Book-related cooking

 
My blogs are somewhat converging with this post, in part because I think this is very interesting, but also because I have been uncharacteristically absent from book pages these days. I usually like to read at least one book per week, but lately I've been only reading a few pages here and there. I guess the holidays required a lot of time, and I've had the cold here and there, and weird work hours....so this makes for a book-related post instead.

This is from the McCall's Bake-it Book, a 1975 publication. I think it's a great idea to think of cooking around a time period or subject matter. This might make a great party theme. Too, it's a great gift idea for a book or movie lover, to make gift baskets of items related to a particular film or book. For example, the current film "Walk the Line" might include a copy of the DVD, a Johnny Cash CD, a new black shirt....you get the idea. The more esoteric the better, just make sure you choose items that the recipient would really want to have. There are tons of items applicable to a book or movie that might be funny to give, but not necessarily useful. Opt for useful instead. The possibilities are really endless. For a baby shower once upon a time, we used Beauty and the Beast as a subject, but with a tea party theme. The cake had a depiction of Mrs. Potts, and said it was a Par-tea or Kiersty (the name of the baby to be). Guests were asked to bring a snotty tea party food item, and to wear a tea party-type dress. For the game, we took a child's tea set that included a tea cart and tray (how cool is that?!) and gave everyone things like paint, nail polish, glitter, sequins, etc and asked them to personalize the items. That way the little girl could keep the stuff, but the items would carry a memorable extra. It was fun. Another friend holds annual Christmas ornament parties, and asks guests to do the same to plain ball ornaments. Now she has decades of special items, some of the artists are now gone but not forgotten. It's a nice tradition.