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From Mensagenda - November 2003
Partly Cloudy - Mixing It Up
by Karen Cyson
There is a secret to making the very
best chocolate chip cookies. And peanut
butter cookies, for goober aficionados.
The secret isn’t an ingredient. It isn’t
a technique. It’s a tool: the Foley Fork.
Yes, from the Foley Company in Minneapolis
(now defunct — the company, not
the city) came the Foley Fork, the secret to
creaming butter and sugar and brown
sugar and eggs and etc.(if you put etc. in
your cookies).
I’m sure there are cooks who’ve used
other tools with a modicum of success.
Personally, I’ve tried everything from
my 1951 Kitchen Aid model 3-C (Want to
hear a hearty laugh? Call the Kitchen Aid
hotline and ask if they have replacement
parts for model 3-C.) to my new stainless
steel Kitchen Aid — the big one with the
aircraft engine driving its turbines.
I’ve used whisks and spatulas and
blending forks and spoons. I’ve even
used my genuine Betty Crocker red
spoon, the one you could buy when touring
the Betty Crocker Kitchens of the
World in Golden Valley — before they
quit giving tours because they were afraid
suburban housewives on the tour might
divulge trade secrets to their rival,
Pillsbury.
Now that’s just plain silly, isn’t it?
For one thing, Pillsbury and General
Mills are the same thing now. And for
another, I always wear the blond wig
when conducting industrial espionage.
Anyway, I grew up using my mom’s
black-handled Foley Fork. It was just
what one did to make cookies. And in 1978
I bought my very own avocado plastichandled
edition. It served me in good
stead for more than ten years before it
mixed its last batch and the handle splintered
away from the tines.
I tossed the debris and added “Foley
Fork” to my shopping list. Alas, several
years of searching passed and I never did
procure one. Finally, in desperation, I
tried to call the Foley Company. No luck.
They’d been bought out by Ekco in Wisconsin.
So I called them. No luck, “but we
get lots of calls asking for them. ”Well,
duh. Perhaps your marketing department
is dropping the ball on this one?
Remember now, this was back in the
dark ages — the “pre-eBay” times, when
phones were attached to walls and people
were still recovering from disco. The
only way to find a Foley Fork was to
make it a quest.
After three years I scored my first
replacement at a garage sale — a rather
bent little number with a wooden handle
painted red. It worked OK, and I could
once again sleep through the night knowing
I could arise and bake at first light.
But still there was that little bit of
unease. What if this one broke? What if I
lose it? What if a rival sneaks into my
kitchen and makes off with it? The solution?
Keep looking.
And so I did. And, not content to be
alone on this mission, I told garagesaleing
friends to keep an eye out, too. I
now have 12 Foley Forks. I feel safe.
Think that’s excessive? How else could a
person buy total peace of mind for less
than $25.00 total?
The count to date is: black plastic
handle — 3, white plastic — 1, wood
with red paint — 3, wood with green
paint — 2, wood with blue paint — 1,
wood with varnish — 2.
I thought this supply would hold me,
until I saw an ad for blending forks. The
Vermont Country Store
(www.vermontcountrystore.com) advertised
that they have a fork that works as
well as a Foley Fork, “a modern day
version that we think is every bit as
good.” Hah! This would only fool cooks
who think they can make apple pie with
Ritz crackers and sprinkle their pizzas
with fake cheese and tofu.
Now that I’m up to a dozen, I have
enough Foley Forks (I think), but I’m not
sharing, so if you want one you’ll have to
find your own. And if you think this
obsession is odd, then don’t even ask me
why I must use my two-quart Hamilton
Beach milkglass mixing bowl to make
pancake batter.
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