Ah yeah; date night.
The other week I bumped into a woman at the local pub in Venice beach, got to chatting, and (incredibly) she gave me her number. After checking to see if it was real and not some sort of trick played by my ass-clown friends, she agreed to meeting.
Unfortunately, I lost most of my money betting against the Rams (really, ALL of it) so it had to be cheap. Fortunately, I had some culinary skills from my time as a cookie on a fishing trawler and a half-bottle of Thunderbird left over from underground bunko night.
So I thought: why not cook something for the lady?
Let’s flash forward a few days mostly spent rolling from bar to bar trying to sell adult novelty items for the prophylactic machine in the men’s rooms to the owners.
After a long day, I came home and realized I have 20 minutes until she’s here and I’ve yet to see if there is anything left to eat. I open the fridge and see it:
Lunchables.
We all know Lunchables; that small box of Oscar Mayer sliced meats, a diminutive stack of crackers, cheese slices and a petite dessert. It was perfectly packaged lunch in that bright yellow and red box with a matching peel off top that always drew your attention.
It was the lunch for kids that had parents who were like, “damn, I just don’t have to time to make a PB&J sandwich.”
Lazy parenting aside, the kid that had a Lunchables was praised as some sort of futurist devoted to a perfect, compartmentalized lunch. Hell, I still pick these bad boys up today – or the lesser known and cheaper “Dirty John’s Lunch Packs.”
Lunchables were introduced in 1988 by Kraft Foods (the daddy company of Oscar Mayer). Now, before you read on, let that sink in: Lunchables are 26 years old – almost as old as some of the t-shirts I wear. They were created by a true pioneer for latchkey kids and lazy adults, Bob Drane.
I had to learn more about this innovator and, luck has it, there was a great article written by Doug Moe for The Wisconsin Journal on the man, the myth and the legend known as Bob “The Snack God” Drane.
Drane had worked at Oscar Mayer for 20 years and was given the almost insurmountable goal of, “contemporize and broaden (Oscar Mayer’s) product lines.” A normal man would have shattered at the mere thought of trying to update a company’s image, a company that still openly drives an erection on wheels to sporting events.
And before you start commenting on how “classic” and/or “timeless” the Oscar Mayer Weiner mobile is, shut your trap, close your eyes, imagine that thing driving in and out of a tunnel and try not to laugh.
Drane decided to hit the drawing board hard (with a ton of help from a number of experts and focus groups) to forge Lunchables. Once the finalized product was created, Drane and his team of badasses knew they had lightning in a bottle when everyone universally agreed on how epic Lunchables are to humanity.
Here’s another little factoid that you, the reader, may not know: Lunchables were losing money for Oscar Mayer until about 1992 when they introduced those weird, crappy pizza variants. That’s right, despite being hugely popular; Lunchables were in the red because of production costs.
Everything was rolling nicely for the company until parents in 1997 started reading the little nutritional labels on the side of the product. Upon examination, parents discovered the Lunchables they were feeding their kids weren’t so healthy: an average serving sized package for a Lunchables products had well over the daily amount of saturated fat, sugar, and sodium that was healthy for a child.
The company slowly made steps to raise the nutritional value of the Lunchables by eliminating some of the larger meals, having healthier Lunchables, and replacing some of the dessert options.
However, the meals that I have noticed in the grocery stores appear largely unchanged, so score one for my childhood.
As far as the taste goes: pretty much the same as I remember it. Being
the red-blooded American I am, I love that “white cheese” that Oscar
Mayer is so good at producing; however, I’m not a huge fan of the ham
that it’s packaged with – it was a little too greasy for my taste. The
crackers are really just Ritz, not that I’m not complaining, and the
little treat at the end was a mini Nestle Crunch bar, which wasn’t bad.
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| The also popular yellow cheese option |
Today, there are 26 different variants of the Lunchables line including the traditional deli meats, hot dogs, pizzas, nachos, and even wraps. They still have a Capri Sun packaged in optional Lunchables as a drink, and the dessert can range from Jello pudding to candy.
Getting back to my date, I laid out the Lunchables in a presentation that would make Gordon Ramsey weep and found some clean Dixie cups for the hooch. I lit some sexy candles I stole from a kid’s birthday party at the Chuck E Cheese’s and Febreze bombed the hell out of my apartment.
I was ready to rock.
Unfortunately, my date’s husband caught wind of our upcoming tryst and came over pretty pissed (yeah, apparently she’s married). Anyway, he showed up and started yelling until he noticed the sweet platter of Lunchables.
I offered to break bread and, wouldn’t you know it, he couldn’t resist.
He ended up being a pretty cool guy and promised to swing by next week with the new Madden.
Until next time!
