A Retro-Tastic ™ Food Celebration for July 4th!
I can’t separate any holiday from the favorite food dish I associate with its celebration. I would never dare hosting a Christmas dinner without a Butterball turkey and a can of mom’s favorite cranberry jelly? I would not dare confront the cries of disappointment if I failed to present a no-bake pumpkin pie or everyone’s favorite multi-colored marshmallow yam casserole at the table for Thanksgiving dinner!
No, my family and friends deserve only the greatest foods at holiday feasts.
This is why I always bring everyone’s favorite picnic side-dish: Pie Plate Salad (featuring popular Veg-All brand canned vegetables) to neighborhood July 4th potlucks. Our neighborhood party would not be the same without it.
Backyard grilled burgers and hot dogs need a fresh and colorful side dish to go with. While everyone else shows up with the common macaroni salads and coleslaws, I never forget this famous Pie Plate Salad. Its a tradition that always pleases. I know this because the hostess is rendered speechless each time I show up with it!
In fact, you should see how much attention I get when I show up with this colorful plate of bite-sized vegetables held conveniently in place with lemon Jello ™. All eyes are on this colorful picnic side dish each time I bring it!
A great nation deserves a great picnic side dish so please give this one a try at your celebration and you will be as filled with as much pride as your guests are with patriotism.
This post is part of what we hope will become an annual celebration of America’s mind-blowing “Retro-TasticTM ” culinary history. It has not always pretty folks but it’s ours and we think it should be celebrated right along with the rest of our nation’s heritage!
For every brownie and cherry pie in this country’s great culinary past there is something horrible made with gelatin and canned corn that probably should never have been dreamt up.
Unfortunately, (or fortunately depending on how you look at it) there was no Internet back during this sweet spot of American kitchen domesticity. These creative masterpieces were not preserved for our visual pleasure the way today’s creations are. Our mis
sion therefore is to give these dishes their due and present them as they would have been presented ‘back in the day’…if only food blogs had been around to popularize them.
Pie Plate Salad!
You can find the inspiration for this event (and other Regrettable Retro Food Recipes) over at BuzzFeed or on the back of consumer packages everywhere. Please be sure to check out my co-conspirator and friend Trix at Tasty Trix for her effort at celebrating America’s forgotten culinary history as well!
Now who wants another slice of Pie Plate Salad?
This is what you will need:
- 1 package lemon Jello
- 1 can mixed vegetables
- 1/2 cup frozen peas
- 1 cup "salad dressing"
- lettuce or parsley for garnish
This is how you make it:
- In a medium bowl dissolve one package lemon Jello in one cup of hot water. Stir until completely dissolved. When dissolved add 1/2 cup of cold water.
- Add one can of canned mixed vegetables, drained., and peas.
- Add mixture to a clean, cold 8 or 9 inch glass pie plate and refrigerate until firm. 4 hours to over night.
- When ready to serve, un-mold onto a flat plate and garnish with greenery and 'whipped dressing" or tartar sauce.
Notes
There will be plenty of this for your guests to take home!
Holy Moly, this looks like it could have come straight out of my 1959 copy of The General Foods Kitchen Cookbook.
This looks way too close to some of the “creations” that came out of my mother’s sea-foam green Tupperware Jell-o mold… Do they even make Veg-all anymore?
Oh Trevor, I can’t think of anything more delicious to go with my corn and bologna boots that this gorgeous pie plate salad!!! I just know it’s going to be a hit! I am literally licking my screen.
Trevor, that is one swell salad, made even more so by its high portability factor. That should earn it an extra star in any housewife’s card catalogue of recipes.
Your presentation is worthy of Betty Furness herself, and I particularly applaud your salad dressing (brilliant citation there, my friend.) Oh, but this is fun. I can not WAIT for next year. Let this become a yearly celebration! Happy 4th to you and yours. Bravo!
And people really eat this? However, my mother probably made this at one point in her life. Have FUN!
oh that sounds so gross I may have to try!!!
‘For a brief shinning moment’ I thought you had fallen off your high horse in Montana and landed on your, uh, head but thankfully I realized it was the other end! Why oh why, did you not post this recipe BEFORE I submitted my pie intentions to the OC Fair this year?
I will share that my MIL is almost perfect. She gave me a loving husband and a devoted, nurturing father of our children, plus she has never given me any advice. Sounds perfect. I had to deduct a tenth of a point due to the fact of seeing tomato aspic on her table more than once. My children were young, far too young for expose them to that. I am waiting for the trauma to set in.
Oh, and ‘salad dressing’? Don’t go messin’ with that. It’s the main ingredient in tuna salad with sweet pickle relish that my mommy used to make. I can’t let that one go.
p.s. I miss your rootin’-tootin’ hide, cowboy.
This is why Larry said he left home and joined the Navy!!!
I’ve never tried a pie plate salad but -have to be honest- not feeling too awfully sad about that right now! Beautiful presentation and the perfect side dish to go along with Trix’s corn and bologna boots- now all you need is a glass of Andre pink champagne with a scoop of green sherbet flatting on top, yum 😉
I love that you actually made it and presented it so beautifully!
Nice throwback! Happy 4th of July!
Pie Plate Salad is certainly different. I am not sure that I can go there (the lemon jello scares me), but it looks like a fun dish. Hope you had a wonderful 4th of July.
Scary that in another life I may have tried this very dish. It could all just be a very bad dream though. The Clafoutis looked marvelous, and am looking forward to seeing you strut your stuff on WordPress!
You are here Ms. Culinary Diva! Welcome!
“Yield: 32 servings. Nobody takes that much for some reason.” Oh, Trevor, you’ve outdone yourself! I’ve never heard of this one. I’m proud to say my mother never made things like this. She *did* make the occasional bowl of strawberry Jello with sliced bananas (at the behest of the children), always with the reminder that it was not good for us and we wouldn’t be having it again for a long time.
I’ve never had pie plate salad. This must be a wacky West Coast thing because in Maine, this didn’t exist. 🙂
Retro-tastic? Definitely! I cannot wait for your next installment. My mom would definitely go back for seconds. She loved lime jello filled with veggies…and as kids, we steered as far away from it as we could!
I just hopped on over from Maureen’s space…and love it. Beautiful salad…would go back for seconds in a heartbeat.A perfect platter too.
Just shared this with an old roommate who used to use VegAll in her signature Minnesota Hot Dish. Even she thought this sounded gross!
Seriously brilliant post, my friend.
I was thinking your vegetable guacamole photo was terrific (they always are- no exception here) and then it sort of swept over me as I looked closer- oh my! It’s not guac at all, and it’s gelatinous. Whoa! (I really need to change my lenses!) Reading further, I see, it’s a blast from the past. Just thankfully not my past. I think I must have had VegAll as a kid but was lucky enough to escape this jello’d vege dish. I do have fond memories though of some green jello thing with pineapple and celery in it. Can’t wait to see your next retro recipe!
Well I guess I can add mt pineapple cheese ball to the event table. GREG
http://www.sippitysup.com/pineapple-cheese-really-thetableset/