Turning back the hands of time

Remembering the good old days.
What was your favored lunch bucket item?
 
A plain old bologna sandwich on fresh white bread with a smear of mustard seem to be common in my lunch bucket. I still like them on occasion.

Ditto!

My mother made that sandwich for me every day for 5 years.  It was accompanied by a Red Delicious apple and milk which was in a smelly Thermos.

She neatly folded waxed paper around it.

When I objected to the Thermos milk I then got a nickel for a small carton of milk.

The fresher the white bread the better.  I then like to smoosh it flat.

PB&J, in wax paper in a brown bag, with a cold chocolate milk, in a wax carton

I broke too many of the glass-lined thermos bottles. Mother stopped giving me the soup to go with the sandwich. I always bought the glass bottle of milk, and stayed with the wax box that had the pull-up corner opening.  I was not permitted to choose chocolate over white milk....which became one of my prime reasons for leaving home at age 17! Remember the slogan- Choice, Not Chance in the Modern Army!!!

Iwalked home for my lunch every single day.  When I was in high school , it was a twenty minute walk  so had just 20 minutes to eat and to brush my teeth. 

When my grandmother was alive, she prepared us the same lunch every day.  It was egg salad or salmon salad on rye bread  with a glass of milk and a dish of pudding or piece of  pie.

After she died,  my sister and I would come home and eat whatever was around.  By then, we were allowed to have soft white bread!  My specialty was  deviled ham or potted meat.  When the early garden "came in", we would add sliced red radishes to our sandwich with  lots of mayonaise.

We always tore the top bit of wrapper off of our Sweetheart Straws and blew them at someone sitting nearby.

That nickel milk carton was first in a squarish squatty wax covered container and then it was taller and thinner container.

Life, in my case did not follow cARTon.

american cheese and fritos on whatever bread was available

Had to be bologna with processed,wrapped cheese and mustard on white bread which I rarely ever got. What ever happened to that really really soft white bread that we got in the early 60's that you could compress to a flat sheet? White bread texture isn't like it used to be. I couldn't stand that white milk in the little cartons. Often it was warm and sometimes old. Whatever milk wasn't opened would be put back into the coolers. Every so often a kid would get one that had been out for a while and put back into the coolers that was all curdled up. Lots of kids took a pill bottle full of powdered chocolate to put into their milk. I don't remember having plastic bags until the mid 60's. Remember those pleated wax paper bags ? The school that I went to forbade those metal or hard sided lunch boxes because the kids would use them to hit each other. Either those soft sided, insulated bags that had the red,scotch, checkering that smelled inside or a paper bag was the norm. No thermoses allowed either. I'm tempted to ask how many of you remember going to school w/o air condition as well.  

Bologna and mayonnaise on white bread.

Hey Dawn, I went to Rockway Jr. High, Southwest High and Palmetto High, none of which were air conditioned!

Ya know something Don, I think we're dating ourselves. I'm sure many of these fine folks can tell us stories about walking a mile to school in bad weather. Don't think they would understand anything about navigating land crabs as far as the eye could see on the roads back then would they?

heh, remeber the term 'latch-key kids'??  i was one of the originals - before any kind of phrase to describe it had been created.
 
when i was in grade school, i had to go home for lunch since we lived close enough - only those that had to take the bus to/from school were allowed to eat in the lunch room.  i dunno what the distance cut-off was for being qualified to take the bus - no one was more than a mile and a half from school to begin with (so no need, really, for bussing at all).  on a rare occassion (usually when it was extremely cold/snowy) the 'walkers' were allowed to bring lunch with and eat in the lunchroom. 
 
anyhoo, standard lunch was pb&j on wonder bread.  or oscar mayer bologna with kraft sliced/wrapped american cheese with mustard on wonder bread.  always had a glass of milk - sometimes plain; sometimes chocolate.  some kind of fruit was standard as well.  sometimes would have chips or frito's or pretzels, too.  if mom was home (she wasn't usually if as she usually worked) i'd get grilled cheese or maybe soup.
 
come high school (and had to take the bus cuz it was miles away) i still had the same sandwiches daily - just weren't freshly made.  fruit was still a standard - either in the brown bag or i'd buy something at the counter.   would get some chocolate milk at the counter, too.  once or twice a week i was allowed to buy lunch instead of carting it with me.  that would be on pizza day usually.
 
once i was old enough to have a job, i rarely brought lunch with me...had the funds to buy lunch daily, so i did.  each day was something different and the cycle of what was offered was two weeks long, iirc.  only constants every week were pizza on friday and french fries on wednesday (or maybe it was tuesday).
 
even though i didn't eat lunch at grade school, we still had recess and could buy some snacks and milk during that.  snacks were pretzels (made daily and delivered while still hot, yum!) they cost a nickel and were a dime by the time i was in 8th grade.  candy as the snack was only offered on fridays.  milk was a nickel the first couple years and then moved to a dime somewhere around 3rd of 4th grade.  was a dime when i was started in high school...i remember it being a big deal when it went up to 15 cents!
 
*raises hand*   i remember no a/c in the classrooms!!  not in grade school or high school.  even the local public schools didn't have it.  at some point, the offices (at the grade school) did get it.  although, not at the high school.  i don't think they had the offices with a/c until my senior year and, even then, not all of them had it.

I usually ate in the cafeteria (full meal cooked on-premises, with milk: 30¢), unless I saw something on the upcoming menu that didn't appeal to me, such as the vile tacos that they always served with diced beets (one of my most hated veg) on the side. On those brown bag days, the sandwiches I most looked forward to were:

• Spit-roasted beef with mustard and relish.

• Peanut butter and red raspberry or boysenberry jam, to which I'd add a thick layer of BBQ potato chips.

• Mom's delicious cold meatloaf with ketchup.

joclyn



 
*raises hand*   i remember no a/c in the classrooms!!  not in grade school or high school.  even the local public schools didn't have it.

I didn't experience a/c until my second semester of 8th grade, when we moved from the 1920 built junior high school to the brand new one. I did NOT miss sweltering in that old school.

Nobody's house or car had it either.

I worked in the cafeteria in the 6th grade and lunch was free.  I loved eating in the cafeteria.

In grammar school the only "lunch" I ever had was a package of crackers or a candy bar at the small grocery store across the street. Or, after starting school in New Haven in sixth grade, I;d take the bus into downtown and eat at the Waldorph Cafeteria. In junior high I'd sometimes get a hot dog in the back of a small variety store around the corner. In high school I'd skip out and grab something at the Yankee Doodle, or slip into Mory's with a couple of Yalie friends who were members.

mar52


I worked in the cafeteria in the 6th grade and lunch was free.  I loved eating in the cafeteria.

They had a cafeteria in my junior high school. I went there the first day of school in seventh grade. I looked around. I never went back. In high school I know they had a cafeteria, but to this day I have no idea where it was. In grammar school they didn't offer any food.

I don't remember ever taking my lunch to school. Seems i always ate the cafeteria food. I take lunch now and eat what everybody here used to eat!

I went to the same school from K-12. They never had a cafeteria either. They opened a hot lunch concession run by mothers using those infrared sandwich warmers and Stewart, later Landshire sandwiches that were in those heat proof plastic bags. Usually were inedible and disgusting anyway as whatever was left over from the previous day was reheated the next and you got cardboard. I was also a latch key kid by the third grade with both parents working. We didn't have A/C at home until after I started College and my mom was beginning to have her own private summers.  I didn't get A/C until the '67-'68 school year for 9th grade home room where they had recently built a 4 room addition that had it. Only those classrooms,the front office, and the library had AC. Otherwise most classes still were in un A/C rooms until the second semester of my Jr. year when we moved into a whole, new school. My kids couldn't comprehend not being in A/C all day at home,school,or anywhere else. Only real taste they ever had of that life was after Hurricane Andrew where we were without power for nearly 2 months.

I don't think air conditioning was invented when I went to school.
And that potted meat with a heavy smear of mustard should not be forgotten(thanks for the reminder Greymo).
Every kid in school use to trade lunches but I always ate mine as packed.
I can never remember cafeterias in schools.

We use to sit on wooden benches in the basement and play knives. That is where a jack knife is opened partially and flipped.
The winner was the one that got most the fingers under the handle when the tip was sticking in the bench. We would play for treats in a lunch bag, cookies, candy, etc.
Try taking a knife to school now and there would be a lockdown.

I started 1st grade in 1953.  My grade school did not have a cafeteria so in good weather I walked home for lunch & in bad weather my mom packed my lunch.  My favorite lunch box sandwich was either a balony or vienna sausage sandwich, squirt of mustard on 1st slice of bread, balony or vienna suasage, lettuce, mayo,bread.  I loved how the lettuce got limp & everything was slightly warm by noon time.  Now I know that for most folks a warm, limp sandwich is not appealing, but waht can I say I love it.   I still will make a sandwich in the morning, wrap it up, leave it out & eat it for lunch.  Also, before anyone asks, no food poisoning after eating sandwiches this way for over 57 years. 
 

I've always regretted my dislike for homemade bread, smoked ham and my dads summersauge with a little block of his favorite cheese on the side, and a whole dill pickle from our garden, instead I wanted what the other kids had, Wonder bread, baloney, and a little bag of crisps.  I'd love to see that lunch bag sitting on the table in the morning now!
But then there was the government issued peanut butter, that was kind of grainy and had a more natural taste to it, that I liked, and who could forget that age old school dish, Johnny Marzetti.

I started the 1st grade in 1955....We always had a cafeteria in school....I still remember that every wed. (1st - 12th) the lunch was always, cheese enchalatas, pinto beans, spanish rice, corn bread, fruit and milk in 1/2 pint bottles with the cardboard stopper....I always loved Wed. lunch....cost .30 milk included, .02 for extra milk....
No A/C in any school....

Tuna fish sandwiches were my favorite with chips and either Twinkies or a Fruit Pie. Bologna and ketchup came in at a close second.

Fresh, made from scratch Ham Salad sandwiches made by the Cafeteria Ladies. I can still taste them to this day and I'm 70!
My hometown was 98% German Catholics, so Friday's was always Tuna Noodle Casserole or Grilled Gheese & Tomato Soup

DougS


Remembering the good old days.
What was your favored lunch bucket item?

A plain old bologna sandwich on fresh white bread with a smear of mustard seem to be common in my lunch bucket. I still like them on occasion.

Peanut butter and grape jelly sandwiches on Wonder bread.

I have few fond memories of cafeteria lunches or brown bagging. We eat a whole lot better, in terms of quality, now-a-days than we did when I was a child. 

But I do have a bit of nostalgia for the tuna fish salad sandwiches on whole wheat , and the grilled cheese, aged for at least two hours in the steam table, that were served in the cafeteria at Newburgh Free Academy ( a public high school) when we taught there. Gail has no fond memories of even those items, preferring in those years to have a yogurt for lunch.

Cheers, John  

Ham sandwich with mayo and white bread so fresh it'd gum up on the underside of your front teeth.  Ah, those were the days, still my favorite kind of sandwich but I'd like to think I more sophisticated now, grilling ham and cheese and toasting rye, or pumpernickel, still with mayo, but also a little dab of creole mustard.   
 
We also had sandwiches made with variety pack cold cuts, bologna, salami, pressed ham, and olive loaf, with the pressed ham being my favorite.  Few months back I had this bizarre urge to taste olive loaf again, and got the smallest serving (1/4 lb?) of Boar's Head olive loaf I could buy, at the grocery deli.  With mayo and white bread, it wasn't bad, and brought back a flood of memories. 

Anybody ever get, or remember, a brown sugar sandwich?
Fresh bread, thick butter and heavy with brown sugar. A work cohort use to bring those in his lunch bucket to work.

Peanut Butter, lots of it, no jelly. Still prefer peanut butter without jam or jelly.

BelleReve


Few months back I had this bizarre urge to taste olive loaf again, and got the smallest serving (1/4 lb?) of Boar's Head olive loaf I could buy, at the grocery deli.  With mayo and white bread, it wasn't bad, and brought back a flood of memories. 

 
I do like Olive Loaf with mayo, though I'm not a bologna fan at all. I try to not use the really soft white bread. I'd sometimes put mustard instead but I think mayo does go better with the olives.

The rare times I get it, it never stays around long as other family members seem to secretively like it too, once they try it...