The Cookbook

(Image description: a mid-century magazine illustration of a bowl of beef chop suey on rice, with recipe instructions in pastel boxes and visual directions in circles forming Chinese lanterns.)

CHOP SOUPY

Food for chopsticks—Prepare attractive pieces of everyday food, flavor it well, and share the fun of eating it in style.

CONTENTS
1 pound round steak, cut in very thin strips*
2 tablespoons salad oil
1½ cups sliced fresh mushrooms (or 4 ounce can,
1½ cups celery, sliced as shown
1 cup green pepper, sliced diagonally
4½ cup green onion cut in 1-inch pieces
1 can soup (beef broth or onion soup)
2 tablespoons soy sauce
2 tablespoons cornstarch
1½ cup water
Cooked rice, (follow directions on package since amounts and methods vary; usually 1 cup rice is cooked in 1 or more cups water, for 4 servings.)

In fry pan, brown beef in oil.

Add vegetables, soup, and soy sauce.

Cover: cook over low heat 20 minutes or until meat is tender (stir now and then)

Blend cornstarch and water; stir into sauce.

Cook, stirring until thickened.

Serve with rice, hot tea and fortune cookies for a happy ending.

*4 servings.

CHECK WITH MOM BEFORE YOU USE HER KITCHEN!

Here’s another example of The Cookery Of My People: a mid-century white American interpretation of Cantonese-diasporic cuisine, relying on convenience food (along with the canned broth, the rice might well have been Minute Rice.) I don’t recall whether Mom used this exact recipe, but she periodically made something similar; her version of pepper beef stir-fry used a Lowry’s powdered marinade base that’s long since defunct.