I, too, used to love these things. Mind you, my mom always cooked us great meals at home, but Swanson TV Dinners included stuff we usually didn't get: fried chicken, Tater Tots, weird crusty desserts, things like that. Plus, there was playing with the oven, folding back sections of foil, all the other vagaries of the prep.
Plus, they gave us a choice. Like I said, we got great home cooking, but my folk were of the "eat it or go hungry" school. What was served was what we all ate; there were no "Hey, little Dave doesn't like peas, so we'll give him a cheese stick instead." But with a TV Dinner, my brother and I got a choice. We could have different things. We could weigh the appeal of Salisbury Steak vs more enjoyable vegies with the Turkey Dinner vs Tater Tots that only came with Meat Loaf. The power was ours!
Too, it may have been other associations. My brother and I only got TV dinners on the rare occasions when my folks were going out and we were going to have a babysitter. Which was always a fun time. Plus, we always ate TV Dinners on TV Trays in front of the TV (fittingly enough), which was itself a unique treat.
I'm sure that the actual Swanson TV Dinners were a wretched culinary wasteland that I would turn my nose up on today, but I still have a fond place in my heart for them.
Things I miss: The Swanson TV Dinner
Things I miss: The Swanson TV Dinner
So, when I was thirteen or fourteen, my dad was (once again) between jobs.* One of his former students (he'd been a teacher, among other things) was a regional manager for Swanson foods. He loaded us up with free samples. Months of free samples. Rather than just serve them as TV dinners, my folks repackaged everything and froze all the bits separately so they could mix and match.
I ate a lot of Swanson's that year. It kept us going.
*Dad was often between jobs. Probably why I've had less than ten in my entire life.
Yeah, I loved these as a kid. No idea how I'd feel about them now. I still miss the peeling of the foil.
Salisbury steak was my go-to TV dinner. I recall back in the day they weren't bad in terms of quality, but it seems like they got cheaper ingredients as I grew up. More likely I grew to recognize it was never high-quality to begin with, but damned if I still don't occasionally get a hankering for one.
When I was on my own I used to buy the family pack of frozen Salisbury steak and eat hot open-face sandwiches a couple meals a day. Oh to be young again.
Fried Chicken Dinner. Fried chicken with apple cobbler. Apple cobbler with mashed potatoes, mixed veg burning hot but with ice crystals still in the middle.
I still have the occasional Banquet salisbury steak dinner, but honestly, I'd rather just make a cheeseburger.