Monday, November 20, 2017

How to Cook for Thanksgiving: Vintage Ads Tell Us!

My mother did make pumpkin pie with canned pumpkin and Pet milk. She also made
a stellar apple pie, which I believe my sister is going to make for us on Thursday!

McCormick has been packaging and advertising spices since 1889.
Our family dinners long ago used most of these spices. Also now!
Most of us really don't much like pumpkin pie these days.
From 1902: another brand of seasoning. I found many ads for Thanksgiving
menu items on the web and in my old magazines. Most of the ads (except
this very old one) make me think of the Thanksgiving dinners of the
past and how our tastes have changed without giving up the classics.
This ad from 1924 illustrates how long American cooks have been making sweet
potato casserole topped with marshmallows. (Actually it started quite a bit earlier!)
My aunts used to make this for Thanksgiving, but we've moved on to a more
savory sweet potato recipe with garlic, cilantro, and no added sugar.
Another random ad from the internet.
Ocean Spray canned cranberry sauce is an old-time
classic. Some time ago, I started making several cranberry
recipes from scratch instead of just slicing it up.
This ad could appear right now and no one would think anything of it.
Unless you are actually supposed to recognize the name Margaret Rudkin (google doesn't).
From our local food corporation, Chelsea Milling Company, comes the
corn muffin mix used in the Thanksgiving favorite corn casserole.
Jiffy Mixes aren't advertised much, so I didn't actually find an ad for this.
This ad really looks unappetizing -- and pathetic. Not so vintage, either.
I feel sorry for anyone who eats like this! We always make our own gravy.
I don't remember this classic green bean casserole as a family tradition,
but it sure does get a lot of attention in food histories and recipe collections.
Campbell's introduced it in 1955. It seems to have swept the Nation.
Whatever.
This ad really makes me sad, reminding me of how normal smoking once was.
My father smoked Camels for most of his life: until it was too late.

5 comments:

Beth F said...

fun collection of old ads!

Carole said...

Love those ads. Have a great week. Cheers from Carole's Chatter

Deb in Hawaii said...

A very entertaining look back. Although allowing for regional and familial differences, ;-) I still see a lot of familiar dishes from my youth here. Thanks for sharing!

jama said...

Fun to see the old ads. We've come quite a ways since then with updated versions of old favorites, but I still like pumpkin pie using canned pumpkin and evaporated milk!

Nan said...

My father smoked camels, too, and my mother L&M's which I just saw the other day. I didn't know they still made them. They bought them by the cartons and I can still see them sitting on the butt'ry shelf.