I remember so far back that fast food was rabbits and roadrunners.

I remember the Burger King jingle.

I'm old enough to know why Sawyer referred to Hurley as "Grimace."

I know when our home town got its Sonic--because building it was the first summer job my brother and I assisted our dad on!

I don't remember prices so much, but I remember packaging! All burgers and fish sandwiches from McDonalds came in styroform boxes.

And I remember Swanson TV Dinners where the box looked like a TV set with woodgrain. Metal pans sectioned off with a foil you had to peel back. Took roughly 35 minutes to heat up and that was a fast meal at the time. My favorite was salisbury steak and french fries.

When I was a wee lad, my mother made the mistake of giving me a TV dinner that had chocolate pudding in one of the little sections. It was so good and hot -- I spent the rest of my childhood hoping for a TV dinner with such a pudding chamber. I never found it again.

Was it Libbyland? I remember those as being designed just for kids. The food trays would have pictures on the bottom so when you ate all your food you found animals or treasure (they had a safari theme and a pirate theme dinner). Here's a tray from the safari theme:



I vaguely remember the Hungry Man dinners and the 3-course meal TV dinners:



I don't think the concept of soup lasted long. Probably because it spilt in the oven and everywhere when you lifted the tray.

Wow, that does seem familiar, the little animals in the chambers there. Plus, it explains why my mother would have put a whole TV dinner in front of me. (This memory is from earliest childhood, like 3. Four years max.)

I think that's it, Jay. I found a box that says dessert is pudding made with Milk Magic. I can't think of any other company that made TV dinners with pudding (the others were things like peach, apple, or cherry cobbler or brownies).

My precious madeleines.

In Lafayette, Louisiana we didn't have McDonald's until around 1970. Tough watching the national campaigns as a kid, when we couldn't have access to any of the crap advertised.

Burger Chef was king. A friend of mine's dad was a state polititian who owned the local franchise. Our Burger Chef's were similar to the one pictured, except ours had covered parking areas between the sign and the restaurant.


We had one Burger King in our town during the 60's. It was a pretty big deal to eat there instead of Burger Chef. The Burger King giveaway back then was a thin plastic glove/puppet. It was sort of a disposable serving glove with the Burger King printed on one side.

Another friend's dad had the Burger King franchise in the 70's, and broke the news to us that Burger King would soon be serving breakfast. We thought that was the craziest idea ever.. and we laughed, and laughed, and laughed...

Swanson had vanilla pudding in their spaghetti and meatballs dinner. No joke, it was the best vanilla pudding I've ever had.

I think Australia has had McDonald's and Burger King (renamed Hungry Jack's for legal reasons, apprently) since the late 1960's. There's always been McDonald's, as far back as I can recall. Although it's been awhile since we had the styrofoam burger-containers. There aren't any 'chicken 'n chips' any more, either. All you get are chicken nuggets these days.

I don't mind the 'made while you wait' rolls, or the coffee and stuff that they serve. McPizza sounds like a let-down, though. What a shame.

Every once in awhile, the mom would make a tv dinner without the fruit cup dessert or chocolate brownie.

wow, those nights were terrible.

and sometimes we'd have breakfast for dinner-pancakes, eggs.

-the hell?

As you can see, i have had dinner problems my whole life

I remember chicken mcnuggets being introduced. It was like winning the lottery to a kid.

Certain things are making sense now, if that's what you mean.

Haven't been in a McDonald's or anywhere like that since I was a kid. Because the food is minging and actually very expensive for what it is. When I say that I don't eat there to kids at work, they WILL NOT BELIEVE ME. "But it's lovely!" they say, staring quizzically at me. Depends what you compare it to, I suppose. 'Lovely' if other staples of your diet are frozen burgers and other reconstituted meat products, not so lovely if you are used to fresh fish, vegetables and things with actual flavour, rather than salt.

Why I like to eat cereal at night?

I don't recall how the fish sandwiches were packaged when I had my first fast food meals but the Big Mac (and the Carroll's Club Burger) had a thin piece of cardboard encircling them and were then wrapped in foil.

I remember the syrofoam. I feel the Big Mac lost something without that never to degrade material.

Unlike dan, i love mcdonald's and some other fast foods, but mostly choose not to eat there for health reasons.

A letter from Arby's. (America's Roast Beef, Yes Sir!)

Has anyone here ever worked at Arby's? I find it hard to believe that a big hunk of beef is slow-roasted and then sliced paper-thin at the restaurant itself. Seems more likely that it arrives sliced.

But then, I've never worked in food service of any kind, so I'm hardly an expert in this area.

It's made from space-age polymers designed in the lab to taste more like roast beef than real roast beef.

Because it's PEOPLE! ARBY'S ROAST BEEF IS PEOPLE!!!!!