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APRIL ISSUE | APRIL 202 2
THE ONTARION
SELECTIONS FROM ARCHIVAL AND SPECIAL COLLECTIONS
‘The Gay Cookbook’ makes a meal of camp and serves it up with a side of LGBTQ+ activism Author Lou Rand Hogan garnishes internationally-inspired recipes with witty commentary in this fascinating look at mid-century queer domesticity GILLIAN MANFORD | ARCHIVES CLERK ...in that magic hour 'tween day and dark, after effacing the ravages of the day's toil, and before the night's serious cruising, ya gotta take on some food. Man, woman, or child, a girl has got to eat! — The Gay Cookbook, page 7
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he year is 1965. Homosexuality is illegal in most of the world, the Stonewall Riots are still four years away, and those defying gender norms through their relationships, gender presentation, or behaviour are considered immoral, deviant, and dangerous. However, that same year Chef Lou Rand Hogan presented a different vision of queer life in his cookbook The Gay Cookbook. Hogan’s book could easily be mistaken for a novelty, joke, or political statement. In reality, it’s all three, and a usable recipe guide as well. An ad in the 1965 New York Times suggested that “Straights and other types of squares will find much to enjoy [in the cookbook],” inviting in curious readers, while also teasingly associating them with ‘squares.’ Squares were those old fashioned moralists who, by 1965, were finding themselves in opposition to the progressivism of ‘60s counterculture. In the 1960s, humorous, niche, and culturally specific cookbooks proliferated. As Hogan explains in his book, “there seem to be new jazzy cookbooks for everyone, for every type, every temperament. A mad, mad, mad Editor has coyly suggested: ‘Oh hell, May, why don't you people have a cookbook? After all, you're supposed to be 'one-in-six', and that's a lot of cooking!’” Despite Hogan’s lighthearted manner, the growing movements for gender, racial, and sexual equality played out in the pages of many mid-century culinary guides. Some brought serious attention to underrepresented cultural foodways, while others used humour to target problematic norms. In this case, Hogan uses the medium to critique the heteronormative concepts of gender and domesticity. This combina-
tion of elements become ‘camp,’ a term often associated with queer modes of entertainment and expression, as well as the aesthetics of the mid-century period. Writer and activist Susan Sontag examined this elusive concept in her 1964 essay Notes on ‘Camp.’ Sontag explained that camp is intentional, exaggerated, and ‘deadly serious,’ despite appearances suggesting otherwise. The idea had long been present in queer communities, but by the 1960s it had taken on a political dimension. Camp embraces the artificial, and in doing so, also exposes artifice. By taking ideas held seriously and dearly by the dominant culture (in this case, mid-century heteronormative ideals of domesticity, gender roles, and gender expression) and viewing them through the lens of camp, these norms are exposed as constructions, their dominance over society questioned, and those living outside of those norms given greater agency over their own narrative. Through camp, Hogan challenges readers to reflect on conflicting stereotypes perpetuated by mainstream society. For example, how can gay men be both deviant and dangerous, while also effeminate, weak, and ridiculed? Hogan and illustrator David Costain take the mainstream perception of queer people away from the back alleys, dingy bars, and jail cells to which they’d been relegated, and mock quaint mid-century domesticity. An illustration of a gay couple sitting at the kitchen table—one masculine presenting figure who is large and bearded; the other, more feminine in a floral apron (see photo to the upper right)—reflects domestic imagery from the period, queering the American familial ideal. Throughout his book, Hogan reappropriates the language of heteronormative homemaking by simultaneously mocking these traditions and inviting in those who have been excluded. In the chapter on meat-based dishes, ‘What to Do With a Tough Piece of Meat,’ Hogan writes, “Men en-
joy real, genuine, honest to Gawd Corned Beef Hash; so let's make em happy.” He both adopts and subverts the trope of the housewife using her domestic skills to keep a happy husband while employing a few campy double entendres along the way. The Comstock Laws—the same ones that prohibited the distribution of birth control by U.S. mail—would’ve had this book banned for ‘promoting sexual deviance’ and labelled it too obscene for the post, greatly restricting it’s reach and accessibility. However,
by the mid ‘60s these laws were in dispute, and, in Hogan’s book, saucy illustrations abound. Men dance the Can-Can in a recipe for French Dressing (see photo on next page) and recline in bowls of Fruit Salad (see photo below). The text is sprinkled with camp witticisms and cheeky culinary suggestions, using jargon that would have been opaque to straight readers, like instructing penny-pinching hosts to “Save that imported Sherry (at $7.80) for someone really elegant; serve the .98 cent stuff to that casual trade.”
The Gay Cookbook has practical uses, too. Hogan’s work as a chef on international cruises influenced his menus, as did the post-war fashion for ‘exotic’ travel as a marker of middle class consumption and cosmopolitanism. Hogan teases those adhering to fussy, outdated ideas of sophistication and antiquated performances of queerness. “We all know a mad character…who puts pineapple-cheese…on round crackers, and tops this with a candied violet, no less. Gawd, Mabel, how gay can you get?” Instead, Hogan suggests
