I've been a vegetarian for 16 years now, and I have a collection of cookbooks to prove it. For a while now my shrinking shelf space has put a halt to cookbook purchases because the alternative is to start storing them in the garage. And really, who gets inspired to cook in their garage?
So, I try to avoid buying cookbooks whenever I can. Really, I do. But then I came across this delightful-looking little book while thrifting. I loved its title and its illustrated cover:
I have a habit of reading copyright pages, and I flipped to the one in this book. 1972. Hmm, I thought. I wonder what vegetarians ate in 1972?
Two dollars and 15 minutes later, I was sitting at my kitchen table ready to find out.
Turns out, vegetarians from the '70s enjoy a lot of the same stuff as vegetarians from 2011. With one exception. It's this thing the author calls a "two-hours-later" course. I had never heard of it before.
From page 9:
"So, the two-hours-later course came to be. This may consist of a great bowl of strawberries and a pot of cream, or maybe hot chocolate on a cold night, accompanied by thin slices of the torte that couldn't be finished earlier, or a platter of nuts and dried fruits with mulled wine. This two-hours-later course is especially recommended if grass is smoked socially at your house. If you have passed a joint around before dinner to sharpen gustatory perceptions, you most likely will pass another one after dinner, and everyone knows what that will do--the blind munchies can strike at any time."
After reading the passage on page 9, I read it again. (You know, just to make sure I got it right.)
Guess vegetarians did do things a little differently in the '70s. At least when it came to writing cookbooks.
