Retro...um...food?

January 12, 2005 10:25 PM

Scary recipes from the past! Included: Jello molds with meat inside, weird dinners made with hot dogs (including Circle Dogs, which would be the name of my band if I had one), and tuna spaghetti. Actually, I'd like to try some of the desserts...
posted by braun_richard (26 comments total)

Cool. Reminded me of this.
posted by dhoyt at 10:47 PM on January 12, 2005

Jello molds with meat inside

what
the
fuck
cosby?

*dry heave*
posted by The God Complex at 11:03 PM on January 12, 2005

Umnn... am I the only one here who's had tuna spaghetti and liked it? I think it's a pretty common dish in Bavaria, and I found it pretty tasty as well.
posted by onalark at 11:19 PM on January 12, 2005

Here's one that should turn your stomach. [though I love it - it's an old family favorite]

Salmon Pea Wiggle

Yes, it's a self-link, but where else are you gonna find that recipe? [no, I didn't google]
posted by kamylyon at 1:16 AM on January 13, 2005

Umnn... am I the only one here who's had tuna spaghetti and liked it?

Pasta water is on, I'm looking through the pantry, no canned clams....let's make tuna spaghetti! Actually, my mom made it when we were growing up, no, it is not weird.
posted by fixedgear at 2:57 AM on January 13, 2005

Jello molds with meat inside

recipe from the past? i was in alsace three years ago for a while and that was the only dish the family i stayed with served that i would not eat. To their credit only the hopelessly Alsatian father chowed down on it. The meat i believe had been boiled or something with the water for the jello, spread like spam although it appeared to be real ham.
posted by sourbrew at 4:23 AM on January 13, 2005

Ever since hearing a friend describe it, I've been curious about this pudding. Make sure that your beef suet is fresh, and the lemons have thin, unwaxed skin. Apparently, when you cut into it, the lemon oozes out its own self-manufactured custard. Seems to me that this might be the English roots of all things American and gelatinous.
posted by bendybendy at 4:48 AM on January 13, 2005

Actually, spaghetti al tonno is on a lot of menus in Italy. Add some tomatoes, some white wine, a caper or two, some parsley - it's delish!
posted by CunningLinguist at 5:27 AM on January 13, 2005

Remember the Inexplicable Object of the Week?
posted by Eideteker at 6:17 AM on January 13, 2005

Shapiro, Laura. 2004. Something From the Oven: Reinventing Dinner in 1950's America. New York: Viking.
posted by djfiander at 6:19 AM on January 13, 2005

am I the only one here who's had tuna spaghetti and liked it?

I don't know if we mean the same thing, but plain pasta with extra-virgin olive oil, canned or pouched albacore, and balsamic vinegar is good. Spaghetti tonnato is good enough too, but there's something about what amounts to runny tuna mayonnaise that weirds me out on the conceptual level.
posted by ROU_Xenophobe at 6:35 AM on January 13, 2005

Salmon Pea Wiggle: this recipe contains my grandmother's complete diet, save potatoes. If you added potatoes, you would have the only victuals my grandmother would eat. And they had to be Maine potatoes. She was anti-Idaho, and wouldn't believe it if she liked a potato and found out it has a non-Down East provenance. She would have gone easy on the pepper.
posted by bendybendy at 7:18 AM on January 13, 2005

I was raised on nasty Jello. To this day, Jello strikes fear in my heart.

Jello with mayonnaise and cottage cheese
Jello with raw onion bits
Jello with peas
Jello with canned salmon

Excuse me...I must go visit the porcelain bus...
posted by Secret Life of Gravy at 7:46 AM on January 13, 2005

Grape jelly meatballs. Yerk.
posted by Marit at 8:01 AM on January 13, 2005

"Jello" = Gelatin = the stuff that comes from animals. It's what makes meat stock (chicken. beef, fish) jiggly when it gets cold. Gelatin is also very healthy for you, it soothes your small intestines and relaxes you -- that's one of the reasons you drink broth when sick, you know, "soothing broth". It's also one of the keys to making rich sauces that you pay fortunes for in fancy restaurants. It's funy how divorced people are about food.
posted by stbalbach at 8:33 AM on January 13, 2005

Oy, the grape jelly as sauce thing just boggles my mind. I mean....why?! You have to tell people that's what they're eating, it's so altered; you could get a superior effect by just dumping a bottle of barbecue sauce on top of the mini-weiners or meatballs. (Better yet, use marinara. Better yet, skip that whole concept altogether...)

Anyway, we used to do this thing in my family that I still do on occasion when I'm feeling nostalgic: Salmon Fritters. You drain a can of salmon, mix it with Bisquick (actually I usually use Jiffy Baking Mix, which is more or less the same) and some finely chopped onions, and fry it. I usually add garlic, oregano, and lots of black pepper, and an egg or two if I've got some I need to use up. Topped with a little apple butter or applesauce, they're great. Just don't kiss strangers after eating them.
posted by lodurr at 9:04 AM on January 13, 2005

Oh my god, those pictures of the crazy cakes are from a Betty Crocker recipe card set that my mom had back in the '70s (in a Harvest Gold plastic recipe box, natch). To her credit, mom never bothered to try even a single one (she never liked cooking much in the first place; I think she "won" the recipe box/cards at a neighborhood Sarah Coventry party she went to out of politeness), and so thankfully our childhood desserts continued to consist of ice cream or Pepperidge Farm layer cake.

As a side question that seems to petty for AskMe: does Pepperidge Farm still make layer cakes? I haven't seen one since I moved to L.A., and I find it hard to believe the second largest city in the U.S. would no longer be in their market.
posted by scody at 9:05 AM on January 13, 2005

Who on earth would eat this?

However, I actually want to try this. And these cakes are too cute!

And yes, Pepperidge Farm still makes layer cakes.
posted by SisterHavana at 9:32 AM on January 13, 2005

> the stuff that comes from animals.

Boiled bones, hooves and horns. Retired from marked in Europe because all three ingredients are perfect vectors for the mad cow disease.
posted by NewBornHippy at 10:05 AM on January 13, 2005

does Pepperidge Farm still make layer cakes?

I have definitely seen them. I got a craving for chocolate cake about three months ago and visited my frozen food section. I think they had chocolate and coconut.
posted by Secret Life of Gravy at 10:29 AM on January 13, 2005

Boiled bones, hooves and horns.

It can come from that. It can also come from boiling a chicken and reducing the stock to make a rich sauce you eat at restaurants (restaurants because anyone jiggly about Gelatin obviously doesnt know anything about cooking or food at home).
posted by stbalbach at 10:44 AM on January 13, 2005

I just remembered an insane recipe from my childhood.

We ate hamburger on a nearly daily basis, and my mom had a "Fun with Hamburger" recipe book. I think I was about twelve when I decided to make the Mock Drumsticks: You mold hamburger meat around a popsicle stick, roll it in crushed cornflakes and then fry it.
posted by Secret Life of Gravy at 10:50 AM on January 13, 2005

One of my sister's favorite holiday activities is looking up my parents' friends in old church cookbooks from the 1960s and 1970s so she can ask them embarrassing questions like: So Bambi, do you still make "Wetbacks' Delight with Fritos?", or I was wondering where you got your recipe for Banana Jello Cake?

My sister's not only a great cook, she's a superb social terrorist!
posted by gesamtkunstwerk at 11:15 AM on January 13, 2005

looking at all of those cakes reminded me of these. how great was it when someone brought those in to school?
posted by jennababy at 11:25 AM on January 13, 2005

Lime Jello Marshmallow Cottage Cheese Surprise.
posted by verstegan at 12:57 PM on January 13, 2005

OMG, verstegan, I've been looking for that for ages. Thanks!
posted by Vidiot at 7:21 PM on January 13, 2005