Anyone want a little giggle-I’ve found a cake book from the 1970’s

[retainertrainer]

I’ve been sorting out my mum’s cupboards and came across the woman’s weekly birthday cake special. I’m going to take my inspiration from it for all family birthdays in the future.

Who knew you could make such masterpieces out of buttercream!

My mum has a fab 70s marks and Spencer’s recipe book, with a intro section that says ‘a dinner party for entertaining her husband’s business colleagues is one time the home cook can really enjoy herself’
I also love the explainations of how to boil and serve pasta and what olive oil is for

One of my sisters was interested in cooking so they got her that Hamlyn cookbook and some other items for Christmas once. It was brill! We had all kinds out of it.

I have my great aunts handwritten cookery book. She was born in late 1800’s and ran her own bakers and caterers from 1920 until the late 1940’s. Her cakes were superb and the book contains lots of ideas about using veg in cakes in place of sugar during rationing. She lived with us until her death in 1980 and was a cantankerous old biddy but I really admired her independence and skill. Not many women ran their own successful businesses then.

I've still got that Dairy cookbook

I have that dairy cookbook it was my grandmas and she was a brilliant baker. It has handwritten changes to the recipes. I wonder if I have all the ingredients to make her chocolate cake....

www.candyboots.com/wwcards.html

This always makes me laugh.

I loved looking at my mum's 70s birthday cake books. In fact I recently asked for her ginger cake recipe after watching bake off - it was from the bero cook book!

badgerhead I've still got my stork book from comp in 1980 too. I refer to it for the weights of the ingredients for batter. Thirty eight years later I still have to look it up!

My mum used to make the most amazing cakes. She's not very artistic so it was quite a struggle to fulfil my demands for Snoopy or skaters on a frozen lake. The one that nearly broke her was an extremely detailed house with windows and dyed green dessicated coconut for the lawn.

Oh OP! Can you look up whether it has a (possibly slightly alcohol based) hedgehog cake in it? I would love to make it for my Mum, it was her favourite one to make for us. I’d love if it was the same book I have been googling the recipe to no avail.

So excited about this thread!! I love old cookery books. My mum has loads, incl the be-ro one, dairy cookbooks, and the English Electric one from the 70s which always makes me laugh, as the oven temps for all the recipes are given in Celsius/Ferneheit only, as though in complete denial of the existence of gas ovens!!

I love looking at the photos as well, the food always looks so brown, and it's never artistically arranged by a food stylist as recipe books are nowadays. It's more like a whole page with a load of cakes shoved next to each other, and titled "clockwise from top: English madeleines, melting moments, Viennese whirls" etc.

Is the birthday cake book the Australian Women's Weekly one? My kiwi MIL has that, and she and my (also Kiwi) SIL are absolutely brilliant at making novelty kids' birthday cakes, inspired by that book! My DS has been in receipt of a couple of brilliant ones they've made.

EvaHarknessRose I am sure an MN'er made an interesting hedgehog cake....

wanders off whistling innocently

Ooh Be-Ro, my mum always used the recipe for scones.
Also had cookery books that were a series and I want to say from a garage like Shell or something.
I now have my grandmas cordon bleu cookery books.

Oh thighofrelief! My dm has that book and I had that coconut lawn cake one year

I absolutely loved that Dairy Cookbook. Was my first ever one and started off a bit of a cookbook obsession. I also had The Creative Cook - massive ringbinders with weekly inserts. God, I was such a cool kid!

I still use my grans old be-ro book!

Sorry I got stuck in soft play hell. I was planning on adding some photos! Here goes!

I have that Dairy cookbook!
I also have several Marguartie Pattern books, one of them is the best cookbook that I have.

When I make kids birthday cakes I make wonderful creations, and only use buttercream
I think roll out royal icing tastes awful, and makes the cakes taste horrible. (it is the reason kids don't eat the cake nowadays I think) Butter icing is lovely.

So frustrating! It’s not letting me attach any! I’ll try again later.

I remember my dad being really miffed when he picked up an old cookery book from a charity shop once and reading the lines, ‘If you are a man and you’re new to cooking.....’ He’s a brilliant cook lol

I have Marguerite Patten's Everyday Cookery which was given to me for Christmas 1968. My DH made a cake using it today.

I had the Dairy Cookbook too and my daughter uses it now.

I have the Dairy cookbook! and some M&S paperback ones from the 70's
I have a lovely hardback one left to me by my Grandma, she's written in the front of it for me. I always used to look at it when I was at her house, and she promised it would one day be mine.
It's called The cookery Year written in 1973 and goes through every month and what to cook and what's in season.......

I had the Hamlyn All Colour Cookbook - it was recommended that we buy it for O Level Domestic Science. The teacher who suggested we buy it was Mrs Kitchen !

My mum has one from the 1970’s that I love - The Cookery Year, which I think she got from readers digest. It’s all about using foods in season, which is a forgotten art now

steppemum totally agree. I hate fondant icing and it's bloody impossible to get right. Give me good old butter cream icing any day!

This Hamlyn one, McFugget?

This is the real thing, will post photos/recipes on request!