A personal tribute to our Margaret Fulton

Jul 24, 2019 - Celebrated food writer Margaret Fulton, OAM, has died at the age of 94. ... She was known as “the woman who taught Australia to cook.” Indeed ...

To dear Margaret 

Thanks for teaching me how to polish up my cooking.  My mum set a fine example,  but you took us way up and beyond meat and three overcooked vegetables (vege).  

With love, Claire.  

The first Margaret Fulton Cookbook was published in

1968.  This image is of one of the early editions.

Australian food has changed dramatically since World war 11 with the increase in overseas travel in the 1950s and the1960s. Another factor was the great number of recipe books which had begun to be published. overcooked(The early books have lengthy sections on baking with more than half of the recipes being puddings and cakes.)

In 1966, both Epicurean and Australian Gourmet were founded. Epicurean, the official magazine of the Wine and Food Society of Australia, was the first magazine which, because of contributors, was devoted to food and wine.

Margaret Fulton was the first of the Australian celebrity cookery writers. She taught generations of Australian families how to cook and entertain.

Margaret:  “I was travelling a lot. I would go to a country and would be introduced to the best cooks and dishes… so I was really bringing the world to Australia. It had been starved, of the international feeling about food because of a world war and a world depression.”

Prawn Cocktail - circa the early 1970s for 4
Combine 1/2 cup tomato puree, 2 drops tabasco sauce,
1/2 tsp lemon juice and 2 tbsp cream.
Place shredded lettuce in 4 individual dishes;
divide and arrange on top - 1 kg cooked prawns (shelled and deveined);
spoon sauce over and serve with triangles
of thin buttered brown bread and wedges of lemon.

Germane Greer was writing ‘The Female Eunuch’, published in 1970 but while she was suggesting that women throw out their bras and learn about women’s liberation, many apron-clad women were practicing to be ‘Domestic Goddesses’.

I had a foot in both camps!
Being the proud owners of a new project home, much of our family's entertainment consisted of impromptu BBQs or hosting dinner parties, often with a culinary theme, which required cooking up a storm for several days before.

Armed with ‘The Margaret Fulton Cookbook’, we produced French influenced dishes featuring entrees such as Prawn Cocktail or Mushroom Pate; mains of Beef Burgundy and Coq a Vin, and desserts like Chocolate Mouse, Pavlova or even Avocado Crème.

In the late 70s in the USA, I bequeathed my copy of Margaret’s book to a friend when she begged me to teach her how to cook vegetables from ‘scratch’.

Footnote - At this time, a large proportion of the diet of many Americans consisted of convenience and fast food.