Customer Reviews

JELL-O: A Biography

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Filled with TONS of interesting (and hilarious) info about Jell-O. A real riot!

Jell-O blends a culinary history with a recipe book, following the story of jello's evolution as a famous desert and offering recipes for both main dishes and desserts. It lacks an index, so you'll have to read the book if you want the recipe for Spider cakes and other classics. Humor also blends in as chapters discuss the promotion of jell-o.

This book is amusing and informative. It is full of more facts about Jell-O than you can shake a stick at! The history of Jell-O and the marketing of Jell-O are explored in great detail (did you know that 500 million packages of Jell-O are sold each year?).

But, best of all, this book is full lots of amazing Jell-O recipes. As soon as I finished this book, I went thrift shopping for Jell-O molds!

After 107 years on the market,Jell-O gelatin continues to sell well in many parts of the world. Thirty thousand boxes are sold every nine seconds in the United States according to kraftfoods.com(the company that owns the trademark brand). This book is filled with various recipes involving Jell-O gelatin and pudding mix. In 1939,Jell-O pudding debuted in three flavors:vanilla,chocolate and butterscotch. Today,there are fifteen. The others are lemon,pistachio,french vanilla,banana cream,coconut cream,devil's food,chocolate fudge,white chocolate,cheesecake,chocolate cherry,chocolate mint and cookies and cream(white chocolate with bits of Nabisco Oreo cookies). The 18 gelatin flavors are cherry,strawberry,raspberry,orange,lemon,lime,cranberry,black cherry,berry blue,wild strawberry,mixed fruit,peach,apricot,island pineapple,grape,mango,strawberry banana and strawberry kiwi. Comedian Bill Cosby has endorsed the brand since 1974,starting with only the pudding. In 1987 he began endorsing the gelatin. Today he endorses every Jell-O item including the Smoothie Snacks(fruit and milk medleys) available in 3 flavors:peach mango,strawberry banana and mixed berry. The late Roy Rogers and the late Kate Smith previously endorsed the pudding and previous spokesmen for the gelatin include the late Jack Benny and Andy Griffith. Cosby,the longest-tenured spokesman,has done a multitude of commercials and print ads for the brand. Cosby said in a 1987 commercial for the gelatin,"You can't be a kid without it.". There are about 200 different Jell-O items on the market today. The gelatin inventor's wife came up with the name Jell-O. Today's Jell-O slogan is "because it's magic".

I have not read this book yet. It is a paperback in used but good condition. This is not a recipe book but instead a look at the history of JELL-o products, and the influence they had on everyday families, TV shows, advertising, and so on. It looks like it will be very interesting. I plan to use it to write my lesson on JELL-O for my antiques club.

This is book is fun and informative. I bought it some time ago along with its companion volume 'Spam'. Both are awkward, square books that are too wide for any average shelf- but that's not the real production problem. It lies instead in the quality of the paperstock used in the cover which is too light and cheap- subsequently both books have curling covers which takes away from them. The embossed inks and raised fonts are attractive but they simply need better stock to carry them. Get it right in the next edition and charge 50 cents more if necessary!