Kathleen, Loved your post. Great observation.

One of my all time favorites is, still is, Comrade Chicken-Russian dressing, onion soup mix, apricot or orange jelly with chicken. Don't laugh, it's good-yeah the onion soup mix is not so healthy-but per person, it's not so bad.

Those names have me seeing shades of Ray :) I guess you have me feeling a little punny, too. I think most people, like myself, find recipes online by typing in whatever ingredients they have on hand.

That's cool... I'm going through a stack of cookbooks each evening (I need to thin the herd) and I've found some of the titles "interesting", but now I'll be looking at them with a fresh eye.

I was teaching a class at the Senior Center and the manager was telling me what was being served for lunch if I wanted to stay. After she mentioned the main entree she quickly corrected herself. She told me they used to call it by the first name and nobody stuck around to eat it and it was one of their least attended lunches. A smart food service manager changed the name and now it was the second favorite lunch. Go figure....

A book I was going through last night I noticed was loaded with hyphenated names:

Moroccan-Style Lamb Chops
Triple-Decker Vegetable Omelet
Bolognese-Style Pork Ragu Over Spaghetti Squash
Jalapeno-Lime Chicken
Indian-Style Vegetable Stir-Fry
Orange-Scented Panna Cotta
Strawberry-Topped Cheesecake Cups

-Grainlady

If my memory serves me....recipes form the 50's rarely wer much of a clue to what was in the dish...
I think chicken marbella, is one Ceasar salad, Snickerdoodles are a few examples.
One of the favorite recipe names in my file is "cherry berry in a cloud". Not too hare to figure out but certainly fancifully described!
Linda c

I remember from the movie The Women that Norma Shearer asked her cook to make Pancakes Barbara for breakfast, and the cook thought it had too many calories for the husband. It reminds me of desserts like Bananas Foster, Crepes Suzette, etc. My first dish in a French restaurant was Poulet Henriette.

Some restaurants here used to name dishes after celebrities, especially restaurants like Van Gogh's Ear (now closed) formerly in Venice.

Lars

I remember as a young kid trying to figure out what Baked Alaska was? lol

/tricia

I went looking for a recipe for Pancakes Barbara and found a recipe for MacArthur Park Cake. :)

Here is a link that might be useful: In honor of Donna Summer.

AAAAAGH!!
Grainlady, what was the lunch served at the
senior center???

Julienning - Whatever happened to matchstick, thin strip? Shoestring?

Caramelize - I used to just brown things.

Al dente - How about firm?

Au jus - juice?

Entree - main course ?

dcarch

Shades of Ray -- LOL. Very punny.

lbpod-

Sorry, I can't remember what the renamed meal delight was....

Here are some recipe names I've found odd....

-Mimi's Purloined Empire-Building Raised Waffles

-Outrageously Oatmeal Bread - Really? It's only 1/2 c. of oatmeal...

-All the "IMPOSSIBLE" Bisquick recipes, which are possible.

- From a USDA Booklet entitled "FAMILY FARE a guide to good nutrition" - 1974 "Luncheon special"

- "The Fantabulous Whole Wheat Carrot Cake" - a favorite recipe, but what kind of a word is "fantabulous" in association with carrot cake?

- I have early COOK BOOKS (two words), and later COOKBOOKS (one word).

- I have an affinity for "MOCK" recipes. If it's got oatmeal in it, then it's oatmeal pie, not "MOCK" Pecan Pie.

- Thrifty Recipes (by Better Homes and Gardens - 1928)

"Hygienic Welsh Rarebit"

"Minoodle"

"One Dish Meal a la Casserole"

"Scrambled Potatoes" (a mix of diced potatoes and scrambled eggs)

"Mock Oyster Dish" uses salmon

"Mock Fried Oysters" uses eggplant

"Meatless Vegetable Soup" - wouldn't that just be Vegetable soup?

"Delicious Carrots" and "Splendid Carrots" (attitude?)

"Ecstatic Onions (onions, white sauce, ground cold ham, buttered crumbs)

"Roast Mock Goose" (spareribs, apples and prunes)

"Mock Duck" (flank steaks, mashed potatoes, bread cut in small pieces, onion, sage and salt)

"Miniature Chickens" (slices of cold roast pork, slices of bacon, bread crumbs, sage, salt, onion, egg, leftover gravy)

"Creamed Mock Chicken on Toast" (side pork, pork steak or veal steak, onion, salt, pepper, milk)

"Meatless Meat Loaf" (cold cooked beans, bread crumbs, walnuts, bell pepper, egg, fat, salt and pepper)

"Baked Hamburger" (Ingredients: hamburger, diced potatoes, onion, cracker or bread crumbs, dry sage, parsley and mint. Instructions: Boil all ingredients together for 15 minutes, then pour into a baking dish and add catsup. Bake in 300-degree oven about 45 minutes.)

-Grainlady

And...Salisbury steak....which isn't steak at all....or Swiss steak which is...

Some time after WW II it seems we adopted many foods that were "european"...probably brought back as ideas from those serving in the armed forces. But perhaps my observation has to do with the fact that I was more aware of food as a 9 year old than I was before.
I think it was during that time about 1946, that we got Pizza....also known by us non Italians as Pizza pie. and scampi, also known as shrimp scampi by those who didn't know it was an Italian way of cooking prawns with lots of garlic. I remember seeing Chicken Cacciatore With Tomato sauce on a menu. And finally after the end of the war we were able to convert "Liberty Cabbage" back to Coleslaw

I didn't see any influx of Vietnamese food after our troops came home from there...nor Korean foods after that skirmish was over. But already we are seeing a large influx in middle eastern foods into the American everyday menu.
Our food preferences are always evolving, thank goodness!!

Well, it's still good to know no matter what it's called, things don't change that much.
We had noodles with meat sauce last night or Tufoli with Bolognese sauce.

Great collection, grainlady! I wonder what makes the Welsh rarebit hygienic? And I can't imagine mint in a hamburger & potato dish, but then I can't imagine boiling it for 15 minutes before baking it either.

(Maybe the mint was the "green vegetable" the way a friend said he put green onions in a dish to increase the green vegetables his son eats! Unclear on the concept.)

Have you seen the Ritz Cracker's Mock Apple Pie recipe on the box?

Snickerdoodle - "This whimsical name originated in New England; it's simply a nineteenth century nonsense word for a quickly made confection."

Apple Slump - "Louisa May Alcott loved this dessert so much that she named her home in Concord, Mass., "Apple Slump." It was a steamed apple dessert. How about OREO Villa? Dark brown home with white trim.

Salisbury Steak - "Dr. James Henry Salisbury might have been the first of the protein-diet doctors, proclaiming in 1888 than humankind's maladies were caused by too much starchy food. His solution? Chopped lean meat, or hamburger steak. To hide the "liver-y" taste of hamburger, he recommended adding horseradish, mustard or Worcestershire sauce. By the 1900s, Salisbury steak was a staple menu item, often served with mushroom gravy or smothered onions".

-Was Devil's Food Cake invented as the nemesis to Angel Food Cake?

-Red Flannel Hash - so called because of the crimson color beets gave to the dish.

-Grainlady

And there is Hummingbird Cake, but the little birds are safe.

And then there are the Navy terms for some foods...

***t on a Shingle (chipped beef on toast)

And more....(grin)

I've enjoyed reading this thread; it's interesting!

Donna

And didn't you get grossed out the first time you heard of 'Toad in the hole'? Even though no amphibians were harmed in the making of the dish.

And a lot of people refer to any sort of kool-aid or punch as 'Bug Juice'.

We use to call the rolled up left over pie dough sprinkled with cinnamon and sugar, 'Pigs in a Blanket'. Found out much later that was the name of something else. I don't why we called the pie dough treats that.
Clare

Aptosca, long time avid reader but rarely post.

Loved to see your reference to the pie dough with cinnamon and sugar. My mother added butter to the mix.

She learned the trick from her mother, but have never heard of others doing the same (maybe I am sheltered?)

anyone else? Just taught it to my own daughter this past weekend to much delight!

mississaugamom - I forgot to say that you dotted it with butter. Sometimes we would put homemade jelly or jam in the rolled up dough. I think I liked those more than the actual pie. LOL. My son now loves the "leftovers" too. Glad that you are passing it along to your daughter. I just turned 60 last Dec. and was taught by my Mom who was taught by her Mom. So the tradition has been going on for more than a 100 years.
Clare

We always made "cookies" out of left over pie dough....buttered it and sprinkled with cinnamon and sugar.
And in the interest of more "playing with the dough" sometimes we spread jam on, folded it over and smushed down the edges so the jam couldn't escape!

Yeah....descriptive recipes....pigs in a blanket... hot dogs or sausage wrapped in biscuit dough... toad in a hole... egg fried in a piece of bread with a hole cut in it...ants on a log, cream cheese and raisins in a celery sticks....Welsh rabbit which is melted cheese sauce....cottage pudding which is cake....
And probably lots more I can't remember.