To ask if there’s a social class issue surrounding Findus Crispy Pancakes ?

[Jumell]

I’ve read some things in mine and sort of sense this might be the case but not 100% sure

Also is there a class issue around Fray Bentos pies ?

I love those !

Omg I use to love findus crispy pancakes.

Probably still would if I hadn't discovered I can't eat wheat 🫣😂

I’ve never had either, but my DH reminisces about the vesta chow mien and other very convenient foods- his parents both worked and they all caravanned in Europe in the holidays. I was brought up with a mostly stay at home mum who had an allotment. So it was all home cooking (really, really solid bread) Cranks recipes etc. Some class, totally different experiences.

Someone once told me that it is permissible for food companies to use old meat that has been deep frozen for years if the meat is going to be tinned. So surplus supplies of meat are often used in tinned meat products such as dog food and spam. I would think those bentos pies would fall under the same category 🤢

Ah I thought that might be the case I might have made the wrong call

Id have put white wine with pizza because I’d see it as ‘lighter’ than a meat based dish … but maybe I’m wrong !

If you’re taking Crispy Pancakes and Fray Bentos pies then you also have to mention Bernard Matthew’s Cheesy Hamwichs 😂

I'm foreign so didn't grow up with these foods. I remember a roommate when I was at uni eating a Fray Bentos pie and the rest of us thought it looked disgusting. The Fray Bentos eater was working class. The rest of us didn't really fit into the English class system because foreign.

Findus pancakes with the cheese looks like what the Dutch would call a kaassouffle. That is definitely considered to be a bit of a lower class food here.

We used to heat out house for hours on the warmth given off by the molten cheese filling of many a crispy pancake. No need to use the coal if Mum was making those.

@Chowtime we’re pretty down with COOK.

😂

In my teens I thought I was, oh so with it, making Vesta beef curry.
And the bees knees for making my own prawn cocktail for starter.

I was also waitressing in a "posh" restaurant and one of the starters was "orange juice"
Wtf???

🤣 at the orange juice but you’ve triggered my memory there !

Used to have Fray Bentos pies long ago when I lived in Zambia and didn't have a car ( for food shopping). Thought they were down market at the time but needs must.

I remember orange juice starter and half grapefruit with a cherry on top!

We begged our French chef trained mother for crispy pancakes (very expensive for a family of 7!). I still love them. Fray Bentos no chance, we used to call it dog meat.
We never had upf but we did have a Bejam freezer. Mainly full of fruit and green beans with ice cream on top.
Fwiw my mum had a title but only dusted it off when she was angry. Used to intimidate rude teachers.
Rusty Lee has a recipe in her book for crispy pancakes.

yes and tomato juice.
Is owning a Crimpet the modern version of findus pancakes or are Crimpets posh?

Yeeeees, the height of poshness and being so cool....

Im common and grew up poor-ish. We never had either because it was cheaper to cook from scratch. We didn’t really have any convenience foods. I was jealous of those that did.

Ah but @CuteOrangeElephant all of those Dutch fried snacks like kaassoufle may be common but goodness they are DELICIOUS. I’d love a pint and s bittebollen right now!

Were Findus Crispy Pancakes and Fray Bentos originally aimed at the MC's? Freezers were expensive and Women's Lib and freedom from the kitchen was mostly embraced by MC women in the 60/70s.

I think generally it’s much better to cook from scratch and I personally wish that now in 2024 it were easier for people - time wise actually more than convenience wise !! I mean my old job I didn’t get home until 7pm

• who on earth would start cooking from scratch after that ?

Ooh, do they still make Findus crispy pancakes? I'm in my 50s, and my private school and Oxford-educated, thoroughly middle-class mother used to give them to us all the time in the 70s and 80s as a quick after-school supper. I think she cooked them in the aga. I suspect they wouldn't live up to the memories, though.

I agree, definitely not a middle class dinner. Mine were both university academics and I've never had either the pancakes or a tinned pie. I'm 60. My mother even made her own yoghurt in the 1970s.

I'm from a working class background (hate all that class nonsense tbf - it's not talked about as much in NI) and my mum cooked everything from scratch. But she started buying crispy pancakes when we begged and pleaded her for them. Then the Fray Bentos crept in. Before you knew it we were eating toast toppers and sandwich spread. Those crispy pancakes were a slippery slope🤣

How did you cook either of those things when you were camping? Fray Bentos pies were very British food because of their role in feeding the Forces.

We had them in the 90s, when my mum went back to work and we got a fridge with a big freezer, rather than the freezer shelf.
Chips were from scratch for years cos frozen were expensive.