Purely by
chance recently I came across a recipe for ‘Christmas Salad,’ – which was very
timely indeed. I was initially inspired to search for other historical recipes
for dishes with this name, but ended up focusing on the avocado instead.
In case
you missed my post several years ago on the topic of the ‘calavo’ – it was the
new name developed for the fruit by the CALifornia AVOcado Growers’ Association
decades ago. Obviously, the name did not stick, so avocado it is today.
Here is
the recipe that started me off:
Christmas Salad
Calavo, diced, 2 cups
Red apples, unpeeled, diced, 2
cups
Lemon juice 3 tablespoons
Olive or salad oil, 4 tablespoons
Salt, ½ teaspoon
1.
Combine diced calavo and red apples; toss together
lightly.
2.
Mix lemon juice, oil, and salt.
3.
Pour over fruit and allow to stand in refrigerator
until ready to serve.
4.
Serve in lettuce cups; garnish with watercress
(Makes 8 servings.)
The China Press,
December 24, 1936.
The following recipe is
entirely appropriate for the season too, although I have to say that it does
not appeal to me personally at all:
Calavo Egg-Nog
(For One)
One egg, one cupful milk (part cream
can be used though unnecessary,) three tablespoonful sugar, sprinkle salt,
Guasti* sherry, Burgundy jelly.
Beat white of egg until stiff –
add one tablespoonful of the sugar. Mix yolk with sieved calavo. Stir in one
tablespoonful sugar and sprinkling salt. Add very gradually cupful of milk. Add
one or two teaspoonfuls wine flavouring. Top or fold in the stiff meringue. Add
a dash of nutmeg and top with a tiny piece of Burgundy jelly.
Los Angeles Times
September 4, 1933.
Guasti sherry was a
Prohibition substitute for ‘cooking sherry’: I mentioned it in a previous post,
which you can find here.
Anything with
cranberries is also right for the season:
Calavo-Cranberry Mousse.
1 cup cranberry puree
⅔ cup
granulated sugar
2 tablespoons lemon juice
Few grains salt
1 cup diced calavo
1 pint whipping cream
To prepare cranberry puree, drain
juice from unsweetened, cooked cranberries; then force through siee. Add sugar
to hot cranberry puree to dissolve; cool, and add lemon juice and salt. Prepare
calavo by cutting into halves, removing seed, peeling and cutting into small
cubes. Whip cream until thick and fold in cranberry puree and calavo cubes
gently. Pour into refrigerator trays and freeze. Serves ten to twelve.
Los
Angeles Times, January 16, 1936
And from
an Australian newspaper in 1945, in an article on Food of the American South-west
comes this novelty.
As an appetiser, Guacamole is particularly suited to a
meal of this kind and, is simple to prepare. First, peel an avocado, remove the
seed and put the pulp through a sieve; if it is ripe enough, mash with a fork.
Feel and chop one tomato and mix it into avocado pulp to keep it from darkening.
Add one tablespoon of lemon juice, one teaspoon of Worcestershire sauce, one
half teaspoon of salt, one small onion, minced, and two dashes of hot pepper
sauce. Chill and serve in bowl as a spread.
Cairns Post (Qld.) 26 October, 1945.
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