abundantly bless your table

I love the Betty Crocker Picture Cook Book, 1950, the first of Betty's books, for it’s almost giddy prose. It’s got a Ronald Reaganesque post-war optimism that makes you want to leap out of bed in the morning just to bake something. Okay, not in the morning, how about staying up late just to arrange appetizers on little sticks.

Here’s a few excerpts:

“Planning, preparing, and serving meals is an art which develops through inspiration and thought. And meal planning is really fun! It may look difficult to the beginner, but like driving a car, swimming, or anything we learn to do without thought or conscious effort, it is a skill which grows easier with the doing.”

“Something soft and something crisp

Should always go together,

And something hot with something cold

No matter what the weather;

Something bland needs the complement

Of something with tang and nip.

Follow these rules and all your meals

Will have taste appeal and zip.”

“Salads are refreshing, lovely…like coming upon a woodland spring, clear and cool. Beauty will be the reward of your understanding touch. And health benefits will abundantly bless your table through the precious vitamins and minerals of crisp, sparkling salad ingredients.”

“If I were to design a coat of arms for our country, a pie would be the main symbol. It would appear with a background of wild berry bushes, --and orchards. For pie is part of our history and tradition. By right of inheritance, adoption, and improvement, pies have become distinctly American. Every American home has its favorite pie.”

“Hot quick breads in their many delightful forms help tell the story of civilization. Notice the bits of history tucked into these pages and serve them up as table conversation. They’ll make cooking, and eating, more fun.”

“Muffins, the name means little muffs…to warm the fingers.” (How quaint, even if untrue.)