pudding out of fish? That grosses me out. Pudding is one thing, but a fluffy fish pudding is another. I could be wrong, but I really don't think this one is going to be in my test kitchen. There is a bonus. Not only have I included, the pudding recipe, but there is a mackerel soup, too!
Bon Appetite!

Anyone Got A Cig?

I'm talking about candy cigs. Do you remember them? It was so cool to walk around with one in your mouth and pretend you were puffing on it just like your parents did when they smoked. How swell it would have been if they found a way to have a smoke like substance come out the end. They came in these neat little boxes that looked real. I could carry them in my Barbie purse along with my candy lipstick and pretend I was a big girl. My God! Who thought of that and what were they thinking? Be brave, then, and buy a bubble gum cigar.
Penny candy. That was part of our culture. Every Friday my dad would come home from work with 2 little brown bags full of the stuff for my sister and I. What a treat to dig through it and see the sweet little treasures.
You could always tell what kind your friends were eating by the color of their mouth, lips, or tongue. Blue meant Spudnik gum. Red were the fireball jawbreakers and black pieces in your teeth were the licorice pinwheels. Any color could be the sippy sticks and yellow pieces in your teeth were the banana b-b bats.
I loved the candy beads. Think about it, love beads at age 5. They came on an elastic string and your neck ended up being stained in an array of psychedelic colors from sucking on them. Top it off with pumpkin seeds with an inch of salt encrusted on each one and a marshmallow ice cream cone.
Wax lips were the rage because after they were in you mouth too long and you started gaging, you could just eat the stuff. It amazes me we all didn't die at a young age from being plugged up with wax, artificial flavors and gum.
How about nip wax bottles with juice in them. Juice? I am sure that the flying saucers were made with the same stuff communion wafers were but only different colors.
Mmmm...Necco wafers,(the chocolate ones) candy buttons on paper, Bazooka bubble gum and fizzies. Boston baked beans, jawbreakers and neopolitan candy slices. DumDum suckers (why are they called DumDum?) and Tootsie pops. They are the ones that ripped the skin off of the roof of your mouth when you tried to bite into the Tootsie Roll.
Just think about it. These precious gems basically only cost 1 penny apiece. You could get 100 pieces of candy for a dollar and have a candy buffet. It might look like a deal, but when it was all said and done, $1.00 for candy, $50.00 for the dentist and $100.00 to have your kids stomach pumped. Not a good investment afterall!

What's For Supper?

Remember coming home from school and asking your mom, "What's for supper?" In my case, it never failed. It seemed like she was going to make exactly what we had in the school cafeteria for lunch. Those were the days in the fifties of optimism and prosperity was in the air. Most people believed in the advertisers promises of brighter tomorrows. Homemakers were intensely motivated with convenience foods like canned soups and jello and the media created a peace time market for war time foods. They were foods that were totable and convenient.

We watched the idealized TV shows like Father Knows Best or Leave It To Beaver. Mom served the meals with perfectly designed hair and a crisply starched dress with a tiny apron. At the table sat the perfect children and the husband in a suit coat. Little did we know, that mom was actually killing us with all that convenient food.

I remember having to eat everything on the plate, as we all did then. How criminal not to, when there were starving children in other countries. I bet I sat at the table for hours trying to chew and swallow what my mother considered steak. I would have given it to the dog, but we didn't have one. Stuffing those little green peas down the metal table leg was a chore and time consuming. Years later when the old table made way for the new one, hundreds or maybe thousands of dried up little peas came pouring out the bottom of the table legs.

The casserole was the dish of choice back then. An abundance of processed foods were avaliable to let the cook, who really didn't know how to cook, create a dish of comfort. To this day, I can't understand why these foods were considered comfort foods. Was it because we fell asleep so easily after eating them? Or, was it due to the fact that they filled us up so fast? These casseroles were so high in fat and after a decade of rationing foods during world war two, plain cooking was all that housewives could do.

I really think the companies that manufactured can openers in those days made a killing. I know because my mother had at least ten. We always had canned food and I am sad to say, I didn't see or hear of brussel sprouts until I was in college. I also remember the only lettuce was iceberg. There were two kids of dressings, orange and italian when the cooking got fancy. When I think back on those days at the kitchen table, I shudder. Maybe that's why I learned how to cook so well. Bon appetite!

Mmmm...Good...Mmmm..Good!

As I am sitting here eating lunch of my gourmet Campbell soup combo, chicken noodle and vegetable, it suddenly dawned on me that I don't know a thing about the history of the company. Mmmm good. I think I'll spell my name on the spoon. Better yet, I'll float a buttered saltine on top and break it up until it sinks to the bottom.
The wonderness of the soup distracts me as I google a search. Well, Joseph Campbell and ice box manufacturer Abraham Anderson started the Anderson & Campbell Soup Preserve company in 1897. They made ketchup, mustard, salad dressing and sauces. Their best seller was Beefsteak tomato soup.
After Campbell retired in 1894, Arthur Dorrance became president of the company. He reluctantly hired his nephew, a chemist, to work for the company. Soups were expensive to ship, but cheap to make. So, the nephew removed the heavy water and created a formula for condensed soups. How brilliant!
In 1904, Grace Wiedersein Drayton, an illustrator, added some sketches to her husbands ad campaigns for the soup. The Campbell kids were born and they have been selling the soup ever since.
The kids were so popular, that doll makers wanted a piece of the pie. Or, shall I say, a slice of the tomato. The E.T. Horseman Co. got the license to market the doll and put the Campbell logo on their sleeves.
Think about it. What a genius marketing plan. Advertise to the housewives and get to the kids. It's a win win business. I've been eating the soup for 50 years. There certainly is better out there and I always make my own, but, there's something to say about being Mmmm good.
I think I'll run to the store and grab some Velveeta cheese. A nice fat greasy grilled cheese sandwich and a hot bowl of Campbell's tomato soup sounds good for my supper.

Little Miss Muffet Sat On Her Tuffet, Eating Her Curds And Whey

When I was a kid, we ate cottage cheese all the time. I think it was cheap then. Once, in 4th grade, we took a field trip to the local dairy and saw first hand how it was made. Actually, it looked pretty gross.
According to Wikipedia, cottage cheese is defined as: "Cottage cheese is a cheese curd product with a mild flavor. It is drained, but not pressed so some whey remains. The curd is usually washed to remove acidity giving sweet curd cheese. It is not aged or colored. Different styles of cottage cheese are made from milks with different fat levels and in small curd or large curd preparations. Cottage cheese which is pressed becomes hoop cheese, farmer cheese, pot cheese or queso blanco.

Cottage cheese may be eaten straight. It is also eaten with fruit, with fruit puree, on toast, in green salads, - or as an ingredient in recipes like jello salad and various desserts. It can be used to replace grated cheese or ricotta cheese in most recipes (such as lasagna).

The term "cottage cheese" is believed to have originated because the simple cheese was usually made in cottages from any milk leftover after making butter.[1] The term was first used in 1848.[2] An older term for cottage cheese is curds and whey.
Sometimes my mother would serve the ultimate depression lunch called bread dip. It's just cottage cheese thinned with milk, topped with black pepper and was good for dipping bread. The fancy salad was lettuce, a scoop of cottage cheese with fruit cocktail all around and the cherry on top. Now, that was livin'!
I like it on a baked potato, with saltine crackers and in a scooped out cantaloupe.
High in protein, low in fat, cottage cheese is a great substitute for the higher- fat cheeses. Truly a food of the Gods!

We Want Ovaltine!

What is this stuff anyway? Only a boomer would know. It seems to me, it's better eating the crunchy little morsels off the spoon, than trying to dissolve the stuff in milk.

Ovaltine
Ovaltine Malt Beverage Mix 400g - Pack of 2 Jars
Ovaltine presents the Captain Midnight action book for sports, fitness, & nutrition

Kool Aid, Kool Aid, Tastes Great!

Remember drinking Kool-Aid? The sweet fruity drink that dyed your teeth and tongue, and your mom got upset when you spilled it on your clothes?
According to Wikipedia:
"Kool-Aid was invented by Edwin Perkins and his wife Kitty in Hastings, Nebraska, USA. Its predecessor was a liquid concentrate called Fruit Smack. (smack?) To reduce shipping costs, in 1927, Perkins discovered a way to remove the liquid from Fruit Smack, leaving only a powder. This powder was named Kool-Ade. A few years later, it was renamed 'Kool-Aid', due to a change in U.S. government regulations regarding the need for fruit juice in products using the suffix "-ade"[citation needed][dubious – discuss]. Perkins moved his production to Chicago in 1931 and Kool-Aid was sold to General Foods in 1953.

Hastings still celebrates a yearly summer festival called Kool-Aid Dayson the second weekend in August, in honor of their city's claim to fame.

Advertising and promotion
The mascot of Kool-Aid, Kool-Aid Man (aka The Big Man), is a large anthropomorphic frosty pitcher filled with Kool-Aid (usually cherry, though other flavors have been used). He was introduced in Kool-Aid advertising shortly after General Foods acquired the brand. In TV and print ads, Kool-Aid Man was known for bursting suddenly through walls, seemingly summoned by the making and imbibing of Kool-Aid by children. His catch phrase is "Oh, yeah!" For many years, the Kool-Aid Man was portrayed by a live-action actor in a giant pitcher suit; starting in the mid-1990s, the character was computer-generated. The most recent Kool-Aid commercial, however, features a new actor in a whole-new pitcher costume."
Originally, Kool-Aid sold for 10 cents a packet, but during the depression, Perkins cut the price in half to 5 cents so families could afford it.
This sweet drink has left a legacy in our culture. Did you know that because of the Jonestown massacre and cyanide laced grape Kool-Aid being the drink of choice, coined the saying, "Don't drink the Kool-Aid." That basically means, don't trust any group of people that you think tend to be a little kooky.
Other than drinking the stuff, Kool-Aid has a variety of uses:
Fabric dyes, great for tie dying tee shirts.
Yarn dyes.
Frosting's, just add Cool Whip.
Fruity lip gloss, add to petroleum jelly and heat.
Lemonade flavor to remove iron stains from the bath tub.
Orange flavor to run through the dishwasher as a cleaner.
Water color paints.
Hair dye.
Face paints.
The list is endless and to think we drank it and stained our insides a variety of psychedelic colors.
Most importantly, don't forget Ken Keasy's Kool-Aid acid test presented by his Merry Pranksters.
Kool-Aid anyone?

Take Me Out to the Ball Game!

Remember eating Cracker Jacks as a kid and digging down inside the box to get the prize? Well, my grandfather figured it out. He would open the box on the bottom and get his prize first. I still have a big jar filled with his treasures.
Frederick William Rueckheim and his brother Louis were German immigrants. Frederick came to Chicago in 1872 to clean up after the famous Chicago fire. He also worked selling popcorn from a cart. The two brothers made the first Cracker Jack, but it was called candied popcorn and peanuts. The original was popcorn, peanuts and molasses. A sample was given to a salesman and after eating it he exclaimed, "That's a cracker jack!" Hence the name.
The problem with the mix was that it all stuck together. In 1866 a process was discovered to prevent this. It is still a secret to this day.
The song , "Take me out to the ballgame," was written by Jack Norworth. Cracker Jack was immortalized by the third line, "Buy me some peanuts and Cracker Jack."
A prize in every box was introduced in 1912. Since then more than 23 billion prizes were given out. Some of these prizes are valued at more than $7,000. Now they have been replaced by paper jokes and riddles. I remember once, my grandmother found a beautiful hand painted Chinese bowl in her Cracker Jack box. It was quite astounding and no one could figure out how it got in there. If you are interested in learning about these toys, you can go to The Cracker Jack Collectors Association
So, march on down to the store and grab a box with sailor Jack and his dog, Bingo on the front and have a memorable journey. Maybe you will be lucky enough to get a Chinese bowl, too.

Cracker Jack*r Toys

New Quick And Easy Veg-All Pie Plate Salad!

I ran across this vintage ad and just had to share it with you. Looking at it brought back the memories of food when I was a kid. As I have said in my earlier food posts, the baby boomer generation really was stuck with some pretty awful food by today's standards.
I really never had fresh vegetables growing up except corn on the cob and iceberg lettuce. I saw my first brussel sprout when I was 19 and thought it was a mutated cabbage.
This ad really took the wind out of my sails and I am having trouble trying to figure out exactly what it is. Bottom line, some mother fed it to her family and felt really good about it. To be honest with you, when you click on the picture and you can see the recipe, it's pretty disgusting.

Tang, The Space Age Drink!

Tang is short for tangy and is supposed to have the flavor of tangerines. With more vitamin C than oranges, Tang was the breakfast drink of choice during the 1960's.
Tang was introduced to the public in 1959 and was marketed as the modern breakfast beverage. In 1965 the Gemini astronauts took the drink into outer space and made Tang a household name.
Made by General Foods, Tang is a sweetened drink powder, artificially flavored and colored. It's one of America's favorite chemically treated foods.
The Apollo and Gemini missions took the drink into space and drank it out of silver pouches. Just add water and you can have a days worth of vitamin C.
Actually, Tang had nothing to do with the space program and was developed by General Foods in 1957, 12 years before anyone went into space. But, because of the advertising, "Tang Takes Off," the space program became a valuable asset to the marketing and sales of the drink.
Sales of the drink today are not what they were back then. I'm sure most people decided that drinking real orange juice instead of mixing tangerine flavored chemical powder with water with a six year shelf life was much better for you.
One household tip is that Tang is an excellent cleaning agent and can be used to clean your dishwasher. Just run Tang through the cycle instead of soap.

Red Rose Tea!

Remember the Red Rose Tea commercial with the wild jazz band chimps? These guys were The Marquis Chimps, Charlie, Enoch, and Candy. In 1960, they were in three TV commercials. One showed them as cowboys, another playing golf, and the most famous was the Red Rose Tea commercial.
In 1961-62, these chimps starred in the comedy called the Hathaways. They also made guest appearances on numerous shows such as The Kraft Music Hall and The Jack Benny Hour.
I bet you loved this commercial as much as I did!

Crown Roast Of Franks

I collect cookbooks. I have many that are vintage that I buy just for the pictures. Last night, while looking through a case of old weight watchers recipe cards, I ran across this one. I was laughing so hard, I couldn't stop. I just had to share it with you. It's a perfect weight watchers recipe because no one would ever eat it. Can you imagine being a kid and your mom made this for supper? What would the husband say? Would they love it and think it was cool? Or, would they pretend to love it so they wouldn't hurt mom's feelings? What a culinary horror! I realized that the whole baby boomer generation could have easily been wiped out because of two things. One, the food and two,the food. It's all very hard to swallow. Literally. I was just wondering what this would look like on the Thanksgiving table instead of the turkey.
Bon Appetite!