I am baffled, I was discussing what to do with 2 sleeves of stale saltines, and I remembered seeing a depression era recipe where one took saltines and egg and milk, and baked them [I think with chopped cabbage] into a casserole and I wanted to see if I could find it online.
All I seem to see is eggplant recipes - in general middle America of the Depression had no idea what an eggplant could possibly be [or at least the pasty white parts of us] so I am somewhat baffled.
Anybody else possibly have a source for why I am remembering it as a cracker and cabbage recipe?
After a quick look around, it seems there are not a ton of recipes of any kind that combine cabbage and oysters (mock or genuine). There are some for kimchi and a lot with oyster mushrooms, oyster crackers or oyster sauce.
Interesting. I’ve seen mock apple pie with Ritz crackers instead of apples (which is some kind of witchcraft, because it works far better than it should), but not the saltines-as-oysters.
I’ve seen the mock apple pie as well, so I searched YouTube for mock oyster casserole and didn’t get a hit for that but I did find this about what went into a mock oyster soup.
I would think the mushrooms more than the broccoli are the substitute for oysters there but … is oyster dip a thing (OK, google shows me that it is)? And if it is, that doesn’t seem like it has much of anything to do with an oyster dip, being a mushroom, broccoli, and cheese dip. Which are all ingredients that go well together, but how in the hell is that supposed to replicate oysters?
On the subject of Saltines and mock seafood, there is a salad I like called Georgia cracker salad which is also called mock shrimp salad. It’s made with Saltines, tomatoes, and mayo. Mock Shrimp Salad - Hillbilly Housewife
Sam Weller in Dickens’ Pickwick Papers says: “Poverty and oysters always seem to go together.”
In the 19th century, oysters were sold on the streets – perhaps Britain’s first version of street food – where passersby snacked on them and public house goers bought them with a hefty pint of stout – another cheap alternative form of “sustenance”.
There are unauthenticated stories of workers in Scotland complaining about being fed too much salmon. I thing there are some similar stories about lobsters in Maine
