"WHAT ELVIS ATE"
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A Review "The Life and Cuisine of Elvis Presley" by David Adler, Crown Trade Paperbacks, 159 pages. 1993 I discovered this droll, funny gem of a humor book online and ordered it. The author David Adler delves into foodie Elvis's eating habits in different times of his life and various locales, the South, California, Germany, beginning with Elvis's origins as one of the poor folks along with his family, parents Vernon and Gladys Presley, in Tupelo, Miss. It's a poignant, touching, sad, funny, sometimes hilarious journey that's enjoyable. Poverty-stricken Southerners in 1930s Tupelo when Elvis was a child all ate corn bread, a mess of greens, fried okra and if lucky a piece of meat, Adler reveals. It's awful, but Elvis's Daddy Vernon shot squirrels his mama Gladys cooked with dumplings, or fried. When Vernon went to prison for three years for forging a check for the sale of a pig, Elvis and his mama basically lived on welfare commodity grits and cheese, supplemented with vegetables from a neighbor's garden. They turned into fervent church people attending the holy rollers First Assembly of God, for the lavish picnic spreads after church every Sunday, a bright spot in their week. Fried chicken, biscuits, congealed salads and a "vast array of heavenly desserts" (Elvis's favorite part) were served. As a toddler, Elvis would fight his uncle for peanut butter on crackers. "Soaks" for baby Elvis, which much later he would eat in bed at Graceland, were either fried corn bread squares or round fried cornbread patties dunked in buttermilk, simple and satisfying "comfort food." Elvis couldn't afford to eat lunch in his Memphis high school cafeteria very often. That's sad, and along with his even earlier years helps explain the King's proclivity to really chow down whenever he could. And why he appreciated such typical 1950s queasy sounding cafeteria fare as "bologna cups" filled with whipped spuds and topped with American cheese, super sugary "peach rolls" similar to the also popular red jelly rolls, "fish flake salad," "mock apple pie" made with Ritz crackers instead of apples, luridly colored extra sweet cakes with shocking pink and neon green icing, etc. A teacher who taught shop later found out about Elvis's lunch time woes and often gave him lunch money. Elvis then took a lot of shop classes. In 1950s diners and other teen hangouts and all big restaurants "the frankly fake" was favored over the real--"any artificial snack made from a pre-packaged mix was considered more modern than an elaborate sit-down meal made from ingredients found in nature," Adler wrote. When soldier Elvis was in army stationed overseas in Germany, he recoiled from any foreign dishes as if they were poison (later on, he did come to enjoy spagetti with meatballs, lasagna, and pizza topped with barbecue from a Memphis eatery, "Connie's"). The Army mess only cooked plain basic American fare for the soldiers (in very generous amounts) which suited Elvis. Elvis wasn't a "bean man." He refused to touch any kind of shellfish, oysters, shrimp, scallops, lobster, clams, etc. Elvis was obsessed with hamburgers, popsicles, peanut butter and banana sandwiches fried in butter (sometimes with bacon, too), home made banana pudding, chicken-fried steak, thick chocolate milkshakes, root beer or cola "float" drinks, among" other delicacies", and especially liked corned beef hash loaded with potato bits and onions, canned chili, little canned Vienna sausage links, canned crowder peas, ice cold Georgia cling peaches, fried hominy grits, hot butter and jelly biscuits dunked in boiling hot coffee, and "fried potato sandwiches" made with bacon, white bread, onions, and mustard. He always considered pre-packaged snacks from vending machines, which originated in the 1950s, special treats. It didn't take much to make the King happy sometimes
He would eat an entire cake at one sitting. When he was "dieting" he ate an entire case of yogurt spread out over the day. Strawberry and blueberry were his favorite flavors of yogurt. Sometimes Elvis would eat a pack of hot dog buns without the hot dogs. He liked his food cut up in bits and "burnt' or well cooked. He ate all night (kept a night cook staff on call as well as a day kitchen staff) and slept much of the day. (to be continued) -
I'm more curious about what Elvis was eating during the many occurrences when he lost weight: -during his stint in the Army (1958-60), slimming to a lean physique for the first time in his adult life (he was kinda chunky in '56 and '57) -he'd put all that weight back on in late-1962 and got very lean again by the time he filmed the movie Fun In Acapulco -for the '68 Special..and lost even MORE weight the following year for his first concert in eight years in Vegas '69 (he was amazingly fit that year) -how he maintained that weight loss for three years until '72 when the depression of his pending divorce began to sink in -losing 30 lbs. for The Aloha From Hawaii worldwide satellite concert in '73 -his dramatic weight losses in the fall of '74 and the fall of '76 (after which he'd finally accepted being overweight)
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Might have been popping "Bennies" like I read the Fabs did in Germany. Bennies were still legal. Prescription diet pills, "Black Beauties" may have been the same thing...the kind of thing that ruined Judy Garland (according to Debbie Reynolds in Debbie's new book). It's no wonder reading about all the (mostly) junk food Elvis consumed-- along with a vast array of pills-- that his heart gave out so soon
Wish he had valued himself more. I read that after his mother died he just didn't care about anything anymore, he gave up, basically. Probably some truth to that (?). I read "Elvis and Me" by Priscilla again recently. She sure left out a lot. You get that impression. She wrote, "Elvis wasn't an ordinary man, so he didn't lead an ordinary life." -
Elvis flew friends to Colorado just to get this particular "mother of all sandwiches" at great cost. Called "Fool's Gold Loaf," it consists of one entire loaf Italian white bread, two tablespoons butter, one pound lean bacon, one large jar smooth peanut butter and one large jar of grape jelly. After the loaf is evenly browned slit it lengthwise andhollow out the interior. While the fried bacon is still warm, fill the insides of the loaf with peanut butter and jelly to taste. Arrange the bacon slices inside and close the loaf. Vegetarian variations: omit the bacon or use fake veggie bacon. Elvis could eat one entire Fool's Gold Loaf at one sitting.
