Bird's custard powder, Bisto gravy and Fray Bentos pies are all having a little fashion moment. According to Asda, we're increasingly stocking up on what might politely be called "heritage brands" and leaving the newer stuff - wasabi paste, extra virgin olive oil and cinnamon sticks - mouldering on the shelves. Sales of Bisto, which recently celebrated its centenary, have risen by a fifth, while Bird's custard powder has done even better, with a hike of more than 25%. Asda, which is doing rather well out of the recession, reports sales of its own-brand fish fingers up 18%.
That's not all. Brands that had become kitschy jokes, the edible equivalent of the lava lamp, have been called out of retirement and placed on active duty. Arctic Roll and Wispa are back on the shelves, while Marks & Spencer has recently launched a jam sandwich, claiming just one bite will take you back to the elemental pleasures of your childhood. And that, everyone seems to agree, is what lies behind the passion for the kind of food you last had at your gran's in 1981 - a desire to sink back into the loving certainties of a simpler time.
The problem with those certainties, though, is that they are bad ones. Many of these highly processed foodstuffs are saturated with sugar and fat. They were mostly developed in the middle of the 20th century, at the high point (or low point) of industrialised food production, when the journey from farm to fork was at its most contorted. These products seemed tasty, easy and quick to a generation that had dug for victory during the war and now fancied letting someone else decide what to have for tea. But, as we all know now, those families of the 60s, 70s and 80s that sat down to breaded scampi would actually have been better off (in all senses) if they'd continued eating as they had when Hitler was a looming shadow.
And it's because we know all this that we've spent the last 15 years re-educating ourselves about the food on our plates. We may not grow our own fruit and veg, but we know a man who does, and he's there every Saturday morning at the farmers' market. We try to eat seasonally, to avoid buying food that has been forced into spooky maturity before its time. We aim to buy locally, to cut out the need for preservatives or pointlessly wasteful packaging. And we shudder at the thought of a generation of schoolchildren brought up on Turkey Twizzlers.
So why are we now throwing away this hard-won knowledge and opting once again for expensive, processed foods? If it really is nostalgia for our childhood, we might ask what was really so great about having to choke down blancmange at primary school, only to bring it all up in the lavs afterwards. And was grandma's cheesecake, constructed out of condensed milk and tinned mandarins, really so fantastic, especially when accompanied by sharp reminders about elbows on tables? The only comforting thing was perhaps the feeling of absolute security that comes with being told what to do and how to eat. But that, surely, is a security born of absolute powerlessness which no sane person would voluntarily re-visit.
Even if you don't buy any of this, there remains the sad fact that Britain's recent conversion to a food culture not so different from that of the French or Italians is revealed to be pretty shaky. Far from having turned into a nation that cooks its food slowly, understands the importance of provenance and isn't afraid of veg that comes with a coating of mud, we're actually the same old deracinated diners we always were. At the first sign of a challenge to our security, we turn away from our new-found love of humble, home-cooked food in favour of something brightly coloured out of a packet that requires you to add two teaspoons of water.
kathryn.hughes22@googlemail.com
