To ask which foods used to be super fancy but are now totally "normal"

[cheesenpickles]

I was chatting to my 3 year old today about how, when I was little, pizza was quite an exciting thing. It's what they ate on American tv shows and there was no way you could get it delivered to your house. Got me thinking about things that are ordinary groceries now which were the pinnacle of fancy/unthought of in the 80s and 90s (and earlier!)

Avocados are another one. My mum would buy one for her and my dad as a special treat to eat with vinegarette from their special "avocado pear" bowls.

Mexican food as well. Old El Paso kits were the height of fancy pants when I was younger.

Halloumi, gets and hummus were things only my family seemed to know about (parents were stationed in Cyprus) and trying to explain squeaky cheese to my friends when we brought a huge brine-filled jug of the stuff back from holiday was hilarious considering it's totally normal now.

Halloumi cheese and courgettes. A posh vegetarian friend introduced me to them both at university.

I remember, way back in the olden days, that Nat King Cole sang a song called "Let There be Love". In the lyrics, he mentioned "Chile Con Carne". Because of the popularity of the song, that meal is supposed to be the first "foreign food" ever eaten in England.

I'm older enough to have gazed in awe at spaghetti coming in a long paper bag and being cooked. My mum's friend cooked it and sprinkled parmesan on it - they were very fancy!

I thought it was tasteless and bland. 40 years later I still think pasta is the absolute worst. Just nasty stodge.

I thought I hated pizza until I was about 13 and an actual pizza place opened up in town. Until then i’d been served up my mother’s iterations...firstly quiche with sliced tomatoes on the top which was then usurped by a cheese scone dough base approx 2 inches thick with a significant covering of tomato purée, grated cheddar or Red Leicester cheese and sliced tomatoes. Can you imagine how dry it was???? Real pizza was a revelation to all of us, including my mother!

I can remember when olive oil was only available from chemists, for medicinal/cosmetic purposes.

Had my first Chinese meal when I went to uni 1971.

DF used to put olive oil on his hair in preference to brylcreme, there used to be a congealed later on the top as bathroom was so cold.

Layer not later

@bumblebee it's probably why I went veggie at 13!

McDonalds was fancy when I was a Kid.
We'd have to have gone to th me cinema before we would have gone there (once a year)

Also a Chinese, my friend always used to have them but I didn't try one until I was at least 16

I can recall my bf taking me for a meal in the mid 70s and ordering avocado with prawns as a starter. I was flabbergasted and he was rather arrogant and patiently explained that it was ' an acquired taste' and indicated I wouldn't like it when I asked to taste

Coffee. Thank you Costa, Nero et al. The unspeakably vile brown dishwater from cafes and restaurants that was called coffee before the arrival of these giants probably accounted for UK tea drinking habit. I know it's fashionable to hate them but drinkable coffee is something to be celebrated.

@mumslave - Your description of your Mum's pizza has really triggered a memory for me of eating something similar. Must have been a recipe somewhere!

I remember when the first delivery pizza place opened in our town in the early 80s. When it arrived, instead of tomato sauce they'd used sliced tomato. Both tomatoes and topping just slid off the soggy base Safe to say we weren't impressed and didn't try again for years!

Mayonnaise was posh,we had salad cream.

Blueberries
Quinoa
Courgette noodles

Canned drinks before ring pulls were invented. To open your beer or fizzy drink you needed an odd shaped can piercer which you hooked over the edge and pressed the pointed bit into the can. Best I can do in the way of description.

Northern Ireland didn't get it's first Tesco, it was a tiny city centre one, until 1998 (only local supermarket and m&s food hall until that point) it brought a load of new things my favorite was the butternut squash I was 17 and we were all killing ourselves laughing at the phallic nature of it's shape as nobody had seen them before!

Those Lyons individual fruit pies were a real treat in the square flat box (similar to Mr Kipling fruit pies) only much more delicious and bigger. I was only allowed one for school trips or on holiday, it was probably the mid to late 60s.

Scampi used to be a treat in our house when I was growing up.
Prosecco - fizzy wine was for celebrations only (my parents are both wine enthusiasts so wine wasn't a strange concept, but fizzy wine was).
"Fancy" ice cream like Ben & Jerry's. Was either a tub of neopolitan or a vienetta.

Me and DH still call our DC ‘posh’ when they ask to eat things like hummus or pesto! I gave him and bread stick the other day and he proclaimed ‘where is the hummus’ 😄

Although weirdly for me I always found things like oven food like chicken nuggets etc as quite different and posh as a child as my family is Jamaican and would usually eat chicken & rice, salt fish or curried goat etc.

Espresso or any espresso based coffees - they just weren't around.
Cannelini beans
Olives
Doritos - I remember reading about them in an American book and having no idea what they were!

Also bagels

I was born in NI in the early 80s. We didn't have a lot of money so it was very much porridge for breakfast, tinned soup and a spud/beans on toast for lunch and meat, spuds and veg for dinner. We felt very fancy on special occasions when we had curry made from a jar, tandoori chicken or spaghetti bolognese. Even more fancy was when you got A WHOLE pot noodle to yourself. Going out for dinner happened extremely rarely.
We were all quite adventurous eaters though, so when my parents were better off from the mid 90s we often had avocados, olives, couscous, percolator coffee etc. My mum really came into her own as a brilliant cook once more money was available for buying different ingredients.

Lasagne. I remember how exotic it felt the first time we had ate it as a family. Still love it.

@cheesenpickles
I’m in my forties and I remember parents ordering pIzza delivery on Fridays and we lived just outside London