Martha Stewart makes me homesick. Okay, let me clarify that.

I grew up in the American Midwest, surrounded by corn fields, farmland, and berry-picking expeditions every summer. When I started paging through Martha’s American Food I couldn’t help but feel nostalgic. Several of these dishes made frequent appearances on our dinner table: meatloaf, chicken pot pies, tuna noodle casserole, pot roast, sloppy joes, kielbasa, creamy coleslaw, green bean casserole, strawberry shortcake, cherry pie. Oh, I’m drooling on my keyboard. That’s attractive.

This cookbook is full of Mom’s home cooking Martha-fied! The photos are gorgeous, the recipes are classic and easy—as American food should be, and she covers every region from coast to coast. But don’t fret, my Canadian friends, as “American” as this cookbook is, I think you’re going to absolutely love it.

In fact, I’m overjoyed to offer a copy to one of you lovely, lucky readers.

To enter this contest: Tell me your favourite “American” food in the comments below!

Contest closes May 2, 2012. Canadian residents only, excluding Quebec. Winner will be chosen at random from the eligible entries.

For more great articles and contests, sign up for our Joie de Vivre lifestyle newsletter here.

Full contest rules:

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In the 1960s my busy mother used to bake bread two or three times a week. After we moved to the city in the 1970s she rarely, if ever, made it. By 1970 only 15 percent of all flour sold in the United States was for home baking, while in 1900 it had been 95 percent. I assume a similar pattern existed in Canada, where the cult of convenience was so firmly taking hold. Why would a mother make her own bread when she could find it sliced, wrapped and waiting in the supermarket? This was the beginning of the period when time spent in the kitchen was considered time wasted.

Women wanting to liberate themselves from their domestic obligations, particularly in the kitchen, certainly played a role in this shift. My mother never called herself a feminist, but feminist ideas would have resonated with her. Betty Friedan’s The Feminine Mystique, published in 1963, describes the malaise of women who had to give up entirely on the idea of a family if they wanted a career, or who had to give up on a career or any sort of expression of their own individuality to serve their families.

My mother actually liked to cook and she was a good cook, but like so many women of her generation with children, women who were working outside the home, or women like my mother who were trying to get an education while raising a family, she welcomed anything that could make her life easier. I remember that she made very simple meals for us, and that she involved her children in the cooking as we got older, but she also felt the pressure to take shortcuts. It was the era of the working mother and when packaged food really found its niche. What busy mother has time to coax her children to eat a dinner that she has carefully prepared from scratch? All she has to do is open a package and, considering the amount of salt and flavour enhancers that went into that package, children were sure to eat up. Packaged foods fit into the discourse of the day. They were convenient and they seemed nutritious, and that was almost all that mattered.

Cookbooks from the 1960s and 1970s reflect both the excitement and the anxiety about packaged foods. My mother’s very popular Better Homes and Gardens Casserole Cook Book (published in 1968) is all about opening tins and packages to make dinner for the family. Betty Crocker’s Picture Cook Book was produced by General Mills in 1950 and became a standard in American kitchens throughout that period. Recipes in magazines urged women to serve wedges of canned meat glazed with marmalade, and to broil sausages and serve them with canned peaches.

In Canada Madame Benoit, famous across the country in her day with her own TV show, published Madame Benoit Cooks at Home in 1978. At first glance she seems to be all about authentic home cooking&emdash;she praises the superiority of beans baked in a clay pot overnight in a brick oven&emdash;but she also seems quite excited about the time–saving possibilities inherent in instant mashed potatoes, and includes canned beans and ketchup in a recipe for Bean Pot Pork Chops. For a while, Madame Benoit seemed poised somewhere between a Canadian version of Julia Child (she even trained at the Cordon Bleu in Paris) and Betty Crocker, but she eventually gave in entirely to the faster–is–better trend and wrote a book on microwave cooking. My mother had some of her books in our kitchen.

Of course not everyone was giving in to convenience foods. In 1966 the popular historian Pierre Berton and his wife, Janet, published The Centennial Food Guide. They were clearly in the anxiety camp: “In a country that produces the world’s finest fresh meat, we submit to a dozen equivalents of Spam, all of them appalling,” they wrote with obvious disapproval. “We squirt fake whipped cream on our frozen strawberries and douse our instant pancakes with ersatz maple syrup.” The Bertons, who were clearly in the minority, feared that the way things were going, the art of cooking would soon become the art of stirring, and that babies would eventually be born without taste buds because they would no longer need them.

Watch this archival video from 1967 of Pierre Berton on CBC-TV’s Telescope in which he condemns artificial food.

The Bertons had seven children to feed, and the soup pot was always bubbling on the stove. What to eat was a constant question in their family, a constant source of pleasure. At least that’s how they presented it in print. In fact the stories throughout the book are about cooking with their children, coming up with big feasts for the family and sitting down to a good, cooked breakfast on the weekends. There are also stories about serving more elegant meals, though still composed of local ingredients, when the occasion called for it. There’s nothing about feeding children differently from adults, about hiding their vegetables in chocolate cake or cutting their sandwiches into the shape of a Venetian gondola. It’s probably safe to assume that the Berton household was free of specially prepared foods for children.

What these cookbooks of the 1950s and 1960s make clear, though, is that before the 1970s people cooked real food. They might have been trying to recreate ethnic dishes from faraway places—and by that I mean Italian recipes in New York, French recipes in Quebec and German recipes in Pennsylvania and southwestern Ontario—but they used the local, fresh ingredients they had at hand, and in the process they were creating something unique.

JEANNIE MARSHALL grew up in Toronto, and lived in New York, Berlin and Madrid before moving to Italy in 2002. She has reported on a wide range of issues in Europe for such media as the Globe and Mail, the Toronto Star, the National Post, National Post Business, enRoute, The Walrus, Quill & Quire, Canadian Living and Canadian House and Home and has worked as a freelance editor for the Food and Agriculture Organization of the United Nations. As the features writer in the Life section of the National Post during the paper’s first 5 years, Marshall became known for a distinctive and engaging style of storytelling. A National Magazine Award finalist, she and her husband and young son live in Rome.

Her new book, Outside the Box, is a lively, cross-cultural look at the way packaged and fast foods are marketed to our kids–and a meditation on how our eating habits and our family lives are being changed in the process.

The new imprint announces its name and inaugural title list.

Random House of Canada is delighted to announce the name of its recently created lifestyle imprint: Appetite by Random House. Perfectly positioned on the beautiful West coast under the direction of respected and award-winning publisher Robert McCullough, Appetite by Random House will offer readers in Canada and the United States a carefully selected collection of lifestyle titles in categories including food, wine, health and design.

Appetite by Random House will publish approximately ten books per year starting with Rob Rainford’s Born to Grill: Over 100 Recipes From My Backyard to Yours (May 8, 2012), by the much loved chef and television personality. Rainford takes grilling to a whole new level with twenty mouth-watering menus from around the world, making this the ultimate cookbook for grill masters and novices alike.

This fall, the imprint will publish:

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Asparagus is an excellent source of vitamin K, as well as numerous B vitamins, including folate, B1, B2, B3 and B6. It’s also high in vitamins A and C, iron, manganese, potassium and fiber. Quinoa and other whole grains are a rich source of magnesium, a mineral that acts as a co–factor for more than 300 enzymes including those involved in insulin secretion and glucose metabolism. Spring garlic scapes are the flower stalks that spring out of the garlic bulb. They’re rich in allum, which can help protect against osteoarthritis.

Chef Ezra Title, my cohost on the TV show Healthy Gourmet, created this incredibly healthy recipe. To learn more about Ezra, visit his website at www.chezvousdining.ca.

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If you’re looking for a way to spice up your food without adding a lot of extra calories and fat, here are ten ideas to try:

MARINADES Marinating meat, poultry, and fish not only adds flavor but also improves the texture, tenderizing meat and helping chicken, turkey, and fish stay moist during cooking. Follow this formula for making marinades: In a small bowl, whisk together an acid, such as lemon juice or vinegar; some oil or liquid, such as buttermilk; and seasonings of your choice, such as garlic, salt, pepper, spices, or herbs. Marinate meat and poultry for at least 30 minutes at room temperature in a nonreactive baking dish or resealable plastic bag; if marinating longer (up to 24 hours), refrigerate, turning food occasionally. Seafood should be marinated for only 15 to 30 minutes. Because it’s not safe to consume marinades used on raw fish or meat, set some aside before marinating if you plan to baste food during cooking. Use a clean brush to apply.

DRY RUBS Spice rubs are mixtures of salt, sugar, spices, and dried herbs used to season meat, poultry, or seafood before cooking, especially when grilling. Rubs are quick and easy to assemble; they can also be more flavorful and economical than commercial blends. Unlike marinades, rubs can be applied just before cooking or up to several hours ahead. Use your fingers to rub the mixture on the meat, coating lightly—aim for about 1 teaspoon for every 3/4 pound.

VINAIGRETTES Store–bought salad dressings are often loaded with fat, salt, sugar, and preservatives; making your own enables you to control the fat and calories as well as the flavor.

When you use good–quality ingredients, you don’t need as much dressing to satisfy your taste buds. The best ratio of oil to vinegar for a lighter vinaigrette is two parts oil to one part vinegar; including Dijon, honey, and other thickeners means you can cut back on the oil. For low–fat creamy dressings, swap in low–fat yogurt or buttermilk for mayonnaise and sour cream.

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This raw dish is packed with detoxifying vegetables. Zucchini makes a wonderful substitute for noodles and boasts only 25 calories per cup (250mL). Cabbage and cauliflower both contain indole–3–carbinol (I3C), which helps to balance hormones by reducing excess estrogen in the body.

Almonds are high in omega–9 and vitamin E, and make a great substitute for the typical peanut sauce.

INGREDIENTS:
1 medium zucchini
1 large carrot
1 green onion, chopped
1/2 cup (125 mL) shredded purple cabbage
1/2 cup (125 mL) cauliflower florets
1/2 cup (125 mL) mung bean sprouts or radish sprouts (spicy)

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WHY IT’S LIGHT This Italian restaurant standby turns virtuous with baked (instead of fried) eggplant and a healthier béchamel made from skim milk, which is then combined with some marinara sauce. Using less cheese also helps; here, the two cheeses are sprinkled only on top, rather than in each layer.

serves 4
prep time: 20 minutes
total time: 45 minutes

1 large Italian eggplant (2 pounds), sliced 1/2 inch thick crosswise
1 tablespoon olive oil
Coarse salt and ground pepper
1 cup skim milk
3 tablespoons all–purpose flour
2 garlic cloves, minced
1 cup homemade or store–bought marinara sauce
1/2 cup grated part–skim mozzarella cheese
1/3 cup grated Parmesan cheese

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Time to start planning for your holiday parties, and we’re here to help. We’ve created a festive sampler that includes a variety of appetizers from:

Friday Night Dinners by Bonnie Stern
Bite by Bite by Peter Callahan
Earth to Table by Jeff Crump and Bettina Schormann
Two Dishes by Linda Haynes and Devin Connell (of ACE Bakery fame!)
The Art of Living According to Joe Beef by David McMillan, Frederic Morin, and Meredith Erickson
Gourmet Game Night by Cynthia Nims

Click the image below to preview and download your free sampler:

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Cherries and mustard may sound like an unusual pairing, but they taste great together. Sweet, tart, and hot, this sauce goes well with chicken and veal as well as pork.

Makes 4 servings

2 tablespoons Colman’s dry mustard
1 teaspoon kosher salt
1 pound Bing cherries, stemmed and pitted (3 cups packed)
1/2 cup red wine vinegar
1/4 cup ruby port
2 tablespoons sugar
2 tablespoons cumin seeds, finely ground
3 tablespoons sherry vinegar
1/4 cup honey
4 (9-ounce) bone-in pork chops, preferably Berkshire (each 1 1/4 inches thick)
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