Denise Winterman looked at the key points in the history of the frozen dinner:

• The modern frozen dinner started in 1953 when one retailer had a surplus of Turkey after Thanksgiving. They decided to freeze it up and sell it as a meal.
• While that wasn’t the first TV dinner, it was the first one to pack the food into an aluminum tray that could be used to both cook the food and as a plate for the food.
• The frozen dinner’s popularity was held back until household freezers became more popular.
• The dinners were boosted by changes in family life. More women were working meaning that there wasn’t time to cook. Retailers advertised the dinners to the increasing number of divorced men.
• In recent times frozen food has suffered as consumers have become more concerned with the freshness of their food. But with people unable to afford restaurants due to the recession, frozen dinners have once again become a staple.

Read more about why they were known as TV dinners, the rise of premium frozen food, and “exotic” dinners over here.

Source: BBC