But that didn’t stop this fictional
spokesperson, a creation of the
Washburn-Crosby Company in
Minneapolis (later bought by
General Mills), from being named
the second-most-popular woman
in the nation in 1945, right behind
Eleanor Roosevelt.Mississippi
Signature dish: Catfish. These days,
catfish are mainly raised on fish
farms. Mississippi is home to more
than half of the catfish farms in the
United States.
Who Knew? It gets plenty
hot on the bayou.
During the late 1920s,
Mississippians
would beat the heat
by sinking their feet
in the mud of the
river. Somehow, that
became the inspiration
for mississippi mud pie,
whose dense chocolate resembles
the river’s muddy banks.Missouri
Signature dish: Barbecue. Kansas
City is known for its barbecue, and
the Show Me State’s first barbecue
establishment, opened
in 1908, was actually run
out of a trolley barn.
Also big in Kansas City?
“Burnt ends—the outer
parts of a smoked beef
brisket, cut into smallMichigan
Signature dish: Meat
pasties. These came
from Cornish copper
miners on Michi-
gan’s Upper Penin-
sula. “It’s a circle of
piecrust filled with
minced beef, potatoes, onions,
carrots, and rutabaga, then folded in
half, crimped, and baked. Sometimes
the wives of the miners left room in
a small corner of the pasty to put
chopped apple, sugar, and cinnamon
for the last bite, as dessert.” —Reader
Micki Anderson, Eugene, Oregon
Who Knew? John Harvey Kellogg
was the king of cornflakes, but
he was almost as famous for his
Michigan-based sanitarium and
health spa. Among its patients:
Henry Ford, Thomas Edison, and
President William Howard Taft.Minnesota
Signature dish: hotdish. A casserole
made with cream of mushroom soup,
vegetables, meat, and a starch such
as Tater Tots. “My dad didn’t like
vegetables in his hotdish, so my mom
would leave them out. I was baffled
when I had my first Tater Tot hotdish
with vegetables in it
at the age of 20!”
—Reader Saunia
Okerman, St. Cloud,
Minnesota
Who Knew? Betty
Crocker isn’t real!60 july/august 2019
toh^(hotdish).^seagull_l/shutterstock(mudpie)Reader’s Digest Cover Story