Thriftlady's wartime experiment

Well done Thriftlady. I'm sure it will be very rewarding to challenge yourself and your family this way. And if it will shed those unwanted visitors that seem to settle on our thighs, all the better.

Australia also had rationing books, but I'm not sure of what our allowances were but I'd say much the same as yours.

Hi Thriftlady!

I think this thread is going to be very popular!
I have just baked a spice cake for my project (from the Stork Wartime Cookery book) and am eating a slice now, it's lovely so thought I would pop the recipe on here in case you want to try it.

Spice Cake

3oz Stork marge or butter
3 tbspns golden syrup or 6oz sugar
6oz sr flour
pinch of salt
1/4 tsp nutmeg
1/4 tsp cinnamon
1/4 tsp ginger
1 tbspn lemon juice (lemon essence could have been subst)
1 tablespoon water
Grated rind of 1 lemon
2oz sultanas
1 egg

Topping:
1oz stork marge or butter
2 tbspn brown sugar
1/4 tsp nutmeg
1/4 tsp ginger
2 tbspns flour
1 oz walnuts (optional)

Cake:
Brush a cake tin with melted butter and line with greaseproof paper (or dust with flour). Cream the stork/butter with the golden syrup or sugar and beat in the egg. beat well until the mixture is light and fluffy. Sift the flour with the salt and spices and add to the mixture, alternately with the lemon juice and water, mixed together. Lastly stir in the sultanas and lemon rind (if you have it).

Topping:
Mix together the flour, brown sugar and spices and cut the stork/butter into the mixture with a fork. When the mixture is crumbly, scatter it over the top of the cake. Add the roughly chopped walnuts (optional). Bake for about 1 hour and 10 mins at gas mark 4/150C fan oven.

Can be served hot as a pudding or cold as a cake.

I'll be reading this with interest. I've often thought of doing this myself as wartime rationing fascinates me. I've got "We'll Eat Again" which I got from Past Times years ago. I tried making the cinder toffee from it, but decided they were wrong about the size of tin they specified!!! Needless to say I used one which was far too small and it all frothed up over the cooker.

I'm not sure what vegetarian/vegan rationing was like though as I can't find out what they got instead of the meat ration.

I devised a wartime menu about a year ago which we stuck to for a month. Must say neither I or the kids enjoyed it much but it got us through a tight month.

Ah rissoles, and spam fritters , no wonder we were a sturdy lot in those days . My late Mum always made soda-scones with the milk on the 'turn' mainly because she never owned a fridge in her life, and the milk was kept in a metal bucket half full of cold water to keep it cold .
Even mice couldn't get a decent meal in our house . She also made 'stovies which are a Scots dish., if you google it you will get the recipe
Porridge for breakfast with a little salt sprinkled on the top, and if you were lucky the top of the milk . I was 12 before I tasted cornflakes .
We also used salt to clean our teeth.My Mum never had a filling in her life and rarely went to the dentist.Great thread by the way it is bring back lots of memories for me .
Bread and dripping toast Mmm with some pepper and salt on the top.:j
Door-step sandwiches ,there was no sliced bread in the bakers . I thought I had died and gone to heaven the first time I tasted 'Dunkies' which were sugared doughnuts with a hole in the middle. Our milkman started to deliver them along with the milk, and he and the baker fell out over it .The milk was delivered by horse and cart and it was my job to follow 'Jimmy' the horse down our road in the hope he would present me with something for my bucket .My brothers were supposed to take turns but they were amazingly absent when ever the milkman was due. I hated that darned horse with avengence as he always tried to bite me ,ungrateful beast.:mad: I used to bring him an apple or a carrot in the hope he would do his 'duty':eek: His 'deposits ' were used on the garden and we had the best Rhubarb in our road.:eek: The coal man and my Mum were always arguing , She would watch him like a hawk, and if it was raining she would tell him that she wanted extra to make up for the water in the sacks:D God help him if she got some 'nuttyslack' ( small bits of coal that were hard to burn ,like little pebbles) in her order , she would shovel it up and give it back to him the following week.Coal was 6/- a cwt (around 30p) but very valuable as it not only heated the kitchen, but it also went into the big black range that she cooked on.
She spent hours 'black-leading her range so it almost glowed .She also 'donkey-stoned ' the front doorstep every morning apart from Sunday. Women did this then, as they prided themselves on a snowy white doorstep, and God help any child with mucky shoes who trekked mud on it.
I can't remember the last time I saw a white doorstep. even I haven't got one .:D thank goodness. Not everything was great in those days ,housework was a lot harder as there were no helpful appliances. She owned a 'Ewbank' carpet sweeper that you had to push around manually ,but then she only had one carpet to sweep anyway in the 'front' room. It was Lino elsewhere, and that got mopped everyday