Wartime Food better for our health?

[Deleted User]

In the late 1940s (1948 I started school and had to walk 6 miles a day to and from school.one and a half miles each way four times a day I cam home for lunch.Packed lunches wern't allowed at our school you either had school dinners (yuk) or went home for lunch (much preferable ) raioning finished in 1954 when I was 11 and even though stuff was 'off ration' there wern't the choice of shops or food stuff available to buy.In our road there was only one car (the Drs.) and one phone (also the Drs)Everyone either got a bus or walked.My Dad went to London every day on the train and the rest of us walked, in the summer Mum would take us up to London on a bus for the day as she was facinated by the West End and would window shop for hours, rarely buying anything though.Food was plain and at times a bit boring by todays standards and because of the dificulty in supply we often ate some very odd things. It made me used to eating almost anything put on a plate in front of me though and no child got away with 'I don't fancy thet 'it was eat it up or go without.
Portion sizes were a lot smaller too and plates were often bulked up with vegatables .We had a very large garden and grew most of the stuff we ate.We also had a few chickens which ended up in the pot.No senimentality about food it was a source of meat so you ate it.Fresh fish was also eaten ,not fish fingers as they hadn't come onto the market.No freezers or fridges for my Mum milk was kept fresh in a cold bucket of water in the celler and meat bought (if available) every other day.tea was bought loose leaf and butter by the quarter lb from a big block in the grocers .he could gauge the weight with his two wooden paddles to the last ounce.No supermarkets ,no all day Sunday opening,fish and chips were the only take-aways (and that was rare as well) definately no crisps, my Mum thought they were a dreadful waste of a potato and money.But we all survived and never went hungry although I prefer today's herbs and spices and pastas.I don't know that it was healthier just a different sort of life to todays rush and tear (no anti depressants and few folk feeling stressed out which wasn't bad .Drastic dentists though as if you went to the school dentist it was yanked out not filled:):)

tiff

bobthedambuilder wrote: »

And did you do all this on foot, or in the car? You can be sure that in the war, all this would have been on foot, or exceptionally on the bus.

Yes, but I mean Mum said that you wouldnt do all of these things in one day. Children generally walked to school or got the bus by themselves and you might do the shopping one day but you wouldnt be going all over the place. Mondays might be for washing, Tuesdays shopping etc.