The Rise and Fall of the TV Dinner

1953 was a big year for TV viewers in the U.S.. Westinghouse sold the first NTSC approved color television set and TV Guide published it’s first issue. Favorite programs like I Love Lucy, The George Burns and Gracie Allen Show and What’s My Line? were fast becoming family favorites that were too good to miss just because dinner was on the table.

Frozen foods company C.A. Swanson & Sons was quick to catch on to the public’s growing love affair with television so they introduced the Original TV Dinner. This now classic concept featured an ovenproof aluminum tray divided into three separate compartments in which flash-frozen meat and vegetables were tidily arranged. The first TV Dinner consisted of turkey and gravy sitting atop cornbread dressing, green peas and sweet potatoes. It was high in fat, carbohydrates, sodium and calories but it was tasty and fun to eat, especially in front of the television. The ingenious 3-compartment design kept the food from spilling onto your lap and your gravy didn’t slosh into your peas, so everything stayed nice and colorful within those cute geometrically shaped wells. American's were easy to please in those days.

Swanson was surprised  and elated to have sold over ten million of their clever little dinners in the first year. Neatly packaged within a box that really looked like a TV set, knobs and all, each TV Dinner cost only 98 cents; four cents more than a gallon of milk and sixty-nine cents more than a gallon of gasoline.

TV and Print Advertising was directed at the happy homemaker, who was fast realizing that time was precious, cooking was a chore and the way to a man’s heart wasn’t necessarily through his stomach.

By 1962 sales were still going strong despite competitors like One-Eye Eskimo, Frigi-Dinner, and Banquet (the only one I ever heard of).

Consumers were sold on Swanson’s advertising campaign slogan “Trust Swanson” – and so they did. Stouffer Foods made a higher priced (and higher quality) frozen dinner but Swanson TV Dinners were mass marketed and were in all the supermarkets so they had a definite edge over the competition. In those days, nobody seemed to be too concerned about how "healthy" these flash frozen wonders actually were.

Moving boldly forward into the ever-expanding world of frozen entrees, Swanson decided to drop their iconic “TV” style packaging and began calling their TV Dinners “TV Style Dinners”. The only difference really was the packaging. Perhaps the cute TV set with the knobs was becoming a bit too “kitchy” even for 1962. Still, consumers knew that a TV Dinner by any other name still performs and tastes like a TV Dinner.

Eight years later, Swanson finally figured out that people ate (and prepared) three meals a day so they decided to cash in on the concept by bringing out a TV Dinner-style Breakfast. It made a lot of sense since stay-at-home Mom’s decided it was more fun to burn their bras than the morning toast. Many women weren’t even staying home all day. They were going off to work leaving Dad and the kids to fend for their own breakfast.

The launch of the Swanson breakfast line was celebrated in style at the Hotel St. Regis in New York; unveiled by none other than the gourmet French Chef herself, Julia Child. At the time, Julia was at the height of her television career and was recognized as being a master of the culinary arts. One can’t help but wonder whether she secretly loathed the whole idea of frozen pancakes and sausage in a box. Whatever she thought, Swanson Breakfasts sold like hotcakes.

In 1973 Swanson came out with Hungry Man Dinners. These were the big daddies of TV Dinners. No more skimpy portions for today’s manly men! HM dinners gave you a full pound of fried, starchy, fill-you-up food. Those famous aluminum trays were still there as was the no-cook-‘em convenience and pennies per serving price. It was a great product for single guys (and I guess hungry gals) who couldn’t cook a lick and liked to eat a lot in one sitting.  I remember having a few male friends back then who called Hungry Man Dinners “Desperate Man Dinners” for obvious reasons.  Today they’re still going strong at around $3.00 a meal.

It would be another 13 years before TV Dinners would undergo a milestone transformation. The American oven was becoming a nuisance with its messy racks and unwieldy knobs. What’s more it had to be pre-heated and it took eons to heat up leftovers and other savory presentations such as the TV-Style Dinner. Swanson was again on the cutting edge of pop culture introducing the new microwave-safe TV-Style Dinner. The old 3-compartment aluminum tray moved into a respectable retirement home, the Smithsonian Institute.

Something clicked in 1980. Americans started becoming more conscious of what they were putting into their stomachs. They knew that they were getting fatter, but what was more upsetting was that world health organizations were suggesting that there might be a link between saturated fats and heart attacks. It was the beginning of high-cholesterol consciousness and it would soon become a multi-billion dollar industry.

Low fat, low calorie diets were suddenly all the rage and companies like Stouffer’s with their Lean Cuisine line of frozen dinners put mighty Swanson TV-Style Dinners on the unfashionable fatso list of “what not to eat”.

But even those low fat frozen dinners underwent a transformation in 2003 as did many other “low calorie” foods. Suddenly “low carbohydrate” was in,” low calorie” was out.

Frozen dinner manufacturers reworked their recipes and marketing campaigns to fit the fear du jour. Swanson sold out to Pinnacle Foods who, by the way are now offering super-duper-sized 1 ½ lb. Hungry Man dinners. I love their slogan –“Hungry-Man, It’s Good to be Full”……of food I am sure.

TV Dinners have nevertheless fallen from grace. Somehow I have to give some credit to the fading star of C.A. Swanson’s legacy - the last of the lot; the ever lap friendly Hungry Man TV-Style Dinner. They didn't cave in for the cave man when everyone else was getting prissy about what they ate.

Did Swanson jump when the world health organization said too much fat, too many carbs and too much salt was bad for you? Hell no! Taste was still tantamount (next to satisfying your appetite). Julia Child had the same attitude, but I’ll take her chicken cordon bleu over a Hungry Man Dinner any day.

Here’s the Ingredients List for the Hungry Man Buffalo Style Chicken Strip dinner. You get four flour-coated chicken strips, ripple cut French fries, corn and a Duncan Hines Brownie.

Price: $2.75 (4/$11 sale, Safeway)
Calories 920
Total Fat 54%, 35g
Saturated Fat 35%, 7g
Cholesterol 42%, 125mg
Sodium 39%, 930mg
Carbohydrates 24%, 71g
Dietary Fiber 5%, 6g
Sugars 34g
Protein 34g
Weight Watchers Points: 21 WW Points

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