Foods your children eat daily that you NEVER had as a child

[Tawdrylocalbrouhaha]

As I watched DS(3) gorging himself on blueberries, crabcakes and houmous (yes. On the crabcakes) for his tea, I realised that I never saw a blueberry until I was at least 18. Likewise, despite growing up beside the sea, I never had crab in cakes or otherwise, or houmous.

Now I'm watching Back in Time for Tea, and feeling like a museum piece.

When did we start taking this stuff for granted?!

I was born in 1960 - we ate lots of potatoes with some cheap indiscernible meat and occasionally some veg. Lots of bread & butter.

pretty much everything my children eat is totally different. Daily they have things i didnt eat until I was an adult. Humous, garlic, olives, wraps, pasta, huge varieties of fresh fruit and veg, flavoured yoghurts... the list is endless

Vegetables is another. Not that we didn't have them but the selection was: carrots, cauliflower, cabbage and tinned peas. I think broccoli came along during my teen years (I mean to MY house, not the country). That's it though, nothing else, I'm not counting the bit of chopped onion added to the spaghetti bolognese. So no peppers, corn, mushrooms, courgette, mangetout, asparagus, aubergine etc etc.

A couple of years back I asked my dad to pick me up some aubergines while he was shopping. He handed me a bag with 4 avocados! He didn't know what either of those items were but remembered I wanted something beginning with A and figured "much of a muchness"

70s kid here and agree with Nokids

Anyone remember findus crispy pancakes and fray bentos pies?

I often don't trust where it's come from if it's from abroad...who knows what pesticides they use?

Yeah because British farmers only grow food in their own garden, fertilise it with nothing more than spring water and harvest it at dawn with only their amble bosomed women-folk

cant

My dad complained that the peas I brought him couldn’t be shelled they were rubbish.

Mange tout Rodney mange tout

Salami - I first had it when I was about 10 and thought it was fantastic. I still love salami but DH won't let me eat it as I'm pregnant and the doctor said no :(

Rice cakes - I think I first discovered them when I had a baby and they were the new rusk?? He loves them even now.

Pizza and lasagne are normal to us these days but we never ate at home, but I'm allergic to cheese so it might have been too much hassle for DM. I vaguely remember her buying pizza and having about two slices with loads of salad/other veg type things!

Grapes - not every day because they are grim when out of season but certainly much more than we had them as children. We only had apples, bananas, clementines and the occasional pear in our fruit bowl.

Instant noodles. Noodles were exotic although we ate lots of things mentioned on here as strange. The rest of the things you all mention I still find unimaginably posh and we only have occasionally Although I have taken to buying olives weekly. DS hates them so I get them all to myself.

American style pancakes
Any pancakes outside of Pancake Day
Maple syrup
Pasta other than spaghetti bolognese
Chocolate brownies

"Anyone remember findus crispy pancakes and fray bentos pies?"

We had an orange Tupperware plate that you could perfectly fit two crispy pancakes on, and then put them in the microwave to cook.

The 80s were a glorious time to be alive.

Pasta
Rice
Flatbreads
Curry
Kale
Stir fries
Quesadillas, wraps
Pain au chocolat

saucy likes your mixed herbs too! Think our mothers were similar.

Tin of mixed veg with all meals. Well boiled so watery. and for pudding mixed tinned fruit and carnation cream

My mum and dad think lasagna is the high point of foreign quinine and still daring and we are cooking it for them on Saturday.

They are 86/89 years now bless them.

one of my dc eats all of the following which I hadn't tried until I was well into my teens:

coleslaw
mayonnaise
peanut butter
many many breakfast cereals
broccoli
red cabbage
sweetcorn - though I do remember ads for the Jolly Green Giant - but it wasn't something we'd ever contemplate having
curry
chilli
garlic
kiwi fruit
rice (other than rice pudding)
burgers
meatballs
quiche
pomegranate
melon
nutella
yoghurt -(on the basis it was "sour milk" )
crisps
fizzy drinks
coffee
ovaltine
bell peppers
courgettes though we did have marrows
cucumbers (can you tell I didn't grow up in England)
parmesan cheese
tinned soup (powdered soup mix was super popular though)
noodles

The 80s were a glorious time to be alive

I'm having that put on a t-shirt for it is indeed the truth

Unless you were I miner I suppose!

Agree with the blueberries ! Other than trying one from ds stash of them ( once n once only they are rank! ) Iv never had them !!

Not daily, but definitely weekly:

Pasta
Pesto
Olives
Duck breast
Fresh fruit juice
Pizza (my grandfather insisted on pronouncing this exotic foodstuff as pizzer in the late 80s)
Blueberries
Houmous
Taramasalata
Any kind of dip actually
Fresh salmon (tinned was frequent)

And daily:
Brown bread

We did have proper curry, rice and exotic fruits like mangoes, pineapples and coconuts - my dad is from the West Indies and we used to do a monthly trip to Shepherd's Bush Market to stock up on essentials.

We didn't have cherries or strawberries or raspberries much unless we had grown them ourselves. Fruit in shops seemed to be mainly oranges, apples and bananas apart from short windows when things were in season in the UK. But we ate gooseberries often when they were in season and it's hard to find them now. I really like gooseberries and ought to get a gooseberry bush or two!

Coffee shops were unknown. You could get 'frothy coffee' in a caff but it definitely wasn't a cappucino. I think the first coffee shop I went to was when I was in my mid-twenties.

Omelette
I never tried this till I was about 18. Son loves them has one at least once a week.
Mango
I had the juice as a kid but actual mangoes I didn’t have till I was about 17.

I remember ice cream parlours in the 80s having a revival and my first mc Donald’s beef burger 1980! Was a revelation.

On phone, so clicky link might not work, but this:

www.bbc.co.uk/programmes/b09s8cwq

Is worth a listen.

We had bilberries - close to blueberries, grown by grandfather.
Lots of crab - yum ( Devon) and I could crack and dress one at 9
Hummus - home made ,my mother was a really adventurous cook, despite living in the middle of nowhere and some ingredients being hard to find.
Home made pesto - once, after growing basil in an old butlers sink, getting the pine nuts from the health food shop, ordering pecorino from somewhere. That was a bit of a faff for the reception she got - we'd had it on Italian holidays and it wasn't the same.

Things we didn't have :
Ready pesto - a staple now in my cupboard
Butternut squash - use in so much, wonderful keeping quality , children love
Sweet potato - hardly ever buy traditional whites now
Fresh salmon was a centre piece, whole poached in a fish kettle special, not a quick to cook everyday steak
Smoked salmon - a special occasion starter, not just another sandwich option
Nice yoghurt - either vile, sugary, highly coloured Ski in little pots or my mother's homemade in a little 6 pot machine , that separated out and tasted really sharp

I was born in 1971 and my mum cooked from scratch everyday. It's quite amazing given we were on a very tight budget that we had an almost exotic diet as young kids. She had a spice rack, used garlic regularly, we ate curry, pasta bolognaise along with the staples of beef stew, mince and potatoes, macaroni cheese and chips, cauliflower cheese and chips, liver and onions and occasionally tripe and onions which I actually liked!
Orange juice was served as a starter in restaurants when I was young. My kids would guzzle a whole carton because they were a bit bored.

My kids (now adults) view foods like sushi/sashimi, smoked salmon, Japanese food in general as normal. Also vegan food is totally normal too.

Slightly off thread but prompted by SpringEquinoxs post, we were the first family I knew to get one of the new fanged 'deep freezes'. My mum still has it in a garage and our whole family of five could have hidden in it. We used to drive miles to the local Bejam and my parents would buy trays and trays of frozen yogurts. It was a new and exotic food in the early seventies and the only form of processed sugar we had access to so we devoured them. To the point where just the thought of yogurt repelled me.

Roll on 40+ years and after decades of avoiding yogurt I recently started eating Greek Yogurt to alleviate heart burn. It was a revelation after my years of processed yog. I now make my own delicious natural yogurt and regret my childhood introduction to the sugary stuff. But that's how we rolled back then.

They also used to buy industrial sized bags of frozen catering veg - peas, square carrots, watery cauliflower and rock hard green bean slices. Again, it took me years to get over my aversion and start eating 21st century (delicious) frozen veg.

Just jumped into my head. Anyone remember Macedonia vegetables....or did my mum just make that name up for them. Bags of frozen diced veg with some sort of bean/pea. Disgusting.

Pasta.Its weird what we never had.My house was a meat and 2 veg place.

I loved liver and onions. Don't think DD has ever tried it! Maybe I should broaden her palate!