Oven meal: Company Chicken, Oven-Fried Potatoes, Buttered Carrots, Chocolate Brownie Pie

It is 1959, and Indianapolis Power & Light wants to make sure you can cook... electrically. Thus, The Electric Cook Book, "your complete guide to cooking electrically." During the 40's and 50's, with the rise of larger and better-equipped ovens, came The Oven Meal. Oven meals are menus wherein all the dishes are put in the oven at the same time. Genius. Plus, I got to use the divided dish I borrowed from the 50's.

Company Chicken
Oven-Fried Potatoes
Buttered Carrots
Chocolate Brownie Pie
***
Temperature: 350 degrees F.
Time: 50 minutes
Serves: 6

Company Chicken
1 package EACH frozen chicken breasts and thighs
Flour, salt, and pepper
Shortening
1 can cream of chicken soup
1/2 teaspoon curry powder
1 4-ounce can sliced mushrooms

Flour and season chicken. In skillet, brown thoroughly on all sides in shortening on SECOND to THIRD heat. Place chicken in large casserole. Add soup to pan in which chicken was fried; stir to pick up drippings. Add curry and mushrooms. Pour over chicken; cover and bake.

Oven-Fried Potatoes
Pare 6 potatoes; slice 1/4 inch thick; toss in 1/2 cup melted butter to coat thoroughly. Put in baking dish; salt and pepper; pour remaining butter over potatoes. Bake.

Buttered Carrots
Peel and slice carrots into casserole. Salt and pepper, top with butter, add 1/4 cup water. Cover, and bake.

Chocolate Brownie Pie
2 squares unsweetened chocolate
2 tablespoons butter
3 eggs
1/2 cup sugar
3/4 cup dark corn syrup
3/4 cup pecans
1 9-inch unbaked pastry shell

Melt chocolate and butter [I used a microwave, about 15 seconds at a time]. Add eggs, sugar, and corn syrup, beating thoroughly. Mix in pecans. Pour filling into unbaked pastry shell. Bake with oven meal.

***

Verdict:

Company Chicken: Ehhhh. The sauce is really not great. Canned mushrooms are rubbery and horrible and they JUST TASTE BAD. That, combined with undiluted, curried cream of chicken soup was just overwhelming and gloppy. It's okay, certainly entirely edible, but not something I'd serve to company. Or again. Husband thought it was reasonably tasty.

Oven-Fried Potatoes: Quite nice! Very simple ingredients, tasty result. The butter was a little excessive (not that I mind...), and I think you could get good results from halving the butter, using olive oil, or going 50/50. They were cooked perfectly.

Buttered Carrots: Also cooked perfectly. Yum. I think I liked these the best, actually, with the exception of...

Chocolate Brownie Pie: Golly. I thought this was going to turn out like a chocolate pecan pie as there is no flour in the filling, but I was wrong. This is like... brownies distilled. Husband felt that it was more like brownies than brownies. I would not go quite that far, but it is not "brownies in a superfluous pastry crust", as you are thinking. It is essence of brownie contained by pastry for easier transport to your face. Warm from the oven, thanks to your skillful time management made easier by the wonders of electricity, vanilla ice cream melting in slowly trickling rivulets. ggghgghhhhrrrrrghhh.

All together: A meal well worth making for the novelty and convenience of making it all at the same time in the oven, if you alter the chicken recipe. If I did this again, I'd either rub some chicken thighs with a tasty seasoning mix or figure out a sauce that didn't involve cream of chicken soup. An actual curry sauce, perhaps.

Listen to the Penguin.

Coldspot Freezer Informational Booklet [1952]
Listen to the penguin! He knows whereof he speaks. Except about the bananas. Frozen bananas are great. Especially in smoothies, and banana ice cream. Also the milk. Frozen milk is fine. And the celery. You can throw it into soup, it'll be grand. And tomatoes. For sauce.

Actually you know what? Penguins are not known for their expertise in the culinary fields. They mainly eat bait fish. Don't listen to the penguin. He's full of it.

Coldspot Freezers dance!

Coldspot Freezer Informational Booklet [1952]

You can dance if you want to!
You can leave your friends behind!
'Cause your friends don't dance with freezers
And if they don't dance with freezers
Well, they're no friends of mine!
FREEZER DANCE.
FREEZER DANCE.
Everybody freezer dance!

Coldspot Freezers are Spiffy!

Coldspot Freezer Informational Booklet [1952]

"Well honey, this way, I only have to bake one birthday cake a year!"

My grandma always keeps the booklets that come with her appliances. This is such a booklet.

I really really want to buy this freezer so that I can wear a ruffly red polka-dot apron with ric-rac trim. If I had a daughter, doubt not that she would have a matching one.

Mom for President! With the help of milk.

Carnation's Easy-Does-It Cookbook [1958]

We Vote YOU 8th Vice President!!!

Take a tip from your husband. Run your home as efficiently as he runs his office! Over 1,000 meals a year makes you a B.H.E. (that's short for Big Household Executive) in your kitchen.

Personalize your office (the kitchen, that is) with gay, attractive curtains and colorful accessories. There are so many inexpensive ones these days! You can afford to change them often.

Organize your work space. No home or apartment kitchen is perfect, but you can store your equipment near the logical food preparation, cooking, and serving areas to make your work easier.

Periodic reorganization isn't just for office efficiency experts. (Or, are you the exceptional woman who remains sweet-tempered when the mixer "conks out" midway through angel cake batter?) Periodically, devote a day to maintenance. Have the knives sharpened, straighten kitchen drawers and shelves, scrub the can opener. Surprising how much difference it makes!


Yayyyyyyy! I'm a Big Household Executive! Yayyyyyy!

Carnation Can-Can

Carnation's Easy-Does-It Cookbook [1958]

Vegetables Continental will spark the tired vegetable appetite, or intrigue the most sophisticated guest! Try these intriguing new ideas!

"By Jove! She is a corker!" *monocle pop*

Am I wrong, or is this the flimsiest excuse ever for a picture of a monocle and top hat wearing, bow tie sporting gent ogling a can-can dancer ever? I'm not complaining, I'm just saying.

Additionally:
*Where are those sparkles coming from?
*Why does the woman in the right back have no body?
*Have her companion's legs been replaced with tentacles?
*Where is Monocle Man sitting?
*The dancer's ankles. Those bows seem suspicious. They may have malicious intent.

I suspect the involvement of the Green Fairy in this work.

Carrots make your hair curly, I guess

From Carnation's Easy-Does-It Cookbook [1958].

This little girl is having none of that nonsense. Or is it nonsense? How many carrots has this lady eaten??

I also enjoy that her bosom has a jaunty bow, or possibly a propeller. It seems as if it is about to take flight.

Happy Carnation Family

[1958]

I want a pink fridge. And... suddenly, more Carnation milk products. LOTS more. Carnation sour cream, Carnation cottage cheese, and most of all, Carnation heavy cream. Cream is good.

Merry Christmas to mothers!

This is from a recipe booklet from Coldspot Freezers from 1952.

Click to enbiggen

Now Mother Can join in the Christmas Morning Fun

Thanks to her Coldspot Freezer, mother is no longer shackled to the kitchen while the rest of the family enjoys Christmas fun. The day-long labor of preparing holiday feasts--long taken for granted as woman's lot in life--is now a thing of the past. Mother can have any holiday meal prepared, by simple easy tasks spaced out as suggested by the typical schedule at the left. On Christmas morning--with Christmas dinner store away in her Coldspot Freezer, all ready to cook and serve--a worry-free mother can join whole-heartedly in the gay celebration around the tree.

Summary of Aforementioned Schedule:
*July: Freeze peas and carrots
*August: Freeze melon ball salad
*September: Make and freeze candied sweet potatoes
*October: Make and freeze mince pies
*November: Freeze turkey
*December: Make and freeze rolls

All right, I know, I should wax cynical about who on earth starts cooking Christmas dinner in July, and about what poor mother starts prepping Christmas dinner at the crack of dawn Christmas morning instead of enjoying with the kids, but honestly... this just sounds like a fantastic idea. I mean, sure, 5-6 months ahead of time is excessive, but on the whole, this is genius.

Plus, look at that family. My heart is all soft and syrupy just looking at them. Aren't they adorable? Golly gosh. Also, I want that dressing gown. It is fancy.

In the Christmas spirit, as my gift to you... Melon Ball Salad.

Melon Ball Salad.
Freeze watermelon and honeydew melon in balls. Arrange on lettuce leaf when partly thawed. Red and green melon balls make an attractive holiday salad.

New England: The Cradle of American Cookery

Click to embiggen

'K. New England? So much great stuff. The cradle of American cookery, it is not. Puritan recipes generally go like this:

1. Is it food? If yes, move to #2.
2. Boil it.
3. Yes, lettuce is food.

But, as ever in this particular cookbook, a fantastic job on that line drawing! Look at all those details on this couple going to a fancy dress party as Pilgrims. Bless them, they've even got buckle shoes and a buckle hat!

Making Pies with Mom: 1955

Life in the Willow Village, Ypsilanti, Michigan, 1955. [Shorpy.com]

Mmmmmm. Pie. This little girl seems like a big fan! Like all sensible people.

Wisconsin Dutch

Once again, The Prudence Penny Regional Cookbook [1954]. Yup, one of the major ethnic groups of this here United States is the... Wisconsin Dutch. We want ethnic groups, not ethnic groups. ;) Still, what a lovely lady! I want her apron.

Mmmmmm. Lake of dairy. I want a dairy lake.

Cosmopolitan America Cook Book

Again we have a picture from The Prudence Penny Regional Cookbook [1954]. Just look at all the ethnicities represented in this picture! We've got Russian, um... Russian...? East European? Polish? Irish? I notice there isn't anyone who requires facial shading...

Ideas, anyone?

Creole Coloring Book

Click to embiggen

Wow, that is some epic line drawing! It's got cross-hatching and everything! This is part of the same book that this meal came from. I will admit that I am severely tempted to print this off and have at it with crayons. Especially the fluffy dress lady.

More importantly, this picture is cool because it has time travel! One of these people is Victorian, the other is Georgian, and neither of them is a particularly good example of either. Perhaps it is a time travelers convention? Or just for funsies?

Apple Soup, Macaroni met Ham un Kaas, Rozijen

This week's menu comes from the Prudence Penny Regional Cookbook [1954]. These regions include New England, the South, Pennsylvania Dutch, Creole, Michigan Dutch, Mississippi Valley, Wisconsin Dutch, Minnesota Scandinavian, Southwestern, Western, and Cosmopolitan. I sense a theme in the nationalities present in this list.




Roode Krentenbrig (Red Currant Soup)
Michigan Dutch housewives are famous for beautiful rose-colored fruit soups.

2 tablespoons barley
1 quart red currants
1 cup sugar
1/2 cup water
1 stick cinnamon
1/8 teaspoon salt

Soak barley overnight in 1 cup water. Wash and stem the currants, add sugar, water, and stick cinnamon. Cook over low heat for 15 minutes. Drain and put through a coarse sieve. Add barley with water and salt and simmer until barley is soft and juice thickened. Chill. Serves 4 to 6. Grape juice may be substituted for red currant puree.
BERRY SOUP--Red or black raspberries, huckleberries or blackberries may be used instead of red currants.
APPLE SOUP--Prepare as above using 1 quart diced tart apples instead of currants. Add red food coloring if desired.



Macaroni Met Ham En Kaas (Macaroni with Ham and Cheese)
Macaroni "met ham en kaas" is a great favorite in the Michigan Dutch Country.

1 (8-ounce) package macaroni
1/2 pound boiled ham, chopped
1 (3-ounce) package cream cheese
2 tablespoons butter
Nutmeg
4 eggs
1 cup milk
1 tablespoon finely chopped lemon peel

Cook macaroni in boiling salted water 12 minutes. Drain and arrange in layers in a greased baking dish with ham and cream cheese, dotting each layer of macaroni with butter. Sprinkle with nutmeg. Beat eggs, add milk, 1 teaspoon melted butter, lemon peel and pour over macaroni. Place in a pan of hot water and bake in a 350 degree F. oven 30 minutes. Serves 6 to 8.



Rozijen (raisins)
2 cups seeded raisins
2 cups water
Few grains salt
2 tablespoons cornstarch
1/4 teaspoon cinnamon
1 cup brown sugar

Wash raisins, add water and cook 10 minutes. Mix salt and cornstarch with 3 tablespoons cold water, combine with cooked raisins and cook until thickened. Add cinnamon and brown sugar. Continue heating until sugar is melted. Serves 6.



This was on the menu too, but I did not make it. We just had regular green beans.

Snijboonen (Cut Beans)
1 1/2 pounds string beans
1/2 cup salt (about)
Wash long, tender green beans well. Cut in thin slices diagonally. Place in an earthen jar in layers with 2 tablespoons salt sprinkled over each layer. When brine comes over beans they can be packed in fruit jars and covered with the brine. To prepare for serving, soak in cold water for a few hours and drain. If necessary, soak and drain a second time. Cover with fresh water and cook until tender. Makes 1 quart.

Verdict:

Apple soup: This was basically homemade applesauce with barley. Pretty good, actually. The barley added a little something to chew on. If I ever get my hands on currants, I might try this one out again for funsies.

Macaroni met Ham un Kaas: Macaroni met lemon-flavored scrambled eggs un chunks of cream cheese. Also with ham and a moat of melted butter floating gently around the rim. As it goes, it wasn't too bad. Besides the lemon, the flavor was pretty good, it just could have been constructed a lot better. The lemon was so strong that every time I accidentally got a little sugar syrup from the raisins on my fork, it instantly tasted like lemon custard with ham and macaroni in it. Odd.

Rozijen: I like raisins. These were tasty, actually, but only for about two bites. After that, it was reeeeeeeeaally sweet. Raisins are pretty sweet by themselves, and with half their weight added in sugar, it was overwhelming. I ate a few bites and then had to stop. It would probably be better over cake or something.

Spicy frankfurters, browned potato loaf, succotash, banana-bran bread, baked fudge dessert

Today's menu comes from a booklet I got from my grandma, entitled "Carefree Cooking...ELECTRICALLY."




Your New Range: of course... it's ELECTRIC.
It's a shining jewel in your kitchen, and just as priceless. With it you'll get a new kind of satisfaction in preparing meals for your family--new zest and fascination in cooking the easy modern electric way. There's no learning to cook over again--use your own favorite recipes or any standard ones--and depend on the accurately measured heat of your "up to the minute" electric range to do the rest.




This lot is all supposed to be put in the oven at the same time at 350 F. for 50 minutes. Unfortunately, my oven is a tiny apartment model. Boo.

Spicy Frankfurters
1 pound frankfurters, sliced
2 tablespoons flour
4 tablespoons water
2/3 cup catsup
4 tablespoons vinegar
4 tablespoons sugar
2 tablespoons prepared mustard

1. Cut frankfurters and place in baking dish.
2. Combine flour with water and mix until smooth. Add other ingredients and pour over frankfurters.
3. Cover and place in oven.




Please observe how I used bakeware from the same vintage as the recipe.

Browned Potato Loaf
2 tablespoons butter or margarine
3 tablespoons flour
1/4 teaspoon salt--dash pepper
1 cup milk
4 to 5 cups cooked potatoes, diced
1 tablespoon minced parsley

1. Make a thick white sauce of butter, flour, salt, and milk.
2. Add potatoes seasoned. Cook 5 minutes.
3. Press into waxed paper lined loaf pan
4. Place in electric refrigerator overnight.
5. Unmold. Turn onto oven-proof platter. Place in oven.




It must be an ELECTRIC refrigerator. Do not worry, electric refrigerators are no harder to use than iceboxes, so do not fear them. I only did a half-recipe, so I molded it in an oval tupperware container. If I were smart, I would have baked this in the other half of the vintage bakeware. That is probably why it was designed with the little wall down the middle that is so usually annoying.

Succotash
1 or 2 packages frozen Succotash
2 to 4 tablespoons butter
Salt
Pepper
2 to 4 tablespoons water

1. Place frozen Succotash in a pan with a close fitting cover.
2. Season with salt and pepper.
3. If 1 package is used, use 2 tablespoons butter and water. 4 tablespoons of each if two packages are used.
4. Bake covered.


Yeah... so I didn't know what succotash is. I later found out, a mixture of corn and beans, possibly with peppers and onions. I didn't find any in the frozen foods, so I came home empty-handed only to discover that they now market succotash as "Southwestern Vegetable Blend." What was wrong with "succotash"? It's a lovely word! Also, why does "heat up ready-made food you found at the store" count as a recipe?? Anyway, we had corn instead.

Banana-Bran Bread
1 1/2 cups mashed bananas
1 egg, well beaten
1 cup all-bran
1/4 cup melted shortening
1 1/2 cups sifted enriched all-purpose flour
1/2 cup sugar
2 1/2 teaspoons baking powder
1/2 teaspoon baking soda

1. Mash bananas, stir in egg, bran, and melted shortening.
2. Sift dry ingredients together, add to banana mixture; stir until well blended.
3. Pour into greased loaf pan 9x5x3.




Baked Fudge Dessert
1 cup sifted all-purpose flour
1/2 teaspoon salt
1/2 cup sugar
2 teaspoons baking powder
5 tablespoons cocoa
1/4 cup shortening
1/2 cup milk
1 teaspoon vanilla
1/2 cup nuts
1/2 cup brown sugar
1/2 cup corn syrup
3/4 cup boiling water

1. Mix and sift flour, salt, sugar baking powder, and 3 tablespoons cocoa.
2. Cut in shortening. Add milk, vanilla, and nuts. Mix well.
3. Spread in 8-inch square pan.
4. Mix brown sugar, remaining 2 tablespoons cocoa, and corn syrup. Add boiling water and mix well.
5. Pour this sauce over mixture in pan.
6. Place in oven.



We also ate this watermelon that Ron cut in the fancy way they showed him in Afghanistan. Neat! You can fork pieces out and eat them out of the rind. We've never figured out exactly the kind of melon they kept giving him. We think it could be a christmas melon.



Verdict:

Spicy frankfurters: These were really, really good. Not spicy in any way whatsoever, but good. As hot dogs go, you know. I was skeptical, what with the saucy sauce, but this is why I like trying out these weird recipes. One step below grilled, but how is a hot dog more delicious than grilled? Especially the ones that got a little burned to the bottom. The sauce caramelized those bits into deliciousness. I'm making these again. Don't knock it 'til you've tried it.

Browned potato loaf: Ron liked it. I thought it was fine. Nothing special. Kind of, you know, potatoey. What is with the 50's and loafed things, though? Does everything have to be made into a loaf?

Banana-bran bread: Oh look, a loaf. Amazing. As banana bread goes, not great. As a breakfasty bread, fine. Still, it's no invalid muffin.

Baked fudge dessert: It made fudge sauce on the bottom. Oh man, it made fudge sauce on the bottom. Fudge sauce.