Last year on
a summer afternoon we wandered up the block to a moving sale. It was an elderly
couple getting ready to downsize and move closer to their kids. My vintage
antennae were twitching and I convinced my husband to come along. I’ve learned
it’s wise to take him with me on these expeditions, otherwise we’d have a house
full of things we don’t need, don’t have room for, but I just couldn’t pass up.
He gets a subtle look I’ve learned to read as, “Are you kidding??!!!”. 
There were
lots of old cookbooks, boxes of them tucked in a corner of the garage. I picked
out a couple for a grand total of $2.50 and headed home to flip through them.
The first, and biggest, book is The Encyclopedia of Cooking, by Mary Margaret
McBride, first published in 1959. It’s full of recipes from another era, some
that I’ll try, others, um, not. The
other book is hilarious and worthy of an entire post of its own next week. (How’s
that for a stay-tuned tease?)
The
Encyclopedia of Cooking is over 1,500 pages long, a hefty book of recipes
straight from the 1950’s and 1960’s. The recipes range from cookies that look
good even in black & white, to gelatin salads (yuck), to frankfurter
casseroles I don’t even want to imagine. There’s even a canning section that,
though out-dated, is fun to read through. I’ve definitely gotten my money’s worth out of
this book, and a bit more.
