This is a recent addition to my collection, a happenstance find while browsing a favorite online vendor. It’s a handsome glamorously packaged affair, with nearly a hundred color photographs that bring to mind a Ruth Reichl-era Gourmet magazine or a cookbook from a celebrity chef. But Together is none of these things. As the title…
Month: December 2020
Chicken and Mushroom Cream Soup (Egypt, adapted from Together: Our Community Cookbook, 2018)
Chicken and Mushroom Cream Soup is one of the more enjoyable recipes in Together: Our Community Cookbook. The original recipe was submitted to the cookbook by one Amaal abd Elrasoul, who came to London to help her sister-in-law after the Grenfell Tower fire. She credits the recipe to a neighbor in Cairo. In her own……
Cheddar Cheese Cabbage with Sausage
Cheddar Cheese Cabbage with Sausage is an, um, experimental weeknight meal loosely inspired by a Cabbage-Cheese Chowder, a mid-70s recipe from a previous post. The original Cabbage-Cheese Chowder recipe is a budget supper made from condensed cheddar cheese soup, cabbage, and diced baloney. I made it on a lark, wondering why anyone would think……
Breakfast and Brunch (Country Kitchen Collection, 1980s)
Another entry from Jean Childress’ Country Kitchen Collection, Breakfast and Brunch is a short selection of brunch recipes in Ms. Childress’ familiar hand-lettered calligraphy. The epigraph gives the flavor of what’s to come: a delightful, relaxed way to entertain or to give the family a weekend treat. Less time consuming than an evening meal, brunch…
Chin-Chin-Charlie (Wisconsin, 1988, adapted)
Chin-Chin-Charlie is a meat-and-canned-soup casserole dressed up with traditionally Asian ingredients. This particular recipe comes to me by way of A Book of Favorite Recipes, a 1988 community cookbook from a Catholic parish in Krakow, Wisconsin, but these sorts of “Chinese” recipes show up frequently in older cookbooks. Like the Tuna Cashew Casserole, a traditional……
Crumb Soup (Wisconsin, 1962, adapted)
Crumb Soup is a light, porridge-like soup that seems like it belongs in a Depression-era journal. In modern parlance we might call this a “struggle meal”. I found this recipe tucked away in the Vegetables and Soups section of Our Favorite Recipes, a 1962 cookbook compiled by Our Lady of Perpetual Help Catholic Church……
Cheesy Olive English Muffins (adapted from Breakfast & Brunch, 1990s)
Cheesy Olive English Muffins is my favorite quick and easy recipe from the Breakfast & Brunch cookbook in the Country Kitchen collection. Like all recipes in this cookbook it is included as part of a multi-course brunch menu. It is recommended as a starter to accompany an Oyster and Bacon Omelet, melon balls, and……
Cabbage-Cheese Chowder (Oklahoma, 1970s)
Cabbage-Cheese Chowder is a strange little recipe from that encapsulates everything I love about community cookbooks. As with any church cookbook, most of the recipes in Adventures in Food feel as though they are meant to establish one’s place in a hierarchy. People are prone to share recipes that they might prepare for fancy company, or……
Tuna Cashew Casserole (Various, 1960s-1970s)
Tuna Cashew Casserole is an odd amalgam of cashews, canned tuna, cream of mushroom soup, and fried chow mein noodles. I’ve seen at least half a dozen variants of this recipe spread across different church cookbooks. The proportions and details vary but the key ingredients are the same. There’s usually a crunchy vegetable in there……