Vast new markets open to the arm-chair shoppers. Foods delivered from “our kitchen to your kitchen,” “from our orchard to your table,” is a flourishing new branch of the food industry.
Gourmets today can shop their way around America, pick a fat turkey from a Pennsylvania smokehouse, cultivate their taste for down-South relishes, appease the sweet tooth with buttermilk maple fudge, kitchen-made in Vermont.
Never a day but the folders flap from the mailbag softly, insinuatingly, their bright pages tempting one to pluck fruit ripening in Hesperian orchards, to eat buttery popcorn freshly popped in an Ohio kitchen, to gorge on baked ham country-curved in a manner to defy description. An excitement never stale, shopping the nation by catalogue and checkbook.
Homesick for the smell of a cool country cellar, the smell of apples, that leathery savor of ham? Or the smell of a cookie jar there near the top of the stair, the spiciest smell in the world? Cookies just as fine come from “Aunt Martha,” Marjorie Niles of Dorset, Vermont, old-time sugar cookies, each sweet crumb giving special blessing to the taste buds. Like grandma's cookies, like those mother made, the memory comes back as you sample from Aunt Martha's blue tin. These cookies have the old-time taste but the new look. Thin as a toothpick, well-browned at the edges, shaped like a wide-open flower, a cookie tailored for a special career on tea-party tables. Ten dozen ＄2.75, postage prepaid. Keep the lid on the box and the sweets stay crisp for weeks. Packed as they are, 7 to a deep paper cup, they travel without breakage, but just in case of casualties, each tin holds 8 extra cookies, Aunt Martha's way of fair play to the customers.
A symphony of good smells comes from country cellars with their bins of sober-sided potatoes, fragrant apples in bunks, canned fruits and vegetables on the hanging shelves a dim gleam in the half-light. If it's old-time jellies you searchm, write to John Toms, Inc., Shipman, Virginia. This firm, set up originally to merchandise John Toms Flavor Ridge apples—Winesap, Stayman, and Delicious—has branched into jellies and relishes, made by Old South recipes but in an all-modern kitchen.
Wild elderberry jelly, a pound of juice to a pound of sugar, is just what it should be, piquant in flavor, tender and soft in texture, the color deep wine, a pretty compliment to fowl and game. Clear green the mint jelly of the apple base, scented with an essence distilled from the fresh herb. Open the jar. What fragrance—like that of a mint patch under hot sun! A jelly just firm enough to hold in mold form, all tremble it stands in your best jelly dish. The honey-apple jelly, with its distinct honey flavor, is a Virginia specialty from away back. Clear and pretty, but not so tender as the others in the line, this is made with a blend of juices from various apple varieties to give its particular aroma and character. The quantity of juice to sugar is higher than is usual, and the jelly is fast-cooked to enhance the flavor.
The watermelon-rind-pickle formula was chosen after making 5,000 test batches, trying seventy old recipes to find the one of best flavor, color, and texture. The recipe chosen is over one hundred years old. The rind pieces are large, cut 1 ½ inches square, pale green and cooked clear, cloves the outstanding spice. Tender to cut, an experience to eat.
The picnic pickle slice combines vinegar, spices, garlic, and olive oil for an epicurean treat. Then there's Hunters' pepper relish, one of the oldest varieties of pickle known in the South and called everything from “pepper hash” to “pepper's sport.” Here again, dozens of recipes were tried before the condiment was ready to go places by mail. Still another old-timer is Country Kitchen Delight. A Tennessee judge provided this recipe, his favorite of pickles, one long aged in wood for mellowed goodness.
Those who like sweet mustard pickles will like those from Ma Toms, the former combining the outstanding characteristics of five Virginia recipes; smooth is the blend, both hot and cold, both sweet and sour, both feisty and bland, all in one taste. Any 3 of these items in 12 ½-ounce jars cost ＄2, postage prepaid east of the Mississippi, 25 cents extra for travel west. Or you may order your choice in cases of 24 of the 12 ½-ounce jars for ＄14.50. Address John Toms, Inc., Shipman, Virginia.
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