Saturday Night Nostalgia: Margaret Fulton got you cooking

Even though Margaret Fulton was born in Scotland, she will always be Australia’s own. When it comes to jobs to do in the food industry, Margaret has done them all, cook, writer, journalist, author, and commentator. She blazed a trail for Australia when it comes to food experts and her book, The Margaret Fulton Cookbook, is considered by many to be the cooking bible!

Margaret started her career as a cooking teacher for the Overseas Corporation. She was promoted to sales in the late 40s where she became partially responsible for introducing the pressure cooker to Australian homes. In the early 50s, Margaret becomes a home economist for large cereal manufacturers where she gave talks on using cereals for cooking and baking.

By the late 50s, Margaret had such a rapport with Australian homes that she began appearing in advertisements for Johnson’s Glo-Coat, and more famously Sellotape. It was about this time that The Australian Women’s Weekly started to use Margaret for “cookery class” and as a regular contributor to the magazine.

1968 cemented Margaret’s legacy as she released her famous cookbook and in less than ten years it sold “more than two-thirds of a million copies.” Margaret then released subsequent cookbooks on Italian cooking and Chinese cooking. For both books, she immersed herself in the culture and brought recipes and ideas back to Australia.

The work that she has done to open up the cooking minds and taste pallets of Australians is unmatchable. She was rightfully awarded the Medal of the Order of Australia in 1983 and is still producing cooking videos, books, and articles, but now she does it with her daughter, Suzanne Gibbs, and her two granddaughters Louise and Kate.

Margaret always embraces change and has a new website and app that is launching that will continue her work for generations to come.

What is your favourite recipe from Margaret? Do you have a copy of the iconic cookbook?