“So Far, So Good”—cooking with The New York Times 1961

October 12 | 2020

Today being Canadian Thanksgiving—spent in relative lockdown—I’m thumbing through my mother’s hefty New York Times Cook Book from 1961. As I describe in my new memoir, The Smallest Objective, my mother hosted elaborate dinner parties as a newlywed in the late 1950s and early ’60s. Singling out the page for “Moussaka a la Grecque” is my mother’s bookmark imprinted “So Far, So Good.” Tucked into the same page, too, is a note in her handwriting: 5 hours from preparation to cool stage. Big job to slice and fry—an eggplant yields many slices. Pictured here are other Greek holiday dishes from the same recipe book, suggested for a hostess with a sense of adventure and plenty of time on her hands. 

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