As a kid growing up at McCallie School, my mother took advantage of the fact that we could eat in the dining hall with the boys on weeknights due to the fact that my father was a teacher there.
I’m sure the food is much better now than it was back then when food quality wasn’t quite as important as it is today. I think McCallie must’ve been more interested in academics and sports than food, obviously.
Nevertheless, as bad as some meals were, there was one that we always looked forward to: the Salisbury steak. It’s a dish that’s really hard to mess up, and smothered with gravy, it was hard to tell if the ground beef was high-quality or not. Probably not.
At its basic level, Salisbury steak is a meatloaf with different seasonings and prepared as individual patties or a hamburger without the bread. What makes it totally different is the gravy. If you’re seeking salvation in any food, Salisbury steak might be it. It’s one of those comfort foods that wraps around you like a well-worn blanket, though, admittedly, TV dinners of the ’60s and ’70s may have somewhat stained its reputation.
Fortunately, we’re all grown up now and don’t have to depend on Swanson to give us our Salisbury steak dinner. But the company does leave many of us with the memories of sitting down in front of the TV and enjoying foil containers of Salisbury steak with watery mashed potatoes with a slab of mystery “butter.”