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.

There’s a family story about my mum and frozen pizza. I think this was late 70’s so either just before or not long after Mum and Dad got married.
She wanted to impress him so cooked a frozen pizza not realising the plastic/foam bit needed to be taken off. Ruined their “fancy” dinner.

That cheese in cylindrical cardboard tubes was DISGUSTING. Real Parmesan was a revelation when I tried it.

There is a clip from a Delia Smith program where she is using bell peppers and she says that people at home should start requesting them from their greengrocers because the more people who ask for them, the more easily available they will be. Seems incredible to me now.

My dad was a striking miner and we had food parcels donated by the West German Miners Welfare Organisation or somesuch.

We were introduced to the delights of Aldi and Lidl 20 years before the rest of the country. I don't remember much about it except rye bread and possibly some sort of tinned meat paste. The rye bread was like nothing we'd ever known before.

BBQ's - they caused food poisoning And not to be used.

Ice creams were a very special treat.

McDonald's- parents asked for a knife and fork and were horrified they didn't have them. Never heard of eating food without them.

Crisps - snacks for when they had visitors put in bowls never eaten in packed lunches or just because you fancied a packet.

Fizzy drinks were for special occasions too.

Sorry if this puts a downer on the thread, but is anyone else reading this and thinking that after brexit we'll be moving back to those days, maybe not in terms of absolute availability but as in a lot of these things will be too expensive for many people to buy?

My gastronomic awakening was around the mid 80s - Taramasalata and pitta at my cousin’s house in Camden Town. Eating Tara now takes me right back to that day even though pitta and dips are ten a penny now. I also remember my mum and dad joining the Labour Party and getting meal ideas from their new friends: spaghetti Bolognese!

cushion I remember one of the burger chains serving food on plates with knifes and forks, but it was probably either BK or Wimpy.

My dad (born late 40s) always talks about how chicken was so expensive they only got it at Easter

kateandme Thu 31-Jan-19 20:04:26
my dad just grumbled.yeh you mean how we will all be eating again after Brexit haha.

Well, if so, at least the environment will thank us. Seriously though, there are frequently articles about the food miles involved in imported produce.

Yes to Olive oil from the chemists, as pp said it was used for earache.
My first taste of Spaghetti Bolognese, mother's recipe involved tinned mince 🤮
Too many more to mention and I watch my DGS tucking into hummus, mangoes, asparagus, broccoli, fresh salmon, bagels and so many foods I thought were very exotic when I was young

My childhood diet:

Sunday - roast
Tuesday - leftover meat plus bubble and squeak
Wednesday - pork chops, boiled potatoes, peas and carrots
Thursday - sausages, boiled potatoes, peas and carrots
Friday - fish in a bag, boiled potatoes, peas and carrots
Saturday - beef stew, boiled potatoes,
Peas and carrots.

My mum could boil a potato in her sleep!

In the late 60s, the neighbours thought my parents were posh and eccentric because they had real coffee, made in a Bialetti percolator.

Then an Italian lady moved into a flat in our block and taught my mum how to make spag bol. She also used to come for walks with us and pick ceps in the woods, which she used to slice, dip in beaten egg and then fry with a little garlic. My dad and I loved them and the neighbours thought we were a) very weird for liking "foreign food" and b) likely to die from eating poisonous funghi.

But that was in the days when if you wanted a curry, you bought some vile packet job made by Vesta.

Prawn cocktail
Steak and chips
Black forest gateau.
Glass of orange juice.

I was brought up in the 70's...

Vienetta! In the 80's my gran bought one once a year at Christmas as a special treat! Saw them in Iceland for a £1 recently!

Coffee. Until around 20 years ago, coffee in the U.K. almost always meant instant.

I remember a story from the miners' strike in 1984 that the German miners' union had sent over a consignment of groceries including packets of ground coffee. Consternation ensured for many recipients who had never drunk anything but instant. I drank instant until I was in my third year at university too.

I remember we had butter on our spaghetti until my mum at some point discovered olive oil.

I was well into my 30s before I considered the possibility that an ordinary person like me could ever purchase and drink a bottle of champagne.

I remember my auntie, who was always into any new fad, introducing us to spaghetti (rural N. Ireland in the seventies). It came wrapped in dark blue paper and apparently was to be served with tomato sauce and grated cheese so we had it with Heinz tomato ketchup and mousetrap cheddar. Loved it!

I am German and when I was a child, almost every family had a tiny rack filled with small glass jars filled with dried herbs and spices. But those jars were always full and unused. I think using herbs and spices - besides moderate use of those herbs that you could grow yourself - was quite exotic then and much more normal now.

Fizzy bottled water, Evian etc.

Oh @BarbaraofSeville just missed your post – maybe you can confirm or refute my story!

I was 18 and at university before I knew broccoli existed.

Mange tout, courgettes and garlic bread.

We had to make our own garlic bread from butter, garlic granules and a baguette (exotic in itself)

We were also considered fancy for only having brown bread.

The only pasta we ever had was spaghetti bolognese.

With pre-grated parmesan in the cardboard cylinder.

Any other type of pasta was very exotic.

I was taken to a panto when I was 3 ( I'm 55 now) and I went on the stage and won a can of coke. Nobody in my family knew how to open it!
It's really stuck in my memory.

BlackForest

Not sure if you saw my post above about being a recipient of the German donations. I don't remember there being any coffee and if there was ground coffee, we wouldn't have known how to make it, or have a percolator or other device to do so. If we had coffee at the time, it was usually mellow birds or chicory . Even Nescafe was posh in 1980s Yorkshire.

I do remember being given part of the common market butter mountain too. The packets were stamped with something about it not being for resale.