The jingle jangled its way through the 1980s. “Will it be mushrooms or fried onion rings? We hope it’s chips, it’s chips.”

Sung to the tune of Que Sera, Sera by sweaty builders in the back of a van, the jingle featured in a television commercial for the Birds Eye Steakhouse Grill – a foray into red meat by a company founded on fish fingers.

The ground-beef steaks – and the ad campaign – were dropped in 1994, but now Birds Eye is to relaunch the Steakhouse Grill brand, minus its catchy theme tune.

The resurrection of the brand is the second in recent months by Birds Eye. In January it brought back the Arctic Roll frozen dessert. Both are part of a growing trend among food producers to tap into a wave of nostalgia, seemingly being propelled by a new-found love of comfort food as a way of coping with the recession.

“When times are hard, nostalgia becomes more attractive,” said David Kershaw, chief executive of M&C Saatchi, the advertising agency. “Looking back to bygone days in a somewhat misty-eyed way is a quite understandable response.”

The first high-profile revival came last September, when Cadbury, the confectionery group, brought back the Wispa chocolate bar, which had been killed off five years earlier. Todd Stitzer, chief executive, hailed the revival as the most successful launch ever of a Cadbury chocolate bar.

It was followed by Birds Eye, whose efforts have paid off. More than 3m Arctic Rolls have been sold since they made their return to supermarket shelves after a 12-year absence.

Next in line to be resuscitated is Mellow Bird’s, the instant coffee powder owned by American food giant Kraft. While the brand has never been entirely laid to rest, it is a long way from its 1970s heyday, generating a modest £4m in retail sales, and is being revamped to appeal to a younger crowd. Kraft is also planning to freshen up its Maxwell House instant-coffee label.

It isn’t just brands that are being revived. Marks & Spencer, for example, has introduced a range of sandwiches with old-fashioned fillings, such as jam, ham and salad cream, and corned beef; sales have risen every week since their launch.

Similarly, Waitrose is doing a roaring trade with a collection of traditional cuts of meat, badged as Forgotten Cuts. Some old-fashioned brands are doing well without extra promotion. J Sainsbury, the supermarket, reports that sales of Bird’s custard powder are up 17% year-on-year, while sales of Fray Bentos steak and mushroom pies are up 42%.

Some think there is a straightforward explanation for the raft of “retro-food” that is being snapped up by British shoppers, with market analysts claiming there is no shortage of research to show that consumer behaviour has changed in response to the economic environment.

People are more prepared to “make do and mend”, for example, and enjoy the sense of comfort and wellbeing that trusted brands can bring.

A more cynical interpretation is that the fad for retro-food is also a sign that food companies are cutting back on their spending. Returning to tried and tested formats can be a cost-efficient short cut to securing valuable shelf space in a fiercely competitive grocery sector.

Ben Pearman, marketing director at Birds Eye, said relaunching Arctic Roll made good business sense. “It is a far more effective way of combining consumer needs with the efficiency of creating something we know how to make and already has a high awareness level.” Or, to put it another way, it’s a safer bet than developing a brand new dessert.

Samantha Greenwood, brand manager at Kraft, said that in market research for the relaunch of Mellow Bird’s, a comforting 71% of consumers were able to name the instant coffee when shown the Mellow Bird’s logo.

She declined to disclose how much Kraft is investing in the relaunch, but said the marketing campaign would be heavily skewed towards digital media, which requires a much lower budget than a big television push.

The same money-saving logic also applies to advertising brands. Diageo, the drinks company, is promoting the 250th anniversary of its Guinness stout by rerunning some of its old commercials on Irish television. Company insiders argue that the campaign reminds viewers of the brand’s heritage, but also admit that relying on old advertisements is cheaper. “There is a cost benefit,” conceded one source.

Diageo is not alone in dredging up its old commercials for today’s consumption. Persil’s latest television ad, marking its 100th year, is a compendium of old promotional clips. Heinz has done something similar for baked beans.

Critics (and food snobs) may groan and roll their eyes at some of the brands being revived, wondering if tastes have evolved beyond frozen desserts or instant coffee. This may be beside the point.

Christian Schroeder, chief executive of Lambie-Nairn, a marketing consultancy, said: “Whether a product was good or not, it’s about preaching heritage and tradition and giving people a sense of security.”

Companies argue that there has to be a business case to bring back an old brand – reviving something purely out of a sense of nostalgia makes no sense.

Executives at Cadbury regularly receive letters beseeching the company to reintroduce some defunct chocolate bar or other. Dozens might write or call in, but such low volumes will not have an impact.

“We got out of these bars for a reason,” said Tony Bilsborough, a company spokesman.

“Confectionery is a very competitive market. We’re not going to bring something back just for the fun of it.”

By way of an example, he points to Cadbury’s Aztec bar, which was manufactured for a decade from 1968 and which many older customers recall with fondness. Cadbury bowed to consumer pressure in 1999 and brought it back as a limited edition. It didn’t sell well, serving only to vindicate the decision to drop it in the first place.

The Wispa relaunch was a different story altogether. Fuelled by the internet, social-networking sites such as Face-book and MySpace corralled tens of thousands of fans intoa campaign to get the bar reinstated. That level of interest did prove persuasive and Cadbury duly obliged. The company reported at its annual results in February that the bar’s second coming had so far generated £25m in sales.

The internet has proved a potent tool for retro-food junkies. “Do you remember . . .” type bulletin boards abound and rumours of other revivals can circulate. Confectionery group Mars denies a suggestion doing the rounds that it is to relaunch Snickers under its former British brand name Marathon. And the Wispa lovers on the social-networking sites have a new goal – trying to goad Cadbury into reintroducing the Wispa Gold.

Brand owners should be wary of jumping on the retro bandwagon, however. Graham Hales, managing director in London at Interbrand, a consultancy, said: “While consumers’ economic circumstances may have changed, their desires don’t necessarily change with their wallets. They still want great stuff.”

He warned that downmarket brands could struggle if they feel like a retrograde step for shoppers. There is little sign of that just now. For the time being, the products of yesteryear seem to be pure retail gold.

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