SOS Vintage jello salad

We’re waxing nostalgic for Mrs. Chicago Jim’s mom’s three layer jello salad.

There was a red layer and green layer. That’s the easy part. The middle was some sort of cream cheese, nut and pineapple concoction. I find a million recipes for Ribbon Salad, but that has lemon jello and mini marshmallows.

The version we’re looking for was much more savory and nutty and cut the sweetness of the other layers.

Any ideas?

HI,

I may have an idea for the middle.

The Family Heirloom Recipe Contest at the Ohio State Fair, there was a competitor who had a Christmas Jello salad with these ingredients:

1 (3 oz) box of lemon jello
1 20 oz can crushed pineapple
1 c. whipping cream, whipped
1 (8 oz) pkg. of Philadelphia Cream Cheese
1 c. finely cut celery
8 oz maraschino cherries, cut fine
1 c. chopped pecans

You can find the recipe here, though you need to scroll down to find it.

Good luck!

Regards,
Cathy2

Cathy2 wrote:HI,

I may have an idea for the middle...

Whipped cream is not in the right spirit. Shouldn't it be Cool Whip?

Cathy2 wrote:HI,

I may have an idea for the middle.

The Family Heirloom Recipe Contest at the Ohio State Fair, there was a competitor who had a Christmas Jello salad with these ingredients:

1 (3 oz) box of lemon jello
1 20 oz can crushed pineapple
1 c. whipping cream, whipped
1 (8 oz) pkg. of Philadelphia Cream Cheese
1 c. finely cut celery
8 oz maraschino cherries, cut fine
1 c. chopped pecans

You can find the recipe here, though you need to scroll down to find it.

Good luck!

Regards,
Cathy2

I think this is close enough to to a riff on. Cherries were not part of the original recipe as we remember it. The lemon jello was forgotten as it just sort of served to meld everything together but makes sense. I agree that Cool Whip would probably be more authentic, but I will not allow it in my house.

The recipe above is for a single salad - in mom's version what would be the middle layer between plain red and plain green Jello - so what is known as a Ribbon Salad, but with a less sweet middle.

My mom would generally do straight up sour cream for her middle - nothing else added.

Ditto on the sour cream middle. Mom used to make a rasberry/strawberry jello crammed with frozen rasberries and nuts and the sour cream gave it the tartness.

We had one that the red/green jellos were made in baking pans, cut into small squares and then mixed with cool whip, crushed pineapple and some form of nut (can't remember the type).

my grandma made a version with lime jello and tuna as recently as 2012 or so but she's 100 so I hopefully won't have to deal with that nonsense again

AlekH wrote:my grandma made a version with lime jello and tuna as recently as 2012 or so but she's 100 so I hopefully won't have to deal with that nonsense again

This may be one of the funniest things I've read this year. Well done, Granny!!!!!

Hi,

Whipped cream is definitely more correct than Cool Whip, which came much later in 1966.

The cherries are the decoration:



Regards,
Cathy2

AlekH wrote:my grandma made a version with lime jello and tuna as recently as 2012 or so but she's 100 so I hopefully won't have to deal with that nonsense again

Oh my goodness - we had this as an entree in my college's dining room, and it was so awful. I never realized it was something real people ate because they wanted to!

I'm not a big fan of jello but once made a cherry jello made with coke and cherry pie filling. Served with whipped cream. I think I put it in a trifle dish and must say it was better than I thought it would be.

My mom made a really beautiful one with dark cherries, raspberries, and chopped pecans -- I think in raspberry Jello. More fruit than gelatin, so not intended as a budget dessert. I think she made aspic more often than Jello, but this was a show-stopper at dinner parties back in the day.

Cynthia wrote:My mom made a really beautiful one with dark cherries, raspberries, and chopped pecans -- I think in raspberry Jello. More fruit than gelatin, so not intended as a budget dessert. I think she made aspic more often than Jello, but this was a show-stopper at dinner parties back in the day.

Do you know how to make it? It sounds too wonderful to let it disappear.

Cathy2 wrote:

Cynthia wrote:My mom made a really beautiful one with dark cherries, raspberries, and chopped pecans -- I think in raspberry Jello. More fruit than gelatin, so not intended as a budget dessert. I think she made aspic more often than Jello, but this was a show-stopper at dinner parties back in the day.

Do you know how to make it? It sounds too wonderful to let it disappear.

I think I have the recipe somewhere, but I couldn't locate it easily today. I'll keep looking. Because it was lovely, and I do want to find it.