Pairing gaming fandom and historical nostalgia, Nicole DiSanto from Pennsylvania has impressed the internet by consuming 60-year-old cookies from the Atomic Age.
DiSanto, 39, has a specific interest in the historical period closely associated with post-World War II nuclear-technology anxieties and the Cold War era—the Atomic Age.
This interest was sparked by the Fallout video-game franchise, renowned for its post-apocalyptic setting steeped in the aesthetics and culture of the 1950s. "Fallout is a franchise of post-apocalyptic role-playing video games," DiSanto told Newsweek. "My passion for the games has inspired me to have one of the largest Fallout collections in the U.S."
Living in a fully decorated Atomic-style pink house from the 1950s, DiSanto and her husband have immersed themselves in a lifestyle that mirrors the retro-futuristic world depicted in the Fallout games. "We even went so far as to buy a pink house from the 1950s and have the interior fully decorated in the Atomic style," DiSanto said.
On her TikTok page, she shared her latest flea-market discovery, 60-year-old military grade cookies, still packaged for consumption in case of nuclear fallout. "I got the crackers at a drive-in movie flea-market in my area of Pennsylvania. They only cost me $5," DiSanto said. "I go to flea markets, thrift stores, and estate sales as often as possible looking for Fallout items, and those can be anything from the video game or from the Atomic Age."
In the video, DiSanto cracks open the box and tastes the cookies—something she said she wouldn't necessarily recommend.
"They smell like 100-year-old semi-sweet rusty cardboard... not pleasant at all," DiSanto said. "They taste kinda like they smell, except not sweet—like the oldest, stalest cracker you've ever accidentally bitten times 1,000, basically."
In thousands of comments, people shared their reactions to her tasting the crackers. One commenter posted: "Why do they actually look so good?" Another wrote: "I love your content."
Beyond her culinary adventures with vintage rations, DiSanto engages in Fallout-style crafting and has gained popularity for creating Fallout-inspired foods, such as Blamco Mac & Cheese and Sugar Bombs cereal.
"I'm glad so many people find my Fallout content entertaining," DiSanto said. "What's awesome to me is not only Fallout fans enjoy it, but people with all kinds of interests who have never heard of the game have reached out and told me how much they love my content."
Uncommon Knowledge
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Newsweek is committed to challenging conventional wisdom and finding connections in the search for common ground.
About the writer
Alice Gibbs is a Newsweek Senior Internet Trends & Culture Reporter based in the U.K. For the last two years ... Read more
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