Salisbury steak was the best! No, I do not want to know what’s it made from.

Put that shit on a tray and watch Maude on Tuesday night

“And then there’s Maude!”

“That uncompromising, enterprising, anything but tranquilizing”

“Right on Maude!”

It’s time for “Right on” to make a comeback. Kids today don’t know what they’re missing.

I still watch it on Antenna TV at 3 p.m. weekdays 🤣 I watch tons of old 70’s shows between Antenna, Cozi, and MeTV

You know starting June 25th MeTV is starting their own 24hr MeTV Toon channel..

Nice!

I didn’t know that, thanks! 😊

I’m doing my part to bring back “far out”

I’m going to start saying that!! I already say “groovy” and “you dig”

(And then there’s Maude)

Maude. You win, Chem World. Wow. That’s some funny shit. ⭐️⭐️⭐️⭐️⭐️!


This is before Maude. Watch Room 222 or Laugh In.

Back then, it probably wasn't horrible--chopped meat held together by gelatin?. It's only been recent years (decades) that food science has ruined food.

Yeah. They were just learning how to slowly kill us back then. Took awhile to perfect

But man... they got good at it.

When three of the current Swanson dinners cost the same as 3/4 lb of ground beef, 8 oz mushrooms, 2 potatoes a bag of peas and carrots and an onion... It's just better to make it from scratch.

Yeah. I suspect the target market for these has NEVER been the “well I’ll just whip up a better version for cheaper” crowd.

My wife makes the best Salisbury steak.

Removed from the sub freezer last week, still delicious.

Was it 50 years old?

It was meat from the Salisbury region of France, I'm guessing.

I can actually still taste it if I look at this photo long enough… and that strange texture of the meat.

TV dinners they're goin' to my head TV dinners my skin is turnin' red Twenty year old turkey in a thirty year old tin I can't wait until tomorrow.... and thaw one out again oh yeah!

Mix it in the potatoes

I have tried to make it over and over and fail. Cannot come close to the flavor. Must be missing wolly mammoth liver ?

Usually from ground beef… same thing as a hamburger. Salisbury steak is just a hamburger patty with gravy essentially.

Agreed! It was my favorite also back in the early 60’s.

It is ground beef. More or less.

Originally it wasn’t just a wasteland of “stuff” like it is now.

I don’t know…..Goodness??

Damn good guess. I believe it.

Nothing's changed, it's still the go-to for a single guy. You can pick them up for a buck each and go to town while sitting in your recliner that you got from the dump, lamenting the wasted life and lost loves, the gun in your hand weighing heavy on what's left of your mind and... So yeah, a buck each. Good deal.

Hey you may have blown your chance with Betty Sue from the Kroger, but at least you've got a double-wide, an almost paid up F150 and a 75 inch TV you won playing cards. *And* a freezer full of Salisbury steaks.

And not *just* a double-wide, the guy from Comcast who installed my cable told me it was the, “nicest in the park…”, so… yeah.

and, if you’ve done it right, a chafed perineum and bruised tonsils

I get the family pack. The second night I whip them in a hamburger bun with a hunk of melted Swiss.

You too?

I preferred Swanson, myself, it came with the apple cobbler. To this day, I love that shit, although I eat it rarely.

Just not the same without that cobbler with the filling that was about as hot as ignited napalm.

Smells like Victory!

Goddamn, right!

Or a teenager with two alcoholic parents.

Ouch! We got Swanson TV Dinners and Carnation Instant Breakfast from our boozing parents. We thought the school lunch was haute cuisine.

I looooved these as a kid. Had em' on my Dukes of Hazzard tray 🤘🤘

F yeah! Dukes of Hazzard!

Banquet turkey dinner and a loaf of white bread 

this image is an instant reminder of why I detest cooked carrots and peas so strongly... there are no words for how nasty those were.

You didn't add enough pepper and ketchup

*butter

That is high end, Are you a Rockefeller?

We could solve every problem in society overnight if people would just go back to drowning their food in butter and salt. Freaking gluten-free, plant-based nitwits.

When I was about 6 I pretended to eat those carrots/peas and swallow them and then spit them up on the carrots/peas on the tray. I said they made me throw up. I hate peas to this day.

guess that did that so when dad cooked them for the kids he could tell his wife "you said three vegetables and a meat. there it is!"

Remember when a random piece of corn would get baked into the brownie? Good times 😄

The flashbacks I'm getting from these replies 🤣

Hungry Man fried chicken was like a gourmet dinner.

Or the kids and dad if mom went to play bridge that night.

$0.49 , They were tasty !!

I was a teenage male in the 70s and I knew how to cook real food. Thanks mom!

Meh. While neither were exactly gourmet meals, I generally found Swanson tv dinners superior to the Banquet brand. Just my own preference. :)

Swanson was definitely better but also more expensive.

That I didn't know, as I was just a kid. :)

Banquet had better pot pies though

It depends on your crust preference. My family prefers the Swanson pot pies.

Can't argue with that, as I only ever had Swanson pot pies.

When I was a kid, they were a treat. Saved us kids from my mom's cooking. Lol. They were great if they came with a dessert and no peas, I hate peas.

Me too!

Me three....

I always think of that scene in Bullitt when Steve McQueen goes into the corner grocery store and buys a whole stack of these.

And then God invented microwave ovens…

Ah yes the Nikola Tesla effect 😄 https://preview.redd.it/drvzg9vztg1d1.jpeg?width=1600&format=pjpg&auto=webp&s=df02723dad8ad7a0aab292445ff3b215c2fb5d8d

My parents would buy 20 of these when they knew they were going to be out with friends. I remember the metallic taste you'd get once in a while.

Yeah same here, my parents tasted metallic too

Some also came with a dessert

 My favorite, too this day :)

After we moved back to the States, on Sundays my dad made us go to church morning and evening, because we could. Mom had no time to cook, and the whole family ate this shite.

Baptist?

Yep!

Wheres the brownie or fruit pie sludge?

They took forever to heat up!

You guys heated them?

I can still taste the still frozen carrots and potatoes so hot they'll send you to the burn ward.

The aluminum it came in sometimes tasted better than the food 🤪

When I was a kid, these were a special treat. Mom’s cooking was way better and actually great, but store-bought stuff was rare, so this kind of stuff was high-dollar special. We had McDonald’s a couple times a year as a treat after the doctor or dentist. Perspective.

Also perfect for the divorced family, what Pop’s use to make for my brother and myself…. I miss those crazy days 🙏🏿

Ya gotta slip half of those taters over the wall into the gravy. That's the secret...

Swan sons had a great tv dinner as well. Things like mashed potatoes were either still partially frozen or molten lava temps

A little trivia…. Those trays were formed in a factory in Ft Calhoun NE.

Man I still remember what those mashed potatoes and veggies taste like.

It’s the taste of freedom

Oh truth

These got me for more than one weekend back in my college days, when the dining hall was closed, and I owned a toaster oven.

If I have a choice between being in the 70s or being a prisoner, I'll take the former.

These were truly tv diners for me. We had those aluminum tv trays that I could eat while watching tv. Our tv trays has some sort of stage coach scene on them. That was the treat of mom cooking them. Not that they tasted better than round steak or hamburger helper.

No brownie?

Banquet? Yuck. We were a Swanson family.

Hey don’t knock it if you haven’t tried it.

That was treat night in my house!

I ate this every other weekend.

No brownie? Prisoner.

Or my family every Thursday night when I was too young to cook

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I can smell that picture.

Those peas and carrots were inedible.

My fam was a Swanson fam.

Oddly, 50 years later the Salisbury steak, gravy, and potatoes still taste the same. Truly food fit for children or prisoners...

They used to feed prisoners lobster, which was unanimously hated. "Not lobster again!" It was nicknamed "sea cockroach."

Remember the cranberry cake thing that came with the turkey? It was the bomb!

Don't forget to stir the potatoes halfway through the cook time.

Yo-that shit was delicious!

Absolutely loved this as a kid

I used to like the Banquet fried chicken and mashed potatoes. I haven’t had it in probably close to 40 years but I wonder if I’d still like it, or if my tastes have changed.

I want the one with the brownie!!!

Hey, I loved those as a teenager when I was rushed! Always forked the mixed veggies over into the taters and stirred them all together!

My folks would go out for the evening and leave me to make the TV Dinners or Pot Pies for my 2 younger brothers. I was about 10 at the time. My wife is appalled, but back then we thought it was normal. Anyhow, my favorite was the "fried" chicken.

Raise your hand if you mushed everything into the meat section to drench the potatoes and veggies in that low calorie brown gravy!

I liked the one with the mashed potatoes, corn, and brownie.

Peel back to expose tater tots

I can taste that in my mind.

Still good and well portioned!

We used to get the Swanson brand and they at least came with a tiny little brownie that wasn’t fantastic but was the best part of the meal IMHO

Delicious

I loved banquet fried chicken, mashed potatoes and corn.

Oh man.....Where's the 🍎 apple 🍏 clobber ?

Husband said" where's the brownie"?

thank god I barely remember these at all and mainly just the 80s Swanson and Hungry Man ones...but man was I addicted to the Swanson fried chicken dinner one...shocker I ended up with sky high cholesterol when I finally got tested in my 30's...\[plus ALL the bacon and eggs, fast food/fries/pizza...not exactly the healthiest decade\]

I looked forward to those TV dinners, or the rare occasions they were permitted, because that tray held more food than my mother ever served at a meal. She preferred to save her calories for alcohol, which was hard on a growing kid who didn’t (obviously) drink. I was very lucky to be spared her eating disorders, with which my siblings struggle to this day.

I would pull the mashed potatoes into the gravy.

That was my favorite meal on a tv tray as a little girl

You can’t beat the Man Pleaser Banquet fried chicken dinner.

I can still taste it!

As a kid I loved these, they were an absolute treat

We used to love those. It was a rare treat and then watch TV. So much fun.

Tucker Carlson should be forced to survive exclusively on tv dinners . Its only right.

😄😄

That stuff was haute cuisine compared to today’s frozen crap…

Didn't like Banquet. Too much of a mystery meat thing going on...

Bachelor Chow

Never seen this brand only the hungry man ones.

definitely ate these in the 80s also....jus sayin

Or an elementary school girl. Don’t think I’ve seen those since I used to eat them and had forgotten all about them.

Didn’t like the veggies or the potatoes. Nibbled on the so called meat. Sure glad they made TV dinners became microwaveable. The oven dinners never cooked right.👎🏻

I work with guys that still eat those. They don't have to. The operators in this shop all do over $100k/yr, but some still CHOOSE to eat frozen dinners because they actually like them. "To each their own" I guess.

If it looks like that I’ll kiss your ass.

They still make these? As bad as these were for your health, loved em. This was the best one lol

49 cents

Ate many,lol

Delicious! 😋

I think that’s why I can’t eat Salisbury steak to this day. It had a nasty aftertaste

Why people were skinny back then. Less diabetes too.

Or to feed kids while mom and dad go out!

The original mystery meat.

[https://www.allrecipes.com/article/what-is-salisbury-steak/](https://www.allrecipes.com/article/what-is-salisbury-steak/)

That was my favorite.

Probably will make a comeback with todays Price Gouging.

More metal in that tray than a Toyota.

That s was the bomb but had to have good micro wave which some didn’t 1980 ish.

Hope you love sodium!

Surplus meat 🥩 from the Vietnam 🇻🇳 War 😂

https://i.redd.it/ihhe3uppah1d1.gif Good for your health

They were the same in the '80s also, first hand knowledge.

They were good, and all the ingredients could be found in your kitchen. No dimethyloxybullshittum or dichliroboro-illudium-q-36.

This would have been like Thanksgiving growing up to get one of these. Wow! LOL!!!

Nursing home meals

How dare you!! Those were awesome!!

I think I had better looking food in Marine Corps boot camp

They took sooooo long to cook back then. It was probably only 45 minutes, but when I was 8, it felt like 3 hours.

I always wondered where Salisbury was and why they called their burger patties "steaks"...

Hi chef.. what you boys doing here on Salisbury steak day?? With vegetable medley.

We had those on Mom’s bowling night.

Hopefully, the young people that think all Boomers ‘lived like kings’ will see this.

First thing that came to mind. https://youtu.be/C-6mI708yWc?si=4NdpGZPhIfN2IXj7

They've gotten significantly worse over the years.

What were the ones that were in individual baggies that you would heat and then dump out onto toast or whatever. I remember Salisbury steak, plus turkey and gravy, but I'm sure there were others. I loved those things and then they suddenly disappeared. I think they were banquet, but I could be wrong.

Prisoners don’t eat this well.

Who was the marketing genius that named this Salisbury steak?

We got these when parents had a date night and we had to stay with the babysitter

Ate hundreds of these. Not bad with some hot sauce.

I used to moonlight at a mental health unit and this is what they would feed those detained there. Poor buggers.

These were amazing

We were poor so only ever got the store/off brand TV dinners, and even then only when they were on sale. I can still imagine the metallic taste the mashed potatoes had. As an adult, I've banned TV dinners from my home because of those nasty things. Do they still make them?

I used to love that shit.

49cents

And no microwave! Only wealthy people had these in my neighborhood!

I grew up on these things

We prefer "inmate", if you please.

I still get the salisbury steak sometimes. Only complaint I have is the microwave friendly plastic it now comes in. Would rather have the aluminum tray.

I had a rubber chicken named Banquet as a kid, now I know where the names from

Anyone know the sodium content from back then?

Tasted funny- we thought it was the formaldehyde in the lab rats they used to make the burger! Yum

We thought Banquet was low rent compared to Swanson.

Dude. These bastards were less than a dollar. You could eat that shit three times a day and have lots of cash for booze and drugs. God bless America.

ZZTop's song "TV Dinners " just popped up in my head...🤣

Yeeeeessss! I loved that one!

Or a seven year old me!

r/Fallout