“Sissy-Sweet” Salads

[RedAngie]

Ladies, if you want to hook a rich bachelor, don’t make the mistake of serving him a sissy-sweet salad. Men like them tart.

 

[RedAngie]

 

[LoveSpringsteen]

Ugh! That’s where I went wrong!

 

[Cannot_Wait_4Disney]

An excerpt from my new novel.

It was difficult to pinpoint the exact moment Red knew her romance would end. But when she made spaghettios in aspic and found the next morning that he had dumped it in her bath tub the night before was the last straw. Why couldn't he just be brave and eat it like me, she thought as she puked her meal into the toilet.

 

[Sinder]

Wow that’s really offensive.
What kind of person would even come up with that pineapple and cheese recipe. I hope their likeness has been taken off any package labels

 

[Micca]

Did anyone else Google "Last time anyone was in a dither?"

Oh Lady...What a salad!

 

[luvnwdwgal]

I grew up in the 60’s and 70’s and my aunt would bring a disgusting green jello mold with pineapple and cottage cheese in it to every family get together. Makes me nauseous just thinking about it.

 

[Dan Murphy]

Prunes and Knox gelatin, yum

 

[Micca]

I grew up in the 60’s and 70’s and my aunt would bring a disgusting green jello mold with pineapple and cottage cheese

Did your aunt also make that for "Carry-In" dinners (i.e.potluck meals) in the church basement? Growing up there was one of those every damn time!

 

[NotUrsula]

When I first moved North, my new boss decided that since I would not be able to go home for Thanksgiving, I should go to her house. I really didn't want to, but she insisted, so I went.

There were THREE strange savory gelatin "salads" on the menu. I hadn't seen any since the mid-1960s, and there was no way that I was eating one. Most uncomfortable dinner of my life.

 

[Micca]

The ones I recall are the cottage cheese in lime jello, and shredded carrots in orange Jello.

 

[luvnwdwgal]

Did your aunt also make that for "Carry-In" dinners (i.e.potluck meals) in the church basement? Growing up there was one of those every damn time!

I’m sure she did!

 

[prairie_girl]

I remember my mom making a neon green jello salad that had pineapple rings and cherries around the outside.

 

[Bianca and Bernard]

My mom had a cookbook from Jello that she had gotten years before I was born. It had all sorts of weird Jello recipes. Meat in jello, meat jello, celery jello, etc. I'll have to look through my boxes to see if I still have it...

I remember she made one for dad, that had condensed tomato soup, gelatin, cream cheese, shrimp..probably celery and mayo and who knows what else in it. He threw it out, and asked her to never make that again.

My aunt was famous for making one of two 'salads'; one with lemon jello, pineapple, pimento cheese, and cool whip; the other with lime jello, mayo, pineapple, cheddar and nuts.


Collectors weekly has an article here about some of the bad 1950s recipes. Warning; it mentions hard boiled eggs in gelatin, liver pate en masque (liver, canned green beans in a mold, with a sauce of gelatin, pepper and no fat buttermilk), and chicken mousse 'ice cream'.


When DGS#3 turned a year old, I went to visit. DD#1 invited her in-laws over for a BBQ because I hadn't met them before. (long story) Her MIL brought over the orange jello w/pineapple and carrots mold, and my wonderfully tactless DD#2 blurted out "who in the hell made this monstrosity?". I have never seen anyone get 'visibly miffed' before, but she fit the definition to a tee. (I mean, the woman wouldn't get down and play with the babies, and actually shooed DGS#2 away from her when he went to say hi. There's 3 months difference between the 2 boys. Me? I sat, and laid down, on the floor to play with the babies; I have no shame about it.)

 

[Micca]

I remember she made one for dad, that had condensed tomato soup, gelatin, cream cheese, shrimp..probably celery and mayo and who knows what else in it.

This sounds like tomato aspic. I've had it (just with celery--no shrimp or cream cheese) and I thought it was good. It isn't sweet at all, it a sort of tomato salad.
https://thelocalpalate.com/recipes/tomato-aspic/

 

[Mysterian]

Ladies, if you want to hook a rich bachelor, don’t make the mistake of serving him a sissy-sweet salad. Men like them tart.

View attachment 675706

"In a dither" just entered my lexicon!
Jell-O salads have always been a mystery to me. They always look like some sort of glass tchotchke paperweight. Also incredibly nasty, people just put anything in them. Olives? blech.

 

[RedAngie]

I remember she made one for dad, that had condensed tomato soup, gelatin, cream cheese, shrimp..probably celery and mayo and who knows what else in it. He threw it out, and asked her to never make that again.




S

She probably used “dessert gelatin” which is 85% sugar. Didn’t she realize that men like their gelatin salads tart?

I have two of my mother’s “Joys of Jello-o” cookbooks. They’re filled with all kinds of monstrosities.

 

[leebee]

My mom used to make what we called "Moon Salad." It had lime jello, pineapple, cottage cheese, and I think cool whip... maybe Dream Whip, this was the late 60's and I'm not sure cool whip had been invented yet. We all really enjoyed it, much more than the salad my MIL made with canned mandarins, canned pineapple, coconut, mini marshmallows, sour cream (or cool whip... can't remember). Man, did those marshmallows get slimy!

 

[NotUrsula]

The whole Jello mold thing was a postwar attempt at sophistication for the masses. Some of them did indeed LOOK pretty, and if you'd made them out of plastic that might have been fine, but eating them was just too much to ask most of the time; they were God-awful.

I guess there's a good reason that all of those gelatin molds ended up being used as wall decor.