From a very successful cooking magazine.
According to their website, this recipe originally appeared in the February/March 1999 issue of Taste of Home magazine on page 39. And I have no reason to doubt them, since they’ve been doing the good work of preserving American home cooking for much longer than I have.
I actually hadn’t heard of Taste of Home until I started running into their recipes, but they’re kind of the great unsung hero of cooking magazines; as far as I know their 3.5 million circulation is higher than any other cooking magazine on the rack. For comparison, the also fantastic Cook’s Illustrated has a circulation of about one million; Food & Wine has a circulation of just under one million; and the always enlightening Saveur has a circulation just over 330,000.
Since then, I’ve bought a subscription to Taste of Home, but the first issue hasn’t arrived. I’m hopeful, though. I’d like to think that I’m not alone in trying to preserve and catalog American home cooking.
From the box of D.W. from Cedar Falls, Iowa.
Creamy Orange Fluff
1 (6 oz.) package orange Jell-o
2-1/2 cups boiling water
2 cans (11 oz. each) mandarin sliced oranges
1 can (8 oz.) crushed pineapple, undrained
1 can (6 oz.) frozen orange juice (thawed)
In a bowl, dissolve gelatin in boiling water. Stir in oranges, pineapple and orange juice. Coat a 13 x 9 x 2″ dish with non-stick cooking spray.
Add gelatin mixture. Refrigerate until firm.
Topping
1 package (8 oz.) cream cheese, softened
1 cup cold milk
1 package (3.4 oz.) instant vanilla pudding mix
In a mixing bowl beat cream cheese until light. Gradually add milk and pudding. Mix and beat until smooth. Spread over orange Jell-o layer. Chill until firm.
12-16 servings.