Antique Stoneware Pot - Wisconsin Butterine Co. 6"

"This is hysterical!" exclaims Patricia — and once you know the story, it's hard to disagree. Growing up in Wisconsin, margarine was simply forbidden. The dairy lobby had seen to that. If you wanted it, you crossed the border into Illinois to buy it. There was even a law requiring that apple tart be served with a slice of Wisconsin cheddar.

Which makes this stoneware crock a genuinely funny piece of American food history. Produced by the Wisconsin Butterine Co. of Milwaukee, it once held Ev-Re-Day Oleomargarine — "the spread that betters the bread" — made with some audacity right in the heart of dairy-protectionist Wisconsin.

Walter recalls that as a boy, his mother would return from the Friday supermarket shop with margarine that looked like Crisco — a white, solid mass — with a small capsule of carotene tucked into the corner. You blended the colour in yourself. This pot, with its cheerful slogan and contraband contents, captures that whole absurd chapter of American food politics in a single object. It would sit perfectly on a kitchen shelf, holding wooden spoons or utensils, its story as good as its looks.