Curious Facts

Everything below is in the book — each one links straight to the page it comes from.

1. Every recipe was professionally tested — and the book names the tester. The Hills Brothers had each recipe "specially tested by Marion Harris Neil," a professional cookery writer, before it went to print — quality control on a free advertising pamphlet. Read it in the book →
2. "Level and therefore accurate" was a selling point. The book's NOTE promises that all measurements are level — in 1920, when heaping and rounded spoonfuls still ruled home kitchens, level measurement was modern practice worth advertising. Read it in the book →
3. There is a candy made from a potato. Potato Cocoanut Candy starts with one medium-sized boiled potato, pressed through a ricer and worked with confectioners' sugar and cocoanut, then dipped in melted chocolate. Read it in the book →
4. Yesterday's coffee became dessert. Coffee Cocoanut Tapioca cooks the tapioca in two cups of left-over coffee — thrift and novelty in one dish, using the company's "Instant" tapioca that needed no soaking. Read it in the book →
5. The simplest recipe is two sentences long. Dromedary Dates with Cereal: decorate a greased ring mold with stoned dates, fill with well-cooked cereal, turn out, serve with milk or cream. Breakfast, solved. Read it in the book →
6. The candy thermometer appears by degree. The Boiled Cocoanut Frosting gives both tests side by side — a soft ball in cold water, or 240° F. on the candy thermometer — catching home cooking mid-shift from instinct to instrument. Read it in the book →
7. A candy named Simplicity needs no cooking at all. Warm the cocoanut in a bowl over boiling water, pour on three tablespoons of white Karo Sirup, and form on a marble slab dusted with sugar. The name is the recipe. Read it in the book →
8. Washington Cocoanut Pie is a cake. It bakes a butter-sugar-flour batter in a pie pan, then is split into two layers and filled with cream filling. The pan makes it a pie; everything else about it is cake. Read it in the book →
9. Cocoanut went into the salad bowl. A New Salad shreds a sweet white cabbage and blends it with plenty of Dromedary Cocoanut, blanched almonds, mayonnaise and whipped cream — a coconut slaw, decorated with paprika. Read it in the book →
10. Sugarless candy, two years after the war. The Sugarless Cocoanut Patties sweeten with condensed milk and egg whites alone — sugar had been rationed and prices had spiked, and a candy without it was a genuine novelty in 1920. Read it in the book →