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2 of 2 people found the following review helpful:
5.0 out of 5 stars
Sugar-coated nostalgia., March 8, 2003
Just flick the pages of this book and marvel at the ingenuity of the food technologist, page fifty-eight shows a 1965 packet of Kellogg's Strawberry Kreme Krunch, `Chunks of REAL ICE CREAM Freeze-dried in a nutritious cereal' or page seventy-nine with a 1960s packet of King Stir wands with `SIX IMITATION ROOT BEER FLAVOR DRINKS'. Everything is either flavor-enhanced, sugar-coated or artificial, just the way kids like it too.All the colorful packets come from a huge collection the two author's have amassed over the last fifteen years, starting with a 1930s 5c packet of Mickey Mouse Cookies (which looks in surprisingly good condition considering it is over sixty years old) and moving through the years to the Seventies. The boxes and containers are predictably designed with bright colors and sledgehammer graphics to catch the eye of tiny tots in the supermarket aisles. An interesting exception is the 1970s very graphic Screaming Yellow Zonkers! Popcorn snack box which was black with some small colored lettering. The food makers knew how to pitch their packaging for maximum sales so they used the popular heroes of the time, Superman, Popeye, Dick Tracy, Hopalong Cassidy (I wonder if he ever ate those Burry's cookies) and as the packets show, in more modern times the makers created food with their own heroes, like Cap'n Crunch or Puddin' Head. If you grew up in the Fifties, Sixties or Seventies you'll enjoy this well designed paperback of colourful food packaging, mostly breakfast cereals but also drinks, cake-mixes, candy, Jell-O, ice cream, cookies and more. There's nothing artificial about this book!
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