vintage snacks Archives - Retro Reminiscing Video and Pictures

FUNYUNS — THE SNACK THAT ALMOST WASN’T CALLED FUNYUNS

This commercial takes me right back to when a bag of Funyuns seemed like one of the strangest snacks in the chip aisle. They looked like little onion rings, tasted like onions and even had a name that sounded like somebody made it up on the spot. As it turns out, somebody pretty much did!

Funyuns were introduced by Frito-Lay in 1969, created by employee George Wade Bigner. But here’s something I never knew: Funyuns weren’t supposed to be called Funyuns. The original name was OnYums, but that name was already taken. Advertising copywriter Jim Albright came up with “Funyuns” instead, and more than half a century later we’re still calling them that.

And listen closely to the music in these early commercials. The tune came from “I Love Onions,” a wonderfully odd 1966 novelty song recorded by Susan Christie. The song actually made the Billboard Hot 100 before its melody was adapted to help sell Funyuns.

Another great connection: in 1971, a young Roger Enrico went to work marketing Funyuns. He eventually became CEO of PepsiCo and was one of the men behind Pepsi’s blockbuster Michael Jackson era. Not a bad career beginning for a guy working on onion-flavored rings!

And yes, Funyuns are still around today.

Jiffy Pop — Was It More Fun to Make Than Eat?

It’s Friday night, and this one brings back that whole feeling of the weekend finally being here. Maybe there was a movie coming on TV, maybe we were allowed to stay up a little later, and somehow popcorn just seemed to belong with Friday night. And if somebody pulled out a Jiffy Pop, making the popcorn became part of the entertainment. Standing at the stove, shaking that pan back and forth and watching the foil slowly puff up was almost as much fun as eating what was inside.

There was popcorn, and then there was Jiffy Pop, where half the entertainment was watching that aluminum foil grow into a giant silver ball.

Looking this one up, I found that Jiffy Pop goes all the way back to 1959, but it wasn’t actually the first popcorn sold this way. A product called E-Z Pop had been around since 1954, and its manufacturer eventually sued Jiffy Pop’s makers for patent infringement. The case went all the way to a federal appeals court, where Jiffy Pop won in 1963 partly because its foil expanded differently.

The magician connection in these 1970s commercials wasn’t just advertising make-believe either. Harry Blackstone Jr. was a genuine professional magician, and in 1976 Jiffy Pop was promoting the product as “the magic treat.” Blackstone came from quite a magic family — his father was The Great Blackstone, one of America’s best-known illusionists and a contemporary of Harry Houdini.

Harry Jr. went on to become a major star himself. He was twice named Magician of the Year by the Magic Castle, took his show to Broadway in 1980 and later donated his family’s famous floating-light-bulb illusion to the Smithsonian.

And Jiffy Pop certainly outlasted these commercials. It even had a memorable role in the opening of Scream in 1996.

Best of all, Jiffy Pop is still being made today. Some products really don’t need much improving — watching that foil balloon get bigger was the whole experience!

Since it’s Friday night, this seems like the perfect one to ask:

What memories does Jiffy Pop bring back for you — family movie nights, staying up late watching TV, or trying not to burn the bottom?

Space Food Sticks

They were chewy, rod-shaped energy snacks developed after Pillsbury worked with NASA on foods astronauts could eat in space. The idea was that the food had to be compact, nutritious, not crumbly, and easy to eat, even in tight spaceflight conditions. Pillsbury then marketed them to the public during the Apollo era, when anything connected to astronauts and the moon felt exciting.

They came in flavors like chocolate, peanut butter, and caramel, and were sold as a “nutritionally balanced” between-meal snack. In a way, they were an early version of what we would now call an energy bar, only shaped more like a little chewy stick.

TRS write-up:

Pillsbury’s Space Food Sticks were the kind of snack that could only have come from the space-race era.

In the late 1960s and early 1970s, kids did not just want candy. They wanted something that felt like it belonged in an astronaut’s lunchbox. Space Food Sticks looked like little chewy rods and came in flavors like chocolate, peanut butter, and caramel. They were promoted as a nutritious between-meal snack, but the real selling point was right there in the name: space.

Pillsbury had worked on food for NASA, and the company turned that connection into a grocery-store snack kids could imagine taking all the way to the moon. They eventually disappeared from shelves, but for anyone who remembers them, Space Food Sticks were a perfect little bite of Apollo-era childhood.

Pop-Tarts were introduced by Kellogg’s in 1964

Pop-Tarts were introduced by Kellogg’s in 1964.

They were first sold as a quick toaster pastry and originally came in four flavors: strawberry, blueberry, brown sugar cinnamon, and apple currant. The frosted versions came a few years later, after Kellogg’s figured out the icing could survive the toaster