Gracious Grandmothers Club

I found this picture after googling "weird funny jello." It depicts a "Deviled Ham Jell-O with Carrots". Recently several cookbooks have been published that include really funny, weird, or dated recipes like this one, and I accidentally just inherited such a cookbook from Noel's grandma. "Favorite Recipes by the Gracious Grandmothers Club of Middletown, Ohio" didn't mean to be funny though, which is what makes it even more spectacular. I think Food Network ought to have some sort of stand-up cooking comedian competition, where you either (a) tell jokes while cooking, (b) make humorously disgusting recipes or (c) tell jokes while making humorously disgusting recipes. The recipes from this book fall into all of these categories--here are a few of my favorites:

Corned Beef Salad

To 1 pkg. lemon Jello add 1 1/2 cups hot water. Let jell slightly.

Fold into Jello:

1 cup celery
1 mango or pimento chopped fine

3 large boiled eggs, diced

1 small onion, chopped

3/4 cup miracle whip salad dressing

1 12 oz can flaked corned beef

Mold Jello.

I can't quite decide what is most disturbing about this recipe. Obviously any sort of savory jello is creepy in the first place, but the inclusion of canned corned beef, and the bizarre combination of eggs and mangoes in the same recipe also seem like disasters waiting to happen. I am absolutely not brave enough to attempt this recipe!

I could maybe see myself trying the recipe for Grandmother Wetzel's White Sugar Cookies, which seems relatively innocuous. The funny part of this recipe is the instructions: "Roll out on floured board to 1/8 inch thickness. Cut with 3 1/2 inch cooke cutter. Bake at 350 degrees 12-14 min. Moisten with pastry brush, sprinkle with sugar; decorate with three raisins only." That's the part that gets me. "Three raisins only". Was Grandmother Wetzel a Raisin-Nazi? If you have more raisins will it taste bad? What happens if you only put two raisins? Or leave the raisins off altogether???

And, last but not least, the artery-clogging recipe for

Italian Meat Balls:

10 small cans tomato paste

2 cans water to each can paste

Bring to a boil, lower heat and cook slowly for two hours.

Mix together:

3 pounds hamburger

1 clove garlic

2 1/2 cups bread crumbs

6 eggs

1 1/2 cups Italian cheese, grated

1 tsp basil and parsley

Roll into small balls; if not smooth, add more eggs. Fry meat balls and four pounds Italian link sausage cut in small pieces. Add tomato paste with half of grease from skillet. Serve on prepared spaghetti.

Recipes like that make me glad that people now know words like "saturated fat" and "cholesterol".