It was an epic contest. It spanned about 4 months and had 10 winners. I really can’t blame you if you couldn’t keep track of all the gelatin-goodness (There was a ton of it!), so I decided to do a re-cap so we can relive the fun, the horror and the gelatin.
Best Recipe – Fourth Place:
From Tom’s tasting notes:
Tangy and good. Fun with a interesting texture.
Best Recipe – Third Place:
From Tom’s tasting notes:
Shortbread texture. Very sweet, but not in a bad way. Glaze was good. Strong fruit flavor.
Best Recipe – Second Place:
From Tom’s tasting notes:
Super lemon-y. Dense, but also light. Moist. Not too shabby.
Best Recipe – First Place:
From Tom’s tasting notes:
Delish! It tastes like pie!
Worst Recipe – Fourth Place:
From Tom’s testing notes:
Not good. The flavors just did not combine correctly. The cream cheese and tomato layers were too strong and totally overpowered the ham layer.
Worst Recipe – Third Place:
From Tom’s tasting notes:
Lemon. Olive. Pineapple. And it tastes like it.
Worst Recipe – Second Place:
Chicken Mousse, aka Chicken Ice Cream
Tom’s tasting notes:
Chicken-tastic. Disgusting texture, almost like frozen foam.
Worst Recipe – Grand Prize Winner!
From Tom’s tasting notes:
Awful. Very rancid fish flavor with a strange texture. Lots of vinegar. Needed crackers to even get it down. Should not be a gelatin.
Tom’s Pick:
From Tom’s tasting notes:
It works. The gelatin tasted really good with the meat and cheese. A nice citrus flavor with a good level of spiciness. The biggest negative was that it made my hands sticky.
Ruth’s Pick:
Grandma Porter’s Lime Jell-O with Avocado & Grapefruit
From Tom’s Tasting Notes:
An amazing combination of flavors. Fascinating.
Whew! Pretty amazing to see them all together like that, huh? I LOVE it! Be sure to stay tuned as I bring you more tested vintage gelatin recipes in the weeks to come that you fabulous people submitted for the contest!
*Thanks again to all of the sponsors who gave prizes for the contest, Brigitte from My Nifty Thrifty, Renee from Crash Pad Designs, Thoroughly Modern Milkshakes by Adam Ried from W.W. Norton & Company, Inc., Christy at OrWa Designs, and our fab friends at The CRAVEyard!
Hi, I typed in “retro recipes” and found your blog. I admire, and am super amaze by the courage you and your husband had towards mid century recipes. LOL. The gelatin and ketchup…I do love spam tho lol.
Anyway, I did find the retro recipes that I originally was looking for (Spaghetti and eggs sounds like a winner!), will definitely come back again! Thanks for sharing :)!!
Thanks to you and Tom, I just had laugh tears running down my face as I read about the tuna pizza. I grew up in the 50’s and, thankfully, don’t remember many of these recipes. But I do remember my mom going crazy with instant mashed potatoes from time to time.I also inherited about 80 of these old booklets from my mother-in-law and have tried some of the recipes. Your blog has inspired me to increase my efforts. My current favorite came from Campbell soup,where I discovered how to entertain my guests by throwing a “soup-a-nanny”!