Culinary secrets from Raytown

The first Saturday of every month, the Friends of the Kansas City Public Library set up several tables at the City Market and sell used books. Fiction, Non-Fiction, CDs, and cookbooks.

I found a couple of interesting treasures at yesterday’s sale, including a battered copy Favorite Breads from Rose Lane Farm (1960, Hearthside Press) which has dozens of recipes for vintage breads that are rarely available in bakeries or restaurants (Sally Lunn, Polish Babka, Election Day Cake and Marshmallow Coffee Round). There are several truly oddball recipes in the book I’m planning to try, which is why I bought the book: English Pope Ladies and Shredded Wheat Pecan Bread that uses Shredded Wheat cereal.

An even greater find in the pile of cookbooks was the spiral-bound Raytown, Missouri Treasure of Personal Recipes, compiled by the Raytown Chapter of the Order of the Eastern Star and published by the Bev-Ron Publishing Company.

It’s loaded with quick-and-easy recipes for culinary treats like Betty Turley’s “Hot Sandwich” (the main ingredients are Spam and American cheese), Lillian Meunier’s “Thrifty Supper” (ground beef, can of green beans, one can condensed tomato soup, left-over mashed potatoes), Vera Brown’s “Methodist Chicken” and Billie Krebs’ “Sausage Candy,” which doesn’t, mercifully, include sausage as an ingredient.