What Did People Eat In The 1950's

Farway

quintwins wrote: »

I'm only in my mid twenties but i find this thread interesting and just wanted to add i have gooseberries in my garden, no idea wat to do with them tho.

You can just leave them to fully ripen and then eat them raw, like strawberries, maybe with some fresh cream?

Or cook & put into a crumble?

Raw is nice & easy

You will know they are ripe when they squeeze easily, taste one first

you may have to cover them to stop the birds, old net curtains are MSE

PS look up "top & tailing" before you serve or cook them

quintwins

I was just gonna say there not ripe yet anyway so i was gonna wait til they were i'm sure the kids will eat them they love all berries, i never knew about top& tailing tho thank you for that, do i need to do that if they eat them raw? seems like alot of work.

oldtractor

For those wanting to grow gooseberries; they are ridiculously easy to grow and increase from cuttings which roots very easily too. However they are prone to mildew and I have found its best to buy mildew resistant varieties.
I learnt the hard way and some of my [many] bushes are going to have to come out. 1 or 2 bushes is enough for most families BTW.

oldtractor

quintwins wrote: »

I'm only in my mid twenties but i find this thread interesting and just wanted to add i have gooseberries in my garden, no idea wat to do with them tho.

just stew for a few minuets in a small amount of water or lemonade. add sugar or honey to taste after cooking. You can then set them in a jelly ;or serve with ice cream or creme freche; or you can make jam and pies from the raw fruit.

oldtractor

quintwins wrote: »

I was just gonna say there not ripe yet anyway so i was gonna wait til they were i'm sure the kids will eat them they love all berries, i never knew about top& tailing tho thank you for that, do i need to do that if they eat them raw? seems like alot of work.

top and tail with your thumb nail. not difficult.
they are very sour raw at this time of year; like rhubarb.

Need2bthrifty

quintwins wrote: »

I'm only in my mid twenties but i find this thread interesting and just wanted to add i have gooseberries in my garden, no idea wat to do with them tho.

Green Gooseberries make a fantastic ice cream, Nigella does a Gooseberry and Elderflower Ice Cream which is to die for. Because of the sharp acidic flavour of the gooseberries it is a bit like sherbet on your tongue.

Mojisola

Gooseberry wine - made with the added flavour from a few heads of elderflower - delicious!

Haffiana

I have loved reading this thread, it has brought back so many memories. My mother was from the Middle East and struggled in a land where olive oil was only sold in chemists' shops, and 'salad' was a few damp leaves, two slices of cucumber and some mustard and cress....

Does anyone remember tiger nuts from the sweetshop?

I think anyone who remembers all this would like this website http://www.1900s.org.uk/index.htm which also has some great items about the 1950s. I grew up in London, and some of the things described about the 1920s were still in evidence when I was a child in the 1960s.

Jojo_the_Tightfisted

Itismehonest wrote: »

There were loads of things which were sold, like the broken biscuits, from a sack or barrel. The shops used to buy their stock in wholesale quantities & 'packaging'. They would open it up, weigh or count out what the shopper wanted, put it in a paper bag (or roll it up in newspaper, depending on what it was) & off you went with it in your shopping bag/basket.

Incidentally, who remembers the Co-ops of the 50s & 60s with their 'divi stamps"? They also had the cashier whizz-along-a-wire-in-the-air things. I can remember watching those with fascination while Mum shopped.
Green Shield stamps formed a large part of people's lives then in their pre-Argos days.

If I remember rightly, Argos is actually the Green Shield Shop - they renamed it and made it available to everybody who wanted to sit and wait for their shopping to be [STRIKE]brought to them[/STRIKE] slung down a conveyor belt and handed to you after a 45 minute wait.

JBD

I was born in 1960. We had 7 in our family and money was tight, we mainly lived on carbs. My Mum bought 1 large loaf a day [always an uncut loaf from the bakers], 3 pounds of potatoes and 6 pints of [full cream] milk from the milk man. We had very little meat.
Our most common meals were things like mince and onions with dumplings,' shepherds' pie [made with 1 tin of corned beef], ham and egg pie, cornflakes and wheetabix for breakfast and supper. When we had family to visit we would have ham as a treat.
My Mum always made her own pastry and cakes, using the Be-ro book recipes. They were lovely.
We were all skinny as rakes apart from my Dad. We were all very active apart from him.
Things did change a bit in the 70's, my Mum worked full time and we started to eat more convenience food.