@kaslerma
I'm a retired senior and certainly not a gourmet or "chef" class cook by any stretch of the imagination. I have, however, cooked for a family of six, done a lot of entertaining and have tested and collected a lot of recipes over the years. I love the subject of food and cooking, if not always the doing, and am interested in cuisines from all over the world. The best cookbook I have ever owned is in twelve volumes ---- The Woman's Day Encyclopedia of Cookery, copyright 1966 by Fawcett Publications, Inc. ---- from which I've learned so much. I can easily trace my cooking history by the spills, dog-ears and notes in the margins. I was a child during WWII and remember well my mother's creative cooking in order to cope with the meat and sugar shortages, those prized ration stamps and the cans of used grease saved at the back of the refrigerator to be turned in to the local butcher for the war effort and, of course, extra stamps. As a young woman in the 1950s and 1960s, I was definitely a target for the Jell-O and Campbell's Soup waves in cooking ---- and many of my recipes reflect that ---- but I've noticed that many of those resipes still persist today. If I had to describe the category to which I belong as a cook, I would say the operative word is "frugal" ---- I somethimes think the unbelievable bounty we enjoy today of "over the top"! It's hard for me to accept recipes that call for expensive, end product ingredients (such as commercial candy bars, cookies, frozen entrees, etc.) to create recipes that can easily be done from "scratch". I do undeerstand the plight of the working mother, however ---- I have been one for the last thirty-five years. I'm a little in awe of the culinary knowledge represented here on Recipezaar ---- only hope I can live up to your standards with my contributions