Children's variety book from 1980s. Stories, Puzzles, Recipes, Crafts, and Games. Stories: Androcles and the Lion, shepherd child's ghost, etc. Recipe: bread dipped in egg, jacket potatoes, etc. British?

[Catherine]

I had a favourite variety book back in the 1980s that ended up being sold or given away, and I can't for the life of me remember what it was.
It had stories, puzzles, recipes, crafts, and games, and may have been a British publication. The stories and such I remember included:
- Condensed stories (Androcles and the Lion, etc. illustrated by Victor Ambrus), a story about a crook-wielding shepherd child's ghost haunting a local cemetery
- Recipes: "bread dipped in egg" (basically French toast), and jacket potatoes

This book was quite large, may have been white, and I have a vague memory of a clown on the cover? It's been a long time, but I've been wracking my brain about this for 40+ years now.

[Kris]

A guess - The Rainy Day Book for Housebound Families (also called Rainy Day Book, 192 pages) by Alvin Schwartz?

- "This handbook of indoor activities includes quiet and active games, arts and crafts, hobbies, science experiments, jokes, riddles, puzzles, tongue twisters, recipes, and lists of story books."
- Not sure if it contains condensed stories.
- Here's another cover image on Amazon: https://www.amazon.com/Rainy-Day-Book...
- Google Books has a snippet preview. You might get lucky searching for keywords: https://books.google.com/books?id=9pN...

Advanced search on Worldcat:
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Keywords: puzzles recipes games crafts | Subject: juvenile | 1960-1997 | Book | English

[Kris]

I copied some book details to the topic header. Feel free to edit it.