I find that I like the idea of my childhood convenience foods more than I like the taste of them. The main ones for me are boxed mac n' cheese and Pillsbury crescent rolls and biscuits in a can. I do most of my shopping at a co-op, but once in a very long while I'll go to the regular supermarket and give into the temptation and buy one of these things, but then when I eat them I realize that they really are kind of gross. It's enough to put me off of them for another year or so before nostalgia gets the best of me again.

bologna sandwiches.

but the bologna has to be maple leaf chicken bologna (we're hindu- i didn't even know bologna isn't 'supposed' to be made with chicken until i was in my 20s)

the mayo- has to be miracle whip. no real hellmans or anything else

the bread has to be soft white bread- preferably wonder bread.

Definitely pizza rolls, and Stouffer's frozen mac and cheese when I'm sick. I so rarely buy frozen food, but both of those foods are so linked to childhood memories for me. I insist that they're delicious and I'm shocked when others disagree!

First things that came to mind were Pizza Rolls here too, orange flavored Pillsbury cinnamon rolls and the french toast sticks at Burger King (always got them on road trips for breakfast!)

Maggi noodles (aka ramen). My mom always used to make me ramen when I was sick, and to this day, it's a must have when I'm out with a cold--down to the way my mom used to plate it! Also, puffed cheetos. :)

I hate to even put this admission out there for the world to see, but here it is: I will still scarf down a can of spaghetti-o's like nobody's business. I openly acknowledge that they are gross, and they likely barely even qualify as "food," but it doesn't matter. Give me a bowl of them, and a grilled cheese sandwich made with kraft singles (also bad, I know), and I'm as happy as a I can be.

I'm pregnant and have been craving mostly foods from my childhood. Heinz beans with a package of wieners, Kraft Dinner, Pogos, Habitant French Canadian pea soup with a slice of commercial bread with butter, Campbell's tomato soup with soda crackers smashed in, Oreo cookies and milk. I can make pretty decent versions of most of these things, but sometimes I really do want that familiar, comforting taste of a packaged food.

OH I forgot- like TONS of kids my age- fish sticks. Frozen, mass produced fish sticks. I bought some years ago when my husband was craving them too and we drowned them in ketchup!

ADAUGHTERS! I LOVE Spaghetti-o's and still buy them from time to time at to get my fix. They're the best with a grilled cheese, just like you said! You are not alone.

For me, I crave dumpling soup with rice cakes. When I have a tough day or feel exhausted, I always grab foods that say "comfort" to me:-) These comfort foods symbolize my mother I miss dearly - http://7th-taste.com/2011/01/04/korean-new-years-dumpling-soup-with-rice-cakes/

Cambell's Tomato soup. Alas, not since they started putting high-fructose corn syrup in it.
With saltine crackers, of course.

Campbell's Cream of Mushroom soup with pepperidge farms goldfish and any casserole made with the condensed version. The children of today will have no idea. I havent seen a green bean casserole made this way on thanksgiving for a long time.

Jell-o Pudding Pops

I don't think I've ever been able to eat a tuna fish sandwich made with mayo - it's Miracle Whip all the way for me. (Well, most days it's lemon, capers and mustard, but when I want a taste of childhood I reach for the Miracle Whip). I also crave my grandma's chocolate chip bundt cake, which is basically a box of cake mix, a box of instant pudding and chocolate chips. I toyed with the notion of figuring out how to make 'homemade cake mix' (Corn Syrup and food coloring - ack!), but then I realized I was being an asshole. Why complicate perfection?

My mom made this stuff called Irish Spaghetti. Ground beef, a can of condensed tomato soup, a can of cream of mushroom, a little chili powder and garlic powder all simmered together then served over noodles. Divine. I get the craving from time to time, these are the nights my husband goes hungry!

Most nostalgic meal: grilled cheese sandwich on white bread made with Velveeta, Campbell's tomato soup on the side. It's been awhile since I bought the Velveeta portion, but I still eat the soup regularly throughout the winter and I think it tastes good. Recently I've been wondering about Hostess Ding Dongs. I'm afraid to try them. The remembered flavor is so divine -- I seriously doubt if they can live up to it. Plus are they still wrapped in foil? That's an important part of the experience. My love for Hershey Bars with almonds seriously diminished when the foil/paper wrapper gave way to plastic.

We still eat some boxed mac-n-cheese here but use the "natural" brands like Annies and Trader Joes. I tried Kraft again after a few years of these other brands -- yuck!

This post seems to be a celebration of processed food, but I didn't grow up with any, so don't yearn for it.

My favorite childhood comfort foods are cream of wheat, carrots could in a butter/honey/lemon sauce, and home made marble cake. My husband makes a far superior version of the marble to the one my mother made (she used oil; he uses butter), or anyone else for that matter (he uses fine chocolate and cake flour). His marble cake is the best -- so yes, childhood favorites can be improved upon.

Boy this self-correct feature that appeared on my laptop with the latest software upgrade is a pain!

...that would be "carrots IN a butter/honey/lemon sauce"...

It's more about sentiment than anything else. My gran didn't (well, doesn't) use any pre-made cake mixes or canned frosting or anything like that. She didn't have any.
So what I crave is the way she cooks eggs, the taste of her homemade bread and mayonnaise, her upside-down apple pie, things like that. Familiarity and comfort.
I also seem to have a thing for instant noodles, but that's a whole different animal.

Pillsbury canned cinnamon rolls, Bagel Bites, and grilled cheese sandwiches. I certainly don't eat these foods on a weekly basis like I did back in the day, but from time to time I will get a craving and pick these items up when I am doing my grocery shopping. The smell of the cinnamon rolls always takes me back to the Saturday mornings of my childhood. I remember my mother would always get a little annoyed with me because I would sneak my finger into the icing container to get a taste (or five) before the cinnamon rolls were even out of the oven.

I had never even heard of Kraft's blue box mac'n'cheese until college. Our family was into Velveeta's shells and cheese, it's so fake, but I don't care one bit, I love the stuff. I get it probably once a year to get my fix. Also when I'm sick, all I want is some Campbell's chicken noodle soup. Even though there is not much chicken to speak of, that salty broth makes me feel better.

My grandma Evelyn's butter tarts. When we were kids, they were our treat when she was making a 'real' pie for the grownups. Also, my mum's favourite dish to make, Pierre Franey's chicken with lemon and butter sauce over Uncle Ben's white rice.

Twinkies! Chef Boyardee Ravioli! Canned tamales (really?!)!

Green bean casserole just like the recipe on the can says. Condensed soup and French's crispy onions all the way. I toyed with veganism for awhile and made a vegan scratch version one year and it just wasn't the same.

Also, grilled cheese with squishy whole wheat bread (my mom did try to feed us healthy stuff) and american cheese singles.

My ultimate comfort food is blue box mac & cheese and campbell's tomato soup. You make them both per the directions and then dump them into the same bowl to eat. Mix and enjoy. So yummy!

i'm another for pizza rolls... and ice cream sammiches. i used to live across the street from my grandma, and during the summer i would go to her house and eat pizza rolls and watch the price is right EVERY. SINGLE. DAY. and have an ice cream sammich for dessert (keeping my fingers in the SAME spot while eating the whole thing so i would get to lick off all the chocolate bits that got stuck... weird, but i know i'm not the only one!!)

such a healthy child, i was.

I'm still a Kraft mac n cheese girl. Fish sticks habe been nagging at me for a while just to see if I'd even still like them. Chicken and Rice casserole - 2 cans of water, 2 cans of rice and 1 can cream of mushroom, 1 can of chicken and rice soup.stir, add four chicken thighs, bake 40 minutes at 400 - THAT is my child hood...with always (always!) a can of french style green beans.

Cold Spaghetti-os
Biscuits from a can (flaky layers type)
Jello Cook and Serve chocolate pudding

Maybe I'm showing my younger age here but.... perdue chicken nuggets in the shape of dinosaurs. frozen tater tots.

My mother made an AMAZING homemade mac and cheese and I make it too, but we also ate boxed mac and cheese. They are very different foods to me. One is not better, it's different, the way roasted tomatoes are different from salad tomatoes. They occupy a different place in my mind and on my table. Homemade mac and cheese is a dinner food, to be served with green salads and white wine. Kraft is a snack food, or a quick lunch for a child, or a sick day food craving.

My grandma made rice pudding (from scratch) and that is definitely a comfort food for me as is gumbo which meant family gathering. We didn't have a ton of processed foods, but I guess I'd say a bowl of Campbell's Tomato soup and a grilled cheese on the side (buttered white bread with a Kraft Singles Slice in between) is still go-to comfort food.

Also, if I ever find Count Chocula cereal, I buy it, all of it. I never find it anywhere. Where are they hiding all of the Count Chocula?

My mother's meat loaf. I suppose I could make it myself, but that would mean buying a grocery-sack's worth of foods we don't use: ketchup and Ritz crackers and Worcestershire sauce and I don't even know what. But my birthday's coming up. When she asks what I want, I just might tell her "I would like to come over for meatloaf." I'll even bring the mashed potatoes and green beans.

Every so often, I get a craving for Cap'n Crunch cereal. I buy one box, it tears up the roof of my mouth something fierce, and YUM I'm all set for another 1-3 years.

Oh, and! When I have a terrible cold, I only want Campbell's chicken noodle soup, a grilled American cheese sandwich on Pepperidge Farm bread, and ginger ale or Coke. (Chicken & stars soup should be saved for a REAL EMERGENCY like the flu.) My husband used to try to make it "nicer" for me by buying fancier soup and good bread; I finally had to explain that, though I'm deeply grateful for the thought, when I'm sick I want the same pap that I got as a child.

Baked custard. Plus the sausage pizza from the Greek pizza place in my home town.

Jello Nonfat Chocolate Vanilla Swirl Pudding Cups

I love those pudding cups! I recognize that homemade pudding is richer and less filled with weird chemicals. And sometimes, I do make pudding at home. But sometimes I just want a Jello pudding cup! And I always eat them layer by layer, (first chocolate, then vanilla, then chocolate again), never mixing or combining them on my spoon! :-) As long as I don't eat one more than once every week or two, I think it's a pretty harmless little habit/quirk.

Yeah, pudding cups. And Cocoa Puffs. I'm a sugar addict.

I know I should be highly offended by their nutritionlessness and their mystery meatedness but...Vienna sausages! I can't help myself.

Hamburger Helper. So gross and horrible for you, but so delicious every two years or so in the middle of winter.

Tater Tots. I love real potatoes, but about once a year I get a craving for these. It's a texture thing, I think. Or the fact that as a kid I wasn't allowed to eat them so only had them at other kid's houses. An envy thing, I guess! Maybe I should start snacking on a Barbie Dream Trailer....

Ramen, but only when I'm sick. I especially like the kind that comes in the horrible styrofoam & plastic wrapping that's spicy. I tried it once when I did not have a cold or flu, and almost gagged from the salty chemical taste, but when I'm really stuffed up and miserable, it hits the spot.

My mother used to make something we referred to as egg toast...later we attempted to call it french toast but it's not at all like french toast as most people eat it. We would have it for supper and it would consist of slices of bread dipped into a mixture of brown sugar and egg, then fried to a somewhat crispy outer edge and nice soft, sweet center. I still make it and it tastes not bad but nowhere near like it did in my childhood. By the way, my husband won't eat it! Haven't made it for a while but now I want some. Mmmm.

The only convenience food I long for from childhood is Minute Rice with butter and lots of black pepper. But I haven't actually fulfilled that craving in at least 15 years, so I think of it more as a fond memory than a craving.

The real food that I crave, and do eat regularly, are my mom's homemade lumpia, garlic fried rice, and vegetable soup.

beanie-weenies, bologna sandwiches (I'll occasionally do mortadella and aged cheddar), kraft singles, cheerios, corn dogs, grilled cheese and campbell's tomato or chicken noodle soup

and yes, bologna has to be on white bread with miracle whip - the only time i ever want miracle whip on anything

Mc Donald's...from the old days...before they started baking the pies and frying the fries in canola. Luckily, I found my childhood nirvana in Mexico....where the goods are still fried in lard. Viva Mexico! Don't even get me talkin' bout the coca cola blessings in Mexico minus the corn syrup! Fun food revelations of my past!

I have to give Spam a shout-out here, since it seems not to have been listed yet. I know it is a pretty disgusting food if thought about too long - that seems to be our theme here. My mother used to make it for our family in sandwiches. She'd just open the can, cut it into pieces, grill them in a frying pan until crispy, and serve it on white bread with *gasp* margarine. It was so bad for us, but that crispy, semi-bacony meat product cannot do anything but make me think of my mother, and therefore, I miss it sometimes.

and I second spaghetti-o's! and fish sticks.. for a nod to real food, I miss my great grandmother's incredible yeast rolls, the likes of which I have never had again and nobody can recreate even though we *filmed* her making them. I also miss her hot water cornbread, mixed with pot liquor from the fresh purple hull peas she grew in her own garden until she was 96. ok, now y'all are gonna make me cry! we also watched the price is right, as well as her "stories" sitting on a huge, way-tall queen bed on her sleeping porch. And my mom and I used to eat Vlassic dills out of the jar with Cokes and brush our hair while we watched tv. This usually accompanied "clean out the refrigerator h'orderves night." She also made us what she called "toad in a hole" which was a circle cut out of a piece of bread, then placed in a buttered skillet, then an egg cracked into the center, fried and flipped. I think there are a lot of names for that one. And my sister and I used to always make cheese toast and cinnamon toast. And the boiled peel and eat shrimp and barbecued blue crabs of our trips to the gulf coast. I remember catching blue crabs in the drainage ponds near the beach house with string and pieces of chicken. ok. I think that's it, ha:)

The only food I really feel nostalgia for is the opposite of the processed convenience foods my mother made. Her mother, however, used to cook everything from scratch and because that was such a rare treat, it's what I remember and crave - anything from chicken soup through to lasagne and lemon cake. I don't eat most of those foods now, but I have really intense feelings just remembering them and the person that made them for me. For my grandmother, though, food was about expressing love; for my mother, not so much.

In a household without much processed food, store-bought childhood special treats were Jello pudding pops, Dannon frozen yoghurt pops with a chocolate shell, carob ice cream (what ever happened to carob?). Campbell's tomato soup with Saltines (ate lots of this when I was pregnant). And a fish stick sandwich (on packaged soft white bread! - very exciting for me as a child) from the fish store when we were out shopping. When I was sick, cinnamon toast and tea brought up to bed on a round purple tray (yes, cinnamony buttery sugar and toast crumbs in bed).

I love the processed foods trend here, but despite growing up on kid kuisine and it's ilk, I don't really crave it much. Of course I love ramen on occasion and every once in a while I want a wonderbread and skippy sandwich with honey. But my favorite foods from childhood are still my favorites now: chicken and dumplings, fried okra, spaghetti bolognese, pecan pie.

And a coke over crushed/pellet ice, what can I say. Native Atlantan.

My dad would make us peanut butter and cheese (American) sandwiches on toasted scali bread and I'll make myself one every once in a while - but I don't keep American in the house so it's usually cheddar and not *quite* the same. My grandma would also make us slush from almond syrup and ice which we called 'orzata'. I don't have a clue what the actual Italian word is for it, or how we came to call it what we did (combo of Sicilian dialect and 50 years in Boston?)

My dad was (and is) a lunch truck driver. To this day, when I see a Ramona frozen burrito (say, in a 7-22 or the like), my mouth waters... The chile relleno and weenie roll (a hot dog and chili in a flour tortilla) were the best. Mmm...

The only thing that struck a chord with me was the McDonald's hot apple pie back when it was fried... A&W was still frying their pies until relatively recently, so you could get the same taste hit... It was nirvana-like, because the would sprinkle sugar and cinnamon on top of the hot pie just as it emerged from the fryer.

That was 6 years ago (I used to crave them when I was pregnant); now their pies are baked. Ugh.

Cook and serve tapioca pudding. My grandpa would make it and put in parfait cups to set, each with a cherry on top. I would always eat one warm.

Growing up in an Filipino household, it would have to be corned beef.....but the canned kind- with potatoes, cabbage and peas served over rice. Mums! To this day I still find myself buying a can of this stuff to my bf horror. :)

I'm so comforted knowing other people like cold spaghetti os and beanie weenies. And @ceblanier, have you been to the Varsity lately? They changed their ice at some point and it's absolutely the best Coke EVER.

When I am sick I need to have Campbell's tomato soup and a grilled cheese (made with processed cheese slices), this is the meal my grandmother would make for me when ever I was too sick to go to school. I can not stand canned soup or fake cheese at any other time, in fact I'm somewhat known for making pretty excellent homemade soups...

Whenever I visit with my mom I ask for "her tea" which is; red rose black tea, milk and too much honey. When my husband figured out the honey proportion thing it was like a bright shining star opened up the heavens.

When I married my husband he came with a few childhood favourites (velveta?) but his mom had made a homemade, culturally sourced version of hamburger helper that's become a favourite for me too. It uses traditional south Asian spices (onion, garlic, ginger, cumin and cardamom) with ground beef, peas and potatoes. It's utterly fantastic, glad I married into that one!

TATER TOT HOTDISH. Cooked ground beef, frozen corn, and a can of cream of mushroom soup mixed together in a 9x13" glass dish, then covered with rows of frozen tater tots and baked. Serve with ketchup.

I would still eat that. It was soooo good. Just asked my mom - she said she would still eat it too, if she ever made it anymore.

Other nostalgic foods? Grandma's homemade rice pudding (stovetop, no eggs, served cold) with thawed frozen raspberries in syrup on top. Other grandma's bread maker bread (had molasses in the recipe - soo good!) fresh from the bread maker and slathered with butter. Velveeta grilled cheese with Campbell's tomato soup (though these days I add a can of diced tomatoes and can't bring myself to use Velveeta). Great-aunt's brown bread. Aunt Karen's mashed potatoes (twice baked with cream cheese, sour cream, onion salt, and butter). Grandma's pecan pie. Other grandma's rhubarb cake (made with pudding and yellow cake mix).

The only thing I love better than my childhood version? Chicken soup. My homemade version is AMAZING. Mostly because I add enough salt, lots of veggies, and don't skim the fat (the best part). It has cured many a sick friend.

When we were little, my mom made this ridiculous dish called "corn chips mexicana", it had a ton of sour cream, and some ground beef, and a lot of cheese, and you'd spoon it onto your plate and dip Fritos into it. It was delicious (because it was so terrible for you?) and I crave it but I'd never make it now, and she hasn't made it in probably 15 years. I crave poptarts all the time, but never buy them because I know how unhealthy they are, might have to give into that one, esp the cinnamon ones.

I second the Cap'n Crunch comment of someone above... I'll get a box for the fiance and I, and then tear up and get that sugar film on the roof of my mouth and think "yeah, I'm good for at least a year..."

We have really good cheese in the fridge but still make our grilled cheeses with Kraft singles when we can't decide on anything else for dinner.

I remember loving Spagehtti-O's but can't picture myself eating them now, it makes me cringe.

I love this article and reading all the comments!

My mom's Chicken potpie. 2 pilsbury pie crusts, 1 can swanson chicken, 1 large can mixed veggies (no beans!) , and one can of cream of mushroom soup. delish!

Either that or her version of shepards pie. 1lb cooked ground beef as the bottom layer, topped by a can of ranch beans, 1 can corn, topped with martha white cornbread, backed until brown.

Both are stupid easy but are total comfort semi-homemade food!

A weird combo my parents always gave me and my sister was peanut butter toast and mac & cheese, specifically Kraft. Also, buttered noodles (literally pasta with just butter on it), and yes, those cardboard-y, disgusting (but oh-so-processed delicious) Totino's pizzas.

A lot of these childhood indulgences were also indulged in college, too, come to think of it. When you're poor...haha.

Dinty Moore beef stew. God, it's so disgusting - probably inferior to some dog foods in today's market - but every once in a while the third grader inside me breaks out and forces me to buy a can.

Never eat the "meat"balls in it, though... I hated them even as a kid.

Keebler Rainbow Chips Deluxe cookies (the craving came back just after having my son), every year I request my mom makes me boxed Funfetti cupcakes with Betty Crocker icing, but the thing that I miss the most that isn't made anymore is Smurf Cereal.

My mom didn't use a lot of processed food but she did make snack bars with Jiffy cake mix that i sometimes crave-they were similar to blondies I guess. I also sometimes miss cinnamon toast, grilled cheese sandwiches-well toasted with sharp cheddar on wheat, grits, homemade soup with saltines or wheat thins and Cokes with crushed ice. She also used to make an amazing pastichio (?) which is sort of like a Greek lagagna with cinnamon and bechamel. No one in my family is Greek, but her pastichio is the best I've ever tried.

Ham and American cheese sandwiches on Wonder Bread with Hellman's mayo. Probably because it was one of the few processed food stuffs my mother ever made. A few weeks ago I kept craving olive loaf sandwiches, another staple from my childhood. And lately I've been eating Jello.

I still love tomato soup with grilled processed cheese sandwich. I have also dreamed about frito pie but I haven't had that in years. I am not sure I can digest frito pie any more.

growing up, when it was hot out, my mother used to make this weird conglomeration of food for dinner:

-boxed kraft macaroni & cheese
-a green salad made with iceberg lettuce
-tuna fish salad made with miracle whip
-toasted bagels

i also miss chef boyardee cheese ravioli from the can. crappy, but tastes delicious to me. and horn & hardarts baked macaroni & cheese, baked beans, stewed tomatoes, creamed spinach and chocolate pudding. i have managed to replicate their mac & cheese and creamed spinach through locating recipes via the internet.

I was going to say marshmallow circus peanuts, but when I saw someone post about Miracle Whip, I gave a heavy sign and immediately got a craving for a boloney and cheese with Miracle Whip. Yes, it's Miracle Whip.

Rusks.... Do they still make them?

My childhood pleasures mostly came from gardens. Last week I sat with my mom drinking black tea and eating tomatoes that had been warmed by the sun in her yard. Some were embellished with a dollop of mayo. This was my favorite when I was seven and it still is. Mom made simple, scratch food my whole life and now I do too. We both have tomatoes and peppers and chard in the yard. I may like a few more herbs than she does, but learning about food has brought me back to my childhood, not away from it.

- Fried clams from Long John Silver's (my mom loved them)
- Liverwurst (!) sandwiches - I went through a liverwurst phase in 2nd grade - thirty years went by and then, as someone above mentioned, I totally had a liverwurst sandwich craving during my last pregnancy!
- My grandmother's shrimp dip - I think it's just a can of tiny shrimp, a package of cream cheese and...some kind of bottled chili or cocktail sauce?

The rest of mine are all repeats:
Boxed cake with, I know, it's so horrible, frosting from a can.
Pop tarts.
Instant ramen.
Spaghetti-Os.
Miracle Whip - especially devilled eggs made with Miracle Whip and yellow mustard.
Velveeta Shells and Cheese. Rarely, but when the craving strikes, there is no substitute.

Emily Lentini - I am laughing at "Irish Spaghetti." Given your name doesn't sound particularly Irish, I wonder if the name was meant to be pejorative.

A2Always - McDonald's fried apple pies were the best.

Aurora Highlights - a friend made that South Asian ground beef and peas thing in college once, saying it was a childhood comfort food. Every now and then I've tried to re-create it, but I never really knew what went into it. I'll try your list!

I am a bit put off by all the food snobbiness in the comments! Let's not put down these delectable foods by accompanying our great memories with stuff like "so bad for you, I know!", "I know it's gross but...", "I usually never eat this!" I still buy and am proud to love Lipton tea, ramen noodles, Kraft mac & cheese, fish sticks, Spaghetti-O's, tater tots, etc. etc. not just for nostalgia sake but because they are SO DELICIOUS. Anyone who thinks otherwise is just plain missing out!

Fish Sticks, Totino's Frozen Pizzas, Pilsbury Cinnamon Rolls, Captin Crunch Berries, Hot Fries, Hostess Chocolate Cupcakes/ Doughnuts Cinnamon Pop Tarts and Toaster Strudels....the list goes on and on. I was raised on this stuff. Ugh and Yum all at the same time.

You can't beat the Kraft Mac & Cheese in the blue box. The reason I don't eat it these days is that I just can't eat 1 serving. If I make it....the whole thing gets eaten.

All of these comments are making me smile. I really do still like the Velveeta-type boxed mac & cheese (not the powdered cheese). But a lot of the convenience foods I ate as a child don't do it for me anymore. Off the top of my head, those include: Hamburger Helper, Tuna Helper, Spam & egg sandwiches on white bread with Miracle Whip, baloney and cheese sandwiches, and Spaghettios. I actually bought a can of Spaghettios for my 3-year-old, thinking he would love that as I did, but he refused to eat it.

Oh man. Chicken and Dumplings in a jar. It was some woman's name? Betty Sue? Blue label. It looked really gross and was always near the Dinty Moore Beef Stew (ick). It had thick square noodles and it was just processed food at it's best!

Also three things from a local food store chain where I grew up, Giant. All chocolate related...Food Sticks. They came in a box and looked like chocolate Slim Jims. Their bakery made BIG sugar cookies that had a dark and light side like the Black and White cookie but it was just a sugar cookie. And their brand of chocolate chip ice cream with the tiny semi sweet chips. Those were they days! I don't know how I was a skinny kid! :P

Velveeta mac-and-cheese, mixed with frozen green peas (obviously, not frozen at the time of consumption).

Also, I hardly ever crave any sort of Little Debbie in my daily life, but as soon as I see one at a friend's house...I MUST HAVE ONE. Especially those Christmas trees.

Campbell's Chicken Noodle Soup. The one in that white and red can. Usually I make my own or stick to the healthier, less salty, Progressive version. But whenever I'm down or not feeling well, that's what I want. Glad I'm not the only one with the kiddy-cravings every once in a while.

I've been vegetarian for years but every now and then I crave a Steak-Umm! Do they still make those??

@JAXLBC - I'm the same way. The whole thing right out of the pan. But I refuse to deny myself making it now and then. So, I have learned to split the ingredients in half before making the mac and cheese. Half the noodles go into a mason jar and half the orange powder into the smallest red Rubbermaids - the kind that dressing goes into for lunches.

Kraft mac n'cheese, and Pillsbury crescent rolls. Also, grilled cheese with Kraft singles (the type of bread doesn't matter) with homemade vegetable or, preferably, tomato soup. Campbell's is just too sweet for me. Oh, and tuna salad with mayo, a tiny bit of mustard, and sweet dill relish.

I am absolutely LOVING the "watching Price is Right with Grandma" memories!! I have the same ones. Summer vacation mornings eating frosted flakes and drinking Quik and watching game shows for hours at her house.

On a bad day I will still make myself my mom's green beans (from a can) sprinkled with lemon pepper and kraft mac n cheese. The food I crave the most - zipper peas cooked in a pressure cooker with a tiny piece of fat back like my grandmother used to make. I've seen the peas exactly ONCE since 1997.

It would have to be Junket Rennet Custard (well worth faking a sickie to get), creamed salmon on toast, butter tarts, date squares and at this time of year a meal of just corn on the cob and tomatoes. Guess what I had for dinner tonight.

Cheese, ham, and crackers, a la Lunchables!

Kraft mac and cheese and fishsticks! Tuna sandwich (wonder bread, mayo, starkist tuna) with ruffles crushed in it with a big glass of milk!!!!! Noms!!!

Someone said Food Sticks... YES! Count Chocula, Franken Berry and Boo Berry cereals... Rocket Pops, Strawberry Quik, Jello 1-2-3, Fun Dip, Alba 77, and on and on.... Now I'm thinking about all those giant Lip Smackers... not a food I know but might as well be, don't even get me started on those!

Tuna noodle casserole. When I am really sad I just gotta make it just like mom did - white sauce, peas, onions, canned tuna, elbow noodles. Also good without noodles on wheat toast. You betcha.

My mom made tuna noodle casserole too! I'm going to call her now for the recipe, that sounds soooo good.

I think a lot of people associate food with childhood holidays. I'm from Dublin (Ireland) and we used to go to Wexford on our holidays, and we used to get crusty loaves of unsliced bread that were really soft and fluffy inside. I still think of it as "Wexford Bread", there's nothing like it.

I have American cousins who used to visit us every couple of years when they were kids and one of my cousins has been near-obsessed with a chocolate covered sandwich biscuit you get here called a Purple Snack (the wrapper is purple). To this day (he's in his late thirties) any American visitor has to be sent back with packs and packs of Purple Snacks for him.

MILLER8786: I don't think it's food snobbishness, I think it's more of an awareness of the ingredients we're putting into our bodies and our desire to step away from these things that were normal at first, but are now cause for health concerns... and come on, I don't like looking at a label and wondering what these weird unpronounceable "ingredients" are!! I indulge my cravings every once in awhile, but that's all it is, an indulgence, not a healthy and intelligent way of eating.

but seriously... Zebra cakes? and those Cosmic Brownies? It was hard to share with the siblings and not eat the whole box. Also, every packaged food (poptarts, zebra cakes) seemed to be made with a family of 2 children in mind. It was hard in this 3 kid household to pretend I didn't care when the youngest got more of everything! I'm not bitter, haha.

It would be interesting for everyone to have put their ages at the end of the comments. I realise this is a cultural thing, and therefore most of a only for americans type of post but for me, Portuguese aged 20, comfort childhood food translates into pork or chicken covered in bread crumbles and fried, with some mashed potatoes to go with it. I think I crave it most of the time really, as we do try not to eat a lot of fried stuff

I tried to recreate my mom's fried chicken coated with Ritz crackers and it was totally wrong since they're no longer made with lard.