Book Review: Better Homes & Gardens Cooking with Herbs and Spices

Title: Better Homes & Gardens Cooking with Herbs and Spices 

Author: none named

Date: 1967

Publisher: Meredith Corporation

ISBN: none

Length: 24 pages

Quote: "Here are wonderful recipes to help you discover herbs and spice. You'll find an entire new world of flavor!"

In 1967 that meant simpler flavors than you might have had in mind. The first recipe directs the cook to brown steaks in garlic butter. Then there's a recipe for marinating steak in ginger sauce and serving it with pineapple, which would probably make it easier to digest. So, no worries, these recipes use spices at levels that won't be much of a shock to diners.

Chocolate spice cake was a fad of this period. I remember baking a few different versions and thinking the combination was overrated because the chocolate and cinnamon cancelled each other out, but some people thought it was very distinctive and great fun. Taste and tell.

There's even a recipe for luncheon meat. I've not seen that in a store recently. Nor have I missed it. Luncheon meat was basically a fine-grind sausage, like baloney, that came in a can. It could contain the flesh of almost any animal but usually seemed to major in pork and chicken. It wasn't exactly the same thing as Spam, not better, not worse, a little more savory rather than sweet. Probably any meat (or Worthington Foods soy-gluten "loaf" in a can) that you substitute for luncheon meat will be an improvement. 

The modern cook may have the most fun with the quick recipe suggestions on the last two pages of the book, sprinkling a pinch of one spice at a time into familiar recipes for fresh taste variations. There's a reason why adding dry mustard to scrambled eggs or rosemary to corn has not become the dominant American custom, but many people enjoy these variations once in a while.

Amazon says the price of this little collectible is already hovering around ten dollars a copy, so add it to your vintage cookbook collection now.