The ’90s were a weird yet wonderful time period for food. Foods marketed toward kids in particular stand out from the crowd thanks to wacky commercials, interesting flavors, and funky shapes. Many of us have favorite discontinued ’90s snacks that we still hold dear to this day.
One of the most unique ’90s kids foods comes from canned food celebrity Chef Boyardee. In 1995, the company released a Spider-Man themed canned pasta. The canned dinner featured noodles shaped like Spider-Man, his mask, and spiderwebs in a cheesy tomato sauce; an option with meatballs was also available.
This crossover pasta was created as a promotional item for the cartoon “Spider-Man: The Animated Series” that premiered in late 1994. As such, the item’s run was extremely brief, ending around 1997. Despite only being available for a short time, the comic themed canned dinner left a lasting impression on the public, making it one of the most interesting and popular discontinued canned goods of the ’90s.
The appeal of Chef Boyardee’s Spider-Man Pasta
When it comes to marketing, Chef Boyardee could not have picked a better crossover. Spider-Man had been a popular comic book character for years, and the animated television series was already slated to be popular with kids of the ’90s. What better way to capitalize on the buzz than making a kids’ dinner themed around the character?
The whole idea was already great but the marketing team took it a step further by creating the now iconic bright blue images used on the cans, featuring Spider-Man himself in action. Paper advertisements for the new canned dinner looked as if they came directly from a comic book, featuring bright yellow comic font that read “so hot, it’s practically radioactive!”
These designs were plenty eye-catching as is, but what really made the Spider-Man pasta so beloved is the television ads for it. Commercials had kids transforming into animated characters who got to meet Spider-Man and fight bad guys, all thanks to a delicious helping of Spider-Man pasta. It’s easy to see how kids could see that on television and turn to their parents asking for it in their lunch the next day.
