THE LAST WORD
Guthrie, Margaret E.
THE LAST WORD Margaret E. Guthrie Margaret E. Guthrie, a free-lance writer in Madison, Wisconsin, is the author of a series of state cookbooks and is now working on a book about Middle Western...
...U.S...
...No charge, though a small reimbursement for postage and handling would be appreciated—say, $4.12 plus the price of half a dozen long-distance calls...
...this I had to see...
...It was now apparently a matter for the civilian hierarchy of the Defense Department...
...The stuffy editors of The Progressive won't give me space to print it here—nothing in it is toxic—but I'd be glad to share it with the Pentagon...
...But, as is often the case, everything did not work out the way it was supposed to...
...Army Document TM10-412, which is also known as US...
...If you're going to call the Pentagon, don't even think about your telephone bill...
...Someone laid down the receiver and went to find Colonel Williams...
...of a miniscandal in raisin procurement...
...At your own expense and risk...
...A Pentagon recipe for Christmas cake...
...I placed another call to Colonel Williams...
...So it was time for another call (for which The Progressivewould not reimburse me) to Colonel Williams...
...What you want," he said with a field officer's full measure of authority, "is U.S...
...But it wasn't what I wanted...
...It does no good to say you're calling long distance...
...Navy NA VSUP Publication 7, US...
...He never got back to me...
...Naturally, my curiosity was piqued...
...At last, someone who seemed to know what was going on...
...If what you want is not on that list," Colonel Williams had told me in our last costly conversation, "call Wilma Wynn over at Fort Myers...
...Two weeks later, when I hadn't heard from Colonel Williams and placed another call to him, he was distraught...
...on March 24, 1988...
...Calmly, Wynn told me she had never heard of a book of recipes for Christmas cake...
...Jeez," he said, "I gave it to Smith over in...
...Though I collect cookbooks and earn my living writing about food, I've never come across a 200-page work on Christmas cake...
...I told him what I was after, and he seemed pleased to be able to help...
...While I waited, I listened to idle chitchat about a new grandchild ("Is he ever cute...
...But if you want to waste your time pursuing a 200-page book of military recipes for Christmas cake, go ahead...
...The editor to whom I proposed the idea came up with an enthusiastic response: "I doubt it will work," he said...
...At the Defense Department's Office of Public Information, Colonel Arnie Williams took my call...
...I learned about the Pentagon's Christmas-cake manual from a usually reliable source—Ruth Leger Sivard's invaluable annual report, World Military and Social Expenditures...
...Let me get right back to you...
...Army Document TM 10-412, Armed Forces Recipe Service" Armed with that information, I called the Superintendent of Documents, gave the number and title, gave my VISA card number so that I could be charged $4.12, and in hardly any time at all Document TM10-412 was on its way to me...
...He promised to get right on it...
...Arid this time, amazingly, he did...
...and decorates it in colored icing with angels, Santas, and other schlock customary to the season...
...On the last page of the 198788 edition, under the heading "Weapons in Wonderland," Sivard lists some remarkably silly military boondoggles, among them the tome on Christmas cake...
...From a 200-page book of Defense Department recipes for Christmas cake...
...All I wanted was a book, and one that didn't even contain classified information...
...When Colonel Williams finally picked up the phone, he was distressed to hear that the Superintendent of Documents didn't know what book of recipes for Christmas cake I was talking about...
...The new Administration could do far worse than appoint Wilma Wynn as Secretary of Defense...
...My request to the Superintendent of Documents was officially logged in at 11:15 a.m...
...On June 8, I received a two-page letter, accompanied by a two-page list, from Harold Heilsnis, who identified himself as deputy assistant director, Defense Information Services Activity...
...In fifteen minutes, Sergeant Jarette taught me more about Army food service than I will ever need to know—including the fact that at Christmas the Army just takes yellow cake mix (ugh...
...I had an ulterior motive, too...
...But a military recipe for Christmas cake, I thought, might be a way of sneaking some food into the magazine by the back door—disguised, perhaps, as an expos...
...The editors of The Progressive have a stuffy, if not downright hostile, attitude toward articles about food...
...Their idea of a charming food feature is a piece about deceptive ingredient-labeling, or about toxic pesticide residues* or about corporate crime in the suites of agribusiness...
...Marine Corps MCO P10110.43B, is a list of every recipe the Army, Navy, Air Force, and Marine Corps use to feed themselves...
...I wasn't calling, after all, about some deadly blunder committed by U.S...
...it doesn't contain a single recipe...
...Neither the letter nor the list made any mention of recipes, let alone recipes for Christmas cake...
...With that kind of encouragement, I plunged right in...
...Government Printing Office, Washington, DC 20402...
...Colonel Williams told me I could get it from the Superintendent of Documents, U.S...
...At this point, I began to understand why The Progressive's editor had been careful to disavow responsibility for my expenses...
...It was returned on March 30, stamped Cannot Identify...
...I happen to have a wonderful recipe for Queen Victoria's Plum Pudding...
...But it's just a list...
...and other nonmilitary matters...
...My four-and-a-half-month quest was over...
...people who buy $400 toilet seats don't care about money...
...THE LAST WORD Margaret E. Guthrie Margaret E. Guthrie, a free-lance writer in Madison, Wisconsin, is the author of a series of state cookbooks and is now working on a book about Middle Western cooking...
...A triplicate form was attached...
...forces in the Persian Gulf, nor was I asking how many precious B-l bombers had been grounded after colliding with a flight of ducks...
...Clearly, the time had come to call Wilma Wynn...
...But I don't cook for the Army," she added, "so I'm going to turn you over to Master Sergeant William Jarette, who is a master chef and knows all about that sort of thing...
...Dessert Warfare If everything had worked out the way it was supposed to, this page would have been devoted to a holiday feature for The Progressive's deserving readers—a recipe for Christmas cake...
...Air Force AFM 146-12, Volume II, and U.S...
Vol. 53 • January 1989 • No. 1
