Perfection Salad

For quite some time I have had a fascination for congealed salads or, as they are more commonly known today, Jell-O Salads, "congealed" rather having fallen out of favor as a descriptor since it seems to have developed unsavory connotations and association, as evidenced by the fact that discussing "congealed salads" at this recent, about-to-be-mentioned dinner, led to a discussion of blood puddings and blood sausages.

Anyway, we were invited to a small, pot-luck dinner this past Saturday. For some time I've been wanting to prepare a "Perfection Salad", to my mind the most famous and renowned congealed salad ever created, so I did. Imagine my surprise — dismay even — when I discovered that the other eight people at the dinner had never heard of "Perfection Salad"! I couldn't believe it either.

"Perfection Salad" was the invention of one Mrs. John E. Cooke, who submitted her recipe to a contest sponsored by Knox Gelatin. For her efforts she won $100, a not-to-sneeze-at amount in 1905. The recipe was published in the 1905 Knox cookbook Dainty Deserts for Dainty People, edited by Janet McKenzie Hill. Here is the text of her recipe as originally published. Ms. Hill was a graduate of Fannie Farmer's Boston Cooking School; here's an appreciation of Janet McKenzie Hill.

So iconic was "Perfection Salad" of its time that Laura Shapiro used it as the title of her fascinating history of the development of "home economics", Perfection Salad: Women and Cooking at the Turn of the Century (New York : North Point Press, 1986). It was a time when technology was starting to impinge on the kitchen arts. Here is Ms. Shapiro on salads, and why salads encased in sparkling gelatin were the epitome of modern cooking:

Salad greens, which did have to be served raw and crisp, demanded more complicated measures. The object of scientific salad making was to subdue the raw greens until they bore as little resemblance as possible to their natural state. If a plain green salad was called for, the experts tried to avoid simply letting a disorganized pile of leaves drop messily onto the plate…This arduous approach to salad making became an identifying feature of cooking-school cookery and the signature of a refined household…American salads traditionally had been a matter of fresh greens, chicken, or lobster, but during the decades at the turn of the century, when urban and suburban middle class was beginning to define itself, salads proliferated magnificently in number and variety until they incorporated nearly every kind of food except bread and pastry…Salads that were nothing but a heap of raw ingredients in dissaray plainly lacked cultivation, and the cooking experts developed a number of ingenious ways to wrap them up…The tidiest and most thorough way to package a salad was to mold in in gelatin. [pp. 96–99; quoted here]

"Perfection Salad" is an example of the savory gelatin salad, a taste for which Americans at least seem to have left behind by about 1970. Yes, there is sugar in the recipe (I used a non-sugar sweetener to good effect), but there is also vinegar, so that the overall effect is a pleasant sweet-and-sour effect rather than the dessert-sweet of, say, fruit cocktail molded in Jell-O. The idea easily strikes the uninitiated as somewhere between "odd" and "ooh, gross!" (read, for instance, the disdainful discussion and grossed-out comments here), but it's really quite tasty and refreshing, and entirely suitable for a salad meant to accompany an entree.

I am delighted that I finally got around to making this classic and introducing it to some friends. One taste told me it was a classic combination and a keeper of a recipe that I plan to make again real soon. I am equally delighted that it fit my parameters for "easy to make" : chop a few vegetables, stir some things together, combine and put in the refrigerator. I think my reputation as our pot-luck go-to-guy for all things molded Jell-O is about to be seriously enhanced.

The recipe I give here comes from a fun website called "Recipe Curio" (source), and it's very faithful to the original. Where the recipe calls for finely shredded cabbage, I agree that shredding it as finely as possible is essential to the presentation and the taste; the very fine shreds present more crunchy texture and ensemble taste with the other vegetables rather than a full-on cabbage effect. Remember, it was originally "Dainty".
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Perfection Salad

  1. Thoroughly mix unflavored gelatin, sweetener, and salt. Add boiling water and stir to dissolve. Then add cold water, vinegar, and lemon juice.
  2. Chill until partially set, about 1 hour.
  3. Stir in the shredded cabbage, celery, green pepper, pimiento, and green-olive slices.
  4. Pour mixture into an 8.5 x 4.5 x 2.5-inch loaf pan that has been oiled or sprayed with Pam.
  5. Chill until firm; at least 4 hours. Unmold (it helps to run a thin knife around the edges of the mold.
Posted on August 2, 2011 at 23.06 by jns · Permalink
In: All, Food Stuff

2 Responses

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  1. Written by BearToast Joe
    on Thursday, 4 August 2011 at 17.05
    Permalink

    I've not had a congealed salad in ages! Not even at church! The consistency and the horse hooves (in the gelatin) are a bit of a turn-off for me. Cheers to you both!

  2. Written by Barbara Jones
    on Tuesday, 3 April 2012 at 19.18
    Permalink

    Try the sliced olives!!! In the 1930's and 40's, this recipe was a staple for cooks in Canajoharie, NY., and every cook added the olives. I had been searching for the recipe, yours is the only one that sounds authentic.

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