From all of us here at Gone But Not Forgotten Groceries (just me), we'd like to wish everyone a safe and happy New Years! Here's to another year of bringing you the best groceries from our past!
(Doors will close 2 hours early today so our employees (me) can celebrate the holiday......aw, who am I kidding, I've been drinking since noon......)
"For auld lang syne, my dear, For auld lang syne. We'll take a cup o' kindness yet, For auld lang syne."
Product: Cool N' Creamy Pudding
Company: Birdseye
Years - Late 60s - early 70s
Recently I received an email from a reader/fan/ downright awesome person named Amy Bernstein-Feldman. She was inquiring about a product that she knew she remembered, but couldn't recall exactly what it was. It was a Cool Whip like Pudding from the 70's, but Amy couldn't figure out exactly what it was she was remembering.
So using my magical extinct grocery powers, I started to do some digging. And some more digging. And some more digging. I broke 3 shovels, threw out my back, and possibly uncovered an old indian burial ground, so there is a good chance I'm now cursed. But at last, I hit gold, and came across this product: Birdseye Cool 'n Creamy Pudding. It was a frozen pudding that came in a container very similar to what Cool Whip comes in today. You would thaw the pudding out, and it would be a rich, smooth consistency that was very different then other brand pudding that you could get in the store, and would last in the refrigerator for up to 2 weeks.
It came in 3 flavors, Chocolate, Vanilla, and Butterscotch.
So it turns out that Amy wasn't crazy after all. The product did exist.
Weird Commercials with attractive women laughing continuously - Check.
This product had it all. It had the sexually charged 70's, wrapped up with very era specific package design, wrapped up with a dirty sounding tagline, wrapped up with commercials that make you blush, wrapped up with beans, lettuce and cheese in what I like to call a "Holy Crap, This Product is Amazing" Burrito.
It came in 4 scents, or as my wife hates when I say it, flavors: Herbal , Floral, Citrus, and Unscented.
Besides the obvious, well, um......shape of the "package", the ads for this product cleverly referred to this as the antiperspirant "With the big, wide ball", to which all the girls start to laugh.
The commercials are a whole new level of bonkers, and they were actually voted the worst commercials of 1977. Check em out:
Sex sells, but who's buying? Well, a few years ago a new Tickle stick (now THAT sounds dirty...) sold on Ebay for over $100. Some guy found it when cleaning out his parents bathroom cupboard, and now that guy is rich! Ok, maybe not rich, but he sold a deodorant shaped like a you know what to somebody who wanted to check out it's big wide ball, and that my friends, is pretty f-ing rich.
From the "We thought this was a hoax, but it turns out it's real, but we still think it's not real until it hits shelves. Then We'll be like "Damn! It is real"" department.
Ladies and Gentlemen, friends and neighbors, strangers, strange friends and neighbors, I give you: DEWITOS!
Image by reddit user joe_nipples (Steve Barnes)
Yes, I heard the audible gasp too. So it turns out that we are going to be (possibly) getting a new Dew flavor soon that tastes like Doritos. Let me say that a little slower, you you can read and understand every word I just typed.
Doritos.
Flavored.
Mt. Dew.
They're testing it out now, and if it actually hits the store shelves, it may be the strangest combination of products to hit store shelves yet.
Which got me thinking.....what other crazy products could we create by combining 2 products that do not go together in any way shape or form (I know, I know......Dew and Doritoes share that "Video Game" and "Weed" bond....but besides that...)
Cool Whip Barbasol? (that's Cool Whip that tastes like Shaving Cream, not Whipped Topping you shave with)
Spaghetti-O's Sorbet?
If you have some ideas, post them below!
It's Fun! All the kids are doing it!
Sorry to break format on this one, but I'm certain that in a few months I'll be revisiting this one here at Gone but Not Forgotten Groceries.
Product: Flings
Company: Nabisco
Years: Late 1960's - 1980's (?)
Dear Nabisco,
Stop trying so hard. We get it already. You can turn anything, no matter what the flavor, into a delicious chip, snack, or cracker. Here at Gone But Not Forgotten Groceries, we stumble across something new (old/new) from you almost every day, and honestly, I've almost stopped keeping track. You are good at what you do, Nabisco, so why spread yourself so thin? Pick a core group of products and make those products the best damn products we have ever seen....and maybe, just maybe, you are already starting to do that. But in the 60s, 70s and 80s.......well, lets say you were snack aisle whores. You put it all out there year after year, every flavor.....every shape. "Don't like Curls? We have Sticks? Don't like Sticks, we have cones? Don't like cones? We have a goddamn chip shaped like a platypus. "Well that's random", you say? Goddamn right it is, because we're Nabisco, and we can make these chips/snacks and crackers into any M%#$@R F^&%ING shape we want? Got it......GOT IT???"
"Oh, and you can get that Platypus shaped cracker in 5 flavors, Cheese, Ranch, Papaya, Dandelion, and New Car Smell. "But New Car Smell isn't a Flavor" you say.....look, do you want me to lose my shit? Because Nabisco can lose it's shit REAL easy, and one day, when you wake up, all these shape and flavors will be gone.....and all you'll have left are Triscuits, Wheat Thins, and Chicken in a Biscuit. So don't push it, pal."
I'm almost certain Nabisco would say something like that if confronted. Maybe.
Box picture from Dan Goodsell
Flings were a chip that looked similar to today's Cheese puffs, and came in 3 flavors: Chicken, Cheese, and Ham and Swiss. These were mostly around in the late 60's/early 70's, but I did stumble upon a newspaper ad from 1984, where it appears Nabisco tried to bring back Flings, this time in a bag instead of a box.
Like the other hundreds (possibly millions, or possibly less) of Nabisco Products that have appeared on store shelves over the last 50 years, I'm going to guess that very few of you readers out there remember these. I don't. Which is pretty cool when you add it onto the vast sea of groceries that have filled up store shelves over the years...these could have been someones favorite snack to curl up with on a Saturday night. People have a weird nostalgia towards food, especially discontinued food (which is why I started this blog), so it's neat to find stuff like this that might bring someone a smile.
Product: Hubba Bubba Soda
Company: AJ Canfield Company - AKA "Novelty Beverage"
Years: 1988 - ?
If I was playing "100,000 Pyramid" in 1988, and was the one giving the clues, and the category just so happened to be "Things You Shouldn't Put into Your Mouth", you can bet that "Hubba Bubba Soda" would be the first thing I would say (after I had a good chuckle about all the OTHER, much dirtier things I could say, many of which wouldn't be suitable for daytime TV, most of them offensive enough to get Dick Clark to probably ban me from the show indefinitely, or at least until Ed Begley Jr. or Betty White were unavailable.)
Hubba Bubba Soda started to "pop" up (ha! see what I did there???) on shelves in 1988. It was the brain child of Steve Roeder, who concocted the flavor using bubble gum snow cone syrup. Initially released in the Chicago area, it became such a hit novelty drink that it started to have a much wider distribution, reaching most other parts of the US for a limited time. How limited? Good question. I'm not really sure if this soda lasted a year, or possibly 2, but it wasn't around for long. I remember seeing it, but never quite worked up the courage.
Because nobody wants to drink bubblegum. Fact.
Oh, and if it wasn't bad enough, it also came in Diet, because if you saw a Bubble gum flavored soda on the shelves and didn't want all the calories, you are a horrible person and should realize that Hubba Bubba bubblegum was made for children, and is made of 126% sugar. (wait, can something be over 100%? I'm 108% certain that it can...) If they made diet flavored bubble gum, would you buy it? No. No you would not. So why would you even THINK about buying a diet bubble gum flavored soda??? My god, man, take a look at your life, and try to put together the events that led you to standing here in this soda aisle, actually contemplating buying Diet Hubba Bubba Soda. Is this where you want to be in your life? Is it? IS IT?????
Cans of this soda still "pop up" (Boom! I did it again!!!) on Ebay from time to time, so if you've got about $30 or so tucked away for a rainy day and don't really feel like giving it to me, bid away and hopefully you can own one.
Novelty foods aren't meant to last forever, and Hubba Bubba Soda certainly was that. It was possibly created on a dare....I'm not sure. If I had a can right here in front of me, I'd try it, though I'd rather try a Diet one if you have it......I'm trying to lose some of this weight......
Come on, Nabisco....quit yelling. There is absolutely no need to use an exclamation point in the name of your early 70's cereal called "Sweet Wheats!". I mean, you even went as far as to not use all caps, instead choosing the subtle approach of using all lower case letters. But then, boom, you drop in that exclamation point all willy-nilly, and damn it Nabisco, it's unnecessary.
But then again, so was your cereal, Nabisco, as it only lasted 2 or 3 years tops.
I know what your all thinking: Kellogg's Mini Wheats.
Yep, I was thinking the same thing too. Mini Wheats were introduced in 1971, same time as Sweet Wheats!!!!!, but the original Kellogg's offering was actually the larger size. The bite size version wasn't around until 1980. So I won't go as far as to say Nabisco copied Kellogg's, or vice versa. They both had an idea for a lightly sweetened wheat cereal. Kellogg's won.
Probably because they DIDN'T YELL AT THEIR CUSTOMERS, NABISCO SWEET WHEATS!!!!!!!!!!!!
Nabisco did have a cool box design, with a quartet which included 3 children and a blue kangaroo, which from what I understand of the early 70's (mostly from watching Krofft), was completely normal. Willy, Milly, Big Boo and Blue Kangaroo. They would sit around all day, eating cereal, playing jams, playing with the Kanga-zoom that came free inside, and contemplating future career paths once the cereal was discontinued. 3 of them went on to form 80's pop group "Kajagoogoo", and one ended up in the San Diego Zoo, which if you ask me is a horrible place to keep a little girl locked up.
Product: Snik Snak
Company - M&M/Mars
Years - 1973 - Late 70's
Remember Christmas, back in the 80's, when you'd open presents from relatives who you only saw a few times a year? What did they get you? Chances are, like most of us, they bought what they thought boys my age liked: He-Man, GI Joes, Transformers........but there was a catch. They were going to spend as little on your gift as possible. So instead of Transformers, you got the cheap knockoff called "Convertors" (it's a real thing...look it up). Or "Action Force" instead of GI Joe.
And you smiled, and thanked them, as you were taught to do. Then, a week later, they were blown up by firecrackers in a battle with the REAL GI Joe/Transformers/He-Man.
Knock offs. Nobody likes them.
But enough about my disappointing holidays. Lets talk about food knockoffs. Specifically, Lets talk about the Snik Snak.
Snik Snak was created in 1973 by M&M/Mars to go up against Hershey's wildly successful Kit Kat bar. And by "created", I mean directly ripped off from.
Seriously, it's the same thing. A series of waffers covered in chocolate.......even the freaking name is a rip off! I honestly have no idea how Hershey didn't file a lawsuit against them.
I'm equally surprised that it lasted for at least 5 years on the market.
There is nothing original about this.
Oh, sure, it's 6 smaller sticks instead of 4 larger ones. Whoop-de-do.
These were a little before my time, so thankfully I didn't have to suffer through the crushing disappointment of getting one of these from a parent for a snack, or worse yet, on Halloween in my basket.
I guess there's a reason Kit Kats are still around today and Snik Snaks aren't.
It's probably the same reason I don't really talk to my uncle Sal anymore, either. I'm sure he had a good reason for getting me the "Treasures of the Temple Warriors" action figures instead of the He-Man toy I wanted back in 86.
So, yeah.....I came across this gem in a bin at Walmart.
I picture eating these and constantly pulling beard hairs out of my mouth.
Hurry up, boys, your 5 minutes is just about up! Crab that cash!
Product: Space Dust/Cosmic Candy
Company: General Foods
Years - Late 70's-early 80's
Image by Greg Koenig
Ground control to major Tom.....
Ground Control to Major Tom.......
Take your protein pills and put your helmet on.....
Here's a fun one. In the late 1976, General Foods really took the novelty candy world by storm with it's new candy, Pop Rocks. It was a hit, so a few years later, they released a new candy (which was similar) called Space Dust. It was basically Pop Rocks, just crushed up into a fine powder.
It was instantly a huge success, but it didn't take long for train to go off the rails.
First, Parents complained that the name "Space Dust", along with the appearance of the candy, was too similar to illegal drugs such as Angel Dust. Accusations were even made that the candy, because of its similarity to powdered drugs, would lead kids into real drug use.
As a result, the name was changed from Space Dust" to "Cosmic Candy".
That problem seemed to be solved, but more trouble was brewing. A rumor started going around that the candy was unsafe, and that a kid died while consuming the candy while drinking a soda. (I heard it was Mikey from the Life Cereal commercials). These rumors once again got parents in an uproar over the candy (just chill, parents). It got so bad that Bill Mitchell, chemist and creator of Pop Rocks and Cosmic Candy actually took out a full page newspaper ad in the Feb. 6th edition of the Pittsburgh Press in 1979, explaining that the entire thing was not true. He explains how he started making the candy back in the 1950's for his kids, and how it was perfectly save despite all the rumors about it.
The candy remained wildly popular for a few years. Stores struggled to keep it in stock.
But in a year or too, it seemed everyone lost interest in it. Store who had stockpiled the candy suddenly found themselves stuck with boxes of it they couldn't sell (I wonder if this is why unopened cases of it seem to show up for sale from time to time...)
Image from Traci*s Retro via Flickr
I love the packaging for this candy. It is so.....70's drug culture-y in it's style. It makes me want to put on some Bowie, pop in a movie like Nelvana's "Cosmic Christmas" or "The Devil and Daniel Mouse", and just space out. Maybe pop open a few packets of this......and wash it down with a Coke.....and wait.......to see........what magical places it takes me.......
For here
Am I sitting in a tin can
Far above the world........
Planet Earth is blue
And there's nothing I can do.
So normally I would just end it there, but there is one other interesting, if you can call it that, article I found while looking into this stuff. It comes from the May 22nd, 1978 edition of the Vilage Voice Newspaper. I thought it was a rather strange article to be in a newspaper, but then I noticed the ad directly to it's right, and I was like "Oh...it's THAT kind of newspaper....)
It involves Space Dust Candy and, well, a sex act......
This is from an actual newspaper. I am not making this up.
The article in question in on the left, entitled "Lip-Smacker" - the other Ad is to the right....
"How'd you like a poke in the mouth?" I thought to myself upon seeing
these packages for the first time, thinking I was being clever and a
bit dirty.
But then I did a little bit of research, and I found that Kellogg's did indeed use that tagline.
"A Poke in the mouth makes a hit in the tummy", to be exact. Great (dirty) minds think alike, I guess.
Image/Boxes by Grickily
So this is what I know about Pokes:
1. They came in 4 flavors. Corn, Cheese and Bar-B-Q were the original 3 flavors, and Potato Pokes were added sometime shortly after.
2. These were "Tasty little Snack Baskets", which look like they just took some Chex and opened up one end....a clever snack shape I don't think I've seen before (Bugle's are pretty similar in execution)
3. The boxes are AMAZING. I mean...LOOK at them. The Potato Pokes have an Irish Potato creature on the front! The Corn Pokes have a crazy looking Indian corn creature on it! The Cheese Pokes have a smiling hunk of (alpine?) Cheese on it! The Bar-B-Q Pokes have a ........cowboy looking......what is that.....a hunk of coal? Ok, that one I'm not sure about. But the boxes reek of the late 60's, and I would love to have a set for my collection.
4. The Reason I don't have them in my collection is because they are Rare, and Expensive if you do find them. A Corn Pokes box sold on Hakes Auctions last year for $600. My wife would kick me out of the house if I spend $600 on ANY box (unless there was a diamond ring inside of it, for her).
5. I'm not sure if these were sold in the US and in Canada or only in Canada. The only advertising I could find for them was in the Montreal Gazette, and it says on the Coupon "Kellogg's Company of Canada, 1968". I know there are Kellogg's cereals that you can only get in Canada, so maybe this was along the same lines? I never had there while they were in stores, so maybe someone can confirm for me.
I couldn't find a lot of info on these, like many of the slightly less popular brands of the 60's-70's. But an important addition to the shelves of Gone But Not Forgotten Groceries none the less.
Leave a comment if you remember these awesome yet slightly creepy looking snacks!
Just a quick post today to point out the fact that Kool-Aid has brough back to the store shelves (for a limited time) some of the greatest previously discontinued flavors of all time. A few months ago I had a post about how I found Sharkleberry Fin on the shelf at my local grocery store and since then I was hoping they would bring back more.
Well, I'm here to let everyone know that they must have been reading my mind (or Kool-Aid is working with the NSA), because in stores now you can get Purplesaurus Rex, Rock-A-Dile Red, Great Bluedini, and Pink Swimmingo! So go! Go Now, before they are gone for another 20+ years!
(Thanks to the Impulse Buy for pointing these out! - www.Theimpulsebuy.com)
Product - 7up Gold
Company - 7up/Dr. Pepper
Years - 1987-1988
When I think of boring soda, I think of 7up. Now, that isn't an indictment on its taste....it does have a clean, refreshing taste that every now and again hits the spot. But lets face it, it's what your grandparents have in their fridge. It's what you give the kids when you don't want them to have caffeine. It's a good, safe, soda. Which is the reason 7up Gold was an utter and gigantic failure. It was reaching for a target demographic that wasn't even there (hip, cool people who enjoy 7up). It tried to have edge when none was needed.
What happened is that in 1987, 7up and Dr. Pepper merged into on company. Cherry 7up had just hit the market and was doing really well, so they wanted to follow that success up with another variety of 7up. But there were several reasons why that wasn't such a good idea and would lead to the soda's demise.
Flavor: Sort of an apple Cinnamon flavor, not at all what you'd expect from 7up (I'm sure the cinnamon flavor came from someone on the Dr. Pepper side...great idea, boys. If you have any more ideas, please keep them to yourself)
Color: It was a brown color. Again, not at all what you'd expect when cracking open a can of 7up (ok, when your grandparents were cracking open a can of 7up for you when you were 8)
Caffeine: Yep, it had it. Once again, to beat a dead horse (probably died drinking this swill) people who drink 7up don't expect to get any caffeine. That's why my grandparents drank it.They wanted to be able to sleep at night (or afternoon, or mid-morning.....)
Marketing: I would love to tell you that they test marketed the shit out of this stuff, and that all signs pointed to it being a smash hit, which makes it even stranger that the stuff never took off. But I can't tell you that, because it was basically rushed into production with very little testing. The company didn't want to miss the boat on the success of Cherry 7up, so they rolled it out way too quickly.
Name: Had they given this soda it's own identity, it might not have failed so hard. I'm talking a completely new brand. Instead, they kept it part of the 7up family, and instead of calling it Apple Cinnamon 7up or what-have-you, they called it GOLD. Now I don't know about you, but I don't usually drink gold, so I don't have a reference point for it's taste (actually, gold is completely tasteless and odorless, so there's that too....). So calling it Gold left the taste of the soda a mystery for consumers. And like most people, if you don't know what your buying, you don't.
The Curse: The original prototypes for the cans were made with real gold leafing, and rumor has it that gold came from the lost tombs of King Tut. Because of this, every can created on the production line was cursed, and anyone who drank it turned into a brain hungry zombie. Remember that song Zombie by the Cranberries? That was a great song.
"In your head, in your head, Zombie, zombie, zombie,
Hey, hey, hey, hey, oh, dou, dou, dou, dou, dou..."
Ok, I made that last one up, there was no curse. But there may as well have been, everything else was against them on this idea. (Note: 7up DID in fact release a Cranberry 7up, which was successful, so everything came full circle there and worked out for you, the reader).
Anyway, to sum up, 7up Gold failed hard. Even the CEO of the company admitted it.
In an article in the New York Times (1988), CEO John Albers stated, ''I'll be honest. It's a failure. I've been around for a long
time, and you think you learn your lessons and practice intelligent
marketing, but you can be sidetracked.''
And lets be honest with ourselves.....nobody really misses it.
If you'd like to refute that claim, feel free to post in the comments below.
Check out this awesome 7up Gold commercial, featuring one Kyle Gass of the famed Tenacious D -
At some point in our lives we all need to make hard decisions. Go to college or travel the world. Buy a SUV or buy a minivan. Eat that meatball you found under the couch or not eat that meatball you found under the couch. We make them every day. But the good people at Frito Lay (and I am not saying that to get free samples, Frito Lay......though you do have beautiful eyes. You know that, right? (That is for the free samples)) took it upon themselves back in 1995 to say "Why Choose, bitches? You want Doritos, but at the same time, you also want some delicious cheesy Cheetos. You are high as a goddamn kite, and we're not one to judge you, so lets take the choice out of the equation....and make......CHEETO FLAVORED DORITOS! BOOM!"
Well, as great of an idea as it was, I have to say I certainly don't remember them. And I was in college at that time, so I was, well, lets just say I was their target demographic. (There's a time and a place for everything kids, and that time and place is called College). After scouring the interwebs trying to find a picture of the package, all I could find is this article about them testing this product. Most everyone who tried them loved them, though some said they were too cheesy. And then there is Bill (the single guy). His objection to this product? "Just who is this Chester Cheese guy? Is he really that famous? Why couldn't they just call these cheese flavored Doritos? And what does a cheetah have to do with cheese or tortilla chips?
Well Bill, the reason you are still single is because you ask too many questions.
And Chester Cheese Doritos, the reason you are still not available in stores is because people like to make hard decisions. You either want a Coke or you want a 7up, you don't want a Coke flavored 7up.
And the same goes with your chips.
Oh, and because they are (according to the taste test) way too cheesy, but in a good way?
I kind of wish these were still around, if for no other reason to see what other kinds of mutated Island of Doctor Moreau style chip inventions they would come up with.
Funyun flavored Fritos?
Dorito flavored Pretzels?
The world will never know.
I was never a big oatmeal eater growing up, which is probably why I missed this interesting product from the early 90's: Undercover Bears Oatmeal.
General Mills took the wholesome goodness of oatmeal and the teeth sticking stickiness of gummi bears, combined them, came up with a loveable animal character to be the pitchman, put them in stores, failed to connect on a large scale with kids, lowered prices not once, but 3 times, remained unsuccessful, fired the marketing execs that came up with the idea in the first place, then pulled Undercover Bears from the store shelves, and wept.
I never heard of them until someone posted about them over at Cerealbits.com (check out the site for your fill of retro cereal box goodness!). So I did a little digging, and still didn't come up with much. I was hoping to find a scan of the box, but only found commercial stills and pictures from newpaper ads instead.
Basically, they were gummy bears that were coated in some sort of maple/brown sugar coating and hidden in the oatmeal, so when you the hot water, they bears would magically appear in your bowl!
AMAZING!!!!!!*
*actually only amazing to people who are easily amazed, such as kids, and some dumb adults.
These quite possibly were only around for a year, maybe two, from the little info I could find. So if you remember them, hats off to you my oatmeal loving friends.
Researching these lead me to a lot of gimicky oatmeals from the 80's and 90's I had forgotten about, so I jotted them all down and will be sure to cover more of them here in the future.
Product: Buenos Tortilla Chips
Company: Nabisco
Years: 1981-1983
Wow, I actually remember these. Which is weird, because they didn't last very long. I don't remember the taste, I just remember the package.
Made from real stoneground corn, these chips came in 2 shapes, round and triangle. Seriously, it was the same freaking chips, just in 2 different shapes. So all the equipment that was used to make and package these chips had to be doubled, one set for the rounds, and one set for the triangles. Which is probably why they were discontinued. It was expensive to produce the same basic product in 2 shapes.
I'm guessing old people bought the round chips because they were safer....no sharp edges, very friendly looking. Almost like a smiley face, minus the face. The triangles were what the kids ate....3 sharp points, almost like a knife, not so safe for those kids who loved to live on the wild side and roll the dice while eating their chips. Will I stab my mouth or not? Who cares, I'm young! *Crunch*
If you hurry you can rush out and get yourself a bag with the attached coupon, assuming you have a time machine. Expires 9-30-83.
They came in traditional and Nacho cheese flavors only. Back in simpler times, when 2 or 3 flavors were perfectly ok. Not like now when to be a successful chip company you need to have at least 87 flavors.
Imagine the sugary, artificial flavors of Peeps Marshmallows.......only in ICE FORM!
Yuck.
I just threw up in my mouth a little bit.
I'm not even sure what to classify these as.... Frozen Foods? Snacks? Horrible Ideas? Just Born's idea of a joke? Genius?
Whatever you call them, go get some of these if you can find them. I can't imagine they'll be around for long.
4 flavors, 10 pops per box. And they retail for under $2.00 a box.
I'm sure one day you'll go to buy some, and poof, they'll be gone.
Without a peep.
Yeah, I know......that one hurt me too, but it was for your own good.
Product: Go Ahead
Company: Nestle
Years: 1977-198?
Here's another candy bar from the list (I'm pretty sure there's a list, you guys) of candy bars that that couldn't quite get a foothold into the grand lexicon of the candy industry. For every Snickers and Three Musketeers, there are hundreds, even thousands, or maybe six candy bars that came and went, like a wonderful chocolate fantasy passing in the night. So today we take a quick look at Nestle's Go Ahead Bar.
The Go Ahead Bar was a made of Chocolate, crunchy crisps (think Rice Krispies) and Peanut Butter.
But it wasn't just fattening delicious candy, it was "Fortified with 19 Essential Vitamins and Minerals". That's why I'd eat 4 in one sitting, so I could get 76 Essential Vitamins and minerals (I know, I'd really only be getting 4x of each of those vitamins and minerals, not really 76 different ones, but you just shut up about it already, Steve.)
Image By Jason Liebig
These bars don't seem to have been around for very long, 4 or 5 years tops. Part of the reason was that they were a little more expensive (possibly due to falling into the "nutrition bar" category), so people would often opt for the cheaper bars. And because of all you cheapskates, this bar was sadly pulled from the shelves. They rounded up the bars and put them in boxes, then took them out back and stabbed them. That or they just marked them down and put them on the clearance rack. Not sure.
So that's it for today. I wish I knew more about these bars, and one day I may march over to Nestle headquarters and demand to speak with the person responsible for discontinuing the Go Ahead Bar. I'll handcuff myself to the sofa in the lobby, and chant "BRING BACK GO AHEAD" (which actually doesn't make ANY sense out of context). I'll sit there, for days if needed, until I get some answers for all you Gone but Not Forgotten Grocery Fans.
And then after security escorts me from the building, I'll probably just go to the gas station and get a Snickers.
After all, they are cheaper.
Mini post today to let you know what I found at the grocery store the other day. I found this:
Yep, it's back. After disappearing from shelves back in the 90's, Kool-Aid has brought back one of it's classics. For how long? Who knows. That's why I bought a couple (and picked up the display holder too...).
So the real question now is will we see re-releases of the other flavors in the set? Rock-A-Dile Red,Purlesaurus Rex, Great Bluedini, Pink Swimmingoand Incrediberry? We can only hope, wait, and see I guess. In the meantime, I'll make some phone calls, shot off some emails, and see what I can find out. More to come (I hope).
Product: Krazy Glazy
Company: Nabisco
Years: Early 70's
Once upon a time, Pop Tarts weren't the only breakfast toaster pastry on the market. You had a choice to make while strolling the cereal aisle. One such item that I'd like to highlight today was a little remembered pastry called Krazy Glazy (with a K, because it's gangsta.)
Total disclosure: I hadn't heard of these before either until about a week ago when I stumbled upon this ad in the Spokane Daily Chronicle from November 28, 1973.
Krazy Glazy came in 4 flavors, Apple, Cherry, Strawberry, and Blueberry. The rest, as it turns out, is a mystery. I contact Nabisco/Mondelez and got nowhere. Nobody had any information or even remembered these (as it usually goes with large companies that have a vast history of products and have changed ownership at some point). How can these companies have no library of products? Or do they, and they just don't like to share that information. If they don't, it's kind of sad, actually.
The thing that struck me most about this product is the box. As a collector of vintage packages, I tend to gravitate towards silly characters and colorful boxes that have a distinct feel of the era they were created. And this box certainly hits all those marks. I've never seen an actual box, but if anyone out there has one to share, let me know. I'd love to see it! It has a Crazy (sorry, Krazy) looking Pastry dude on the front...with a massive head wound! I mean, why is he smiling?! He's seconds from death!
Other then the above, I couldn't find any information about this product, so I'm guessing it must have been a flop that wasn't around very long. The only information I could find was a few stills from a Krazy Glazy commercial that was never aired. You can read that interesting little story about that experience here.
And that's it. I would love to get more info on this product. I would REALLY love to get one of these boxes for my collection, or a scan of a box even so I can reproduce it. Surely someone out there must have one. Or has this product already been forgotten? I hope not. So I'm going to do my part to stop that from happening by adding it to the shelves here at Gone But Not Forgotten Groceries.
Product: Richard Simmons Salad Spray
Company: Chelton House Products
Year: 1989-1990
Say what you will about Richard Simmons.
No seriously, go ahead, I'll wait.
Exercise Guru and punchline Richard Simmons was WAY ahead of his time when he created a line of salad dressings in 1989 called Salad Spray. The idea was that you don't need to drown your lettuce in salad dressing. Instead, this bottle would spray your salad, sort of like Windex..... each squirt would release one calories worth of dressing, so you know how many calories you're getting. Interesting concept. Only problem is, it was way before it's time (you can find these products on shelves these days by other large name companies....it just took people 15+ years to catch on and accept them.)
It was the late 80's, and people loved their salad dressings. Or people just were a bit weirded out by Richard Simmons and didn't want to be made fun of by strangers/friends/family/strange friends and family.
It came in several different flavors: French, Italian, Roma Cheese, Dijon Vinagrette, and Oriental (whatever that flavor is).
I couldn't find a whole lot about this product, and actually I had forgotten about it until I was reminded by reader Darryl Heine. So I dug into the internet a bit and still couldn't find much.
So I'd be surprised if anyone really remembers using this stuff at all....spraying your salads....or your annoying sister.
So go ahead.......laugh at Richard Simmons all you want.
For the record, there is absolutely nothing wrong with regular ol' white milk. It's good, and good for you, but there are a bunch of companies out there that just want to spice up your milk drinking experience. Some are still around (such as Nestle Quik and Hershey's syrup), and some are but a memory (Milk MateandPinch N' Sip), so I was surprised when an internet friend of mine was selling something I didn't know anything about: PDQ.
Photo by Grickly
PDQ was created by Ovaltine in the mid to late 60s. It wasn't a powder like many of the other similar products, but instead was more of a small pebble/chip of the flavoring that would dissolve in milk. It came in Chocolate, Strawberry, and the seasonal Egg Nog. I wish that last line was a typo, but it wasn't. They actually made Egg Nog Milk flavoring.
Part of the appeal of this product is that you could also use it as a topping on ice cream ("Who want's some Egg Nog Flavored Ice Cream!!!" said the worst parents ever.)
Something else you might remember of these bottles was that they would often have a collectable label or lid, such as Endangered Species/Cars/and Marvel Superheros in the early 80s.
Like many of the items I blog about, I'm surprised this one somehow made it past my kid "unhealthy food" radar. Nestle Quik was always in my house growing up, so I'm guessing it was just never brought to my attention. It sort of looks like a jar of coffee grounds to me. Maybe that's why I didn't care.
Plus, as a side note, I'm surprised they used the abbreviation P.D.Q., since that stands for "Pretty Damn Quick". I guess you could argue that it stands for "Pretty Darn Quick", but you would be wrong. And I guess it's better then the first name they pitched, "PMFGDQ".
