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Hot foods in grocery stores

Posted: January 7th, 2019, 9:23 pm
by storewanderer
When did grocery stores start to offer hot foods? I recently saw a Mayfair ad clip from a 1969 grand opening and it had hot foods advertised (bbq chicken, etc.).

It did not appear they were advertising a formal service deli but they had a few hot prepared foods in the ad. So I wonder if there was a department just for hot foods or if the hot foods were done by some other department? There was also a bakery ad. I do very vaguely remember the bakery in the right front corner of this store (which closed as an independent when I was about 3).

I thought grocery store hot foods took off in the late 70's and into the 80's...

Re: Hot foods in grocery stores

Posted: January 8th, 2019, 5:36 am
by jamcool
Those BBQ chickens, and the rotisseries on rollers have been around since the 60s at least.

Re: Hot foods in grocery stores

Posted: January 8th, 2019, 3:13 pm
by klkla
storewanderer wrote: January 7th, 2019, 9:23 pmI thought grocery store hot foods took off in the late 70's and into the 80's...
I think your timeline is about right. Mayfair prepared rotisserie chickens from their meat department right up until the end. Only a few stores had actual service delis (off the top of my head I only remember Hollywood Franklin and Silverlake having them). Some of their stores also had snack bars which carried hot dogs, but those were leased departments.

In SoCal the first Service Deli with fried foods that I remember was at Market Basket under Kroger's ownership in the late 70's. They made them the focus of their advertising at the time. When Ralphs entered San Diego in the early 1980's their 'Appetite Shops' were unique to that market. Vons, which was the market share leader at the time, had extensive Bakeries but no Deli's that I remember. Safeway started adding them as a regular feature to new stores and remodels around 1984.

Re: Hot foods in grocery stores

Posted: January 8th, 2019, 6:15 pm
by storewanderer
Interesting. I did not know preparing hot foods in the meat department was a common thing in the past. The two still open Scolaris (which have no deli) do that to this day and I always thought it was a one off program for them. They seem to cook up some rotisserie chickens and also the old meat (including things like sausage, etc.) so you never quite know what will be there.

Re: Hot foods in grocery stores

Posted: January 8th, 2019, 7:20 pm
by rwsandiego
Jewel started Chef’s Kitchen in the 1960’s and before that they opened “Patio Foods Shops” in several stores, including the Oakbrok Center Store. Both carried hot foods like barbecue, fried chicken, rotisserie chicken, and the like.

Re: Hot foods in grocery stores

Posted: January 8th, 2019, 10:49 pm
by storewanderer
rwsandiego wrote: January 8th, 2019, 7:20 pm Jewel started Chef’s Kitchen in the 1960’s and before that they opened “Patio Foods Shops” in several stores, including the Oakbrok Center Store. Both carried hot foods like barbecue, fried chicken, rotisserie chicken, and the like.
And somewhere along the way Jewel got rid of fried chicken. I remember in the late 90's one of the first things the old Albertsons bragged about doing was installing fryers in the Jewel Stores. I think that was about their only enhancement to anything ASC.

Re: Hot foods in grocery stores

Posted: January 9th, 2019, 11:32 am
by Brian Lutz
You'd probably get a better answer to this question over at Groceteria, but from my vague recollections the old Bellevue Safeway opened with a hot food deli department in 1963. I'd have to dig through newspapers to find more info, but you could probably find newspaper ads showing this.

Re: Hot foods in grocery stores

Posted: January 9th, 2019, 2:54 pm
by buckguy
Even A&P put rotisserie chicken these into new stores by the late 60s.

Before it bought Fisher Foods in Cleveland, Fazios had these in its stores in the early 60s. there were independents that had cafes even before that in Cleveland and probably elsewhere. Deli sections with cold foods easily go back to the 50s.