Favorite Recipes of Famous Women<\/em>, published by Harper & Brothers in 1925.<\/p>\nYears ago, I came across this title by way of one single recipe\u2014an anecdotal, two paragraph wonder by Mrs. F. Scott Fitzgerald, described by Stratton as \u201cwife of author of \u2018The Beautiful and Damned,\u2019 \u2018The Jazz Age,\u2019 etc.\u201d It was an entry called \u201cBreakfast.\u201d\u00a0<\/p>\n
See if there is any bacon, and if there is, ask the cook which pan to fry it in. Then ask if there are any eggs, and if so, try to persuade the cook to poach two of them. It is better not to attempt toast as it burns very easily.<\/p>\n
At the time, I was hunting through a large volume of Zelda Fitzgerald\u2019s own collected writings for threads of Zelda\u2019s consuming obsession with ballet\u2014a tragically futile pursuit to throw oneself into at twenty-seven\u2014and I quickly moved on. Much later, I returned to the recipe and was attracted to\u00a0its idiosyncrasy. I had to have the book\u2014a task beyond Amazon, but within my grasp by special request at one of the largest libraries in the country.<\/p>\n
As it turns out, the book\u2014or, at any rate, the available copy I delightfully pored through for days\u2014is a compact, unassuming volume with a red cover so plain it makes the fleur-de-lis pattern on Mastering the Art of French Cooking<\/em> look downright sexy. But within are recipes that read like succinct narratives\u2014little pearls of creative writing by some of the most accomplished women of the twenties.<\/p>\nBy the mid-1920s, when this book was published, Florence Stratton was already a newspaperwoman, working in Beaumont at the local journal, which later became the Beaumont Enterprise<\/em>, covering the society beat. She was well connected, with dear friends that included the first lady of Texas, Willie Chapman Cooper Hobby, in residence at the Governor\u2019s Mansion in Austin. But Stratton, Texas born and raised, was an intelligent woman from the start\u2014educated and driven. She was a master of commentary, veiled in a sweet affability.<\/p>\nDropping names from the get-go, in her foreword Stratton recounts the story of an early attempt at cooking from what she refers to as a book of \u201cassembled recipes by noted men of this country.\u201d From this volume\u20141922\u2019s Stag Cook Book: Written for Men by Men\u2014<\/em>Stratton attempted a recipe for chicken halibut by the silent-film producer Thomas H. Ince. This first brush with celebrity cooking sent Stratton straight to the hospital.<\/p>\nA disenchanted Stratton shortly thereafter received a letter from her closest friend, Mrs. William Hobby, describing a personal collection of recipes from her female acquaintances. Willie Hobby, a progressive and popular figure both in Washington and Austin, had purportedly gathered the recipes while living in the Governor\u2019s Mansion. But one imagines Willie built the foundation of this impressive collection while at cocktail parties and balls, as she worked the room. In other words, it was based not just on celebrity worship, but on personal connections.<\/p>\n
Says Stratton, with a certain dramatic flair, \u201cI knew I had been the victim of the illusions of the great men of this country,\u201d But, \u201cI knew that in the recipes of the great ladies of this land, tender mementoes of secret ambitions to win hearts they loved, lay my way back to health and happiness.\u201d<\/p>\n
Stratton was far from immune to the lure of high society and celebrity. Yet, here she had honed in on something real: food and meals shared between people create an immediate intimacy, and personality can be found between the lines of most any recipe.<\/p>\n
And Stratton is loose with her definition of a recipe. Several entries, especially those categorized as miscellaneous in the extensive table of contents, read more like compelling micro-stories. Zona Gale, the first woman to win the Pulitzer Prize for Drama, in 1921, shared her recipe for a \u201cHappy Meal:\u201d<\/p>\n
\nWhen you put your hand on the knob of the dining-room door or step across its threshold, remember that that in which you are about to participate is a kind of sacrament for spirit and mind as well as for body. Make the hour live in spirit and mind as well as in body. Let every moment of the time be as beautiful as a sentence in a beautiful ritual, and know that it is of the highest importance. If there are children present, draw them up into this new air, make the hour not dedicated to flavors, but to sanctities of which we probably have as yet but the dimmest understanding, and leave the table with the sense of having administered to more than bodily needs by more than bread and meat.<\/p>\n<\/blockquote>\n
Should you have forgotten by now that this is a cookbook, rest assured there are many recipes amongst the 160 that are traditionally instructive: A steamed pudding from Mrs. C. A. Culberson, \u201cwife of the late senator of Texas;\u201d scotch haggis by Countess Margot Asquith, and leek salad from her daughter Princess Bibesco; two recipes for frozen strawberries; a cheese souffl\u00e9\u00a0via Mrs. Thomas Edison. (God help you if you don\u2019t like eggs and mayo, or if you don\u2019t own a mold.) Yet there are other recipes that read conventionally at first, and then deepen upon reflection. Consider Mary Pickford\u2019s \u201ceggs milady,\u201d which is so extravagant with its p\u00e2t\u00e9 de foie gras and black truffles that I couldn\u2019t help but think the screen siren must have been compensating for something. And, indeed, Pickford had a very humble upbringing and began acting as a small child in order to support her fatherless family. As one of the biggest movie stars of that time, Pickford\u2014famously canny\u2014undoubtedly selected this particular recipe with eyes wide open, and a clear idea of what she hoped the reader would deduce about her lifestyle.<\/p>\n
A few are more openly telling, like Helen Keller\u2019s Golden Gate salad, which is linked explicitly to a happy memory of California. Still others display subtle humor: see the Salvation Army\u2019s \u201cMa\u201d Burdick, whose manageable recipe for doughnuts yields six hundred.<\/p>\n
I could determine which women came to the author through Willie Hobby\u2014their vocations and achievements as senators\u2019 and ambassadors\u2019 wives, spouses of ministers, government employees and dignitaries serving as helpful clues\u2014but maybe I am selling Mrs. Hobby short; perhaps she did run in the same social circle as the actress Agnes Ayres or artist Neysa McMein. Most of the contributors to Favorite Recipes of Famous Women<\/em> were, in fact, society women, and I found their names more recognizable and enduring than the film and stage stars when skimming the lengthy table of contents. Lady Nancy Astor, for example, is more immediately familiar today than silent-film actress Dorothy Dalton.<\/p>\nHowever, when Harper & Brothers decided to publish Stratton\u2019s collection, they did send out their own additional inquiries, perhaps to increase the glamour. In an introduction to a volume of love letters between Zelda and Scott Fitzgerald, their granddaughter commented that the publisher asked Zelda to contribute to the book, which offers some much-needed clarification as to why Zelda would provide any advice in the area of domestic arts, and especially in the kitchen. Throughout her life, while possessing of many talents, she was not one to adorn an apron readily. In a letter to her husband in 1931, when\u00a0he was off in Hollywood, she wrote of her plans for Thanksgiving, \u201cWe are all going to mamma\u2019s to-morrow for Thanksgiving. I gave her the turkey and Tilde [Zelda\u2019s sister] the trimmings.\u201d But Zelda, like many of the women in Favorite Recipes of Famous Women<\/em>, would have been keenly aware of how their recipes would read in the landscape of 1920\u2019s society, and they were talented enough to command the opportunity.<\/p>\nStratton, herself, would go on to author more books including a vivid tale of O. Henry\u2019s early love life, The White Plume; or, O. Henry\u2019s Own Short Story<\/em>. Later, she wrote a newspaper column that would solidify her favorable reputation and local appeal\u2014a society column that was devoured by the ladies of Texas called \u201cSusie Spindletop\u2019s Weekly Letter,\u201d which she started in the\u00a0Beaumont Enterprise<\/em> in 1928.<\/p>\nShe may have set out with the intention of compiling a book of culinary endeavors by famous female figures, but she also succeeded in creating a vivid snapshot of these women. According to Stratton, their contributions would be more edible than those of their male counterparts\u2014or, at the very least, not make you sick.<\/p>\n
Meryl Cates lives in Astoria, NY. Her writing has appeared or is forthcoming on\u00a0<\/em>The Toast,\u00a0<\/em>McSweeney\u2019s Internet Tendency, and\u00a0<\/em>Interview Magazine.<\/i><\/p>\n <\/p>\n
<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"
The celebrity cookbook is a perennially popular genre, oscillating through the decades between self-indulgence and self-improvement. Well-known figures like Chrissy Teigen, the prolific Gwyneth Paltrow, and musician\/chef Kelis will all guide you through their home cooking if you\u2019ll let them. You can probably get better recipes from your grandmother, but privileged information from a big […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":884,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_acf_changed":false,"footnotes":""},"categories":[5027],"tags":[21193,21198,21196,21197,21194,3290,21195],"class_list":["post-94576","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-on-food","tag-florence-stratton","tag-helen-keller","tag-margot-asquith","tag-mary-pickford","tag-willie-chapman-cooper-hobby","tag-zelda-fitzgerald","tag-zona-gale"],"acf":[],"yoast_head":"\n
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<\/p>\n