Okay, so apparently in the 1950s, a BLT was called a Bacon and Tomato Sandwich — although the lettuce is doing a pretty lousy job of hiding.
I wonder why it subsequently changed its name. Maybe because “BLT” is just easier to say?
Maybe it was a meat-and-potatoes decade and “lettuce” carried a stigma?
Comics I Don't Understand 
My cousin wrote to me saying “I think lettuce took on a whole new cachet in the 1960s, when Paul Simon wrote the line: ‘Lettuce be lovers, we’ll marry our fortunes together,'” which is the kind of thing that gets Stephan Pastis beaten up by his own characters.
One ad doesn’t mean universality. But it interesting how things that are regionisms quickly take on absolute official rules rather quickly.
I imagine it was the abbreviation BLT that picked up the cache rather quickly rather than the full name of the sandwich.
If you look at the ads, all the sandwiches come with lettuce, even the cheese sandwich. It seems that during that period, if you got a sandwich it had lettuce on it. Only the hamburger lacks lettuce. However, if they had called it a hamburger sandwich, I think it would have it.
I love period advertising for the artwork, lovely illustration here. Why do I have a sudden craving for a frosty Coca-Cola (perhaps even as a fountain drink)?
Years ago my go-to sandwich when eating at diners on road trips with my parents was a BLT.
As for a perhaps more recent trend, when did avocados become popular to include with sandwiches. I’m not a fan, myself…
Singapore Bill explains it along the same lines I was thinking. Interesting what is marked as needing mention and what is unmarked.
The visual style of these for some reason brings back for me a long-ago piece in MAD, illustrating the idea that a single product could be packaged and advertised many different ways. There was a can of soup (I don’t recall if it was tomato or chicken noodle — memory probably influenced by Warhol) but presented with a dozen different labels foregrounding different ingredients and putting others as afterthought notes.. I think the final one was “Tin Can — containing soup of chicken and noodle”.
I agree on the avocado thing. I live in San Antonio and they try and include guacamole with everything. I can’t eat it. It looks too much like what you find in the grand kids diaper.
It must have been pretty well established by 1963:
And lettuce got full billing in this 1958 ad:
According to Wikipedia, the sandwich is about 100 years old, but was not commonly known by the acronym “BLT” until the 1970’s.
Well, I remember my mother fixing BLT’s for me in the 50’s, but she called them club sandwiches, and like in the Wikipedia article, they were double deckered (is that a word?), but unlike the description for a club sandwich in the article, they were bacon, lettuce and tomato all the way down. And even when describing it, it was always bacon, lettuce and tomato, never just bacon and tomato. I don’t remember hearing the term BLT until I was in college, but that is still pre-70’s
There was an avocado shortage this year (as witnessed by their increased prices in the grocery), so that ‘avocado on everything’ fad tapered off, at least here in FL.
Guero, AFAIK the term “club sandwich” mostly just means that double decker structure, and applies across many different fillings. You can even sometimes find a “Club Sandwiches” section on the menu, and it could feature a BLT Club, a Roast Beef Club, a Tuna Club, and more.
Now that I’ve been able to read that (those) article(s), I see my previous comment is overstating it. A little. But probably my ignorance of the history of the term “club sandwich” is similar to that of proprietors of diners who put together menus with “club sandwich” sections including a variety of filling, as long as there is an extra layer of toast and each triangle-sliced part is held together by tiny plastic swords.
So when did Macaroni and Cheese become Mac ‘n Cheese and when did a Peanut Butter and Jelly Sandwich become a PB and J, and when did graham crackers, chocolate and roasted marshmallows become S’mores?
I’d answer 2012 (regrettably), not yet (thank God) but probably will in 2020, and 1977. Of course the terms existed before then but were colloquial and informal and not universal. So my point is, it’s probably impossible to pinpoint these things. We can best find references but we can only speculate how widespread the usage.
Also is a Gin and T and Gin and T? I don’t think so even though everyone (who drinks) in the country (USA) would know what it means.
My friend in England always refers to having a ‘G & T’, which I assume is Gin & Tonic.
Mac ‘n’ Cheese seems to be a ‘thing’ these days – an entire restaurant chain, a feature on many menus I’ve seen – a restaurant here just opened with Mac ‘n’ Cheese for $14.00!!!! Heck, you can still buy the Kraft stuff for under $1.00, i think. Of course, it doesn’t have real cheese, or lobster or whatever in it, but that’s what WE all loved.
In fact, I once made REAL macaroni and cheese, with REAL cheese, and my stepdaughter HATED it. Wanted the Kraft version. Fine by me – lots easier and cheaper to make.
SWORDS IN SANDWICHES – at P.J. Piehole’s, from ‘Cul de Sac’ (the only reason Alice wants to eat there).
https://www.weeklystorybook.com/.a/6a0105369e6edf970b01bb09219029970d-800wi
(there are many more in this sequence, but this was the only one I could find at the moment.)
I always thought it was clever marketing for the Subway sandwich chain to have a sandwich called the BMT. BMT was once one of the three coexisting subway systems in New York. (Subway system, BMT/BLT, get it?) Today, the BMT, INT and IND are all one system, and nobody thinks of them that way anymore.
@ Andréa – Germans are familiar with “gin and tonic”, but they usually leave out the “and”, so it ends up being called “Gintonic“, which I find annoying. One family member tends to leave out the “ale” when asking for “Ginger Ale”, which started to rub off on my kids, until I told my son that if he leaves off the “ale”, I might slice him a piece of fresh ginger.
P.S. I’ve never bothered with mac&cheese mixes in Germany, but on the rare occasions when I’ve gone to the trouble to make real Hollandaise sauce, I’ve learned that half the family prefers the prepackaged stuff (in a carton).
I LOVE sugared ginger!
Many restaurants feature the boxed macaroni & cheese for their kids’ meals. This poses a bit of a dilemma for my daughter. My 4-year old grandson is likely to reject homemade mac & cheese, and happily gobble down the boxed stuff. But the homemade might actually be worth the 4 or 5 dollar price. My daughter hates paying that much for the cheap stuff, even though the kid is much more likely to eat it. I once tried explaining to her that the restaurant has to make money to continue in business. She agreed, but just hates paying so much for something she could whip up at home in fifteen minutes. She wants eating out to be a better dining experience than boxed mac & cheese. I tend to agree with this idea, but a happy 4-year old also makes for a better experience. So when I’m with her, I buy the kid’s meal. That way everybody is happy. :)
About 10 years ago we paid about 10 for a mac and chreee at a Boston restaurant, so $14 today doesn’t impress me at all.
I had never *heard* of boxed macaroni and cheese until my final year in college. My roommates all waxed about it being the so comforting and familiar like Cap’n Crunch and Bob’s Big Boy Blue Cheese dressing. They thought I was being elitist when I told them my mother didn’t allow us to have Cap’n Crunch [*]. But when I told them I had never *heard* of stove top macaroni and cheese they insisted I was be obstinate and argumentative.
I was a curmudgeon geezer back when I was a callow youth.
[*]not quite true. My, also a very young curmudgeon geezer hippy, would occasionally allow us food she didn’t approve of if it was in reason. Or maybe it was because her worthless boyfriends guilt tripped her for being uptight. but there was a while she allowed us to have Cap’n Crunch. I once wanted a bowl very badly but the was no whole milk so I tried it with buttermilk. It was disgusting so I gave it to the dog who didn’t. My mom came home and asked about it and she was livid about the waste (frugality and abhorrence of waste was my mother’s religion in those days) that she screamed and swore she would never allow us to have it again. And she didn’t.
It’s not the $14 price tag that gets me. It’s the casually hip way these upscale menus list it as “Mac ‘n’ Cheese”.
@ Andréa – You are welcome to have all of mine. I keep getting candied ginger as presents (from friends that know that I like ginger ale, or the pickled stuff served with sushi), but despite trying it many times, I simply don’t like the candied variety.
I tried my hand at making it – once – just to see if I could. VERY labor intensive. And I ate it all myself, too. We have a Bulk Nation store nearby, and I daren’t go in, as they have candied ginger. If I go in there, resistance is futile.
In the 50’s when I was growing up, I ate a lot of “Bacon and Tomato Sandwiches”, all with lettuce on them. Must have been 20 years later before I heard of “BLTs”. I also ate a lot of “S’mores” in Girl Scouts and at home around the backyard fire pit, so that name is old. And Mother fixed a lot of macaroni and cheese from scratch — always a treat. But my kids preferred the boxed kind, which was okay by me.
And I, too, love candied ginger. I buy it occasionally in the tiny, expensive packages in Kroger when I can’t stand it any longer. I wish I lived near a place that sells a fresher and tastier version.
You could make it; that’s how I realized why it was so expensive – labor intensive and ginger is not so cheap, nor is it readily available..
Much like baklava, which is also labor intensive and has expensive ingredients, but tastes SO GOOD when it’s still warm from the oven.
Kroger?? I didn’t know that was still extant. Ours in Southeast Wisconsin left years ago. As did A&P, National, Jewel, Kohl’s . . .
I know someone who always orders a “T and T”, or maybe it’s a “TNT”. He likes Tanqueray gin with his tonic. (In my opinion, expensive gin is for martinis. If you want a carbonated gin soda, the cheap house gin is best.
Krogers are all over Texas. They are fighting it out with Walmart/Sams. So far it’s a tie.
Yes, baklava is wonderful!! I’m not a cook, so I wouldn’t attempt making it or candied ginger. Grain-free, nut-free breads are about my limit, and only because I have to.
“Krogers are all over Texas.” Maybe I should qualify that. They are all over the parts of Texas I frequent. It’s a big state, and I don’t really know about most of it.
The thing about S’mores it learning about them was a rite of passage. You’d be around a campfire roasting marshmallows and someone would say I brought graham crackers and hershey’s chocolate so we can make S’mores, and you ask what’s a s’more and they tell you when you eat it, it’s so good you’ll ask for s’more. Then you go back home and tents and campfires and roasted marshmallows seem so “other”. The idea that you could buy S’mores flavored cereal or ice cream or instant s’mores packets would be unheard of. In fact finding a mention of it in a magazine or a television would seem like …. a violation … because it was *your* secret and it’s so tawdry if it becomes … common knowledge.
It’s not cooking; it’s BAKING. Big difference. I NEVER cook (my favorite recipe book is a menu and my favorite recipe is ‘Cut slit in top and microwave 5-6 minutes’), but I used to spend hours baking anything I had a mind to. Nothing, baking-wise, was too great a challenge (attested to by my current weight and figure), whereas if I look just at the ingredients of a cooking recipe, I give up and go out to eat.
I think what discourages me from cooking is that one meal and poof! it’s gone. The effort and cleaning up take more time than the meal itself.
When you bake something, tho, it’s available for at least a day or two.
” If you want a carbonated gin soda, the cheap house gin is best.” Disagree. You can taste the difference in the gin so mid range gin is best. (High end gin is a waste.) And tonic water … Well, Actually the generic stuff you can buy for 99 cents for 2 liters is fine but the soda hose of syrups and soda water that so many bars use… not acceptable. Gin and Tonic is my favorite cocktail.
>t’s not cooking; it’s BAKING. Big difference. I NEVER cook
Funny. I love cooking and I’m really good at it. But Cooking is pure art and no science. Okay, there’s a *tiny* bit of science but that can be picked up with experience but cooking and being a good cook is all about art and flair.
Baking on the other hand is pure magic. You can’t make up *anything*. Admittedly if you make up stuff with no talent your cooking can be terrible. But if you have talent, which is art, noy *knowledge*, you can make up *anything*.
Ah, baking vs cooking — never thought about it that way. It’s all done in the kitchen with ingredients I have to gather and measure and mix and heat somewhere. I have started getting those kits that are delivered to your door, and I can barely manage those. Home Chef is the one I use, but there are others. Otherwise, I do the cut-a-slit-and-microwave thing a lot, too, along with a lot of salads, frequently deconstructed (seems like that word came up recently).
@Woozy, totally agree about the personal nature of s’mores. It’s not just the flavor, it’s roasting the marshmallows and putting them on the graham cracker next to the chocolate so that the chocolate melts a bit, then putting it all into your mouth as the filling squishes out. Now my mouth is watering.
I never had the boxed Mac and Cheese growing up. My mother made it with Velveeta. We used Velveeta a lot. As an adult, I make it with white sauce and shredded cheese. Usually with peas, sometimes canned tuna.
I have actually been using one of the meal kit services a bit. It’s not a bad price when you use the early discounts. I’m a pretty accomplished cook, so this is an effort to expose myself to new recipes because I’d gotten into a bit of rut.
For me they’re a bit too simple. With Hello Fresh, the more complicated ones are “gourmet” and cost extra.
Back to BLTs for a second. As a kid, my family used to make bacon sandwiches with peanut butter, and probably tomato as well. It’s been a while.
We also used to include peanut butter with our grilled cheese sandwiches.
I think I knew about bacon, lettuce, and tomato sandwiches when I was a kid, but when I was a kid I refused to eat lettuce or tomatoes, so at best I might (rarely) have had a bacon sandwich (or a “BLT, hold the LT”).
As an alleged adult, I now don’t mind lettuce, though I rarely go out of my way to ingest any. Still don’t like whole (or sliced) tomato, though chopped up bits in pasta sauces or relish or such is fine. (But I ask for no tomato on restaurant sandwiches that advertise as coming with one.)
Given all of the foods I refused to eat as a kid, it’s a mild wonder I grew up large and strong. Well, mostly large.
If I were to have guessed, I’d have thought “Mac & Cheese” came into use around the time Kraft started marketing it that way, which was way before 2012, so, woozy, what happened (regrettably) in 2012?
And speaking of mac & cheese, I had a hankerin’ for some just a couple of weeks ago. Baked up a batch with sharp cheddar, gruyere, and smoked Gouda; used cavatappi instead of elbow macaroni. It was pretty darn good, but truth be told, if I’m cooking for myself, I’m perfectly happy with the yellow stuff from a box.
Re: Kroger?? I didn’t know that was still extant.
Kroger is the largest grocery chain in the US (at least by revenue) and is the second largest general retailer (after Walmart). Copps and Pick ‘n’ Save are both owned by Kroger (since 2015).
Live ‘n’ learn. When Pick ‘n’ Waste came into town, and Kroger left, I’d no idea one replaced the other but was still within the same company.
How’s this for a strange grocery store name – Piggly Wiggly? I shopped there only ’cause it was two blocks from my home; the name would’ve put me off otherwise.
I moss Kroger here in San Antonio. They left when a union started to give them grief so they just closed the SA stores. Albertson’s left a few years later as they were servicing them from Houston and they wanted out of Houston. Of course they are still an hour up the road in Austin so go figure. They left a lot of brand new buildings empty. No it is down to HEB and Walmart and neither carries some of the stuff I miff from the other 2.
Piggy wiggly was the first grocery store to have shopping carts in the 1910s.
Growing up in the South in the mid-twentieth century, you shopped at either Piggly-Wiggly or Winn-Dixie. There’s a mansion in Memphis, TN, the Pink Palace, (now a city owned museum close to Overton Park) that was the home of the founder of Piggly-Wiggly. Mostly what I remember about it was that it was filled with stuffed big game animals.
Kroger is King Soopers in Colorado, and Ralph’s in SoCal. They buy into the market, but keep the name(s) of the established local chains.
Albertsons and Kroger are leaving Texas because H.E.B. Is eating their lunch. Mr. Howard Edward Butt began his chain of stores in South Texas and has dominated the market there. It has now started to spread north (lookout Dallas-Fort Worth, you’re next).
re: The Pig and shopping carts: Things you learn from the comics.
“There’s a mansion in Memphis, TN, the Pink Palace,”
Here I thought I was original, naming my previous FL house that ’cause I painted it pink . . .
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=wc9s4xxT1ec
We had Piggly-Wiggly stores, too, but the now-defunct local grocery chain I remember best is Red Owl. Currently, the local leader is Cub Foods (though it’s up for sale now).
Pigs, owls, cubs; apparently local shoppers wanted the stores to be named after animals because it was more “natural” or something (though I doubt many went there actually looking for bloody owl drumsticks or prime cuts of baby bears).
St. Louis used to have some national full-service grocery chains, but they’re basically all out. Years ago it ended up with three locally-owned chains. One of those, Shop ‘n Save was bought by SuperValu, a national corporation. Recently SuperValu decided to sell or close all Shop ‘n Save. Local chain Schnucks bought a bunch of them to convert to their brand.
“If I were to have guessed, I’d have thought “Mac & Cheese” came into use around the time Kraft started marketing it that way, which was way before 2012, so, woozy, what happened (regrettably) in 2012?”
Just the tipping point. Kraft starts marketing that way because they want to give the impression of obequity. Food originally doesn’t have names; we just call it what it is. It’s … macaroni and cheese. But if it becomes common and a well-recognized stable of comfortable familiar food we start calling it by affectionate shorthand. Kraft as marketting pushes that idea because it is saying, “Admit, we Kraft, and our familiar product is an essential part of your life that you feel fondly about”. Then “Mac ‘n Cheese” becomes something we say in a casual “Hey, we speak each others language; don’t we” way. And then it goes onto menus in upscale restaurants and casual-chic.
I arbitrarily put that at 2012.
This phase where we start using short-hand in a half common bonding/half challenge way rather fascinates me. I’m not sure when that happened with the BLT or what people thought. I feel it must have been organic Sometimes it seems absurd and inorganic. We are going through the PB and J naming phase right now and it’s odd. I don’t think *anyone* naturally says “PB and J” I think one person made it up and it takes on as… well, a code or a club we all want to be in on “Yeah; I had Peanut Butter and Jelly sandwiches growing up and I experienced what it is meant to evoke and mean; I’m entitled to call it a PB and J and have the associations you all have.”
” It has now started to spread north (lookout Dallas-Fort Worth, you’re next).”
That’s where I am. There’s a big bit of bare land on an intersection near me that is owned by HEB, but there are also 3 Krogers and 6 (yes, 6) Walmarts within 6 miles of my house. It may get interesting if HEB does build.
Has it been pointed out yet that Macaroni and Cheese is called Kraft Dinner outside of the US?
Trivia.
In my house we call macaroni and cheese “Annie’s”.
Dyfsunctional – originally the subways in NYC were private companies – hence the different groups of lines had different names. When NYC turned them all into one publicly owned company was when the old names were lost. Same with the bus lines which used to be privately owned by different companies which were made into the publicly owned buses.
Mark in Boston – You are lucky (and I hope I am) that you mentioned TNT and it went through. I do the newsletter for embroidery chapter (mostly the project for the meeting and what to bring but I throw in other things like exhibitions and such) and have done so for a few years. It is an emailed newsletter. All of a sudden I started having a problem with newsletters bouncing back – all the ones that were emailed to members with their email addresses through the local cable company – as containing objectionable material. Huh? Embroidery objectionable? I started reading it very carefully and the subject line caught my eye. The newsletter is named Thread Needle Thimble and I abbreviate it in the subject line -of course as TNT. So I figured out that someone at our cable company thought it a much more explosive subject than it was – now I write the name out int the subject line and refer to it as “the newsletter” no problem. I also send a copy of the newsletter to the editors of the other chapters in our region and one of them when she read why the subject line changed wrote me back- she had a similar problem when she sent it out for the Skykill chapter.
andrea – I rarely use microwave to cook but when Robert first hurt his arm and we were stuck in the house I was going crazy trying to find something for him to eat. He decided that he wanted chicken pot pie and I bought a couple of them frozen to make. I had planned on making in them in the original oven, but it was going to take more time than Robert wanted to wait, so I figured I would microwave them. I couldn’t. My microwave is only about 3/4 of the wattage needed to cook it – and the instructions specifically said not to cook it at a lower wattage or it would not cook. It surprised me that a microwave,bought within the last few years could not be used for cooking standard frozen items.
I only remember it being called Bacon, lettuce and tomato (and if made at home it was beef fry, lettuce and tomato). I could not always eat lettuce (still varies whether or not I can) so it was bacon and tomato. But it was a problem if I had it in a restaurant – I don’t eat Mayo. I also don’t eat sandwiches which had Mayo on it and someone changed the top piece of bread as it was ordered without, brought to the customer and refused.
The subway lines were consolidated in the 1940s. I never understood why this song was in Hair, since the play was written about 20 years after the IRT, BMT and IND last existed as separate entities.
On the other hand.. when I was very young, I’m pretty sure I did sometimes hear people use those terms, even though that was less than a decade before Hair.
On the other other hand, it’s one thing for my grandparents to have made these references, and quite another for teenagers in 1967 to do so.
Likewise, DanV… when my son was in preschool, his friend spent the day at our house once a week and they always had mac and cheese for lunch (along with yogurt, and then oatmeal cookies: kids that age are nothing if not creatures of habit). One day the friend’s mother asked me for my mac and cheese recipe, because her son never liked her version, but always spoke of “Bill’s macaroni and cheese.”
We all know where this is going…
Bill, how long ago did NY rename sixth avenue to Avenue of the Americas? Everyone still calls it sixth avenue.
Arthur, 6th Avenue was officially renamed Avenue of the Americas in 1945 — but you’re right, no New Yorker calls it that.
You can can always recognize an outsider by his ability to say “Avenue of the Americas” and his belief that traffic lights dictate when you’re supposed to cross a street.
MAC ‘N’ CHEESE –
http://zitscomics.com/comics/november-11-2018/
Bill -when I was a kid in the 1950s and early 60s the signs still had the old names for the various lines. By the time I was working in the mid 1970s they were gone and only the letter/number designations for the various train lines remained with new descriptive signs of 8th avenue lines, 6th avenue lines, Broadway, etc. in Manhattan.
My dad continued to use the old line names for reference – he would give directions to me to take the IND from Queens to Manhattan and transfer downtown to the IRT, etc.
Bill – Dad used to talk about tourists walking back and forth between 5th and 7th unable to find 6th Avenue as it had been renamed, but they had been told to go to something on it. (I really can’t believe that after reaching the other avenue -5th from7th, 7th from 5th – people would not figure that the avenue between must be 6th,despite the name.
My go to lunch was and is peanut butter sandwich – no jelly. Back in school I took a half a peanut butter sandwich, “bones” cut off , to lunch every day,except if it was Passover or the day of the first evening when I couldn’t have bread – and if school was on during Passover – peanut butter on matzoh. When I need a lunch now – such as when I go to a client in Manhattan – it is a peanut butter sandwich I bring with me -now a full sandwich with crusts or roll, depending on which type of bread Robert has me buying to sit around and have turn green before it is finished.
When I was a kid in the 1950s and early 60s the signs still had the old names for the various lines
Okay, that matches my memory.
Still doesn’t explain why a late-60s flower child would use the terms, though.
Honestly, anybody who can’t figure out the name of the avenue between 5th and 7th deserves to be lost.
For the most part, of course, you have to work pretty hard to get lost anywhere in Midtown.
Re: 6th Avenue: all a tourist would have to do is ask any real New Yorker.
So what’s the name of the avenue between 5th and 3rd? I can sympathize with the tourists, especially if they’re coming up from first visiting the village, where 4th Street crosses 10th St., 11th St. and 12th St.!
Back to the original OT subject:
As I stated elsewhere (before I remembered “search”), one of my slang dictionaries traces BLT back to 1952.