Well, it's true, you learn something new everyday! When you think of cuisine, foodies, cookbooks etc. you think Julia Child, Auguste Escoffier, Alice Waters, James Beard. For some, visions of Emeril Lagasse, Gordon Ramsey or the Food Network crew like Paula Dean, Alton Brown and Ms. EVOO may dance in your heads. Well, I've got another name for you, are you ready? Wait for it... what about... Vincent Price?
Yep, you read right, apparently Vincent Price is not only a great (and one of my all time favorite) actor and art lover but he was also a gourmet cook! Perhaps he felt the culinary pull of his genes as his grandfather did invent the first baking powder ever to be commercially manufactured in the US;) His most famous, and I'm guessing largest and most extensive, cookbook is called "A Treasury of Great Recipes" and was published in 1965. A leather bound edition is available but good luck finding any copy published before 1992 costing less than $100. For those of us whose budget won't stretch that far the closest you can probably get to it would be this one which still ranges from $22-50. There's also "Come Into The Kitchen" which is one of a few of the smaller cookbooks floating around in book land and a bit more affordable at $38. Psst, family and friends can be sure to find this on my Facebook wish list this year, hint hint. For those with an even more modest budget, it appears recipezaar.com features a few of his recipes to try out too.
Thanks to Youtube you can hear a recording from an audio cassette of "Foods from the Austro-Hungarian Empire", which is part of the "Vincent Price: International Cooking Course" series he'd done back in the 60s and 70s where he talks about Pickled Mushrooms. I also found a great site for Vincent Price fans with free downloadable mp3 recordings of just about anything and everything he's ever done including a listing of clips talking about wine appreciation and more from his International Cooking Course!
Also thanks to YouTube, there's a couple of really cute spoofs and clever audio compilations worth checking out for a giggle:
They also have an ancient video (ok 1980s) of Mr. Price cooking with Wolfgang Puck (warning, the audio is pretty fuzzy and bad). Rumor has it during one of his many appearances on the Tonight Show with Johnny Carson, Vincent Price actually demonstrated how to poach fish in a dishwasher but try as I might I just can't find a clip of it anywhere (and yes, this goes on my list of things I'd really REALLY like to see!)
So enjoy all the little gems I've sprinkled before you today. If I get the opportunity to pick up one of the above mentioned cookbooks I'll be sure to fill you in on the experience and in the meantime if anyone reading this actually does come across any of the books or does get their hands on the Johnny Carson clip, please feel free to enlighten us all! Chow for now!
I've got another one for you that I think would surprise you. Danny Kaye was, apparently, something of a genius with a wok! He was a good friend of Ken Wong (who used to teach at the Culinary Academy). In fact, I was taking a class at his house when "Danny" called.
ReplyDeleteOh man, I LOVE Danny Kaye too! Yes, that IS a surprise, I never knew he was a foodie. That's it, I'm dedicating the next week to finding out which Hollywood greats were into cooking:D
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