Chinese in a can?

Pappy

Pappy

Living the Dream
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Moved back to NY from Florida. 🤓 2025
When I worked in a grocery store, in the 50s, we use to sell quite a lot of this stuff. I think we tried it once, but the only good thing was the noodles. I don’t see it on the shelf’s anymore. Probably a good thing....

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I was never a fan but I remember it coming in a kit with a can of noodles and a can of chow mein taped together!

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We used to buy the canned chow mein noodles to make these easy cookies at Christmas.

http://allrecipes.com/recipe/9519/chow-mein-noodle-cookie/
 
That doesn't look too good. I actually only ate homemade Hungarian cooking growing up and it was delicious. That's all I cooked when I first got married but as my kids got older they wanted lasagna and spaghetti and mac and cheese so I obliged them but still cooked my husband his favorites. He hated anything with tomato sauce.
 

It used to taste ok. Tasted even better if you didn't think of it as Chinese food.

I bought some recently for reasons of nostalgia, but it tasted very different than I remember. I threw it out without finishing my plate. ick!
 
Yes, that stuff was pretty awful but in truth not much worse than the Chinese takeout available in my area today.

Chun King had some funny commercials back in the early 60's. The one I thought was the funniest is no where to be found. It took place in a movie theater with people whispering "Chun King" to each other, getting louder and louder until they were all screaming.

But here is one vintage tv ad-

 
We have been getting La Choy Chicken Chow Mein w/dark meat sauce and Asian style Veggies. It is packed in two cans, glued together by label. It is very good over rice, and makes for a quick meal. It is what it is.
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RadishRose said:
Yes, that stuff was pretty awful but in truth not much worse than the Chinese takeout available in my area today.

Chun King had some funny commercials back in the early 60's. The one I thought was the funniest is no where to be found. It took place in a movie theater with people whispering "Chun King" to each other, getting louder and louder until they were all screaming.

But here is one vintage tv ad-

Click to expand...

Hey, the elevator operator is Arte Johnson. Remember him from Laugh-In?
 
That's the only "Chinese food" I knew growing up. It was a special treat as my mother always cooked from scratch, but we felt so .....citizens of the world.....when we ate "foreign" food. What can I say? I grew up in Midwestern America, where Italian was considered exotic. I didn't have pizza until I was 13 and Mexican food until I was 18.

As wonderful a cook as my mother was, her idea of spaghetti sauce was browned hamburger, onions and green peppers with a large can of tomato paste that she had liberally spiced with an elderly can of oregano. I had no idea that I loved Italian food until I actually had some Italian food that a real live Italian had made.
 
We ate that when I was young and I thought it was great. I used to drown it in Soy Sauce. Bought some 2 or 3 years ago and thought it tasted like crap. Times and tastes change.
 
The Chinese-in-a-can never was a hit with me.

However, just the other day while in the market I had a wild thought, and looked for canned enchiladas.

Didn't find any, could have sworn I'd seen them before. Could only find enchilada sauce.
 
One of the strangest things we came across was a whole chicken in a can! It was 1983, I had been on strike for 6 months. It came from our food co-op in a generic white & black 50 oz can. As I recall it was fully cooked and not bad.

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How about a canned Cheeseburger??
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In the late 60's my parents purchased a popup camper and my mother stocked up on all sorts of food in cans for us to enjoy when we traveled.

I saw this in the local dollar store and had a horrible flashback to those family camping adventures.

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