Would you eat any of the following dishes?
I just read a book called The Gallery of Regrettable Food by James Lileks. And it is the funniest and most disturbing thing I have seen in ages. It is basically a look at the sickly underbelly of retro cookbooks and the hideous attempts at food contained therein. Here are some choice passages:
"...you'd be convinced that our forebears ate nothing but Snout au Gratin or Cheesy Nostril Salad."
South-of-the-Border Cheesy Meatloaf
1 lb. hamburger meat
36 lb. flavorless cheese (if substituting spackle, crumble 1 yellow crayon for color)
1 cup dusty crumbs from the toaster
3 grains pepper
1 lb. salt
1 atom chili powder
"To remind them they're men, make sure to embed a batch of wriggling, erect wieners in a sea of beans."
"Hey, gang! Who wants a big slice of purply cabbage-cream pie?"
"Perhaps a nice batch of scones & Pepsodent in a banana-placenta sauce?"
"How can you make sure a 10 P.M. party doesn't last past 10:06? Serve them this. Somehow, creamed lobster in a creamy lobster sauce (with cream) doesn't go well with a bellyful of booze."
"Everyone gather 'round! It's time for pastel-tinted hairy balls with salsa verde!"
"This man hated his spinach. Perhaps. More likely, this man has just had his buttocks lanced with a hot railway spike."
"You know, when something bears such a close resemblance to a human body part, it would make sense NOT to surround it with red pulpy slices."
"Kids will love the new vermin salad."
"I don't know what this is, but pour enough liquor in a frat boy and he'd have sex with it."
"Fried strips of albino flesh cunningly blended with parboiled Scottish terrier testicles."
"Burned wieners in a drunken scrum, jostling and molesting what appears to be a rectangular, exsanguinated brain."
"Finger food should not look like breaded fingers."
"Just smother the piscine torsos in a vinyl sauce colored with melted peach crayons."
"Here, an MRI scan shows that the nodes of oversaturated cherry Jell-O have spread throughout the delicious, refreshing prune-flavored foam. Prognosis: dessert!"
"Or... it's human finger bones jammed into a cat brain, wrapped in a nice bow, and sealed in aspic."
"Here two Mr. Peanuts appear to be gazing with pride and wonder at several breaded and deep-fried Hershey's Kisses, each covered with spiced ejaculate."
"What this is doing in a salad book, I've no idea. It has french fries, some sort of fillet soaking in a light black sauce, and three strange nodules fastened on the fillet like nautical parasites. It seems to be the antithesis of salad, unless you count that dispirited heap of humiliated greenery in the corner, and I don't."
"I'm really not feeling well anymore."
Here are some pictures of the author on the Joan Rivers Show. I am amused.