My First Cookbook

Jul
19

Post by community member:

My parents gave this to me for my 9th birthday. I was just working on my Girl Scout Cooking Badge at the time.

The previous summer, I had been to Girl Scout day-camp. They taught us an “easy and portable” recipe, which was basically canned Chef-Boyardee spaghetti with a can of corn added to it, then served in an ice cream cone. It really did look as if someone had already eaten it. Well, and tasted that way, too.

Any cookbook was going to help improve my cooking skills!

The Better Homes and Gardens Junior Cookbook featured some very basic recipes. My sister Karen, who was just a year younger than I was and soon to be earning her own badge, was also interested in the book. We would look over all the recipes, see if we had the ingredients for them in my mom’s kitchen, then make things.

These were not recipes that would require much.

The first section of the cookbook featured beverages, and included “recipes” for grape float, orange float, cocoa, chocolate shake, lime fizz, eggnog, and tutti-fruitti-ice SPARKLE, which was basically KoolAid made into ice cubes, with 7-Up poured over them.

I loved the pretty colors, but I was especially enamored of the glasses with the lemon-wedge art on them and the to-DIE-for lemon swizzle sticks. To this day, I love citrus-y things. I also have a set of nice, large, glass tumblers with glass lemon wedges on them. No swizzle sticks yet, though.

100_3532

There were recipes for such exciting items as cinnamon toast and biscuits (made from biscuit mix, not from scratch).

I really liked the picture of the egg-salad sandwich boats (egg salad on a hot dog bun), until I got sick at school one day after having egg salad. I couldn’t even look at it again until I was about 30.

There were recipes for cookies, candies (think fudge), baked apples, and applesauce with red hots.

100_3529

Main dish items included “frankfurters,” cheeseburgers, oven-fried chicken, and mock drumsticks. My sister and I became obsessed with getting the cheese to melt just like the picture of the cheeseburgers in the book. (She’s a vegetarian now, so I’m sure she never even thinks of that these days.) We also made the mock drumsticks, which were pretty much meatloaf on a stick.

There was a recipe for saucy spaghetti that was made by taking a can of spaghetti and adding a can of Vienna sausage. Ugh. Maybe my Girl Scout camp leaders were cookbook contributors.

The macaroni-and-cheese recipe was for making it from the box. That’s a recipe? Really?

The salads were very basic. Like, take two pineapple rings, plop it on lettuce, stick a cherry and walnut halves on it and call it a salad. The “Peter Rabbit” salad was a canned pear half on a bed of lettuce, decorated with marshmallows, cherries, and cloves to make it look like a rabbit, though it really looked more like a mouse. Ugh.

Still, we used the heck out of that cookbook, and the cover and every page is stained with something we spilled.

I am a better cook than that, now. But it’s still fun to look at the book, especially the pictures. I can even look at the egg salad photo!

Do you remember your first cookbook? Do you still make things from it? Or at least look at it?

Kathi N blogs at How We’re Gonna Do It.

Do you have a recipe post or kitchen-related story to share on the Farm Bell blog?
See Farm Bell Blog Submissions for information, the latest blog contributor giveaway, and to submit a post.

Want to subscribe to the Farm Bell blog? Go here.

Would you like a chance to win a Euro Cuisine yogurt maker? Check out the latest blog contributor giveaway!




Comments

  1. GrannyTrace says:

    That is such a cool book and nice memory. I have a old Betty Crocker Picture Cookbook that was given to me from my mom.It was hers. Its now held together by a big rubber band. Cover is off. 🙂 I loved that book.
    Granny Trace

    http://www.grannytracescrapsandsquares.com

  2. brookdale says:

    I wish I still had my first cookbook, it was the one we used in 4-H back in the 1950s with yummy things like graham muffins. Sis and I made those a lot; we even entered them in the fair and won ribbons!

  3. Liz Pike says:

    Kathi, I especially love how the pages are stained!! And I LOVE those graphics, very retro!!

    Now you just need to share the meatloaf-on-a-stick recipe!!

  4. kindigo27 says:

    I had the 1957 Betty Crocker’s Cookbook for Boys and Girls, which was already vintage when I got it. Most of the recipes were from scratch, with a “quick-tip” to use the Betty Crocker boxed mix. My favorite recipe was a cookie recipe that used honey, which most of the time never made it into the oven because I ate the dough! There was even a section on campfire cooking.

  5. Sherie says:

    Boy – this brings back the memories. I also had the Betty Crocker Cookbook for kids . . .LOVED it & I actually found one on Amazon & ordered it – I still used some of the recipes from it! When I was about 11 I made my Dad the “Volcano” recipe – hamburger gravy flowing from a “volcano” of mashed potatoes! He told me he just preferred his hamburger on a bun from now on, thank you! I also made the salad with a peach half & celery that looked like a girl . . . . those were the days . . .*sigh . . .

  6. Sharri says:

    This post so made me smile! I have the Betty Crocker Boys & Girls cookbook, my mom (a Home Ec teacher) gave to me for Christmas, in 1966,
    I was seven. She wrote inside the front cover:
    “To my little cook”.
    I made many a recipe from that book, it is well worn and stained on many pages. My dad was a willing guinea pig for whatever I made.
    Good memories!!

  7. TeaCup says:

    Brookdale, I didn’t look at all the hits, but what you had might be found this way. Search at bookfinder.com for “4-h cookbook” in the title. I didn’t know which state you might have wanted, so I didn’t narrow mine down further than that. You can put an approx. date in keywords. If your cookbook had another title or subtitle, that will help you a lot!

    IHTH–

    Judi

  8. brookdale says:

    Thank you, Judi, I will try that. I never thought to look on the internet for a copy. Someone must have one somewhere!

  9. Kathi N says:

    Thank you all for sharing the memories. What fun!

    Liz, I’ll post the “mock drumstick” recipe on FarmBell recipes. :>

Add Your Thoughts



Search Farm Bell Recipes

Generic selectors
Exact matches only
Search in title
Search in content
Post Type Selectors
Filter by Categories
All Recipes
Appetizers & Snacks
Bagels
Bean Soups
Beans
Beans, Grains & Rice
Beef
Beverages
Biscuits
Blog
Boiling Water Bath
Bread Machine
Breads
Breakfast
Brownies
Budget
BWB Condiments
BWB Fruits
BWB Jams, Jellies, Butters & Preserves
BWB Marmalades & Conserves
BWB Other
BWB Pickles & Pickled Stuff
BWB Salsas
BWB Sauces
BWB Tomatoes & Combos
BWB Vegetables
Cakes
Candy
Canning
Casserole
Casserole
Casserole
Cereals
Cheese
Cheesecakes
Chilis
Chowders
Cobblers
Coffee Cake
Cold Remedies
Condiments
Cookery 101
Cookies & Bars
Cream Soups
Crisps
Crock Pot
Crowd-Size
Crusts
Cupcakes
Cure & Smoke
Dairy
Dehydrating
Desserts
Diabetic
Dips
Doughnuts
Dressings
Egg Dishes
Eggs
Entertaining
Fat-Free
Featured
Fermenting
Fillings
Fish
Food Photography
Freezing
Frostings & Icings
Frozen
Fruit Breads
Fruit Cakes
Fruit Salads
Fruits
Gift Basket Goodies
Giveaways
Gluten-Free
Goat Cheeses
Gourmet
Gravies
Griddles
Grill-Outdoor Cooking
Hard Cheeses
Herbs & Spices
Holiday
Homemade Cheese
How To
Ice Creams
Ingredients
Ingredients & Mixes
Jell-O
Jell-O Salads
Kid-Friendly
Kitchen Gadgets
Kosher
Lactose-Free
Lamb
Leftovers
Lettuce & Greens
Low-Carb
Low-Fat
Low-Sodium
Main Dish
Marinades
Meat Salads
Meet the Cook
Muffins
Non-Dairy
Old-Fashioned
One Dish Meal
Other Breads
Other Breakfast
Other Condiments
Other Dairy
Other Desserts
Other Main Dish
Other Salads
Other Side Dishes
Other Soups & Stews
Other Special Diets
Pasta
Pasta
Pasta Salads
Pastries
PC Beef
PC Chicken
PC Meats
PC Other
PC Poultry
PC Soups & Stews
PC Veggies
Pets
Pickling
Pies
Pizza
Pizza Crusts
Pork
Potato Salads
Potatoes
Potluck
Poultry
Presentation
Preserving
Pressure Canning
Pressure Cooker
Puddings & Custards
Recipe Requests
Relishes & Chutneys
Rolls
Rubs
Salads
Salads
Salsas
Sandwiches
Sauces
Scones
Seafood
Side Dishes
Soft Cheeses
Soups & Stews
Sourdough
Special Diets
Special Occasions
Steam Juicer
Stocks
Stuffings
Substitutions
Syrups
Tarts
Tips & Tricks
Tortillas & Pitas
Using FBR
Vegan
Vegetable Breads
Vegetable Salads
Vegetables
Vegetarian
Wild Game
Yeast Breads


If you would like to help support the overhead costs of this website, you may donate. Thank you!





Thanks for being part of our community!