More Questionable Food from Average Jane

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Wow, I’ve learned something this week! If I want more comments, all I have to do is ask you a question. I’ll keep that in mind…

After yesterday’s vigorous discussion of unwholesome but delicious foods we eat when nobody’s looking, I started thinking about some of the other foods I loved as a child but left behind once I discovered tastier alternatives.

When I was growing up, we seldom had restaurant food and almost never ate fast food. Thus, for a long time I had the idea of my mother and grandmother as impressive cooks. Well, that wasn’t really the case, as I realized once I got out on my own and started experiencing a wider range of foods.

Here are some of the foods that I used to really love when I was a kid:

"Cheesecake" made with lemon Jell-o. That was the fancy dessert I always made when company was coming. Now I have a recipe for real cheesecake – the kind that cures for a couple of days before you serve it. Back then, though, it was all about the Jell-o and Cool Whip.
Celery stuffed with a blend of chunky peanut butter and Velveeta. As you can imagine, this is very, very salty.
Spaghetti sauce that starts with a can of tomato sauce, a can of condensed tomato soup and a can of tomato paste and includes sauteed onion, green pepper and garlic, spiced with dried oregano. It’s very sweet and thick. I can actually still eat this on occasion, but I prefer something lighter and fresher most of the time.
A supposedly Chinese dish called "Ching Dao" that was made with canned chow mein vegetables, frozen peas, celery, chicken, ginger and a bit of powdered sugar added to the cornstarch used for thickening. It was served over Minute Rice, of course. This was my absolute favorite dish when I was growing up, but it strikes me as an unappetizing blob of salty ickiness now. It’s possible that the dish could be resurrected using fresh vegetables and real steamed rice – maybe I should try that sometime.

So here’s today’s reader participation challenge: describe a food you used to love until you grew out of it. I’m not talking about a food you really still like but think you shouldn’t – I mean a food that just isn’t the same for you anymore now that you’re a grownup.

Comments

9 responses to “More Questionable Food from Average Jane”

January 12, 2005

Huts

My mom used to make taco’s for us. The meat consisted of ground meat and onions. No seasoning. Instead of salsa…ketchup! Lettuce, tomatoes and cheese were normal. The big twist was when the soft shells came out. Then they became burrito’s.
Spaghetti with meatballs and italian sausage in the sauce. There was also a good helping of grease in the sauce from the meat.
Chicken rolled in cracker crumbs and fried in lard. Very greasy.
They are made this way today.

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January 12, 2005

Pharmgirl

Peanut butter and honey sandwiches. Just lost the appeal somewhere along the way. In grade school I was served SO many Peanut Butter and Jelly sandwiches, it’s only been in the last few years I can eat those again! But the PB&H is a thing of the past.

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January 12, 2005

Cagey

I still LOVE peanut butter and honey sandwiches (an awesome energy snack before workouts, BTW).
I lived on Lipton Rice packets my Freshman year of college. I’d get home and it would be like ‘um, what flavor tonight?’. Can’t stand the things now. Tostinos frozen pizzas were another staple I can’t stand now. And Taco Bell and Bud Light.

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January 12, 2005

purplejoolz

And there was me thinking you’d already realised that asking a question was a surefire way of increasing your comments rating. I was dead impressed too!

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January 12, 2005

Goofy Girl

Quarter Pounder w/ Cheese! I used to eat at least one a week from age 12 to about 25. Then suddenly they just didn’t seem as good. Now, 10+ years later, I can’t even walk into a McDonald’s without losing my appetite. The fries aren’t as good anymore either.

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January 12, 2005

Rozanne

In a slight variation on Goofy Girl’s theme–Big Macs. They were so heavy and fatty that, as a kid, I had to lie down after eating one. It didn’t stop me from eating one every chance I could get, though. The only time I’ll set foot in a McDonalds these days is if I have to pee really bad.
I also loved all Hostess products: Twinkies, cupcakes, fruit pies. Boy am I glad I outgrew my taste for that crap.

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January 12, 2005

Fi

Mine was Marmite (a sandwich spread made from yeast extract) and chip sandwiches. Mmm!
Oh, and those thin circles of luncheon sausage with a processed cheese square rolled up into a tube (I give these to my daughter now)

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January 14, 2005

Suzanne

My mother used to serve my sister and I sliced spam covered in brown sugar and broiled until the sugar melted. Spam and spaghettios in front of the TV was a treat for my sister and me.
I wouldn’t touch spam now, but back then, oh yeah. It was delish.

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January 14, 2005

Daisy

I’m laughing so hard at your description of the cheesecake that I can barely type but here’s mine. Despite living in a mining area of south Wales with a healthy population of second/third generation Italian and Spanish families, my mother’s version of “spaghetti bolognese” was a great bolognese sauce (all done beautifully with minced beef, tomatoes, onions, basil) but served with a plate of mashed potatoes, a large hole scooped out of the middle ready for the sauce. Mmmm delicious. But not spaghetti bolognese.

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