the changes in foods since your childhood? doesnt taste the same as it use to?

[green papaya]

do you remember foods you ate when you were younger that are not made the same as it use to be? the quality changed or other changes?

I remember Kellog's Frosted Flakes use to be a little bigger & thinner with a lighter crisper crunch and more sugar coating? and it got soggy in milk faster than the cereal thats sold now

popular candy bars like the Snickers bar are noticeably smaller? maybe 20% smaller than several years ago

TACO BELL use to be pretty good 30 plus years ago, but now the meat tastes noticeably lower grade, almost like a cheap paste, definitely not as good as before, the Taco Salad shells are also noticeably different than before and taste like cardboard now?

I have stopped going to Taco Bell and only go to taquerias now

McDonalds Chicken McNuggets use to be much tastier and a little bigger over 20 years ago, now they are different, not as tasty and they seem to only use white meat, so they are more bland and tasteless, not much better than the cheap frozen nuggets from the frozen food isle at the grocery store.

McDonald's Fries have also taken a nose dive in quality , they taste nothing like the old style, they also use the smallest fries that dont last 10 minutes and turn to tastesless dried out crap

 

[Stanley Doble]

I'm not sure if it's just me. But the Kentucky Fried Chicken we got in the sixties and seventies seemed different. The stuff you get now seems very greasy. I don't remember it being soaked in grease, it seemed lighter and the quality of the chicken seemed better and less fatty.

Tim Horton's stopped making their donuts fresh, several years ago. Now they bring them in frozen. Also, the coffee seems to have changed for the worse about the same time.

 

[Flat Foot Floey]

LOL the examples. It's still fast food and sweets. It was never "good" to begin with.
So it changed, huh? Some new sweeteners I guess. Plus your hands were smaller when you were a kid so everything looked bigger. ;-)

Learn to cook and the changes of junk food chains won't affect you.

 

[green papaya]

another thing I noticed is almost all grocery stores that sell pies come from the freezer, they just put them out to thaw, they are never fresh hot pies from the oven anymore, it's all pre-made frozen food they thaw out before they put it out.

these days the baked goods are made at some far away distribution center , frozen and shipped out to grocery stores, these days it's all heat & serve, they dont have bakers, they just reheat or thaw it out.

I remember KFC use to use nice big meaty pieces, now they look smaller, the drum sticks are so tiny?

the roast ducks they sell at Chinese delis are also much smaller and have less meat than they use to, they use to be bigger plumper & juicy.

and cost around $6 - $7 each back in the 80's, now they cost $15 - $16 each, I wish they would go back to using bigger meatier juicy ducks like they use to, the ducks are smaller and the price is higher.

Hungryman TV dinners use to be big enough for a man sized appetite, now they look like something for a small child? not much bigger than a school kid's hot lunch, they reduced the portions and still call it a Hungryman dinner?

 

[Atticus Finch]

Since I was a child much has changed with the preparation, service and taste of food. Too much to put into a single post. For example, there was no fast food in my county until I was almost a teenager. Everyone ate at home or at one of the few local "sit down" restaurants. My father attended Rotary Club meetings on Tuesday nights. Mom, not wanting to cook for only herself and me, usually heated up something called "TV dinners". I always looked forward to Tuesday nights because I thought I liked TV dinners. Of course, I soon outgrew that notion. Now, I couldn’t tell you if TV dinners even still exist, but I hope not.

AF

 

[LizzieMaine]

I've made many a meal on those one-dollar "Banquet Dinners", and you don't eat them for the taste. You eat them because you're at the end of your paycheck for the week.

Processed foods taste much, much sweeter to me than they used to. Whether this is HFCS or just more sugar being used in general depends on the manufacturer and your point of view.

Some processed foods haven't changed at all. Grape Nuts and Grape Nuts Flakes taste exactly the way they always have. Kraft Old English cheese in the little glass jar tastes exactly the way it always did, as do the Ritz crackers served underneath it. The crackers themselves, are quite a bit smaller since Nabisco was bought out by Kraft.

McDonalds has used frozen meat and frozen potatoes since the early 1970s. It tastes the same to me now as it did then, but I don't remember how it tasted before that. We ate at McD's maybe once a year in the sixties -- and had to drive forty miles to get to it -- and we were too busy wolfing down this coveted treat to bother to think about what it tasted like.

 

[Matt Crunk]

Tom's Hot Fires are a snack that I've eaten since I was a kid and they just don't taste the same now. Don't know if they've changed or maybe my tastes have changed, but something is different for sure. One thing I know is that they don't put near the amount of flavoring on them as the used to. Used to you'd get to the bottom of the bag and some would be absolutely dark red with the flavor coating. Now they're all just a light to medium orange.

 

[green papaya]

the taste of diet / sugar free sodas has improved from the early diet sodas made with artificial sweeteners

I remember the old diet sodas tasted awful compared to todays

the original COKE a COLA also tasted better in the old days, I remember the carbonation use to actually feel like a burn it was so crisp and carbonated back then, it kind made a nice tingling sensation as you drank it, modern COKE just doesnt have that carbonation burn anymore?

when I was a kid a drink of ice cold Coke a Cola was like a shot of whiskey

 

[Stanley Doble]

One thing that has improved is the selection of foods at the local grocery stores.

 

[Matt Crunk]

the original COKE a COLA also tasted better in the old days, I remember the carbonation use to actually feel like a burn it was so crisp and carbonated back then, modern COKE just doesnt have that carbonation burn anymore? when I was a kid a drink of ice cold Coke a Cola was like a shot of whiskey

I will still every now and then get one that hits me like that, and when I do it's usually from one in a glass bottle. Don't know what it is about glass that preserves that fizz better than plastic or cans, but it does seem to make a difference. I've also recently started buying Coke imported from Mexico whenever I can find it (usually at a Mexican grocery or neighborhood grocery where a lot of Latinos frequent) because it's still sweetened with cane sugar rather than corn syrup. It just tastes better to me, although it does sometimes seem a little flatter (less fizz) than US COKE in glass bottles, although it too is in glass.

 

[HudsonHawk]

another thing I noticed is almost all grocery stores that sell pies come from the freezer, they just put them out to thaw, they are never fresh hot pies from the oven anymore, it's all pre-made frozen food they thaw out before they put it out.

these days the baked goods are made at some far away distribution center , frozen and shipped out to grocery stores, these days it's all heat & serve, they dont have bakers, they just reheat or thaw it

I guess I live a charmed life because all the local megamart grocery stores still have bakeries where you can get fresh baked pies, cakes, breads still hot out of the oven and especially fresh tortillas. There are also lots of small local bakeries making up the goodies. And cheap too. I can go buy a dozen or so fresh baked pastries or turnovers or empanadas or kolaches or klobasneks or breads or rolls for about $3.

 

[LizzieMaine]

the taste of diet / sugar free sodas has improved from the early diet sodas made with artificial sweeteners

I remember the old diet sodas tasted awful compared to todays

the original COKE a COLA also tasted better in the old days, I remember the carbonation use to actually feel like a burn it was so crisp and carbonated back then, it kind made a nice tingling sensation as you drank it, modern COKE just doesnt have that carbonation burn anymore?

when I was a kid a drink of ice cold Coke a Cola was like a shot of whiskey

The biggest problem today is that Coke is rarely served at the proper temperature. In the Era, The Coca-Cola Company stressed that its product should be served as cold as possible, and in fact their Fountain Sales department was instructed to check up on drugstores and lunch counters to ensure that they were dispensing and serving the drink at a temperature of exactly 34 degrees. If your Coke isn't so cold it makes your teeth ache, it's not cold enough and it won't taste right.

 

[anyexcuse]

I'm not sure if it's just me. But the Kentucky Fried Chicken we got in the sixties and seventies seemed different. The stuff you get now seems very greasy. I don't remember it being soaked in grease, it seemed lighter and the quality of the chicken seemed better and less fatty.

Tim Horton's stopped making their donuts fresh, several years ago. Now they bring them in frozen. Also, the coffee seems to have changed for the worse about the same time.

Far as I am concerned KFC has went downhill on many levels.

When I was growing up in a small town of 8,000 people or so, the only "fast" food was Pizza Hut, which seems to be fading, too. One store just closed close to here, and I was on a trip lately and went to a lunch buffet in WY and was underwhelmed by the service, taste of the food, and general appearance of the place. YRMV!

I miss the milkman coming to our door!

 

[Matt Crunk]

The biggest problem today is that Coke is rarely served at the proper temperature. In the Era, The Coca-Cola Company stressed that its product should be served as cold as possible, and in fact their Fountain Sales department was instructed to check up on drugstores and lunch counters to ensure that they were dispensing and serving the drink at a temperature of exactly 34 degrees. If your Coke isn't so cold it makes your teeth ache, it's not cold enough and it won't taste right.

That makes perfect sense, because now that I think about it, whenever I do experience that nostalgic burning fizz today, it's always from a Coke that's ice cold.

 

[sheeplady]

I actually think certain things have decreased in quality, while others have decreased in quality less so. I'll give you an example. Wendy's has always been our "fast food" restaurant that we eat at since we've been married. Their prices have gone up and their food quality has gone down. As a vegetarian who eats fish, it is next to impossible to find one that carries their fish sandwich. The few I've found that do the fish sandwich tastes like a horrible burnt fish stick. The burgers have gotten smaller too. Their chicken nuggets are also burnt tasting. Most of them around here no longer carry their baked potatoes, which is their only vegetarian option.

We've started to eat at McDonalds because they have a fish sandwich (sold at every McDonalds I've been to), my daughter loves their chicken nuggets, and their fries are OK. I think the quality of McDonalds has slipped, but it's not as dramatic as Wendy's. Wendy's went from being hands down one of the best fast food places to eat to one of the worst, in my opinion. But then I haven't been in a burger king or KFC in almost a decade.

Subway's quality seems to have stayed the same. They have a delicious soy-free veggie burger that is yummy. And they have a veggie sandwich. But they don't have a drive through, which makes picking up food while traveling with my daughter (especially when she is sleeping and I don't want to wake her) more difficult.

While it's easy to say "learn to cook," cooking is not always possible. People travel, camp, etc.

 

[Fastuni]

While it's easy to say "learn to cook," cooking is not always possible. People travel, camp, etc.

One can take home-prepared foods and snacks for travel or camping. And preparing something during camping is half of the fun, as you will certainly agree.

Of course your point is taken - there are occasions when eating something ¨fast¨ outside becomes necessary.
But it should surprise no one that large fast-food chains operate solely by the logic of maximizing profit. They couldn´t care less about good taste and all too often also the quality of their foods (above legally required standards... and not always even this). No different than (almost) any other mass-produced product. The low expectations/standards of most clients of course is also at the root - otherwise they'd be out of business.

If I want to eat something ¨fast¨ there are numerous non-chain alternatives that offer greater diversity and better quality (although there are many bad ones as well).

 

[CaramelSmoothie]

LOL the examples. It's still fast food and sweets. It was never "good" to begin with.
So it changed, huh? Some new sweeteners I guess. Plus your hands were smaller when you were a kid so everything looked bigger. ;-)

Learn to cook and the changes of junk food chains won't affect you.

This is the way I feel too. I work in the hospitality industry and many of the people are so nasty that I really don't like eating out unless I really have to like when I travel. I find that my home cooked food tastes better than the restaurants.

The country has more people to feed too compared to "back in the old days" so I guess quality and the time it takes to make good quality food is not as efficient as heat and serve food.

 

[CaramelSmoothie]

http://www.scribd.com/doc/230587/McMenu-Do-It-Yourself-McDonald-s-Restaurant-Recipes

Here are recipes I came across some years ago, don't know how true to taste they'll be.

 

[LizzieMaine]

While it's easy to say "learn to cook," cooking is not always possible. People travel, camp, etc.

It's pretty hard to *cook* as opposed to just heating something up from a can when you work over sixty hours a week. Sometimes you don't even have the energy to heat up the stuff in the can.

Speaking of which, Hormel canned chili tastes exactly like it always did -- a taste that can only be described as "Hormel canned chili."

As for Wendy's, I'm glad our local one closed because I am very fond of their spicy chicken sandwiches, and I'd eat them every day of the week if I could. The only thing that's better is Popeye's spicy chicken sandwich, and fortunately the nearest one of those is a hundred miles away.

 

[sheeplady]

One can take home-prepared foods and snacks for travel or camping. And preparing something during camping is half of the fun, as you will certainly agree.

When most people "camp" they are doing it at a luxury place with things like potable water, pit toilets, and they aren't doing it for months on end. It gets a little old lighting a fire in a downpour, scrounging for wood the second time that day, washing your dishes in a creek, and storing your perishables in either the cooler hanging from a tree or the cooler weighed down in a creek. I've been doing it for 5 months 3 days a week, and let me tell you, after three months I was tired of it.

I figure that my family eats out once a month. I know some people who eat out once a week. I need that break once a month.

When my husband and I did a road trip out west we ate out 3 times during a three week trip. Totally justified. I've never had good luck getting home cooked meals through an airport or always getting a hotel with a kitchen, etc.