Interlude: Some Food Quotations from Days Forgotten
This post is just for fun. I hope you enjoy it! I've collected these random quotes in my readings through old things, because I am weird that way.
I took a little break from things recently and may not be daily posts this week (we'll see), but here's hoping this tides you over. I'll start with this graphic made by the government, because it is both pretty in a vintage style way, and also, for whatever reason, kind of makes me laugh. There's something so "modern" about it in a way that seems very dated now. I kind of want this on a t-shirt.
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| U.S. Food and Nutrition Service, 1978 |
And then we'll move on to a series of quotes that also, for whatever reason, also make me laugh. I hope you laugh, too, but if not, well, I accept that my sense of humor isn't for everyone.
Peanut butter is for people who say "yes" to life, and not for those wan spirits who would spread it thinly and carefully to every corner. --Seventeen, March 1963
Even when carrots are overcooked their vanity is not hurt. --Florence La Ganke Harris, Vegetable Cookery, 1952
We do not approve of pepper. --Vegetarian Magazine, February 1, 1920
Our English word soup is too democratic, too all-inclusive. Carelessly, it designates the hearty, as well as the delicate; the effeminate, as well as the virile. --Vogue, January 15, 1935
I was raised in the South, and there we know the value of cornmeal. You folks don't, up North. Now you may deny this and point with triumph to your johnny cake, which is conspicuous upon hotel and restaurant breakfast tables. I point to your johnny cake, too, but it is with the finger of scorn. --Griffith Nicholas, San Francisco Chronicle, January 28, 1894
Most summer vegetables contain little nutriment; therefore where no meat is used, they should be served with cream sauce when possible. These vegetables, though not nutritious, are valuable on the summer table, because of the salts they contain. --New York Tribune, July 27, 1904
It is worth remembering that there are no medium grades of cornbread. It is either irresistibly good or uneatable. --Orange Judd Farmer, December 8, 1917
When one watches the working girl take her luncheon, the marvel is not that so many of them are sickly looking, but that any of them live long enough to accumulate gray hairs. --The (Ottawa) Evening Citizen, February 11, 1908
Eat dry foods rather than sloppy ones; they are more easily digested. --The Theosophic Messenger, November 1, 1907
When a conservative, winter pancake maker wants to join forces with the gay radicals, how does she go about vaulting the fence? --Chicago Daily Tribune, April 28, 1935
To talk of potatoes after rice and macaroni seems to step down from the sublime--if not to the ridiculous, to the veriest prose of life. --New York Tribune, May 24, 1891
In two respects sweet potatoes have the advantage of white potatoes; they are seldom or never mashed, and perhaps partly in consequence of this they are more frequently eaten without salt, pepper, melted butter, and other hurtful condiments. --Julia Colman, The Phrenological Journal of Science and Health, April 1877
Maurice Webb, lecturer and expert on domestic problems, advises wives not to feed their husbands meat, because that makes them savage. "Give them soothing cabbage," says Webb. --Vegetarian Magazine, November 1, 1920
Please let me know if you enjoyed this, and what your favorite was.
That was highly entertaining! And yes, I thought "70s" when I saw the graphic... and was slightly surprised to be correct.
ReplyDeleteThe finger of scorn is my favorite, but I am also raising a quizzical eyebrow at the "feed your husband cabbage instead of meat" quote, because there are *many* instances documented in old books of men becoming substantially angry over 1. there not being enough meat (in their opinion) and/or 2. being served cabbage too often (or at all).
But the idea of meat making people vicious and lack of meat making people wimpy was a popular one. I can see how if a meatless diet resulted in anemia and fatigue whereas a meat-containing diet was non-anemic, then yes, the resultant fatigue and not-fatigue could have some differentiation in terms of fighting, but I remain skeptical about a lack of meat solving anger management problems. (and I am even more skeptical of a proliferation of cabbage solving anger management problems! That stuff often causes gut crankiness and gut crankiness does *not* help with anger management...)
... okay, also the peanut butter quote. And soup being too inclusive of a word (although it is true that the word alone does not tell you whether it will be a small cup of broth, a heavy meal, or something in between)... and I thought that one of the excellent things about potatoes and sweet potatoes was how nicely they go with butter and salt... and a stunning number of working women did actually starve to death, functionally...
But *why* did the vegetarian magazine not approve of pepper? Was it too stimulating? Was it too ubiquitous and over-applied in their experience? Or something else?
They were suggesting that cooks add "any spice liked" to their recipe for "Florentine Macaroni," but they said they did not approve of pepper. There was no explanation. I personally would approve of pepper with macaroni and cheese (which is what the recipe was--no spinach anywhere, which I expect when things are "Florentine").
DeleteI enjoyed this! Especially the peanut butter one. And the cornbread one, that made me laugh. Also the vaulting the fence to join gay radicals.
ReplyDeleteThe peanut butter one is just so true, isn't it?
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