As your grandma will tell you, things were better in the 1950s. Quality entertainment was at its peak with I Love Lucy and The Ed Sullivan Show. You could afford a house on one salary. And there was none of that bip-bop-pop music you kids listen to these days.
But hold up, grandma, you’re forgetting about one thing. What about all that creepy food people ate back in the ’50s? You can’t possibly tell us that our modern day Chipotle can’t hold a candle to Jell-O tuna salad. You just can’t!
Flip through an old cookbook and you’ll be utterly stunned at some of the gross vintage recipes people actually made. Meats mixed with fruits. Canned meats mixed with canned fruits. Anything and everything encapsulated in Jell-O.
It’s all so horrible and we now understand why so many Americans were heavy drinkers in the 1950s — they had to numb themselves to the ghastly flavors lingering on the plate in front of them.
We certainly hope you’re not hungry because you’re about to lose your appetite with these gross vintage recipes.
Here are some of the worst of the worst things that were on American families’ dinner tables in the 1950s. It’s not too late to click away — you’ve been warned.
1. Bing Crosby’s Star-kist Tuna Dumplings
Made with the best canned tuna money can buy — and Bisquick.
Crosby’s favorite dish includes some sautéed onion and celery mixed with a little bit of Bisquick and canned tuna. Baked in biscuit dough cups, this interesting dish is served with a milk and melted, processed cheese sauce.
Sing it, Bing, and then take it to the trash.
2. Lime Cheese Salad
Lime Jell-O with mayonnaise, cream cheese, canned fruit, and chopped nuts congealed within it, served with seafood salad.
Sounds like our kind of meal…
3. Ham Banana Rolls
Drenched in cheese sauce, because everything tastes great with thick, neon yellow cheese sauce. Yes, even bananas wrapped in mustard-covered ham slices.
Thanks, but no thanks.
4. Tuna Fritters
Again, drenched in cheese sauce. It’s like a deconstructed tuna melt, fried tuna patties and all, and we hate every bit of it.
Can you imagine the smell?
5. Lemonegg
Instagram user @retrofoodghoul found this recipe in a vintage cookbook called Plain and Fancy Ways with Eggs.
After having made and tried Lemonegg — basically sparkling lemonade with an egg cracked into it — they described it as:
“A frothier version of lemonade that leaves a nice egg film on your lips.”
Is that even safe??
6. Frankfurter Cheese Soup
It’s literally sliced hot dogs mixed into hot, cheese soup. How charming.
Who knows, maybe it even classifies as gourmet.
7. Salmon Macaroni Casserole
Imagine a lovely baked mac and cheese with a cracker crust on top.
Now imagine it with some not-so-lovely canned salmon and cream of celery soup.
Who deserves the blame for this holiday dish massacre?
8. Spam Fiesta Peach Cups
“Savory and succulent.”
Uh-huh. Sure. What is it? Oh, just a ground-up Spam mixture with oats, ketchup, and mustard, stuffed into a canned peach half.
Was anything fresh in the ’50s?
9. Meal-In-A-Mould
Jell-O was clearly a big deal in the ’50s. But Jell-O mixed with chicken, lunch meat, peas, and carrots sounds like something straight of a nightmare.
But was it sweet or savory? That’s the real question.
10. Tuna and Waffles
Waffles were actually topped with blended cream of mushroom soup, milk, canned tuna, and stuffed olives.
Did Bing Crosby make this one too?
11. Gelatin and Mayo in a Christmas Candle Salad
We have to give it to the ’50s chefs.
They came up with some weirdly creative things. Cranberry-flavored gelatin bases that hold pieces of banana coated in mayo and topped with an almond?
Chaotic genius.
12. Spicy Cottage Cheese Pie
Instagram user @retrofoodghoul also tried this 1954 recipe.
And it’s pretty much exactly what you’d imagine it would be – baked, warm cottage cheese with some cream, lemon, and cinnamon.
It was this close to being nearly edible.
13. Potato Sauce
Even though this is a supposedly fake ad, we wouldn’t be surprised if this condiment actually existed. In fact, we might take potato sauce over some of the other items on this list.
Who’s with us?
14. Pineapple Freezer Cake
Miracle Whip and pineapple — how festive!
15. Shrimp Trees…?
To be fair, this looks like it may be a recipe from the 1970s, but we just can’t let this slide.
Who said it was okay to pin endives, olives, and shrimp cocktail to a styrofoam cone for holiday parties?
We guess they were some sort of masochist.
16. Pears with Miracle Whip
It’s literally just that — hollowed-out pears served with a dollop of Miracle Whip.
At least they kept it simple with this one.
17. “Old Fashioned Girl” Salad
It’s a salad made in the shape of a girl.
Constructed with hard-boiled eggs, tomatoes, shredded carrot, olives, cottage cheese, and French dressing.
Well, we can at least describe this as “different.”
18. Chilled Celery Log
Stalks of celery surrounding a chopped vegetable and spice filling? Uh, we’ll pass, thanks.
Even ants on a log sound better.
19. Deviled Macaroni Deluxe
Hard-boiled eggs, cream of mushroom soup, pimientos, mustard, and macaroni. What’s going on here?
20. Jellied Veal Ring
This is truly what nightmares are made of.
The gelatinous creation isn’t complete unless it includes sliced olives and hard boiled eggs in this intricate pattern.
Don’t forget the radish roses!
21. Frosted Ribbon Loaf
At first, this loaf looks like a delicious dessert.
But the contents of this cake are disgusting.
The frosting is cream cheese-based, which sounds good. But then inside, layers of ham and egg filling sit between the cake layers. Hard pass for us.
22. Liver Sausage Pineapple
Where to even start with this abomination?
The vintage recipe first popped up in a 1953 issue of Better Homes and Gardens New Cookbook.
The recipe includes mixing liverwurst with mayo, Worcestershire sauce, and lemon juice. This is shaped around a jelly mould, covered in pineapple icing, and garnished with stuffed olives.
23. Tomato Banana Tarts
It’s exactly what it sounds like, and it sounds nasty.
Just slice up some bananas and pop them on top of a tomato!
Don’t forget to garnish the dish as well. You know, to make it look even less appetizing. Honestly, who was coming up with all of these gross retro recipes?
24. Hot Dr Pepper
This one isn’t a recipe, but it is still a gross culinary decision made in the 1950s.
“Also delicious served steaming hot.”
“Just heat Dr Pepper or Diet Dr Pepper in a saucepan till it steams. Then pour over thin slices of lemon,” the ad continued. We’re not so sure if this is a hot idea.
25. Banana Candle Salad
For some reason we can’t possibly wrap our heads around, candle salads were in during the ’50s.
Including this phallic monstrosity.
It is essentially a banana shoved into sliced pineapple rings. We’re not sure how that qualifies as a salad, or why anyone would think to put this dish together in this fashion.
26. Almonds In A Haystack
This one is somewhat intriguing–until you read the ingredients.
It looks like some sort of sweet dessert, right?
Wrong. It is a mound of ham, onions, cream cheese, and pickle relish coated with a thick layer of Micacle Whip, which is then topped with almond slices. It was meat as a cracker dip, but feels more like a ham salad nightmare.
Go home, 1950s. You’ve had enough fun for the entire 20th century.
We’re honestly surprised you didn’t make Jell-O go extinct.
