Republished with permission from the Ester Republic.

I suffer from what one might call a bit of a collection addiction. Not of trinkets, per se, but for items in which I recognize some value beyond their utility, and thus feel the compulsion, nay the responsibility, to honor, preserve, and indeed showcase that value, lest it be lost to the world forever. My collection of fine art, for instance, consists of a relatively small, but action-packed closetful of comic books, each a prime representative of what I believe to be an as-yet-unacknowledged post-modern renaissance of self-reflexive American art.

More fledgling in size (but gaining) is a collection of cookbooks that my wife and I have been putting together. The cookbook is an unsung hero of our food culture. We abuse them, spatter them with batter, drop them in sinks full of soapy water, scorch them on hot stoves, and when they can take no more, or should we just run out of space on our kitchen shelves, we send the veterans packing without a second thought to the countless joys they’ve so selflessly given. They are much maligned, and oft overlooked, yet each cookbook brims with history, poetry, and prose to wit, with gastronomical tales to tell about pantries and politics alike.

However, ours is not a quest for elusive first editions of the culinary canon, Joy, Homes, and Fannie; reprinted versions of these suffice. It is the content we are after, not the books themselves. Thus, we seek not the rare but the idiosyncratic, not the mainstream but the Main Street: when you want to learn about meals, not recipes, about fare, not food, the plastic-coil-bound, hand-illustrated (often by children) Ye Olde Country Cookbook takes the proverbial cake.

As a reference they can’t compare to the encyclopedic tomes noted above; nothing can beat the inside cover of a Better Homes when it comes to converting pinches to pecks. But these measure their charm elsewhere. Written not by lab-coat-clad chemist-cooks, carb-counting dieticians, or celebrity-chefs, these are penned by modest home economists, most often through a collective effort of the entire neighborhood, women’s club, or church choir, perhaps as a fundraiser or for charity, each willing lay-chef sharing a dash of wisdom from their recipe boxes and mixing bowls. Only in these rare gems could one find a five-page “Treatise on the Pie Crust,” or a recipe for “preserved children” (see below).

We’ve found at least a baker’s dozen here in Alaska, some hailing from kitchens as far away as Appalachia and New England. Titles include the superlative “Golden North Tasty Treats,” complete with a hand-drawn rendering of the Pillsbury Dough-Boy and an igloo on the cover, “What Cooks in Suburbia,” written in a more masterful prose than most contemporary novels, and the uniquely titled “Cook Book” from the Waupaca Women’s Club, Waupaca, Wisconsin.

From “Killer Brownies” to “Hermit Cookies,” to “Lobster Pot Pie,” to “Flannel Hash,” the creations they offer range from plain to terrific to just plain terrifying (broiled peanut-butter, bacon, and mayonnaise sandwiches anyone?) Count on each to also offer, at a minimum, ten different things you can do with Jell-O, many of which quite disturbingly include some kind of meat product. Regional fare and curious concoctions aside, each book also shares much beyond the recipes themselves, about the homemakers and kitchens of yesterday, about regional tastes, fashions, values, even about hometown drama. One can’t help but conjure up fanciful, soap-operatic explanations for why Mrs. A. Smith’s peanut butter cookie recipe didn’t make the desserts section (where three other similar recipes do), but was filed instead under ‘Miscellaneous,’ between French onion dip (“good for a party”) and Raisin Compote (“spreads nice!”).

I see these books as artifacts of a food culture for which community, sharing, fellowship, and fun were both common and essential ingredients. Take for instance Edna M.’s ‘Great-Big-Party Salsa,’ which calls for diced tomatoes by the quart. To try and scale this down to a family-size version would be the culinary equivalent of the heresy of paraphrase. Besides the food, I can imagine that even the act of assembling these cookbooks was a rich experience that brought neighbors and friends closer together. Through food, friends and family became more important; and through people, foods regularly took on a greater significance, a local identity. Today most consider it quaint when someone insists that a chili, or pizza, or salt-water taffy, is only done right in their home town. Twenty years ago, however, to argue the contrary could get your biscuits burnt! People held a very real pride in local cuisine that was part and parcel to the kinship they felt with each other, with their neighborhoods, communities, and even their landscapes or seascapes.

Perhaps by sharing all of this with you I may very well be creating competition for these books that I so love to collect. But I do so willingly, as a lover of all things food, so that there might be a chance for things to be this way again. And as promised, here’s a timeless recipe originally offered up by the Members and Friends of the Machias Valley Woman’s’ Club, Machias, Maine, 1962.

“Preserved Children”

Take 1 large field, half a dozen children, 2 or 3 small dogs, a pinch of brook and some pebbles. Mix the children and the dogs well together; put them on the field, stirring constantly. Pour the brook over the pebbles; sprinkle the field with flours; spread over all a deep blue sky and bake in the sun. When brown, set away to cool in the bathtub.

This entry was posted on Tuesday, July 1st, 2008 at 2:50 pm by Philip Loring and is filed under Food. You can follow any responses to this entry through the RSS 2.0 feed. You can leave a response, or trackback from your own site.