Is this really where my life has lead me to? A giant mayonnaise snow man? I think I took a wrong turn somewhere…

Well it’s time for another dose of vintage cooking adventures and to celebrate the start of the festive season, we will be making a 1960’s Frosty The Slaw Man which is a chilled mayonnaise based dip tower sponsored by Hellman’s mayonnaise. This recipe comes from a 1960’s advert found in a magazine (I was unable to find which magazine exactly) and it’s quite the centre piece for any festive celebration. As this recipe makes quite a large snowman, I will be halving the recipe as it’s just me and my little family around to eat it (I’m not sure I can subject any of my friends to this tomfoolery and have them stick by me next year). Down below I will include the full recipe when I write it out but please note that during the process, I’ll be halving everything.

Ingredients
3 envelopes of plain gelatin
6 tablespoons of cold water
1 1/2 cups of Hellmann’s Real Mayonnaise
1 1/2 teaspoons salt
680grams of cottage cheese
1 head of cabbage
Various vegetables for decoration

Method
-Soften gelatin in cold water; stir over hot water until dissolved.
-Mix in Hellmann’s mayonnaise, salt, cottage cheese. Fold in the cabbage (Schitt’s Creek fan … you know what episode came to mind).

The method was pretty straight forward but at no point did it look appetizing. I had to think on my feet as to how I would put the recipe into moulds as I don’t have much on hand for a project like this. I ended up putting two body parts into the cottage cheese tubs (the biggest one for the bottom half of his body and the smaller one for the top half). As for the head I decided on two punch cups as I figured two half sphere will make a whole sphere once put together. I popped everything into the fridge for almost 5 hours and then came time to unmould.

Honestly, I really enjoyed the decorating part of this recipe and no matter what I used, I knew this would look absolutely ridiculous. I’m sure if you have kids and want to make this, this would be their favourite part. I used olives for eyes and buttons, carrot for a pipe and nose, capsicum for a hat and smile. I thought about using parsley from the garden as a scarf or hair but instead it went for decorating the bottom of the plate. As my slaw man was a little smaller than the original recipe, I think it came out … I mean it’s cute but also ugly as sin. I honestly couldn’t stop laughing when I started decorating him, I think the fact that he was just melting and drooping made it all the more funny.

As for taste; I grabbed a carrot stick and dipped in… I mean, it just tasted like weird coleslaw so no surprise there but it was just so strong with so much mayonnaise that personally, it was a complete miss for me. I really found the texture to be off especially with the cottage cheese and it felt almost powdery in the mouth. It wasn’t very pleasant.

Even though I followed the recipe, I’m not sure why my snowman didn’t stay standing up straight. Despite my moulds, there was no definition to the snow mans shape once the coleslaw was out. I didn’t end up using both half spheres for the head and I knew they wouldn’t hold up which is why I ended up with only half a head shape. He sort of looked like a white/green poop emoji. I wonder if there wasn’t enough gelatin or if it just didn’t set properly. I left him in the fridge for over 4 hours but I’m wondering if it would have been better to set overnight. The droopiness of the whole thing just made it a funny process and I had the most trouble getting his capsicum hat to stay on top of his head. I don’t see myself trying this recipe again as it’s just not worth it. It was a fun festive activity but it will never eat hummus or a good French Onion dip.

Note: This is not a sponsored post. All opinions and thoughts expressed are solely my own and not influenced in any way. There are no affiliate links and I do not benefit from any link clicks or purchases made.