Foods you miss from the 1970s

[Fat Guy]

I miss that so many items we take for granted today (e.g., Parmigiano Reggiano, balsamic vinegar) were revelations.

I miss that fast food was almost universally better than it is today.

[Chris Amirault]

Cheap and plentiful seafood, including cod, steamers, and lobster.

[heidih]

At first I was going to say you were nuts, but upon reflection I can see the thrust of the original post. Everything is so available today that there is almost no novelty. Of course I am talking about urban areas with access. But even out on the prairie there is internet and blogging and information such that almost nothing is a revelation- though hopefully the actual taste of it is.

[Jon Savage]

Cheap and plentiful seafood, including cod, steamers, and lobster.

Don't forget Abalone- man I used to love the wild harvested stuff. Not that there is any left around these parts alas.

[gfweb]

Mateus Rose in the wicker-wrapped bottle that would soon have a candle in it and join the other ten in the blocked-off fireplace in the Victorian apartment off the Penn campus.

Carrot cake with cream cheese frosting.

Orange roughy.

[Dakki]

Carrot cake with cream cheese frosting.

We still get that, at least if I'm the one baking.

[heidih]

Don't forget Abalone- man I used to love the wild harvested stuff. Not that there is any left around these parts alas.

OK you got me- off the rocks on Catalina Island and grilled with butter on the beach

[Lisa Shock]

Fancy food shops inside of suburban malls. Nowadays, the average supermarket has more than two types of cheese and a selection of oils and vinegars, etc. but, back when they didn't, lots of malls had specialty food shops. Hickory Farms had year-round stores that sold 20+ types of loose tea, lots of cheeses in large blocks, spices and other goodies designed to be used as supplies for your home with less emphasis on the gift items. There were also great local businesses bringing the world to our kitchens.

Real sugar in soft drinks. This was the decade before HFC hit the market, and the soda pop just plain tasted better.

More local dining options, fewer national chains. Plus the fact that most of us ate at home more often and ate more meals cooked from scratch. (ok, Hamburger Helper was introduced, but, many people scorned it at the time)

[David Ross]

Real Caesar Salad, properly tossed tableside in a wooden bowl and served in a "Continental" Dining Room decades before Caesar Salad would find a resurgence in popularity and become a shill of its true self. (In other words, without coddled egg, anchovy, Worcestershire sauce and freshly made, buttery croutons). I'm sorry that some now call "Creamy Roasted Garlic Caesar Dressing" in a bottle the correct way to dress a real Caesar Salad.

And another classic of the Continental cuisine of the 70's I miss terribly-Steak Diane, also prepared tableside, with flames and flourish.

[Fat Guy]

Oh right. Also along those lines, flaming desserts: bananas Foster, cherries jubilee and baked Alaska.

[nibor]

pot brownies

[Jon Savage]

Don't forget Abalone- man I used to love the wild harvested stuff. Not that there is any left around these parts alas.

OK you got me- off the rocks on Catalina Island and grilled with butter on the beach

Yep! And it was cheap too if you had to buy it. Best enjoyed with some Mateus Rose- another blast from the past mentioned upthread.

[Tri2Cook]

I was pretty young in the 70's and can't really remember much particularly special. I have some good food memories from that time but not of anything directly related to the time period that I couldn't get now (other than mom's cooking ).

[Jon Savage]

Oh also Balkan Sobranie a long defunct pipe tobacco.

It was the laphroig of its ilk.

[Pierogi]

I heartily second and third and fourth the lament about the good, fresh, VARIED, WILD seafood. It just irks me no end that "swai" (whateverthehellthatis), tilapia and catfish are the only non-frozen fish I can usually find. And they're all farmed.

I'll add to the ring....Grocery stores with a) real live butchers who actually cut meat, b) real live bakers who actually made pastries and c) seasonal produce that actually tasted like something, and not styrofoam.

And I also miss the Mom & Pop bakeries and butcher shops. A lot.

Edit to add---although I love the luxury of having 10 olive oils and 15 vinegars and saffron and figs and blood oranges and Meyer lemons and smoked paprika and so on readily available, I have to lament and mourn the "dumbification" of the basics like meat, seafood and produce. Not sure it balances out, actually.

Edited February 8, 2011 by Pierogi (log)

[Luke]

Scallops! They used to use them for fish bait back in the 70's....

That being said, it helps lots to have friends who are divers and don't eat Seafood. I tell ya, cleaning 400 Scallops can get tiresom (especially when you get the odd shell containing a Blue Ring Octopus. That keeps you awake....)

Luke

[Mjx]

I hope it's okay posting from a different place, both location- and age-wise: in the 70s, I was a small child and lived in Florence; it was also the decade in which my family first returned to the US, and I saw actually NYC (my parents left when I was a baby).

In Florence, I miss all the small shops in the centre, where my mother did her daily shopping round: the tiny butcher shop (until my parents went veg.), the greengrocer, latticini, salumeria, the small coffee shop filled with the delicious scent of roasting coffee issuing from an enormous, orange-enamelled open roaster near the door that seemed to be in constant use. All these shops are now gone, and have been replaced with gift-shops for tourists, about 85% of whom wish they were somewhere else with better shopping, but 'it's one of the places you must go' (I also miss museums being free on Sundays, and as empty and echoing as catherdrals). I miss Paoli still being good. I miss the chestnut man who always sat under this one archway, all winter long, and the chestnuts warming my hands on my home from school.

In NYC, I miss the many small shops with the most amazing array of edibles (and other things) that my brother and I used to explore, especially on the Upper West Side (I remember a Chinese shop on 105th and Broadway that perpetually fascinated me). I miss yogurt in paper containers and odd flavours (prune whip, anybody?). I kind of miss Sloans. I miss older waitstaff, and diners that didn't seem like they were trying to recapture something, but just WERE. I also miss perfume smelling better; when you're eating, a harshly sweet, plasticky fragrance is particularly horrible. Perversely, I miss my older relatives smoking after dinner (someone is going to crucify me for this, but I don't mean I want it brought back--I've never smoked, and know it's unhealthy, and we're better off without smoke all over the place--but a whiff of cigarette or pipe smoke evokes a wave of nostalgia).

And I could swear that potato knishes were different, then, and I don't think it's just my memory; was there a cooking-oil shift sometime in the 70s?

[demiglace]

Oblong pip filled watermelons. All we get now are round pale seedless tasteless ones.

Edited February 8, 2011 by demiglace (log)

[nickrey]

Prawn (shrimp) cocktails on iceberg lettuce with Marie Rose sauce. Oh, wait a minute, they're starting to make a resurgence.

[Kerry Beal]

McDonald's french fries cooked in beef tallow. Not sure what year they switched.

[Mano]

Real Caesar Salad, properly tossed tableside in a wooden bowl and served in a "Continental" Dining Room decades before Caesar Salad would find a resurgence in popularity and become a shill of its true self. (In other words, without coddled egg, anchovy, Worcestershire sauce and freshly made, buttery croutons). I'm sorry that some now call "Creamy Roasted Garlic Caesar Dressing" in a bottle the correct way to dress a real Caesar Salad.

And another classic of the Continental cuisine of the 70's I miss terribly-Steak Diane, also prepared tableside, with flames and flourish.

And the romaine lettuce was more flavorful and a deep green.

There was no such thing as virgin or extra virgin olive oil that I recall. It was simply pure olive oil.

[abooja]

A predominance of real deal bakeries, and not the par-baked, made-from-a-mix crud that passes for baked goods these days, and is available in most supermarkets. I particularly miss Jewish bakeries. Even if I still lived in New York, I'd be hard pressed to find a decent slice of seven layer cake or, God forbid, an individual Charlotte Russe baked in a small paper cup. People don't value great bakery items like they did in the 70s. This saddens me.

[weinoo]

Jeremiah Tower, Mark Miller, Jonathan Waxman...all at Chez Panisse. California cuisine, for real.

[BeeZee]

A predominance of real deal bakeries, and not the par-baked, made-from-a-mix crud that passes for baked goods these days, and is available in most supermarkets. I particularly miss Jewish bakeries. Even if I still lived in New York, I'd be hard pressed to find a decent slice of seven layer cake or, God forbid, an individual Charlotte Russe baked in a small paper cup. People don't value great bakery items like they did in the 70s. This saddens me.

we used to go to my grandparents' house for dinner on Sunday...obligatory stop was Wall's bakery for 7 layer cake. They were from Austria and sub par cake was not an option. And I also get nostalgic when I see a bakery using plain white boxes with that red and white cotton string to tie them up, it reminds me of that time...

[Fat Guy]

Also started things we miss about the 1990s.