This Middle Class Sandwich That Was Popular In The '60s Still Holds Up Today

We don't have the most positive association with food from the 1960s. It was the era famous for dishes like tuna casserole, Jello molds, and ambrosia, which have largely fallen out of favor for modern palates. But there are some '60s dining staples that we still enjoy today, and the sloppy joe is definitely one of them.

In its most basic form, a sloppy joe is ground meat in a tomatoey sauce between two slices of bread. However, there are a lot of sloppy joe recipes out there with some slight variations. In fact, one of the things that makes this dish so great is the fact that it is so versatile. Out of tomato paste? Use ketchup or barbecue sauce. Out of hamburger buns? Any other bread will do in a pinch. You can also use ground pork, ground turkey, or a plant-based crumble, and your joe will still turn out flavorful and delicious.

But where did this famed sandwich come from, and who is the titular Joe? No one knows for sure. The history of the sloppy joe is murky. Some say it was started by a chef named Joe in Iowa, while others contend the name comes from a restaurant in Florida. But wherever it came from, this loose meat sandwich took off in the post-war period. By 1957, sloppy joes were being reported on as a staple of American public school lunches. This set the table for a key innovation in the 1960s.

The 1960s saw a particular innovation in the sloppy joe that would propel it to a new level of popularity: the introduction of premade, canned ingredients. One of the most identifiable is the Manwich, introduced by Hunt's in 1969. This tomato sauce mixture is intended to be mixed into the ground meat, making the meal even easier to prepare. It proved popular, and the Manwich (now owned by Conagra) is still around today.

Another canned sloppy joe food item that was popular during the '60s was made by the brand Libby's. It was beef or pork and barbecue sauce in a can, allowing consumers to make sloppy joes with bread as the only extra ingredient required. The brand had a notable commercial jingle with an upbeat tempo that declared "sloppy joes are neat!" This product no longer exists, having been discontinued in the '80s, but all-in-one canned sloppy joe filling is still available if you're craving this '60s classic meal beloved by boomers and their kids.