MINDLESS MUSINGS

Growing up as a kid in the 1970s, restaurant and take away food outlets were much less prevalent than our fast-food saturated cities of today. Hamburgers, sandwiches, fish and chips were the usual fair. In my suburb there were two hamburger shops: the famous Cobb & Co. drive in (Cobbo) and Boss’s fish and chip shop (the fish and greasies).

The Cobbo had the delectable double cheeseburger; anyone who remembers, remembers it very fondly! The footlong hot dog was their signature dish, and for a lot of us they were our first encounter with chicken salt on chips; that glorious flavour we all loved but couldn’t get anywhere else. Their burgers were delicious and had a unique twist we often pondered and joked about. I was sure they used cabbage instead of lettuce, but I have no way of finding out.

Boss had the classic take away shop. A Greek bloke who made burgers and fish and chips wrapped in the old butcher’s paper. I know newspaper was a big thing, but Boss used the plain white stuff. You would still hold the packet up and tear off the top, holding it under one arm while eating with the other and offering it to your mates. The ‘help yourself’ signal was opening it all the way on the table.

He also offered the other take away staples: Pies, Chiko Rolls, battered savs (in Sydney), fried dim sims, steak sandwiches and scallops (potato). I’m sure he sold cooked chickens, but I don’t know if they were charcoal cooked or whatever else. It tasted good anyway.

He had a sandwich counter, but I don’t remember many people buying any. I know I tried and wasn’t impressed with them. I even remember a sandwich shop opening a little further along the highway with nice food. Whenever I went there, I would sneak past Boss’s or walk the other way around. He even confronted me about this betrayal once; that was awkward.

I’m pretty sure he made milk shakes, but you couldn’t beat Cobbo’s thick shakes. They also sold soft serve ice cream – awesome! Two shops selling very similar tucker, but we all knew the distinctions, and they would always influence our choice.

“I feel like a Cobbo or a Greasy’s burger”

“I want the Cobbo chips”

I can’t recall anyone being so gauche as buying a combination of both.

We also had a Milk Bar down near the train station. A strange hodge podge store. A very small selection of groceries on a couple of tall shelves squished to one side. Their main clientele was there for frozen ice creams/blocks, soft drinks, chocolates, cigarettes bubble or chewing gum and lollies: packets and the forever adored 1 cent lollies. You would choose from the cornucopia of confectionary in the boxes behind the glass and they would bag them up for you. A 20-cent bag was bloody huge; although there were a few high-end treats: Cobbers were 2 cents and things like giant snakes could go as high as 5 cents! Such opulence! You had to wight things up carefully. I have fond memories of dad walking down there with my sister and I on random evenings; a bag of mixed lollies, an ice cream and a soft drink – sugar rush!!!

Of course, they also sold milkshakes, although I have few recollections of going in for one. They may or may not have sold sandwiches, but they definitely sold pies and sausage rolls; my mate and I used to buy one before going to soccer training. Our teammates were never impressed with our undisguised lack of enthusiasm.

Sometime around starting high school a new hamburger shop opened in the next suburb. The big drawcard was “they put beetroot on the burger”; sensational! A third option in the hamburger stakes. The variety was mindboggling!

McDonalds and Kentucky Fried Chicken (as we knew it) were only accessible by car, requiring a grown up. They were in the city though, which added extra joy to our train trips there; most often to go to the movies. That’s another nostalgic trip we’ll take later.

Those few shops in our immediate area were our easiest options. There were different offerings if you managed to get an adult to drive or rode your bike, but we never felt starved of choice. For us it was a genuine smorgasbord with clear differences between establishments.

These places were family run and were not 24-hour businesses. Some were even shut on Sunday! There were very few service stations like today with built in convenience stores; these seem to have replaced the corner shops and/or milk bars.

Boring? I don’t remember it that way. Getting bored? Of course, now and then. It was all we knew though and we felt spoiled for choice.