Like Ayun Halliday, my very first cookbook and source of inspiration was Betty Crocker's New Boys and Girls Cook Book, published in the early seventies. "Thirty-four years after it was given to me," she writes in Dirty Sugar Cookies, "the pictures of the sweeties . . . still exert tremendous Pavlovian appeal . . . . I'm like an elderly gay gentlemen who, after years of global sexual intrigue, takes perverse pleasure in pawing through the laughably wholesome physique mags that dominated his boyish imagination. How does that old saying go: One man's Kookie Kat sundae is another's crew-cut shot-putter a-frolic in his skivvies?"
It was the first book I grabbed when sorting through my mother's house, and although I've thought nostalgically of whipping up a recipe or two, I just couldn't see actually making Tuna and Chips Casserole or Coffee Can Stew. My own children had different ideas, however. Snatching the book from my hands so fast, the Test Helper's page ("We always left the kitchen clean. Then Mother liked to have us help.") came flying out, they instantly decided they wanted to make Confetti Pie.
It was pretty scary--not just what my kids managed to do to my kitchen (where were MY Test Helpers?), but the ingredients as well. Chocolate pudding mix, dessert topping mix (who knew they still made that?), and marshmallows were the backbone of the recipe.
Like Halliday's encounter with the Enchanted Castle Cake at a friend's birthday party ("Crisco by way of cough syrup"), my children were disappointed with the final product.
I quote: "The picture of it looked really good and great and yummy but it's not really . . . I have to say it's not the best pie in the world." Of course, maybe that's because their mother couldn't find the multi-colored, fruit-flavored miniature marshmallows the recipe calls for. Or maybe it's because Dream Whip tastes like soap.
Still, like Halliday, I can't resist the pull of the pictures in the Boys and Girls cookbook even now. Writing about the Enchanted Castle Cake, she says, "its photograph was so magical that even after Darla's party, I continued to think, I'll bet that tastes wonderful, every time I turned to page 101." I too know I'll always fondly remember Opera Fudge ("add and stir until blended 1 package creamy white frosting mix") as one of my favorite treats, but frankly, I don't think I'll try to make it again any time soon.
**To make a great (edible) chocolate cream pie, Cook's Illustrated's recipe is worth the price of the online subscription.
that looks like a great cookbook. I will look for it on ebay. That is great that the kids got into it.
Posted by: gabriella | Monday, June 19, 2006 at 02:01 AM