Flickr's photo pools are an incredible source of aggregated images. Our favorite recent finds are Vintage Cookbooks, Ra! Ra! Cookbooks, and The Gee, That Food Looks Terrible wikicollections of the weird and wonderful realm of culinary resources of days gone by. The 50s and the 80s seem to be the eras of particularly spirited food styling tips.
A most helpful resource for any modern woman: the makings of a butter tree.
via Glen H Sparky's awesome poolSadly, the origin of this recipe is unmarked, but it seems to have been published in the 70's
Here's how you MAKE A BUTTER TREE...
- Take two to four sticks of butter and dip first in warm, then in cold water. Then stick them together to form a cone shape.
- Place the butter cone in a serving dish. Use a butter curler to ridge the cone by pulling it up lightly from the bottom of the cone.
- Hold the butter curler at a sloping angle and push it into the butter cone around an inch above the stand or tray on which the cone sits. Then bend the curler slightly out to form a petal. Leave about ¼ inch space between each petal and keep working in the same manner around and around the cone towards the peak.
- Here we show you three layers of petals completed. You can see how they alternate in their position, each above each other.
- In this picture we have reached the top of the cone. Now the final peak is split in two with the butter curler. The butter tree is now completed… refrigerate until serving time.
Note: After forming each petal, the curler should be dipped into a pan of boiling water before going to the next petal.
