Don't Mess With A Classic

When I was very little, I scared the crap out of my mother by getting sick and almost dying. I don’t remember the incident -- I was very young -- but I am told I was very close to death. Afterwards, I refused to eat anything but Chinese fried rice for several days. This apparently gave my mother some ideas about “sick people food.”

And so, for the rest of my childhood, whenever I got the snurfles, I would be tucked into bed and fed on a variety of selected viands, notably Canada Dry Ginger Ale and Campbell’s Chicken And Stars Soup. NOT chicken noodle. Chicken noodle was for a quick workday meal or convenient Saturday lunch. Chicken noodle was ORDINARY food.

Chicken and Stars was for SICK people. At least, that was my take away from it. And because I am a creature of habit, when I feel ill, Campbell’s Chicken and Stars is a thing that comes to mind. Not because I’m wild about canned soup, but because Mom served it to me when I was little and didn’t feel good. Comfort food. And for most of my adult life, I have kept a can sitting in the pantry for those occasional days when I don’t feel good.

A few months ago, I got a bug, and I was not well, and there was no soup in the pantry. My dearest went out and obtained the necessaries, and as she prepared to heat up the soup, I noted that the can was wrong. The label as I saw it is shown above.

In my youth, the stars were tiny flecks of pasta, barely identifiable as stars, drifting as a nebula in a yellow sea of chicken stock, interrupted only by the occasional chunk of carrot and floating asteroids of chicken meat. It was familiar and comforting.

THIS stuff, on the other hand, didn’t seem to have any chicken asteroids... and rather than tiny, distant stars, the stars were big cookie cutter chunk things. This soup looked nothing like what I was used to. But my baby had gone out to get food for me when I was sick, and bein’ a grownup now, I kept my mouth shut... and ate the soup.

It was awful. It tasted wrong. They’d changed the broth recipe, and it tasted coppery and wrong. The stars were too big, and the wrong consistency, and there was no loose chicken meat. What the hell WAS this dreck?

When I felt better, I checked the store. Campbell’s had indeed changed the recipe. There was no other “Chicken And Stars” style soup. This was all there was now.

And I frowned and shrugged inwardly. Another part of my childhood, like Fizzies and moon landings, had passed into legend. Lousy corporate bastards. Grr.

...and I promptly got on with the rest of my life. So it goes.

And this past week, I got SERIOUSLY sick, came home from work, and went comatose for the rest of the day. I felt wretched. That’s what I get for not getting a flu shot this year! Urrrgh! And Berni had it too, and we spent a couple of days home from work, right before Christmas, apologizing to each other for being so disgusting...

And after a couple days, I felt that I could manage getting a few things at the grocery store. I wanted soup. Beef and barley! Mmm! And I went and picked up a few things, worked my way round to the soups, got some beef and barley...

...and noted that the cans of Campbell’s Chicken And Stars seemed to have reverted to their previous labels... complete with pictures of the old soup and stars... and, this time, a big “ORIGINAL RECIPE! It’s BACK!” joining it on the label.

I examined a can. It LOOKED like the old soup. But the bastards had disappointed me. They’d denied a dying man his last request! Still... maybe they’d realized their mistake. Perhaps I wasn’t the only person out there who needed Chicken and Stars when they were sick...

I bought a can. I heated it up. I ate it. It was indeed as I remembered it when I was five. It was not at all the weird copper flavored giant star noodle crap they’d tried to sell me last time. I also thought it was interesting that the giant star noodle crap was nowhere to be seen at the store any more. No, apparently, Campbell’s has decided that classic was the way to go.

I wonder: am I the only one who eats Chicken and Stars when they’re sick? Was I the only one who felt betrayed, and prepared to give up Campbell’s? Did Campbell’s have a New Coke Moment, there?

(PROPER Chicken and Stars Soup, seen here)