Book review: Secret Recipes for the Modern Wife
Monday, August 10th, 2009
THIS CONTEST IS CLOSED.
Secret Recipes for the Modern Wife is not your usual cookbook. In fact, none of the recipes can be cooked up into dishes that you can serve to your family… as food. Rather Nava Atlas, the author of several vegetarian cookbooks, has done something much different.
Cooked up with a 50s flair, she’s provided us with all of the real-life ingredients we need for a long marriage, for better or worse. For instance, her “Happily-Ever-After Ambrosia” includes the following ingredients: shavings of fresh coconut, harmony, pineapple rings and candied fruit, affection and mutual respect, glistening cubes of ruby red gelatin, security and support, mint ice cream, children who turn out well, rich frosting and whipped cream toppings, lasting love and happiness, and chocolate syrup.
To make the ambrosia, she says, “…Realize that real life doesn’t always resemble a dessert buffet, filled with sensuous pleasures and emotional fulfillment. Still, it’s human nature to feel hopeful, and even though you know that ‘happily ever after’ exists primarily in fairy tales, it may be possible to grab morsels of love and happiness from time to time.”
Other so-called recipes include “Completely Fried Wife,” “Mother-in-Law Fruitcake,” and “Psychotherapy Pie.” In addition to the recipes, Atlas offers lots tongue-in-cheek tips, such as, “Just as you can avoid home baking from scratch, you can sidestep the important issues in your marriage by sweeping them under the rug. Doing so will probably come back to haunt you in years to come, but why worry about it today? You’ll deal with your snowballing problems later (or not). Now, go and treat yourself to something starchy and sweet.”
The book is a good laugh for those at any stage of marriage. It’s the perfect bridal shower or wedding gift.
Want to know who won? Check out the winning Recipe for a Happy Marriage.
THIS CONTEST IS CLOSED. Atlas was kind enough to offer a copy of her book as a prize to Project: Happily Ever After readers. To win it, all you have to do is comment on your personal recipe for a happy marriage. I will judge your “recipes” (with some help from a select team of disgruntled marrieds.) We’ll give bonus points to any recipe that 1) makes us laugh out loud 2) makes us say “wow, so true” 3) provides advice that really works. Deadline for entries: 8-21-09.
