December 01, 2012

Mimi Sheraton: Visions of Sugarplums

Throughout history, various food have become symbols that nourish the spirit even as the do the body — soul foods, in fact, at their most elemental.

I have two copies of this book, in both the 1968 and 1981 editions.

The first was a present from friend Mike during my senior year of college. Mike was out on co-op, but we still saw each other every week at the school paper. Someone in his office owned the 1968 edition, and was photocopying it for everyone else, more than 200 pages including the index, table of contents, introduction and eve the title page. Then the whole thing had holes punched in it, and was bound in an Accopress report cover. Perhaps they set up an assembly line in the conference room to assemble them. The entire office was probably completely unproductive for the rest of the day. Mike knew of my little obsession and grabbed a copy for me.

It is a book worth toiling over a photocopier for, although one can more easily pick up a used copy of either edition.

Sheraton includes so much information about the recipes and how they fit into cultures' Christmas traditions that one can read this book for fun, year after year. Which I do, at the kitchen table with some tea or in bed under the flannel sheets.

Of course, you can bake from it too, and quite deliciously. Visions of Sugarplums has been a useful guide as I've added recipes to the web site.

Sheraton makes some assumptions about the skill of the baker, probably because this was written in 1968 and many of the recipes were direct from their originating culture, or, at most, one generation removed. The directions are short, but not a problem for anyone with baking skills. Unfortunately, this means it is not a good book for beginning bakers.