In the early days of the space program there was a craze for associating all sorts of products with the space program. It was a way of celebrating mankind’s great dream of exploration, and incidentally make a buck. The craze made it into a children’s cookbook published in 1959, which published this recipe for a dessert called “Apollo Fluff.”

There’s an obvious reference to the American space program in the title, and in the illustration to the right – it looks straight from the science fiction magazines of the period.

The odd thing about this is that the recipe was published in 1959, and the Apollo program’s name wasn’t announced until 1960. Did the author of a children’s cookbook know something before the rest of us, or did they adopt the name of the Greek sun god for a recipe shortly before someone else proposed it for America’s space program? It’s certainly an odd coincidence. As for how this tastes, I haven’t tried it, but if any of you like this kind of creamy-sweet dessert that was popular in the 1950’s, please make it and send a picture and review of it.