Yum? Tastes Do Change
Dairy Queen is a warm childhood memory, because the franchise owner in my hometown was a generous fellow who understood that soft-serve ice cream and french fries were cheap, and who used to delight in the reaction he’d get when handing over portions too large for a child to hold comfortably. When I saw this poster at a nostalgia convention in September, it was too “good” to pass up. It not only tapped into that fuzzy memory, it merrily stomped into another: Terrible-looking foods! I grew up in a time when Jell-O dishes jiggled and casseroles crammed with dubious combinations of ingredients abounded at every potluck dinner. Lack of house space a few years ago prevented me from continuing my bad-cookbook collection, but I still have several that I saved for reasons unrelated to recipes. While James Lileks is well known for his humorous writing on the subjects of food and interior design, this wonderful site—describing a Weight Watchers card collection from the ’70s that I swear my mom had (but never used)—is not. At least, not yet.
11” x 15”, Dairy Queen promotional poster, 1959
