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Eating Maine History: Sunset Salad
Welcome to our Eating Maine History series, where we dive deep into the Maine State Museum’s collections to bring you the old, weird, and maybe even tasty foods of Maine’s past.
This episode’s recipe is Sunset Salad, a recipe from the 1956 Village Cookbook out of Yarmouth, Maine. Read more about Sunset Salad and see the recipe cards.
Watch the video below to learn more!
More about Sunset Salad
The recipe was contributed by Ann M. Bartlett. This salad features orange jello, oranges, lemon juice, carrots, and salt. It is served on a bed of lettuce with…guess what? Mayonnaise.
This recipe is from The Village Cookbook, a handwritten book of recipes sponsored by The Village Improvement Society in Yarmouth, Maine. Proceeds from the book supported an annual scholarship for a Senior at North Yarmouth Academy.
The sunset salad recipe is not unique to Yarmouth Maine, though different cooks put their own twist on it. It was an official recipe from the company Jell-o, though this version of the recipe doesn’t call for mayonnaise.
The Jell-o company rose to fame across America after humble beginnings. In 1897, Pearle Wait, a carpenter in LeRoy, New York, created a fruity gelatin dessert while experimenting with a cough remedy and laxative tea. His wife named it Jell-O. He failed to market the product so he sold the recipe for $450. In the early 1900s, Jell-O began to take off. The first four flavors were orange, lemon, strawberry, and raspberry. Lime was introduced in 1930.
Other companies also sold gelatin products, which were used in both sweet and savory dishes. Over the years, cooks have elevated jello into an art form. Whether it was to impress friends at a 1950s party or to try to make food more fun for kids, jello has come in many shapes, sizes, and flavors. Savory jello may seem terrifying to modern taste buds, but many people over the years have liked their meats and vegetables to be a little jiggly.