Remember when...

Now when flares and wedge heels became a hot fashion item I was in high school. At that same time the Mum's of Australia became very daring in their recipes.

Now I have spoken to people about the same age as me, and they also remember in horror the food that their Mothers cooked.

Here as some of the gems, now please don't gag at the thought of some of these food combinations, because at the time Mothers of Australia, probably the world were not only burning their bras and wearing stretchy pants - remember crimplene the lycra of the 70's - they were also experimenting in the kitchen.

Now hold onto your hats here comes some of the food combos

Savoury mince on crumpets - now this seems to have consisted of minced cooked with water, tomato sauce and something sweet because it always tasted like sugar had been added. It was served on a toasted crumpet arghhh!

Green jelly with marshmallows - pineapple chunks were set in green jelly, and when it was just about set the top was covered with white marshmallows. As if we didn't eat enough sugar back then.

Rehydrated/dehydrated peas and beans - now these were the fast food of the 70's, you bought packets of dehydrated peas and beans, then covered them with water and boiled until they were soft. Now it didn't matter how long you boiled them, they were always chewy and wrinkled !

Deb - Now this was the era of dried food. Luckily my Mum never made this, but I did try it - only once. Think soapflakes with a feint taste of school clag. Yukky.

Rissoles - Now I don't mind a nice moist rissole, but for some reason packets of dried soup - back again to the dried food - seemed to appear in a lot of recipes. In the rissoles was a packet of chicken noodles soup, so you had a rissole made of beef mince, with crunchy noodles.

Now I got a pair of these lace up boots, when I was in primary school. I thought I was the trendiest person.

Another mince recipe - Mince on toast - Still a lot of beef recipes, because beef and lamb was cheap then. It wasn't till later that you could buy chicken fillets. Now this was mince cooked in water with gravox added, then served on toast. My dad loved this and I still think he has it now. But for me to eat it I would cover it with tomato sauce, and I rarely eat tomato sauce.

Now for the last dessert recipe - tinned pineapple with condensed milk. Yes you place slices of pineapple in a bowl and cover them with condensed milk. Now it was extremely sweet, but my Mum has a very sweet tooth and this was a very common dessert. Its lucky I still have my teeth after all this sugar.

Perhaps you have some more gems from the kitchens of the 1970's , perhaps even the 80's when we got into Nouvelle cuisine, a little bit of food on a large plate that cost a fortune.