My husband was out of town over the weekend and into this week. So, my daughters and I ventured out to the vintage district one day they were both off of work.
A favorite antique mall with many vendors had lost their lease, leaving the vendors to scramble to find new locations and sell off merchandise. The sign out front said it was their last day, and the discounts were deep. It looked somewhat empty inside, with just a few items here and there remaining. I checked every nook and corner to see if they had something I collected or was needing.
Something that has always irritated me when we're entertaining guests is that we don't have enough serving spoons for the different dishes. I always make-do with a large tablespoon used for servings foods where portions might tend to be smaller. But I had always wanted at least one other serving spoon to go with the ones that are part of my stainless flatware set.
When I came across the basket of miscellaneous silverplate and stainless serving pieces, I pawed through the entire thing, hoping to find my pattern or a close match. Well, lo and behold, there was a pattern of silverplate that looked similar enough to my stainless flatware. In fact, there were 3 of these serving spoons in that basket. The vendor originally priced all of the serving spoons and forks at $3.75 each. With the moving sale, they'd each been marked down to $1.33 each! I quickly checked online and found an exact same piece for sale priced at $14 through eBay. I bought all 3 spoons. I'll be using them on Sunday in serving our Easter dinner.
Here's a comparison between my stainless pattern and these serving spoons. The handle on the far right is the stainless pattern. They look close enough, don't you think?
I also looked closely through the stacks of vintage books. Here's one that caught my eye, a Sunset magazine cookbook. The copyright on this cookbook is 1949 and the publishing date is May of 1963. It's old-school, complete with pen and ink illustrations in place of modern color photos. There are over 1000 recipes inside, and practically all of them are for cooking from basic ingredients. That's the kind of cooking I do. The cookbook was also on steep discount, with the vendor originally asking $10 for the book. I got it for $2.38. I'm sure I will find this cookbook not only entertaining but also very useful. And of course, I'll share recipes with you, as well. Just a P.S., in searching online, someone on eBay has the same quality of this cookbook (meaning in very good condition) listed for $11.99.
Anyway, those were my finds this time in the vintage district. It's nice to know that I could resell any of these items and make a profit, if need be.
Wishing you all a very lovely Easter weekend with friends and family. I'll be back on Monday.
I would have been right there with you looking for serving spoons. I have a thing for serving spoons and think you can never have too many. My favorite is a large one that came with our stainless set, and I've never seen one quite that large since.
ReplyDeleteHappy Easter, Lili, to you and your family.
Hi Live and Learn,
DeleteYour large serving spoon sounds like a great one to have. I imagine it's perfect for casseroles, where servings tend to be on the large side.
Have a happy Easter with all of your family, Live and Learn.
The silver spoons are a great match, and I understand your lack-of-serving-spoons issue. I inherited my mom's silverplate silver set, so that has been helpful for me. Nice to have extras. :)
ReplyDeleteHappy Easter!
Hi Kris,
DeleteOh, that's so great that you have your mom's silverplate set, with its serving pieces, too. Those extras come in handy.
Wishing you and your family a wonderful Easter and a great trip to visit your son.
Hi, Lili. Love the Sunset cookbook. They always had great recipes, so I'm sure you'll enjoy that great score for more than just the frugal victory! I'm laughing here about the serving spoons, because I can't decide if I got my extra spoons for a lot less than you, or a lot more. When we bought our home, it came with a lot of household goods included -- including some very handy serving spoons. I'm pretty well supplied now, with actual slotted and other fancy serving spoons, as well as a set of simpler huge "tablespoons". Hooray! But I don't know if I got those "free", or paid hundreds of thousands of dollars??? What do you think? Happy Easter, everybody! Sara
ReplyDeleteHi Sara,
DeleteI've bought a couple of Sunset magazines over the years and always enjoyed their recipes. One in particular was a favorite of our family's, it was called Green Tomatoes in Hiding, a spiced cake with green tomato puree. Their recipes always seemed to prepare a food just a little bit differently from other publishers.
Those were some really costly spoons that you bought. Good thing they came with a house as a bonus!
Have a wonderful Easter with your family, Sara.
My parents were subscribers to the magazine, so I have oodles of clipped-out recipes. They/I also bought a number of the cookbooks over the years. The one I use the most is Cookies (With Step-by-Step Techniques) from 1985. I highly recommend that one. Sara
DeleteI prefer to put a positive spin on it and say that you got some freebie spoons. Your comment made me laugh. :)
DeleteHappy Easter, Kris. As often, you and I seem to be on the same page (and similar sense of humor). LOL I'm going to be dishing some fennel and tart cherry salad with one of those "free" spoons today. (Hubby found some good fennel at the grocery store, so that's a bonus for our menu!) Hoping everybody is having/has had a blessed and beautiful weekend! Sara
DeleteSome of the stories I read in some of the above comments remind me of when my hubby and I started out. We purchased the inside contents of an elderly woman's home when she was moving to a retirement home. I think it was for $500. Her kids took what they wanted and the rest was ours with the condition we removed everything out of the house to use or get rid of. We got a washing machine, dryer, refrigerator, a full size bed and 2 twin beds, cookware, bakeware, serving utensils and so much more. We still use a lot of the cookware and bakeware today and our children slept in those beds until they moved out and then we got rid of them. The washer, dryer and refrigerator stayed with out first home when we sold it but I will say we got a great headstart on our marriage with all the things we got with buying the insides of her home.
ReplyDeleteAlice
Hello, Alice. I hope that your modified Easter dinner was delicious. Isn't it wonderful the advantages of being willing to buy/accept "hand-me-downs" and/or other used things, to get more for your money than if you insisted on choosing all new things, and sometimes the older things are better quality, too? We own almost nothing new in our home, and haven't since we got a few nice new things as wedding gifts. For furniture and housewares, we have almost completely family hand-me-downs, Craigslist and garage sale finds, left-behind items, etc.; and you know what, they work out just great, and our finances are much stronger than most people we know, as well. And here's a fun one, like your $500 clean-out deal (which sounds like something DH and I have also done). We went to see some sewing and craft items on Craigslist, and when we got there, they said it was an estate sale, and they didn't even know what was in all the boxes. I was looking through, and finally DH asked if they'd rather we just took all of it for a flat fee, because they seemed rather overwhelmed with it all, and having a parade of folks coming in haggling over one skein of yarn, etc. They said, "Oh, PLEASE, would you want to do that?" DH said, "Absolutely." They said they wanted $100 for four or five boxes of stuff, and we said, "SOLD." When we got home we found antique linens, as well as half-finished projects and raw materials. DH actually called them back to make sure they didn't want the linens, but they didn't. We donated a religious quilt to a local church (they LOVED it), sold some of the fancy linens for nice prices, and still use a lot of the daily linens and sewing/craft supplies 10 or 15 years later. And everyone ended up happy! Have a great day! Sara
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