Sabillasville is a small town on the Pennsylvania border, north of Frederick. I forget where I got this cookbook but it seemed like a good one to learn about a new place and cover some more “Western” Maryland recipes. Alas, things did not pan out so well.
The town of Sabillasville was officially founded in 1813, and named for Savilla Zollinger, a wife of one of the early Swiss settlers to the area. I can’t find anything about when the St. John’s Church opened there. The cookbook, “The Best in Cooking in Sabillasville,” appears to be from the 1960s. I would have suspected the 1950s, but there is an ad for the Shamrock Restaurant in Thurmont. The Shamrock opened in 1963 (and closed in 2019.)
“Ann Gordon” is a bit too common of a name for me to find out much about her. I made her recipe for Deviled Fish Sticks. I absolutely love fish sticks and all things deviled so the recipe jumped out at me. The end result wasn’t particularly interesting. Sorry Mrs. Gordon! It was still good, being fish sticks and all.
Fish sticks are basically a type of croquette. In the early 1900’s they were known in England as “fish fingers.” Gorton-Pew Fisheries is credited with commercializing them in the 1950s. They were heavily marketed, and recipes like the one Ann Gordon shared appeared frequently in the women’s pages of newspapers.
Fort Worth Texas Star-Telegram, 1955
I made a second recipe from the Sabillasville cookbook, for “cut glass cake.” The result is a prime example of how differently a recipe can turn out based on your prior knowledge of the dish. I happened to have none. I was unaware that I was meant to prepare the jello as per package directions and then put the jello bits into the creamy jello. The end result should be lots of clear gelatin bits, thus the name.
I took the instructions at face value and ended up with an entirely different jello-based desert that nonetheless tasted fine.
Mrs. Catherine Tressler contributed that poorly-written recipe. Tressler is a common name around Sabillasville so I had an equally hard time finding anything about her as about Ann Gordon. I believe she was involved with the American Legion but beyond that, I couldn’t nail down any life details.
Oh well, every post can’t be chock full of information. Like the ingredients in these recipes, this one is a bit of a shortcut.
Recipes:
Deviled Fish Sticks
- .25 Cup butter, very soft
- .25 Teaspoon mustard powder
- 1.5 Teaspoon Worcestershire sauce
- .5 Teaspoon lemon juice
- 1 dash Tabasco sauce
- 2 Teaspoons grated onion
- .25 Cup finely chopped parsley
- 2 packages fish sticks
Combine butter, mustard, worcestershire sauce, lemon juice, tabasco, onion and parsley. Mixture will not be completely blended. Place fish sticks close together in broiler pan; spread with butter mjixture. Broil 4 inches from heat about 7 or 8 minutes or until golden or done. Bake at 450 degrees 12 to 15 minutes. 4 to 6 servings.
Cut Glass Cake
3 pkg. Jell-O (lime, lemon, cherry or whatever flavors you desire.) Dissolve 1 env. plain gelatin in 1/4 c. cold water. Add this to 1 c. hot pineapple juice, cool slightly. Whip 1 pt. of whipping cream, add 1/2 c. granulated sugar and 1 tsp. vanilla, mix together with Jell-O and gelatin mixture. Put graham cracker crust in 9×13 inch pan, after adding 1/4 stick of melted margarine. Pour gelatin mixture over graham crackers and let set in refrigerator until ready to use.
Recipes from “The Best in Cooking in Sabillasville,” the St. John’s Ladies Guild, c. 1960s.