Have you ever had one of those moments where you're like lifting the flaps of a box of raisins and you realize that the entire cardboard box construction from concept to manufacturing is a product of the massive wave of commercializing and mass production of packaged food products aimed at post-ww2 housewives trying to single-handedly maintain middle to upperclass living standards without the historically necessary assistance of hired help?
@InspectorCaracal No, although sometimes when opening a can of soup I think about the marketing around convincing people that they needed convenience foods and how it’s become part of our traditions.
@InspectorCaracal @aldersprig To not need convenience foods, you need a convenience job. I would love to have the energy to make bread once a week.
@DialMforMara @aldersprig that is not what a convenience food means
@aldersprig @InspectorCaracal okay, what’s the difference between convenient food and a convenience food?
@DialMforMara @aldersprig check your notifications from before you sent that. 😉
@aldersprig @InspectorCaracal I replied to the post you’re referring to before you said this
@DialMforMara @aldersprig Bakers and bakeries that make your bread for you are a long-standing element of settled society. We're talking about things like pre-made meals, not basic foodstuffs.
@aldersprig @InspectorCaracal I repeat the first half of my statement.
@DialMforMara @aldersprig If you aren't actually interested in the actual conversation that we are actually having besides telling us that you think our opinions are meaningless, then maybe you shouldn't get involved in it.
@aldersprig @InspectorCaracal I’m confused now. Also hungry and depressed.
@DialMforMara @aldersprig Chiming in with "no, I DO need convenience foods" when you apparently don't know what convenience foods are is not an especially valuable contribution to the conversation.
Additionally, I am sorry you are depressed, but don't see how that is relevant.
@aldersprig @InspectorCaracal I’m trying to figure out why you’re getting snippy at me, because I don’t think I said anything particularly irrelevant. I thought this was a “let’s complain about capitalism” and was joining in.
@DialMforMara @aldersprig No, it was a discussion about the history of prepackaged foods. I'm not that indirect of a person.
@aldersprig @InspectorCaracal You led with “have you ever been opening a food when suddenly you think about the recent history of capitalism.” I hope you can understand my confusion.
@DialMforMara @aldersprig Not really...? I mean. I didn't say capitalism anywhere and was talking about commercializing mass-market food products.
@aldersprig @InspectorCaracal I saw “I just realized how and why I’m being marketed to,” which, at least on Mastodon, generally indexes a specific rhetorical strategy. Lyn’s response, which was also about food marketing, reinforced that this was the direction the conversation was going in.
@InspectorCaracal @aldersprig You don’t have to say the word “capitalism” to indicate that you’re talking about capitalism.
@DialMforMara @aldersprig To quote myself: I'm not that indirect of a person.
@DialMforMara Just for a future reference point, I’m not a “let’s complain about capitalism” person, so generally it’s more like “this is a fascinating study of humanity” if I’m doing it.
@DialMforMara @InspectorCaracal I… bake bread every week?
@InspectorCaracal @aldersprig HOW do you have the energy?? Teach me your secrets!
@DialMforMara @InspectorCaracal Bread’s pretty simple. It’s mostly made up of strategic waiting, after all.
🍞
@aldersprig I had a very confused moment before being like "oh, right, there are such thing as American traditions"
@aldersprig I've been thinking about this and the only ones I can think of are cranberry sauce and the uses of Campbell's cream of mushroom soup. >.> Help me out?
@aldersprig @InspectorCaracal mac and cheese? Jell-o?
@DialMforMara @aldersprig I don't think those count as traditions... 🤔 (I'm assuming you mean, like, Kraft mac & cheese, I make my own)
@aldersprig @InspectorCaracal Mac and cheese is an American institution. There was a song on Barney about it. My mom made it for lunch every Sunday when I was in elementary school. Jell-o has its own genre of cookbook.
@DialMforMara I was thinking more “We have green bean casserole with onion crunchies every Thanksgiving dinner, with the cranberry sauce from the can.”
(I was an adult before I knew that anyone ATE the cranberry sauce)
@aldersprig My bubbe used canned cranberry sauce for Thanksgiving. I would make sandwiches of it on buttered dinner rolls.
My aunt took over about five years ago and started making her own cranberry sauce. It took me a while to get used to it.
@DialMforMara Yeah, T. likes the stuff and eats it out of the can, but it took me a while to get used to it, you know, not being a table decoration.
@InspectorCaracal Cream of mushroom soup was the one that was coming to mine, the green bean casserole in particular.
@aldersprig Ahhh yes.
Did you know, I had never had that until I had Thanksgiving at what would be my in-laws one year?
@InspectorCaracal I think it was something similar for me. My family does green beans, but not in a can of soup. Toodle Noodle Casserole, OTOH, was like all the time.
@aldersprig My mom was a post-hippie with a penchant for French cooking and an intense dislike of all "standard" American foods because her mother was absolutely terrible at them, so that might explain some of my childhood culinary experiences. xD
@InspectorCaracal Mine was a … post-hippy vegetarian. Who learned to cook from a caterer/aunt and who disliked “processed” foods and made most of her own stuff.
Otoh, my dad fed me pot pies and frozen fish sticks.
@aldersprig I think I've talked to you before about the tuna casserole we do, but I don't think I've ever mentioned that it has its origins in "mixing a can of tuna into a prepared box of Kraft mac'n'cheese and sticking it in the oven" xD
@InspectorCaracal Oh really!
Kraft M&C is not something I had until college.
Where it was usually the Walmart version because it was cheaper.
@aldersprig Oh, I didn't have it as a *kid*. xD It was one of J's standard Bachelor Dinners for Friday nights, because fish. The other standard was ordering a green peppers and mushrooms pizza from Papa John's.
@InspectorCaracal Ooooh. That makes sense.
That’s pierogies and baked beans from a can, for us.
@aldersprig pierogies 😍 I gotta learn how to make those. Or find where to buy them.
@InspectorCaracal Around here, BJ’s sells a nice brand of kosher pierogies.
@InspectorCaracal i mean, who hasn't?
@InspectorCaracal yes, vaguely. When you acquire enough boxed baking supplies it starts to feel very 1950s. Something in the design and schema.
I haven't baked bread in years and years. The wife doesn't like bread and the baby isn't interested yet.
@pnathan I wonder if it's because they're so pre-Age-Of-Plastics or something? 🤔
No, but that's really interesting. I would have never imagined that WW2 indirectly led to the consuming society abandoning the knowledge about how to judge the quality of food and products... and introduced the concept of trusting brands rather than our knowledge and judgement.
Which I guess later led to convenience products even being a possible idea/marketing strategy.
o_o
O_O
...
jesus fuck
I can't look at the boxes of raisins on my pantry shelves without feeling weird now
DAMMIT
I like raisins -_-
(and they make sour ones now with like infused lemon juice I guess? something)
@InspectorCaracal yes! The idea merged interestingly with explorations of the evolution modern grocery store as a self-service venue. It also seems to interact with the rise of ubiquitous advertising norms, as well as shipping networks leading to large scale farming of exotic fruit (like bananas).
I'm currently looking into the impact of school systems and how children were fed.
A similar, if earlier, phenomena is the shift away from wet-nurses and the rise of formula feeding.
@InspectorCaracal I finally realised why this toot felt weird to me. Raisins are sold in plastic bags here. (Which is just a tangent, because the same would hold for the cardboard box that cereals or cake mix are sold in and I thinkk I'm rambling now but I wanted to share that tidbit at the start of the toot anyway)
@Anke They're sold in a few different kinds of packagings here, but the cheap/generic brands or single serving packages are boxes. I think the major brands have all switched to resealable plastic bags, based on the shelves at the store.
@InspectorCaracal No, but sometimes I think "why did I get raisins?"
@InspectorCaracal ...no?