Meals from a box hold a helping of nostalgia, too

Boxed convenience foods aren't just dinner

My children had no idea a salad could come in a cardboard box on a grocery store shelf until I took them to buy Suddenly Salad.

The Betty Crocker meal had been a staple at my Grandma’s house, where I was raised. And the trio of noodles, dried red peppers and flavorful seasoning packet brought me back there as instantly as the Suddenly Salad was made.

I hadn’t consumed boxed convenience foods since I was a child, but grief over my grandmother’s death before the pandemic caused me to make the special trip to the store.

Food and grief have been inextricably tied for millennia. We take food to families who have lost a loved one. We serve food at lunches after funerals. We “eat our feelings.” During the coronavirus lockdown, with time on my hands after a job layoff, I found myself obsessing about things over which I have no control. At night, I lay awake ruminating about how much I hated that Grandma was dead.