Foodie Facts

Consider this The Food Lover's Companion lite--short and sweet trivia about retro American food. Who pitted the first cherries and nestled them into pie crust? Was a meatloaf sandwich the result of a late-night refrigerator run? And does anyone really crave green bean casserole, complete with fried onions on top? In this time of hyperawareness of locality--when every roast chicken needs a pedigree of a free-range home and antibiotic-free past--it's time to celebrate the very basics of American cooking, the joy of Velveeta and pleasures of Jell-O. In this fun collection, author Ann Treistman takes readers on a journey through a 1950s kitchen, sometimes with surprising results. For example, deviled eggs were first prepared in ancient Rome, in a slightly different form and without the familiar moniker. The practice of removing the yolks from hard-boiled eggs, mixing it with spices and refilling the shells was fairly common by the 1600s. Why the devil? Well, it's hot in hell, and by the eighteenth century, it was all the rage to devil any food with a good dose of spice. Adding mustard or a signature sprinkle of hot paprika turned these eggs into devils. The perfect gift for those who love to make, bake, and eat food, Foodie Facts promises to be a wickedly good read with recipes to boot.