In this weekly series, home cook Bruce Watson works his way through a decades-old family cookbook, adapting the best recipes exclusively for Slashfood.
Looking back on my childhood, I can remember few potluck dinners that didn't feature some version of Jell-O. While my mother somehow missed out on this particular 1970s cultural phenomenon, every one of our neighbors and friends had some unique, idiosyncratic method for serving the famous gelled fruit dessert. Moreover, since I didn't get it at home, every bizarre concoction was an exciting culinary thrill for me.
Searching through my family cookbook, I was pleased to find what I am now convinced is the ultimate Jell-O dessert. The creator, Karen Mono Little, wasn't a blood relative, but her close friendship with my Aunt Evie (and amazing kitchen wizardry) gained her a place in our collection of family recipes. Although my updated version of her dessert is more naturally flavored and has much less sugar, I have to admit that it also lacks some of the savage, addictive intensity of the original. After the jump, I've included Karen's recipe as well as my own. Enjoy!
The London Festival of Architecture will be starting this week, and the culmination of the festival will be tasty, indeed. As part of the festival, there's a competition to re-create famous architecture out of Jello (referred to as jelly across the pond).
According to the Guardian Online, the contest to re-create famous architecture is a charitable event and the proceeds go to Article 25, a disaster relief and development fund. Apparently the contest was inspired by the Millennium Bridge, which opened as a pedestrian bridge in 2000 in London but developed a dangerous wobble after only a week. It was nick named the "Wobbly Bridge," and had to be shut down to be fixed.
The architect who originally designed the "Wobbly Bridge" is actually making a Jello replication of it for this contest. He says that even though he was, of course, embarrassed about the flaws in the bridge, he is amused that his mistake can be used as the basis for a charitable event.
So this has peanut butter, eclairs, and cake in the title. Must be a diet food.
Actually, it's the Peanut Butter Eclair Cake, from Shirley McNevich over at Mom's Best Recipes. Besides peanut butter, it's made with Jello Instant Pudding, Cool Whip, and Honey-Maid Graham Crackers. I can picture my mom making this in the 60s or 70s, getting the recipe from a magazine.
Last year I picked the 8 best school lunch items I remember from my school days (admittedly, a long time ago). But what about the lunches that a lot of kids hate? Here are my choices:
1. Mystery meat: What exactly was this? I'm trying to go through my mental Rolodex and I can't remember. Was it meatloaf? Salisbury steak? I'm not sure, but it just seemed to be this mass-produced glob of grayness topped with lame gravy. The days I saw that this was the lunch were the days I just had something to drink and maybe a bag of chips.
Some people eat while they're traveling. Others, including myself, travel to eat. Either way, the two activities -- travel and food -- are connected, so we're giving a little weekend linklove to our favorite travel site, Gadling:
If you happen to be traveling through LeRoy, New York, you most definitely want to make a stop at the Jell-O Museum, erected in the city of the jiggly stuff's origin.
One of the side effects of blogging about food is that you start to want to play around with platings and presentation a lot more than you would if you were not photographing your meals. Joe, from Culinary in the Country, for example, augmented his already attractive Chocolate Crème Caramel with some extra caramel rounds along the outside of the plate and a little freeform sugar sculpture on top. The overall effect is great and really brings the look of the dessert up to restaurant-quality - and probably an expensive restaurant, at that.
The crème caramel itself is actually quite easy to make. The most difficult part for someone attempting their first one is to not burn the caramel before you pour it into the empty ramekins, as it can be sensitive. The "crème" part of this dessert is made with soy milk and bittersweet chocolate, held together with eggs, just like the traditional versions are. The chocolate will cover the soy taste, for anyone sensitive to it, but using soy milk will make the dessert a lot lighter than if it were made with cream.
And if you have somehow managed to overdose on chocolate from Valentine's Day, you might want to check out Elise's recipe for Rose Petal Flan instead!
When I first came across the idea of nailing Jello to a wall, I thought it was pretty funny. Strange, but funny. Now that an alert reader has pointed out to me that this was not an isolated incident and that many people out there devote time to the very same thing, I have to admit that I am a little disturbed.
My Science Project has taken their love for all things Jello and conducted a study into the "feasibility of securing Jell-O to a vertical surface by means of manually impacted cylindrical metal fasteners." In other words, they attempted to nail jello to a wall. They tried the standard recipe, jello with holes molded into it, jello with straw supports and jello with fruit. The best recipe was one they termed "ballistic jello," which involved about an ounce of gelatin in 2 cups of water.
I'm thinking that this challenge could be some sort of a party game. Possibly at the same types of parties that serve lots and lots of jello shots early in the evening.
When people are bored, they come up with all sorts of unusual experiments that, if otherwise occupied, perhaps they wouldn't ordinarily try. There is little doubt that this has led to some great discoveries over the years, but this particular one is probably unlikely to have widespread cultural ramifications. It involves Jello and the question of whether or not it can be nailed to a wall.
I won't keep you in suspense. Jello - or jelly if you're not from the US - cannot be nailed to a wall in its standard form. When prepared according to package directions, the amount of gelatin that gives the food its signature "jiggle" is not enough to hold it together when nailed to a board. If you live somewhere where you can purchase concentrated jelly/Jello cubes, however, you will find that it can easily be nailed to a wall.
Scents are a way of setting a particular product or advertisement apart from the competition, forcing people to take notice before turning to something else. Just look at the bus station ad for the Milk Board, which was an extreme example, but clearly generated a lot of attention. In a crowded marketplace, this type of unavoidable advertising is just what some companies need.
Recent products to jump on the scented ad bandwagon include Kraft Jell-O and White Fudge Chips Ahoy, which got full-page scratch and sniff ads in People Magazine and Diet Pepsi Jazz, which has scented coupons and "store signs infused with the new soft drink's [fragrance]." LG even used chocolate-scents to market their new Chocolate phones, although it probably triggered a chocolate craving before one for mobile phones.
After I made my Jello pie, I wanted to do more Jello desserts - by which I mean that I had an extra package of Jello left over. I decided that I would try my hand at making a layered dessert because some of them just look too interesting to pass up and I've never actually attempted one before.
As it turns out, they're very easy to make. Gelatin doesn't set up at room temperature, so the layers-to-be can sit out while you wait for things to set up. The initial time involved is about 2 minutes, after which you can do household things (or blog) while you wait to pour on the next layer.
One of the reasons that Jello is on the list of the best desserts for the 4th of July is not only that it is very popular, perhaps simply due to tradition, but that it is pretty. It comes in bright, clear reds and blues and, for a holiday that is color-heavy, the lure of their look is hard to resist. I should know. I was lured by the look of the Patriotic Jello Pie, despite the fact that I haven't eaten blue jello or Cool Whip in years.
The jello website has a video tutorial for making the pie, so I watched it, went to the store to pick up the necessary ingredients, and set to work on the pie.
Don't spend all your time thinking about what you're going to barbecue for the 4th of July – what about dessert? After all, you're going to want more than just a beer to wash down all those hot dogs and potato chips when you are out with friends and family, waiting for the fireworks display to begin.
Anything with Jello – as one of the few foods that actually comes in the color blue, Jello is the perfect choice for making red, white and blue desserts, not to mention that it's always a kid favorite. Try a patriotic Jello pie, red white and blue terrine or an All-american trifle.
Shortcake – there is something classic about shortcake after a barbecue. You can use almost any fruit, but opt for strawberries, blueberries or raspberries on the 4th. For the cake, make a traditional biscuit base or just use a slice of pound cake. Try this recipe or this one.
Chocolate chip cookies – maybe the expression should have been "as American as chocolate chip cookies," because not only were these invented in the US, but they're a favorite with everyone. And you can't go wrong with the famous Tollhouse recipe, which started it all.
In this weekly series, home cook Bruce Watson works his way through a decades-old family cookbook, adapting the best recipes exclusively for Slashfood.
So this has peanut butter, eclairs, and cake in the title. Must be a diet food.
Last year I picked the 8
When I first came across the idea of 
When people are bored, they come up with all sorts of unusual experiments that, if otherwise occupied, perhaps they wouldn't ordinarily try. There is little doubt that this has led to some great discoveries over the years, but this particular one is probably unlikely to have widespread cultural ramifications. It involves Jello and the question of whether or not it can be nailed to a wall.
It was almost a year ago that 
Don't spend all your time thinking about what you're going to barbecue for the 4th of July – what about dessert? After all, you're going to want more than just a beer to wash down all those hot dogs and potato chips when you are out with friends and family, waiting for the fireworks display to begin.
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