Comments on: Retro recipie attempts at “the good old days”

By: the good old days » Blog Archive » Retro Recipe Attempt: Mock Apple Pie

Thu, 23 Oct 2008 13:35:02 +0000

[...] week’s retro cooking was inspired largely by comments on Historiann’s post about my Not-So-Orange Velvet Pie. I’d never heard of the Mock Apple Pie which was mentioned [...]

By: Indyanna

Indyanna — Sun, 05 Oct 2008 18:40:02 +0000

Won’t even require monetizing (the shirts part, I mean). Everyone could design their own favorite shirt, “source” it locally, and send in the image for potential posting.

By: Historiann

Historiann — Sun, 05 Oct 2008 14:20:04 +0000

Well, Indyanna, I guess you could offer colonial campfire cookies!

And Rose, I’m glad you like “the good old days.” (Tom, you can still send Xmas cookies–I’ll have to work on the shirt.)

I’m sure many of you have already seen the T-shirt that says, “More people have read this T-shirt than have read your stupid blog.” I think most of us academics could get T-shirts that say, “More people have read this T-shirt than have read my stupid book,” and that would probably be accurate, too.

By: Indyanna

Indyanna — Sun, 05 Oct 2008 03:17:05 +0000

Historiann,

I realized right after I hit send yesterday that neither of my ovens (@Philly or in Bituminosia) actually works, in the sense of heating up! So I might have had to “bake” these things on a sheet propped over an open fire in the backyard. Except that I also don’t really have a yard at either place. All that said, I would like to have a T-shirt for next summer; I even have a good design in mind!

By: Rose

Rose — Sat, 04 Oct 2008 23:20:07 +0000

You’re right, Historiann–I *do* really enjoy that blog! Thanks for bringing it to my attention. As Tom notes, above, his parents still engage in some pretty retro foodways, but *my* parents actually have retro FOOD in their house. Seriously–stuff that no one’s seen on a grocery store shelf since 1967.

By: Tom

Tom — Sat, 04 Oct 2008 21:07:05 +0000

Christmas pudding made with suet is a long standing family tradition where I come from (though it seems to get ever harder to find good suet, most of which is destined for bird feeders, I guess). I love it, of course, but somehow Rose never seems quite as enthusiastic. And I’m pretty sure I’ve eaten the mock apple pie; another tradition on the old homestead is mock mincemeat, which I also love. Mockery, just generally, I guess, was an old tradition at home, now that I think of it.

And maybe we’ll send you some Xmas cookies, Historiann, if you up the ante on the prizes to Historiann-logo T-shirts. Oh wait, I guess you decided against monetizing, didn’t you?

By: Sisyphus

Sisyphus — Sat, 04 Oct 2008 19:31:10 +0000

Wait, I want my readers to send me cookies! Brilliant plan, Historiann!

And I wouldn’t be able to eat any of the foods even from when I was growing up any more … mom hasn’t cooked any of them since she had to do on a low-cholesterol diet.

But speaking of baking, I remember when she used to make pies from scratch and had a little extra lump of dough, she used to make “cinnamon sugar pie,” which was a thin little mini crust baked up with lots of cinnamon and sugar on top. Kinda like a cross between a snickerdoodle and a really crispy dessert quesadilla. Yum!

By: Historiann

Historiann — Sat, 04 Oct 2008 13:40:56 +0000

Little Midwestern College, as I recall (and as Indyanna suggests), “Mock Apple Pie” was a recipe on the back of the Ritz Cracker box in the 1970s. How interesting that that even-higher-carb “apple” pie recipe has such deep roots–I never would have guessed that! Thanks for the fun facts.

And, Indyanna–the cookie contest was just a joke about trying to get my readers to do my holiday baking for me…but if you insist…

By: Indyanna

Indyanna — Sat, 04 Oct 2008 03:50:14 +0000

If you waited all year for something spectacular from, say, Cakewrecks, I think that orange thing (how did the slice end up being so un-orange?) would be a bit of a letdown. Those old church auxilliary community-gathered fund-raiser cookbooks were/are great documents, however. I’m remembering that that mock apple pie recipe enjoyed a surge of popularity back in the–well, it wasn’t the EIGHTEEN-fifties that I’m remembering!!–and, despite my eight year old skepticism, it was really quite good and convincing. I’m e-mailing my sister tomorrow (wait, she doesn’t use e-mail) for an old family recipe to take a run at that holiday cookie contest you announced, Historiann!

By: Little Midwestern College

Little Midwestern College — Sat, 04 Oct 2008 01:39:08 +0000

Hey Historiann, great post, made me smile. The other day in my class on nineteenth century frontier women we read an 1850s text that referenced “mock apple pie” made of crackers, water, sugar, and spiced with cinnamon and cloves in pie crust (no actual apples at all), which horrified my students. I had to fess up to them that I’ve actually had it (made by my grandma, of course, who was very thrifty, from a mid-twentieth century version of the recipe using saltines crackers)–it’s really not that bad. But then we also liked the sugar sandwiches she made for us. . .