A Canadian Family

Carnival of Central and Eastern Genealogy – Traditional Dishes

Time Capsule - circa 1960s

Last Spring I was rummaging through some cardboard boxes at a used bookstore in Ste-Catherine (Quebec) where I’ve bought many books throughout the years. Unfortunately, on that day it was having a Going Out of Business Sale. Anyways, I spied an old hardcover copy of The Joy of Cooking by Erma Bombeck (ca.mid 1960s). Ah! – I thought, just the book to add to my daughter’s new cooking library. I could see that the previous owner had lovingly covered it with what looked like plastic shelf liner(the old-fashioned non-adhesive kind) and I’ve always been attracted to “previously-loved” books. Imagine my surprise when I got home and began to flip through the pages and a flurry of papers fell out into my lap. It was a collection of handwritten recipes (in French), newspaper clippings (from La Presse & the now defunc Montreal Star) and little product recipe booklets from American companies. It really was a little time capsule of Quebec food tastes in the 1960s.

The 1960s were a time of great change in Quebec eating habits – at least in the middle-class neighborhood where I lived. In the 1950s our family had eaten pretty much the same diet as our Acadian and French Canadian ancestors but in the 1960s there was a new influence on our diet – American television. Through American television we were exposed to American chefs such as Bombeck, but also American-style T.V. dinners and interesting recipes based on foods like Cheez Whiz and Jello.

How does all this connect to the Carnival of Central and Eastern Genealogy? Well, if I were eating anything from Central European cuisine during my childhood, it would have been something my mother got out of one of these little booklets, so today I’m sharing Heinz Ketchup’s version of the famous Russian dish – Beef Strogonoff.

Enjoy, and never forget to use your

Heinz – everything goes with it!

Carnival Headquarters

Jessica’s Genejournal

http://jessicagenejournal.blogspot.com/

May 20, 2009 - Posted by Evelyn Yvonne Theriault | . | beef strogonoff, blog carnival, ketchup, recipe