Date I made this recipe:
May 8, 2016 – Mother's Day
No Time For Cooking
by Arlene Francis
Published by:
Danfoods Co.
© 1961
Recipe: Sweet and Sour Skillet – p. 29
And so Mother's Day.
This is one of those "holidays" that leaves me overwhelmed
because I could go in so many different directions with my cookbook collection
in order to honor my mother that I almost have a complete brain shutdown. Sadly, very few cookbooks are titled
something like "Mother's Day Cookbooks" because that would be too
easy, right?
That said, I thought I had a cookbook picked out but then
changed my mind after watching late night/early morning episodes of the
(vintage) TV show, What's My Line, on
BUZZR cable station. And this explanation will be long so get
yourself a beverage and get cozy.
BUZZR is one of
those stations that I swear just appeared overnight on my cable lineup and it's
all about game shows (thus, "BUZZ[E]R") that ran from the mid-50's
(shortly after television started become a household item) to the late 80's.
Included in the lineup of shows are three vintage shows that
I watched as a kid: To Tell the Truth, What's My
Line and I've Got a Secret. Mind you, the episodes I'm currently watching
are mostly from before I was born but no matter. I tuned in from an early age and was
fascinated even then.
Actress Arlene Francis, the author featured here today, was one
of four celebrity panelists on What's My
Line and I think she holds the record for length of appearances – 25
years. Wow! I had no idea.
The premise of What's
My Line (CBS -1950-1967), as well
as To Tell The Truth (1956-1968 on CBS, 1968-1975 in syndication) and I've Got a Secret (CBS -1952-1967), is simple:
a single guest or a panel of guests (2 fake, 1 real) appear before a
panel of four celebrities (celebrities at the time the show aired) and the
panel has to decide a) who is telling the truth (To Tell the Truth); what someone's occupation is (What's My Line) or what someone's secret
is (I've Got a Secret). The ones who fake out the panel get
money.
The shows are all hosted by celebrity hosts (again, of the
era), are all produced by venerable game show producers, Mark Goodson and Bill Todman. And because they all ran on CBS and because CBS was the only channel we got for a long, long time (in black and
white, no less), we watched these shows.
And since these shows were early evening entertainment, the
panelists as well as the guests usually dressed to kill. The women wore beautiful evening dresses
(although some might have worn evening gowns) with beautiful jewelry and the
men wore suits, often with bow ties that were all the rage. But it was really
the women I wanted to see and who I remembered, especially Kitty Carlisle who appeared on To
Tell the Truth.
Now, Arlene Francis
(today's cookbook author) was quite beautiful yet the person who sticks in my
mind as the embodiment of poise and elegance was Kitty Carlisle. She wore the most beautiful gowns, the most
beautiful jewelry, never had a hair out of place and spoke so eloquently that
it was hard not to fall is line with her. Kitty
Carlisle was an actress, singer and a major patron of the arts in NYC. I believe she was photographed at one of the New York Public Library fund raisers
that I discussed in a blog a few weeks ago.
Kitty was married to playwright and theater director, Moss Hart and for
some reason, I keep mixing him up with composer Lorenzo Hart of Rodgers and Hart fame (before Rodgers
became Rodgers and Hammerstein). I
shall have to work on that. No doubt if
Kitty was alive, she'd set me straight; she passed away in 2007.
If Kitty Carlisle
commanded center stage on To Tell The
Truth, then Arlene Francis did
the same on What's My Line. On that show, whenever they had a mystery
guest (i.e. someone famous and recognizable), the panelists had to put on
blindfolds and Arlene's was always so fancy in satin and sequins. Loved that.
And since we are walking down memory lane, I hope you
indulge me a minute as I have to talk about these three shows:
On To Tell the Truth,
three people walked onto the stage and then the announcer said "WHAT Is
your name please?" The force with
which he said "What" just slays me.
And so all three said "My name is [fill in the blank]. Then the host, in this case Bud Collyer, asked the four celebrity
panelists to read along with an affidavit in which the "real" person
said what he or she did. Then the three
guests were asked questions by the panel, said questions designed to trip up
the fakers by drilling deep into the topic.
Then the panel voted for who they thought was telling the truth, and
then the announcer said "Will the REAL [insert name] please stand
up?" and the person did and if the panel got all or some votes wrong, the guests
got money as well as "lovely" gifts from the sponsor—things like
nasal decongestants and deodorants, I kid you not!
Although many guest panelists appeared on the show, the ones
I remember the most (and am watching now) were Tom Poston, Peggy Cass, Don Ameche, and Kitty Carlisle. A very young
Johnny Carson sat in on the panel a
few times as did the ageless Betty White.
One interesting note about this show that ties to this
blog: last week, I was watching an
episode and after the real person was revealed, the other two stated their
names and what they really do for a living and one of them said "My name
is Bunny Day and I'm a cookbook
writer" and folks, I almost fell out of my chair. Bunny
Day? THE Bunny Day? (Do we not love that name?) Oh my gosh, I have two of her cookbooks and
cooked from one of them – Crazy-Quilt
Cookery – for this blog. Wow! I tell you what, I was impressed with myself
that I knew who she was!
On What's My Line,
the guest has an interesting line of work, ranging from nuclear physicist to
female bull fighter to this hilarious one:
sells glasses to chickens (don't ask) and the panel of four has to guess
what that line of work is. Each guest is asked to sign in on a chalk board,
then the host reads the name, and then the guest is asked to shake hands with
the panel so that they can "get a better look at you" which always
stops me short because these are humans, not horses! But anyway...
Sometimes a famous celebrity appears on the show in which
case, they are introduced as a "mystery" guest and the panel has to
put on blindfolds. As I mentioned above,
Arlene Francis and fellow panelist, Dorothy Kilgallen, have the most lovely
blindfolds; the men stick to basic black eye shades.
Most of the "mystery" guests disguise their voices
so the panel won't guess who they are but that usually fails and Arlene is
often the one to figure it out. In one
instance, the mystery guest was Wilt
Chamberlain and the panel guessed who he was right away, likely because the
disguised voice was coming from so high up!
The mystery guest is usually someone who is currently starring in a TV
show, movie or on Broadway and the panel often keys questions to ascertain who
they are – "Are currently in a movie?" "Have you just arrived in New York ?" and the
like. For the regular Joe Schmoes of the
world, questions usually start with "Do you work outdoors?" "Is a product involved in what you do?,"
or "Do you provide a service?"
The panel often has a harder time figuring the person's line of work
just because it's hard to narrow things down in the allotted time. (And in the
case of guy who sold glasses for chickens, the panel finally figured out it had
to do with chickens but likely never would have figured out the eyeglass
part. I know I wouldn't!)
The "regular" panelists on the episodes I've
watched so far are Dorothy Kigallen, Fred Allen, Arlene Francis and Bennett
Cerf. The show's host was John Daly.
And then on I've Got a
Secret, the guest(s) do indeed have a secret that they whisper to the host
and the panel also has to guess at what the secret is. On this show though,
celebrities often appear as themselves and then share a secret about themselves
to the show's host (Garry Moore, who
also helped give actress Carol Burnett
her start when she appeared on The Garry
Moore Show.) On one recent episode,
actress Kim Novak appeared and her
secret was that she designed the dress that panelist Bess Meyerson was wearing. Backstage
before the show began though, Bess told Kim that she hated the dress, not
knowing that Kim designed it. Apparently,
it was quite itchy. Talk about your
awkward moment!
And speaking of awkward, the thing I constantly have to keep
in mind about these shows is that the panelists often said things we would now
consider to be politically incorrect, such as jokes about ethnic groups or even
comments about women. Sometimes the show
hits its own "awkward pause" moment and sometimes I create one by
gasping at the comment.
The panelists I've seen so far on I've Got A Secret have been Bill
Cullen (who later went on to host other game shows), Betsy Palmer, Henry Morgan
(not to be confused with M*A*S*H star,
Harry Morgan) and Bess Meyerson. Bess was also Miss America 1945 and was
the first and only Jewish woman so far to win that title.
Now then, you're probably thinking what does any of this
have to do with Mother's Day, my mother in particular, or Arlene Francis? Well kids,
my mother loved watching these shows. I
loved watching these shows with my mother, ergo my walk down memory lane. But these shows also make me reminisce about
my mom's sense of style and how she always dressed to impress. And when I see all these women wearing
beautiful evening dresses, I think of her and it makes me miss her and also
long for the day when people dressed up.
Yes, jeans and t-shirts are comfy, no doubt about it, but when people
dressed up, it just changed the game.
They walked more elegantly, talked more elegantly and looked like a
million bucks. When mom died, I took a
lot of her favorite dresses and eveningwear plus some jewelry to few vintage
stores so that they could be worn by someone who could appreciate them. Sadly, I was a couple inches taller than my
mom so nothing of hers fit me. Happily,
I kept some of her vintage jewelry and evening bags though and wear them if the
occasion fits.
And so just before Mother's Day, I was watching these shows
which air early in the morning, one behind the other, and there was Arlene Francis and I remembered that I
had a cookbook by her on my shelf.
So asking myself WWML (What Would Mother Like), I perused
the cookbook and after much hemming and hawing, decided on tonight's Sweet and Sour Skillet. I'd have to look
but I swear I saw a similar recipe in my mom's handwriting on a recipe card in
the card collection I now own. Mind you, I have no recollection of her
actually making it, but details, details.
Aside from the fact that this recipe was easy to make, it
was also somewhat healthy; I can't say that about a lot of other dishes in this
cookbook. It's not that they were loaded
with calorie-laden ingredients, it's just that my mom leaned toward leaner
recipes. In fact, I know she would not
have made this recipe with salami as called for so I substituted ham.
One dish that I almost made was called "Sunday
Cassoulet," a fancy name for baked beans with hot dogs but that just felt
too heavy even though mom sometimes made a similar dish. And a "Date Drop Cookies"
recipe that sounded similar to mom's was bounced because dates are very
expensive. Very. Sorry, mom!
Two dishes that I could have made had I stopped laughing in
time for dinner were "Hurry Curry" and "Delicious Quickie"
which, of course, is not what you think but rather a mixture of cream of
mushroom soup, diced lunch meat, onions and olives over biscuits. Don't think so. And I also passed on "Savory Tongue on
Toast" because mother would have as well.
Ew.
The last section of this book – "Arlene's Diet Tips"
– made me chuckle because my mother also had a diet tip and it was pretty
simple: "Just push yourself away
from the dinner table, Ann." She
wasn't kidding and you know what? It
worked!
In the end, Andy and I were quite happy with the dish (which
I served over rice) and I think mom would have been happy as well. And that's what Mother's Day is all about, right – making mom
happy? In my family, we also had another
rule – "Don't Embarrass Mother" but that's another story for another
day.
This dish is no embarrassment to anybody so go ahead and
make it and if you get the chance, check out these vintage game shows. I now dream of evening dresses and glittery
jewelry...
Sweet and Sour Skillet
– Serves 4
2 tablespoons butter or cooking oil
1 medium onion, chopped
½ cup green pepper
1 teaspoon cornstarch
2 tablespoons vinegar
1 9-ounce can pineapple tidbits, undrained
1 teaspoon soy sauce
1 6-ounce package sliced salami, diced (Ann's Note: I substituted diced ham)
Salt and pepper to taste
Cooked rice, if you wish
In a large skillet melt butter or oil. Add onion and green pepper and sauté for 5
minutes. Blend cornstarch and vinegar
and stir into vegetables. Add pineapple
tidbits (and juice), soy sauce, salami (or ham) and salt and pepper. Bring to a boil, stirring, and simmer for 5
minutes.
Ann's Note: I served this over rice.
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