Campbell’s Pepper Pot Soup
Campbell’s Pepper Pot Soup had been around since 1899 when it made its way from Philadelphia kitchens into cans, containing potatoes, onions, carrots, jalapeños, red pepper flakes, and beef tripe, but after over a century on the shelves, Campbell’s quietly axed it in 2010 because apparently palates became more sophisticated. This wasn’t your typical chicken noodle situation – we’re talking about soup with actual organ meat floating around.
As the Encyclopedia of Greater Philadelphia reported, it accomplished an incredible feat for a simple canned soup by staying in the market for over a century, debuting from 1899 until 2010, and considering the longevity, its taste couldn’t have been all that bad. A soup that survived two world wars and the Great Depression clearly had something going for it.
Hunt’s Pudding Snack Packs in Metal Cans
When the product first came about in 1968, this shelf-friendly milk pudding was served out of a can, coming in a variety of flavors and was all the rage due to its convenience and tastiness. Before those familiar plastic cups took over lunchboxes, pudding came in actual metal cans that you had to open with a can opener. Before Snack Packs came in plastic cups, lunchbox pudding cups were served in cans in the 1970s.
Those who know them will also remember these quick desserts for the dangerous metal lids that had to be discontinued due to safety concerns, and after the allure of this can changed forever, Hunt’s Snack Packs have become more of a symbol of childhood than a highly sought-after dessert. Imagine explaining to kids today that their pudding once came with sharp metal edges.
Old El Paso Canned Tortillas
In the 1970s, Old El Paso sold corn tortillas in a can, with each can including about 18 tortillas that you could fry in oil after popping the can open, though some who remember eating the canned tortillas say they were terrible while others say they were pretty flavorful. Old El Paso canned tortillas worked to bring everything from enchiladas to tacos to life without the need for homemade tortillas, and according to history buffs in Texas, these canned tortillas appeared in cookbooks from the 1960s, but plenty of people remember enjoying them well into the late 1970s as well.
Throughout the 1970s and 1980s, Tex-Mex cuisine began growing in popularity with American home cooks nationwide, and before the supply chain could catch up to popular demand, these canned tortillas were often a must-have when traveling to areas of the country far from Texas and Mexico where access to fresh tortillas was out of the question, though you can now simply go to any grocery store and pick up a plastic bag of tortillas.
Nuteena Vegetarian Meat Alternative
In the 1970s and 1980s, there was increased awareness around healthy eating and vegetarianism, with brands like Loma Linda helping to lead the charge, and Loma Linda’s canned meat alternatives, including Nuteena, a veggie loaf made from peanuts, graced many kitchen cupboards. According to Take Out, vegetarianism only gained widespread popularity as a lifestyle choice in the 1970s, and one of the earliest meat substitutes available was Nuteena, developed by Loma Linda, a company affiliated with the Seventh-day Adventists, with this canned protein alternative primarily crafted from peanut paste, soy, corn, and rice.
Long before Beyond Meat and Impossible burgers dominated headlines, vegetarians were opening cans of this peanut-based protein substitute. It might sound unappetizing by today’s standards, but it was revolutionary for its time. Today, Loma Linda Foods still sells an array of canned goods, from nut meats and Vege-burgers to a plant-based seafood alternative called Tuno.
Canned Brown Bread from B&M
B&M, the brand behind the popular bread, was created in 1867 and canned a variety of meats, seafood, and corn, though it’s unclear when bread was added to the lineup, and if you’ve never had bread from a can, you might wonder how it’s consumed – you don’t reach for a spoon after opening your can, instead you need to open both the top and bottom of the can, then gently shake the can until the soft loaf slides out, ready to be sliced and good on its own or topped with butter, jam, or cream cheese.
The bread was particularly popular in New England in the past and remained popular until just a few decades ago, though it did see a brief resurgence via social media in 2020, and some who lived with it in the 1960s and 1970s remember the canned bread fondly as a part of family dinners, while others shudder at the memory. While canned brown bread is still available in New England, it’s certainly lost some of its popularity and has never been widely available outside of the region.
Libby’s Fruit Float
Libby’s fruit float hit the scene in the mid-1970s amid colorful advertisements and convenience foods, and all you had to do to enjoy a Libby’s fruit float was add milk and stir. The can had actual pieces of fruit, which added both flavor and texture, resulting in a frothy milkshake-like dessert that was reminiscent of a pudding, and there were four servings in each can, making this a great option to serve to guests when you wanted to impress with your futuristic cooking techniques.
This was the space-age answer to dessert preparation – just dump, stir, and serve. Nowadays, we turn to DoorDash or UberEats when we want a quick sweet treat, but in its heyday, fruit float was pretty “far out,” with different recipes ranging from a 30-second stir and serve version to a 10-minute cake, some requiring extra time to chill for the best results, but minimal actual cooking or preparation.
Chef Boyardee Pac-Man Pasta
This was a marketing tie-in with the popular 80s video game, featuring vaguely Pac Man and ghost-shaped pasta in something called “golden chicken sauce” or tomato sauce with or without meatballs. This unique product came in three flavors: golden chicken sauce, spaghetti sauce with mini meatballs, and cheese, but the Pac-Man pasta was often criticized as an underwhelming meal – a sentiment supported by its discontinuation just a year later.
While it is probably fair to say that neither of these two pasta products could compete with a real Italian nonna, they both brought some truly unique vintage cans into the world, and regardless of which flavored pasta you selected, the can would come with a vibrant illustration featuring Shredder cutting his way out of the aluminum and the four main characters drawn with their swords in hand, ready to head to battle – like the food or not, these old cans added quite a bit of color to the dinner table.
Armour Treet Canned Meat
You can still buy Armour Treet today, but since it’s been wildly eclipsed by Spam in popularity and the public consciousness (Spam has become a part of the lexicon, but who knows Treet?), you may have trouble finding it. Today, Armour Treet is made with chicken, pork, and smoke flavoring, though the classic rectangular can promises it still offers a “traditional baked ham taste,” and according to a Reddit review comparing Treet with Spam Lite and Walmart’s house brand canned meat, Treet is less expensive than Spam, has more calories, fat, and sodium, and the flavor is salty and slightly metallic.
Treet was basically the knockoff version of Spam, but it had its loyal following. It’s still technically available, but good luck finding it in most grocery stores. The brand got completely overshadowed by Spam’s marketing dominance and cultural staying power.
Neo-Life Stroganoff-Style Casserole
While not difficult to pull together, some decades ago, someone decided to make compiling this dish even easier by putting it in a can, and one brand to do so was Neo-Life with its 1970s Stroganoff-Style Casserole, though today, the closest you’ll get to this is likely Hormel’s heat-and-eat stroganoff, but it comes in a plastic, microwave-safe dish and not a can.
Neo-Life Nest’s dehydrated food brand used its “nitro-gard” protection to preserve its meals as long as possible, shooting nitrogen into each can to prevent the food inside from deteriorating over time, and this technology was applied to Neo-Life Nest’s dehydrated stroganoff-style casserole, meaning that the food could be consumed for decades after it was packaged, making stroganoff-style casserole a favorite among survivalists, with Neo-Life selling this product in bulk to folks across the United States in the 1970s, sometimes even in quantities large enough that they were said to last a full year for one adult.
Dinty Moore Meatball Stew
Since its premiere in 1935, the meatball stew and many of the companies’ canned foods have had great success, and reviews on Amazon show the Dinty Moore meatball stew was quite popular, made of beef meatballs, tomatoes, potatoes, carrots, and peas in a beef gravy, but they fell out of favor and were finally discontinued in 2016, mostly attributed to the size of the meatballs getting flatter and smaller as the company tried to cut production costs, but it ended up being detrimental to the brand’s success.
Dinty Moore is the king of canned stew, but in 2016, they made some enemies when they quietly gave the boot to one of their most beloved flavors: Meatball Stew, which had been on shelves since 1935 as a variation of the classic beef stew but with big, soft meatballs instead of cubed beef. When you start shrinking the meatballs in your meatball stew, you’ve basically defeated the entire purpose of the product.
