Monthly Archives: October 2014

Double, Double, Toil and Trouble: The History of Halloween (Condensed)

Halloween. There can hardly be a more interesting holiday to research, and, in honor of this coming Friday, research it we certainly have done! The deep traditions underlying “All Hallows’ Eve”, the mutations of those traditions over time, and, naturally, the literature following the course of the holiday over the past few hundred years… all of these factors have made for an extremely interesting study of Halloween. This holiday, which is observed (in many different ways) all over the world in some form or fashion, has a history as diverse as the many cultures which celebrate it today.

The History of Hallowe’en (Condensed)

Samhain was celebrated on October 31st/November 1st as the Celtic people observed the end of the harvest season and beginning of the dark & bare winter.

Samhain was celebrated on October 31st, as the Celts observed the end of the harvest season and beginning of the dark & bare winter.

Halloween, as we currently celebrate it, is an eclectic mix of holidays. Its main influences are the Celtic “Samhain” harvest festival, and the Christian “All Hallows’ Day” or “All Saints Day”. The influences of the Celtic harvest festivals are undeniable – as Samhain was viewed as a liminal time, when fairies and spirits could be transported to “our” world and walk amongst the living. These spirits were welcomed home with candles, feasts, dances and offerings. The Christian influence on the holiday came later, when, in 835 A.D., Pope Gregory IV changed the celebration of All Saints Day from May 13^th to November 1^st, the same day as the Celtic celebration. There are many assumed reasons for this change, some of which may be attributed to Celtic influence, but also for practical reasons – too many pilgrimages made to the Vatican in the summer months, etc. By changing All Hallows’ Day (and All Saints’ Day) to October 31st & November 1^st, the Pope effectively gave even more popularity to this end-of-the-season festival established to highlight the beginning of winter.

Quite a few Halloween traditions spread from this merging of the festivals. As Christians viewed All Hallows’ Eve as a time allowing the recently departed a chance to extract revenge on their enemies before advancing to the next world, a tradition of disguise was born. Christened folk dressed up in masks and costume in order to confuse the dead – to give themselves safety against any possible revenge by those seeking vengeance. In the Middle Ages the tradition of “souling” came about, where people (particularly children, and often in disguises) went door to door, parish to parish, to beg for “soul cakes” in exchange for praying for the dead relatives of the rich they begged from – the origin of modern day trick-or-treating was born.

After all, Halloween isn’t Halloween without a Jack-O-Lantern to scare away the evil spirits! (Ca. early 20th c.).

The first history on the holiday printed in the United States was Ruth Edna Kelley’s The Book of Hallowe’en, published in Massachusetts in 1919. The author, using Robert Burns’ famous poem Hallowe’en as a guide (a poem internationally regarded as one of the most historically significant works on the holiday, published in Scotland in 1786), stated that “in short, no custom that was once honored at Hallowe’en is out of fashion now.” Almost a century later, this statement still holds true, as disguising ourselves, begging door to door, and celebrating are still popular today (though we are not sure how many people know why they are doing such strange acts on this day of the year).

Scottish and Irish influence truly made the holiday into what it is today, as their Celtic ancestry but staunch Roman Catholicism merged into the collaborative holiday that we know today. Despite the Puritanical influence on early America, and their dislike of holiday celebrations of almost any kind, the influx of Scottish and Irish immigration in the 19^th century dramatically increased the holiday’s popularity in the United States (a popularity which has only increased ever since).

Gothic Fiction in the Romantic Period & Halloween in Literature

“The Nightmare”, a 1781 oil-painting by Swiss-Anglo artist Henry Fuseli. This painting gained instant popularity at the beginning of the Gothic literary movement.

It is a truth universally acknowledged that the human race seems to like to scare themselves silly. The abundance of horror films in modern society and the popularity of said films are proof of the hold that “terror” has on the general public. It is an amazing concept, to willingly give a piece of art (be it a movie, a book, or a photograph) the ability to terrify a human being. This is not a recent notion, however. It is no mere coincidence that gothic and “scary” fiction has reigned supreme since the 1700s when its popularity first emerged. Gothic fiction by popular 18th century writers like Ann Radcliffe and Matthew Lewis (authors of The Romance of the Forest [1791] and The Monk [1796], respectively) helped pave the way for titles such as Frankenstein (1818), The Vampyre (1819), all works of Edgar Allen Poe (early to mid 19th century), Carmilla (1871), The Strange Case of Dr. Jekyll and Mr. Hyde (1886), The Picture of Dorian Gray (1891) and Dracula (1897) to be widely read and devoured by a blood-thirsty public throughout the 1800s. The Victorian period saw a great rise of interest in the supernatural, as evidenced by the popular fiction, but also by the shift of society to an industrial world, which made civilians long for the simple days of old. “The world’s first industrial societies came to hunger for the country… Halloween, as imagined by Victorians – rural, rudimentary, and demanding a certain amount of innocence – was entrancing” (A Halloween Reader by Lesley Bannatyne).

As to Halloween (or simply the dark and unnatural) in American Literature, there are quite a few early works that, when compared to the Halloween celebrated today, exemplifies this shift in belief of Halloween as a waste of time or a hoax to a romanticized, idyllic pastime entrenched in tradition and history. In fact, “The Disappointment” – what is considered to be America’s first opera, performed in 1767 – tells the story of a conjurer duping four Pennsylvania colony folk into believing that he has a magic rod cut on All Hallows’ Eve that will lead the four to pirate treasure. The Halloween reference is placed significantly – to prove the gullibility of the four travelers. Early America saw Halloween as a code word for scam, a time for tricksters and frauds to cheat the public. However, by the end of the 19^th century, America was beginning to see the Halloween we were always meant to see – a time for celebration, for honoring the dead, and for being glad to be alive.

This Halloween, as you put on your fishnet stockings or cover your face with a mask guaranteed to terrify the neighbor’s kids, just remember to give a respectful nod to your ancestors and deceased friends or family – as it was for them that this celebration of life was created!

Happy Halloween!!!

Theatrically Speaking: Charles Dickens, his Amateur Theatricals & his Performances at the Podium

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No one reading a Dickens novel can deny the author’s enthusiasm for the theatrical. To see a young orphan used and abused by adults at every turn, to have to bear a young girl dying and her desolate grandfather withering away by her grave, or a miser being shown the error of his ways by ghosts… Dickens captured the hearts and attention of readers all over the world, and was, quite arguably, the most popular writer throughout the Victorian period. However, Dickens “the author” was not merely that – he was a man of many talents, much of which sat in the dramatic arts. A known producer of amateur theatrics, an actor himself, and performer until the day he died – Dickens captivated the world and unfortunately paid the ultimate price for living for his audiences.

A youthful Dickens.

Dickens as a Young Performer

Charles John Huffam Dickens was born in Portsmouth, England in 1812 into what started out as an idyllic childhood that soon turned into a slightly unstable family situation. Because of his father’s debts, the author was forced to leave school at the age of 12 to work in a blacking warehouse where he earned six shillings a week pasting labels on pots of boot blacking. This formative time in Dickens’ childhood gave inspiration to many of the traumas portrayed in his works – most notably Dombey & Son and Old Curiosity Shop. Later on in life, Dickens would live with a fear of his literary talent failing him, and the constant looming possibility of ruin and poverty. One could argue that these fears, when present in the most popular celebrity of Victorian England, stemmed from this early age and his abbreviated childhood, as he was called upon at an early age to contribute to the family earnings.

Dickens grew up with a love of performing, and in 1832 at the age of 20 Dickens gave serious thought to becoming an actor. He went so far as to arrange an audition for himself at the Lyceum Theatre through the help of the then-current stage manager. Unfortunately (for Dickens, rather than for us), he came down with a severe cold the day of the audition and was unable to attend. Dickens continued with a steadfast love of theater and attended as often as he could.

Dickens’ Theatricals and The Frozen Deep

Once Dickens achieved great success with his writings (beginning with Pickwick Papers and Oliver Twist and only becoming more intense and thrilling as installments of his novels went on), his almost super-human energy (the author reportedly walked about 12 miles every day) allowed him to humor his theatrical side and stage amateur performances with the help of family and friends. In 1852, after the author and his family moved to Tavistock House in London, Dickens converted the schoolroom into a miniature theater, “capable of holding an audience of ninety” (Fitzsimmons, The Charles Dickens Show p. 26). He and his children, along with their friends, put on performances every few weeks, and Dickens excelled in as many aspects of the theater as he did in literature. His longtime friendship with Wilkie Collins was often a great inspiration in these times, and Collins even wrote some plays specially to be performed by the Dickens household.

Engraving of the end scene in “The Frozen Deep”, Dickens as the wild Wardour lying on the frozen ground. (Illustrated London News, 17th Jan. 1857).

One of the last amateur performances Dickens was to participate in was The Frozen Deep, a tragic theatrical written by Collins (with the significant editing and assistance of Dickens) in which Dickens played the role of Richard Wardour, as well as stage manager. Not only would this production prove to be significant in the way of theater (its success warranted a performance in front of Queen Victoria and Prince Albert), but it also was the momentous occasion that brought Dickens together with his later love, Ellen Ternan. Ellen, an 18-year-old young actress that was hired by Dickens, along with her mother and older sister Maria to play in The Frozen Deep, would soon become the scandal that the public blamed for the dissolution of Charles’ marriage to his wife, Catherine Hogarth.

Though the home theatricals soon dissipated, as Dickens bought the country home “Gad’s Hill Place” in Kent and, though very much frowned upon, separated from his wife, Dickens was soon to begin the next phase in his thespian career with a series of Reading Tours that he would continue until a few months before his death.

Dickens and his custom-made podium, specially designed by himself so as to not cut his body language off from his audience!

Dickens and his custom-made podium, specially designed by himself so as not to cut his body language off from his audience.

A One Man Show

“For the readings were an entertainment. They were not readings in the literal sense of the word. Dickens was a magnificent actor, with a wonderful talent for mimicry. He seemed able to alter not only his voice, his features and his carriage but also his stature. He disappeared and the audience saw, as the case might be, Fagin, Scrooge, Pickwick, Mrs. Gamp… or a host of others. Character after character appeared on the platform, living and breathing in the flesh” (Fitzsimmons p. 15). Dickens began reading professionally at a time when some say his literary powers were beginning to decline. Though he got some serious negative feedback from a few close friends about the idea (his longtime friend John Forster, for one, told Dickens that it was demeaning for an author to perform his own work), Dickens persisted. After reading in Edinburgh to an audience of over 2000, Dickens explained his euphoria at performing his work to Forster in a letter, “I must do something, or I shall wear my heart away. I can see no better thing to do that is half so hopeful in itself, or half so well suited to my restless state.” Fitzsimmons attributes much of Dickens’ wish to read (and possibly rightfully so) to its use as an outlet for his restlessness and miserable situation at home, and to the idea that he could make use of his theatrical talents and desire to be a thespian, all the while earning money to assuage his fear of living in poverty.

Dickens’ readings, however, exacted a great emotional strain on the author, and were obviously a direct contributor to his much too early demise. He performed many “shows” in a very small period of time, and the constant traveling, worry and keeping up of a charming & animated façade took its toll. However, Dickens refused to relent and disappoint his audiences. Reportedly, while giving a reading in Baltimore on his birthday in February of 1868, the distinguished statesman Charles Sumner came to visit the author at his hotel at 5 in the afternoon, and found Dickens in a right state, “covered in mustard poultices and apparently voiceless” (Fawcett, Dickens the Dramatist p. 171). At Sumner’s protestations against the author performing that evening, Dickens’ traveling manager George Dolby stated that, though he had told the author that it was ill-advised to perform that evening, Dickens would take the stage despite his ill health. In the words of Dolby to the statesman, “You have no idea how he will change when he gets to that little table.”

It was during this intense scheduled period of readings that Dickens was involved in the Staplehurst rail crash, an incident that left the author in even poorer health from the strain on his nerves and his subsequent mistrust of the rail system. Directly after the accident, Dickens helped tend to the wounded and dying, and got back on the train to rescue his unfinished manuscript of Our Mutual Friend. Little known to the public, Ellen Ternan and her mother were traveling with Dickens from Paris when the accident happened, and Dickens was able to avoid an appearance at the inquest in order to save Ternan the scandal such a fact would immediately produce.

The front page of The Penny Illustrated Paper, dated March 19th, 1870 – just four days after Dickens’ final public reading.

One of the continued strains on the author, with regard to his reading performances, was his portrayal of Nancy’s murder by Bill Sikes, taken from Oliver Twist. The absolute terror and melodrama of the scene took a great toll on Dickens, so much so that Dolby wrote, “That the frequency with which he persisted in giving this Reading was affecting him seriously, nobody could judge better than myself, living and travelling with him as I was.” Disregarding this constant strain on his nerves and his extreme bouts of depression and illness, Dickens persisted. If anything, this obsession with portraying the murder scene with voice as well as action just perfectly for his audiences shows the energetic state of his mind, despite a failing body and spirit.

Ignoring his declining health and personal turmoil, Dickens continued to read publicly until just three months before he suffered a fatal stroke, with his last public reading given on 15 March 1870. Dickens was to conduct reading tours for over a decade – and not any single performance to less than a full house. There is no doubt in our minds that should this literary icon have chosen the stage rather than the pen, he would have found similar great success and admiration for his work.

Dickens the Renaissance Man

Dickens will always be remembered for his literary genius – the man who created universal and beloved characters and stories, the man who became the face of English literature. Additionally, Dickens should also be remembered for his all-around charm and allure, for his ability to captivate audiences with more than just words, but with his entire being.

Tavistock Books maintains a specialty in the works of Charles Dickens – first editions of his work, Dickens in parts, his plays, his biographical works, and even letters, pictures, and items related to the author and his life. Hence the name of our shop after the London home Dickens turned into an amateur theater for his friends and family. Look out next week for our monthly list of “Select Acquisitions”, also titled “Theatrically Speaking” – a list of crossovers between literature and the performing arts. Email Margueritte at msp@tavbooks.com to be added to our Mailing List!

Click here to see our Dickens items in shop –>

The Seattle Antiquarian Book Fair (Galoshes Optional)

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Yes, we took this picture ourselves. No, we don’t do weddings.

I do believe (with my rawther limited experience to back me up) that the Seattle Fair is the perfect Antiquarian Book Fair. I don’t mean to slam any other fair in the world (I still love the coziness of Sacramento, and I just adore the blisters I get from my heels in Pasadena). I just mean to say that out of the fairs that I have been to and worked at so far, Seattle seems to be the perfect blend. First off, the exhibition center is a beautiful venue that is somehow bright and peaceful at the same time, the people are kind and helpful, the town interesting and alive.

Now the truth is, we cannot give a good account of load in and move out, as we had some very kind friends drive our books up and back, and they basically made it one of the easiest fairs we have ever packed out of. This time around the buying was a bit scanty, nevertheless, there is a perfect combination of style & class, but also a fun and easy-going nature displayed by the booksellers, by the fair staff, and by the customers. I don’t think I am explaining it well – but let’s just say that it was one of the best book-filled weekends I have had in quite a while!

Once you're done setting up, you may as well take a moment to be alone. When your boss isn't snapping pictures of you not-working to use against you later, that is.

Once you’re done setting up, you may as well take a moment to be alone. Take my advice though, and maybe don’t do it when your boss is snapping pictures of you not-working to use against you later.

I will say that my favorite part of the fairs is set up. I know many booksellers moan and groan about putting the books on their shelves, but the part of me that takes after my mother wants to make it “pretty” almost as fast as possible. There are no breaks. There are no survivors. So help me God if my boss comes back into the booth before it’s all done… and ever again casually mention that “that volume shouldn’t be there, it should be displayed with the front board to us.” He knows better than that now. My second favorite part of the fairs is walking around with a nametag on. I know it is silly (and possibly rather petty of me) but I like looking important to customers meandering around the booths. I’m not sure most booksellers realize this, as many have been in the trade for quite a while, but take it from a newbie – to people overwhelmed by the size and sheer amount of “stuff” at the book fair, name tags make you seem quite spectacularly intelligent and useful. All you need is a haughty expression and WHAM! It’s like you’re the president.

Vic, looking pleased to have arrived in Seattle in one piece.

All kidding aside, the Seattle fair truly does have it down pat. There seems to be a dressy day and a dress down day. There are customers actually buying, there are institutions actually looking, there is lots of space and light – but most of all, there is a very good attitude around the fair. Booksellers seem to be there to have fun, and are excited to sell some books. While some book fairs can be rather expensive for the bookseller to exhibit at, Seattle is a great venue for an affordable price – one that a seller might actually be able to make back in his or her sales.

The city itself boasts quite a few great restaurants, bars, and rain (which, in my super humble opinion, are the 3 things every great city needs). Of course, the fact that we had dinner at the Space Needle, went to see the Seattle Symphony, and then proceeded to get bumped up to first class on the flight home didn’t hurt my feelings on the weekend whatsoever. Tavistock Books is definitely looking forward to the Seattle fair next year!

The Seattle Antiquarian Book Fair. Let’s play Where’s Waldo with Vic! First to find him gets a 2% discount (What? I said we made money, not that we were bathing in it).

Vic Zoschak. Further remarks unnecessary.

Gourmets, Drunks & a (Short) History of Cookery Books

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Tavistock Books’ recent acquisitions contain a large focus on Cookery titles. Not only have we recently had in stock the cookbook with the 1^st English Language recipe for tacos, but also The Cook’s Oracle, the first cookery book published out of Stockton, California (a more exciting purchase than you might think, which generated enthusiasm from around the country). The influx of interest in the food genre persuaded us to write this short, slightly perverse and tongue-in-cheek history of Cookery Books.

The Roman Gourmet

An error of 19th c. scholarship attributed the work API CAE to an “Apicius Coelius”, but modern scholarship shows that the name is almost certainly Marcus Gavius Apicius.

We can assume that the first person to ever cook something (let’s face it… most likely a woolly mammoth or something equally as strange) probably did it completely accidentally – perhaps by dropping their meat on an open flame and deciding to eat it anyway. Lo and behold! It’s so much better when it isn’t dripping blood on you! (Unless it’s steak tartar, which I highly doubt cave men had, but what do I know?) The first cookery book and collection of recipes known to man is a work falsely attributed to Marcus Gavius Apicius (falsely, as the surviving copy dates from the 4^th or 5^th century AD, and Apicius lived in the 1^st, but that’s a whole different can of worms and I don’t really feel like going into it), a Roman gourmet and lover of food in the time of the Emperor Tiberius. Though impossible to prove his connection to the cook book “Apicius” (yet quite obviously named in his honor), it should be understood that this man was quite possibly the most food-obsessed person in the world. Legend has it that Apicius poisoned himself after realizing with horror that out of his fortune of some hundred million sesterces, he was down to his last million – having spent the majority on lavish feasts and immense amounts of food and drink. With the “prospect of starvation before him,” the Roman gourmet ended his life. Now that is devotion to the art of cookery!

Though M. G. Apicius is not the author of the 4^th/5^th century work API CAE (a title on the famous manuscript of the cook book), it is said that he did produce cookery recipes in his time, and gave many tips & hints in the art of cooking to those in his inner circle. It is said that Apicius himself developed a way of producing pork liver, in a similar fashion to how goose liver was served at the time. The name “Apicius” has been attributed to several gluttons (I mean “foodies”) since, with at least 3 in Ancient Rome alone.

The Grotesque Middle Ages

In preparing for this blog article, I read Old Cook Books, An Illustrated History by Eric Quayle. It is recommended that everyone read this book, as it is filled to the brim with fun anecdotes about the history of cooking and writing about it. BE WARNED, however, that you shouldn’t read the first few chapters when about to eat, when thinking about eating, or just after eating. Maybe read it when you’re on some kind of juice cleanse. Not only did the recipes included for Grilled Womb, Boiled Parrot & Stuffed Dormice pretty much determine that I was going to be drinking water for dinner after, but Quayle’s description of feasting in the Middle Ages was, to me, positively disgusting.

She really loves her life right now.

Apparently in the Middle Ages everyone was obese and drunk all the time, and it was a competition to see who could walk away from the feasting area without passing out in their dishes. You know what? I’m not doing it justice. Let’s quote some of Quayle’s write-up on Medieval feasts, shall we? (Just remember what I said about not eating at this time, you’ll thank me later). “In Medieval days, the banquets and feasts enjoyed depended for their success almost entirely on the ravenous appetites and unrefined palates of the unwashed mobs that thronged the rough-hewn tables… The over-filling of empty bellies and the immediate allaying of pangs of hunger… were the prime objectives of the sweating cooks and minions who dished out the helpings… Anything even remotely edible had been tossed into these same cauldrons… in the background, the spits turned with their heavy carcasses, dripping with fat, before glowing fires of heaped-up logs. When the revels commenced, immense quantities of food and strong drink were consumed at a single sitting, the plates being scooped clean in greasy handfuls as each new course arrived… The less stalwart were the first to go, as many collapsing across the tables as slid beneath them. Great pride was taken in being the last to submit” (Quayle, Ch. 2). In translation… everyone was plastered and unsightly in the Middle Ages and it wasn’t half as sexy as TV makes it out to be.

This quote had basically nothing to do with this blog subject, it simply pleased me to force you all to share my current pain. Let us return to the matter at hand. It was in the Middle Ages that the first work of cookery in English is known to have been printed. The Boke of Cokery, printed by Richard Pynson in 1500, is known in only 1 copy throughout the world (at the Library of the Marquess of Bath). This work not only gives the reader recipes for use at feasts or in an aristocratic household, but is a historically significant work. Pynson, possibly with the help of others, details many royal feasts that allow us 21^st century minions to know exactly what was served to King Henry IV with the Spaniards and Frenchmen as they jousted in Smyth Felde! This noteworthy work, the first of its kind in the English vernacular, opened a door for publishing English-language recipe books – a genre that has remained popular ever since.

Cook Books in the United States when it was Not the United States Yet

Our 1796 edition of the states’ early work, “The Frugal Housewife.”

The idea of printing recipes in a book only grew in popularity with this publication from Pynson in 1500. Once printing for the masses became commonplace, cookery books entered the fray same as political broadsides and religious prayer books. The earliest American Cookery Book (to our knowledge) was printed in 1742, before the United States had broken away from our meat pie loving friends (Still bitter about this… I love meat pies). This book, entitled The Compleat Housewife; or, Accomplish’d Gentlewoman’s Companion was printed in Williamsburg and was a publication of the original British work printed in 1727 of the same name. Other early cookbooks were to follow, in 1762 with The Cyder-Maker’s Instructor, Sweet-Maker’s Assistant, and Victualler’s and Housekeeper’s Director and The Frugal Housewife, or Complete Woman Cook in 1772 (which, oh, we happen to have a copy of for sale!). These books have, in actuality, exceedingly long titles (as was common for books – see Eleanor Lowenstein’s Bibliography of American Cookery Books 1742 – 1860 to view full write-ups) that describe the multitude of foods whose recipes you will find inside their volumes (pastries, soups, stews, creams… even methods of roasting, boiling, frying, potting, preserving, candying and pickling). These all-around instruction manuals were important to the ladies of early American households, as help with recipes or household chores could be difficult for some early communities to find when in remote areas.

Charitable Cooks in the later 19^th and early 20^th Centuries

Let’s skip ahead a few hundred years (because continuing down this road will only ensure that you will all end up passing out on top of your desks… or under them, apparently), to the 19^th and 20^th centuries of “Charitable” Cooks and their publications. Cook Books began to be readily available to the average civilian in the later 19^th century, as the literacy rate grew and cook books were written for chefs in average households, not purely for aristocratic or wealthy ones. In America in the 1860s, the first fund-raising “receipt books” were compiled and sold at Sanitary Fairs held to raise money for military casualties and their families during the Civil War. This idea of publishing cook books to raise money for the war effort spread like wild-fire. After the war came to an end, the Ladies’ Aid Societies around the country found a myriad of other local charities to devote their efforts to – hospitals, churches, schools, temperance organizations, etc. Throughout the United States, benefit cookery books continued to be printed well into the 20^th century. As Margaret Cook states in her foreword to America’s Charitable Cooks: A Bibliography of Fund-Raising Cook Books Published in the United States, “Though the recipes in early locally-published cookery books are often amateurish, they reflect the cooking fashions of the period in various parts of the United States more accurately than the standard works by professional authors… the great fascination of these early regional cookery books for collectors and local historians is their elusiveness” (p. 7). Charitable cook books in California alone make up the 359 titles in Liselotte & William Glozer’s compilation California in the Kitchen – proving their immense popularity as the hundreds of titles extend merely from 1870 to 1932. Seldom copy-righted, these amateur cook books present a window in time to the average American household fare – and ought to be cherished as such!

Tavistock Books has just issued a Cookery List, full of Charitable Cook Books, Cookery Advertisements, Pamphlets, Brochures, Cookery Education – the whole nine yards – to a handful of cookery customers. If you would like to receive this list privately, please contact Margueritte at msp@tavbooks.com. We promise… there are no recipes for Grilled Womb anywhere in those titles.

(However, if you’d like us to scan that recipe and send it to you, that is a definite possibility – and we promise not to tell TOO many people what you’re having for dinner.)

The same recipe can be used for flamingos?!?! Well why didn't you say so before??

The same recipe can be used for flamingos?!?! Why didn’t you say so before??