Until recently, the oldest cookbook I had in my house came under the name Fanny Farmer, a 1979 edition revised to include 1,800 recipes for some of the most classic American and international dishes of the past 35 years or so. But it wasn’t until a friend gave me a cookbook printed in 1958, titled Thoughts for Buffets, that I got an enjoyable and quirky glimpse into the foods and entertaining styles of the “Leave it to Beaver” era.

Where Fanny Farmer intersperses into its compendium such outdated recipes for chicken croquettes and daffodil cake – geared for anyone with an interest in cooking – the newest addition to my bookshelf takes a sexist stand by assuming that only women are in charge of the party buffets and hors d’oeuvre platters. And the foods the book recommends for throwing parties “filled with gaiety” are no less antiquated than the advice urging “hostesses” to use “the new packaged mixes and frozen foods on the market” as shortcuts to their cooking success.

In a section titled “Memos to the Hostess,” the unnamed authors of the book (published by Riverside Press Cambridge) suggest everything from wheeling in fish dishes on tea carts and serving chowder from tureens to purchasing “the latest collapsible aluminum trays” for setting those pre-dinner snacks on. Hubby, of course, secures a perch at the wet bar mixing martinis.

Setting out then-trendy appetizers such as chicken livers in foil, asparagus sandwiches, cold trout and “savory bits” (Wheat Chex, Rice Chex and Cheerios broiled with melted butter), are the antidotes for hostesses desperate to fill in conversation lulls among her guests. She may keep a clean kitchen and make fantastic glazed beef balls, but she’ll never chair the neighborhood party committee if boredom strikes her soirée.

The book also offers decorating ideas to enhance the food experience, some of which have carried over into modern day such as water bowls filled with floating candles or white tulips on the Easter buffet. But others remain forever lost in the annals of home entertaining at a time when grasshopper pie sprung onto the scene and Martha Stewart was lunching on deviled eggs in grade school. For those cutting-edge Cantonese meals, for instance, it’s suggested to accent the table with a “graceful piece of driftwood and perhaps five bright blossoms.” Or when the men gather for “football suppers,” the wives could occupy their time “arranging lovely red apples on silver paper doilies for background.” This, after they’ve banged out a meal consisting of “topside cheese sandwiches, sour cream coleslaw and eggnog pretzel pie.”

Few recipes in the book are familiar to 21st-century palates, which has made it a fascinating read. Things like minted peas, beet borscht in mugs and grape juice molds would undoubtedly be the nail in the coffin at today’s dinner parties, where guests arrive with bottles of fine wine and contemporary appetites for globally inspired foods that were unimaginable to those everyday party folk of the 1950s.

Below are a few vintage recipes from Thoughts for Buffets, of which current or future generations might see come into vogue again. If outdated clothing and hairstyles can loop back into existence, who’s to say that noodle pudding soufflé and roast capon won’t?

4-5 lbs. fresh tongue

1/2 cup butter

3 tablespoons flour

2 tablespoons grated onion

4 cups of beef stock

1 cup dry red wine

2 tablespoons each of lemon juice and sugar

Salt and pepper to taste

Cover tongue in water and boil for three to four hours, until tender. Remove root and peel tongue while hot. Cool and slice. Melt butter; stir in flour and brown. Add grated onion and cook slightly. Combine with beef stock, wine and seasonings. Place tongue in the sauce and cook for 10 minutes.

1 envelope gelatin

1/2 cup milk

1 cup mayonnaise

1 tablespoon lemon juice

1 cup heavy cream, whipped

1 four-ounce can of caviar

Dissolve gelatin in cold milk. Heat in top of double broiler until completely dissolved. Cool. Add mayonnaise, lemon juice, whipped cream and then the caviar. Place in a one-quart ring mold. Chill until firm. Un-mold on platter of iceberg lettuce leaves. Fill center with crabmeat salad (optional).

1 tablespoon butter

1 cup sugar

1 1/2 cups all-purpose flour

1 scant teaspoon baking soda

1 cup raisin, preferably yellow

1 cup chopped nuts

1 cup canned, condensed tomato soup

Cream butter and sugar. Sift dry ingredients together; add nuts and raisins. Add this mixture alternately with the tomato soup to the butter and sugar. Grease a loaf pan (10” x 5” x 3”) very well and line the bottom with wax paper. Bake one and a half hours in a 275-degree oven. Let cool and then frost with your favorite vanilla butter cream frosting.