Thriftlady's wartime experiment

thriftlady_2

Popcorn for home popping -anyone know if it was available ?

[Deleted User]

My late Ma-in-law always used Izal toilet paper, as she had three sons and a husband she thought that the ordinary soft paper wasn't tough enough for her 'chaps .also she thought that as it was rather like sandpaper they wouldn't use so much of it. She was one very strong-minded lady and my two daughters were a little afraid of her at times .I remeber once years ago when we were staying at her house she roused us just before daybreak to go 'mushrooming' She knew a field locally where they were in good supply. So there we were my husband and myself and our two little girls and her, wandering around a field looking to pick these blessed mushrooms in what seemed to me an unearthly time of the morning (it was barely light) and rather cold. My eldest DD whispered to me 'Why doesn't Granny go to Sainsburys like you do Mum ?'
I wondered that too at times, she would have loved this site had she still been alive .She was the 'old wife' that all the tales were written about. I think as she had stacks of recipes for all sorts of things .She was an amazing woman who had seen a great deal of hardship in her early days having been widowed at 28 with two very tiny children in the early 1930s when there was very little assistance available.
She would save the lining from the Brook Bond loose leaf tea packets and re-use as a kind of greaseproof paper .She also made some terrific firelighters out of newspaper very tightly twisted and a tiny splash of parrafin on it .Her home-made ginger-beer was gorgeous and her garden was huge (around an acre) and she grew almost every fruit and veg that she could . She kept chickens and had a couple of pigs in the sty at the bottom of the garden Her sons would go fishing down off Cowes point and also go 'rabbiting' . My husband never tasted anything from a tin until he was 18, and was called up to the RAF (conscription was still around after the war)and he was sent to Germany. After we were married he had found a taste for processed peas, and his Mum always used to moan at me as he wouldn't eat any fresh veg at all.She thought it was my fault as I was that odd 'cockney girl' that her eldest had married . Which was a bit unfair as I love fresh veg and wouldn't eat tinned veggies at all. She was a great lady though for all her funny ways and died at 85 in her own bed with all of her faculties and her own teeth of which she was very proud of ,as she had never had a filling, and she put that down to the fact she never used sugar in her life .To sweeten anything she always used honey. I think that My Mum and ma-in-law really knew the value of a copper coin and would have made excellent chancellors of the exchequer's . They never spent what they didn't have and owed no one a penny .
My Mums philosophy was, if you have 6d then save 2d, have 2d for essentials, and use 2d for 'happy cash' .I have always done this all my life and like her, owe no one a penny either . Sometimes when things got tight finacially it was handy to have that sometimes tiny amount of cash behind me for emergencies .
My 'happy cash' is what I have to spend on what ever I fancy, be it only sometimes in more stringent times a cream doughnut. It's what makes me happy, not the amount that is important .
Women of my Mum and ma-in-laws generation were definitely made of stronger stuff than perhaps my generation were.They had to be as often they were left alone whilst there men folk were away for long periods of time and often had to bring up their families alone .Todays young Mums who have to do this I do feel for, as it can't be easy for them as there is so much that their children want, and far more peer pressure.

Night-Owl_5

Great Thread Thriftlady, another one here who has nominated you for post of the month.

Have loved reading all the wartime stories keep them coming:T

tinkerbelluk

Thriftlady - I got this off an American site for you:

During the Depression, popcorn at 5 or 10 cents a bag was one of the few luxuries down-and-out families could afford. While other businesses failed, the popcorn business thrived. An Oklahoma banker who went broke when his bank failed bought a popcorn machine and started a business in a small store near a theater. After a couple years, his popcorn business made enough money to buy back three of the farms he'd lost.
During World War II, sugar was sent overseas for U.S. troops, which meant there wasn't much sugar left in the States to make candy. Thanks to this unusual situation, Americans ate three times as much popcorn as usual.
Popcorn went into a slump during the early 1950s, when television became popular. Attendance at movie theaters dropped and, with it, popcorn consumption. When the public began eating popcorn at home, the new relationship between television and popcorn led to a resurge in popularity.
Microwave popcorn -- the very first use of microwave heating in the 1940s -- has already accounted for $240 million in annual U.S. popcorn sales in the 1990s.
Americans today consume 17 billion quarts of popped popcorn each year. The average American eats about 59 quarts.

Also this "Then the Yanks came. (Please forgive us, you guys over there, but to us you were all THE YANKS). They were all big and handsome and smiling and wonderful. Based up on the hill, they were all over the village and they had CHEWING GUM and POPCORN: what treats for a child brought up during rationing."

Penelope_Penguin

Hello, just received an e-mail about the Dig For Victory Allotment.

It's in London't St James Park, open 7 days a week, until the end of September.

Apologies if this has alreday been posted - I've been away for a couple of days and not had chance to catch up on the thread.

Penny. x

thriftlady_2

Thanks Night Owl and all the others who've nominated me :A

I am getting a bit worried about the butter situation now. We have about twos thirds of a packet now and I'm not at all sure it will last. Was going to give the kids bread, butter and jam for their after school snack but I think it'll be just bread and jam or honey.

thriftlady_2

tinkerbelluk wrote: »

Also this "Then the Yanks came. (Please forgive us, you guys over there, but to us you were all THE YANKS). They were all big and handsome and smiling and wonderful. Based up on the hill, they were all over the village and they had CHEWING GUM and POPCORN: what treats for a child brought up during rationing."

Excellent :T I'm not sure where the nearest yanks were in Worcester though -I'll have to research. It's such a useful snack for the kids.

Thanks for the Dig For Victory link -I'd love to see that allotment.

thriftlady_2

This is a fantastic website. I was just googling Worcester in wartime and found some storie of wartime worcester on the site -one chap remembers American soldiers marching in convoy down Ombersley road where I'll be later today

http://www.bbc.co.uk/ww2peopleswar/

Chipps

The chicken is causing me a problem because it wasn't really available during the war so I feel a bit guilty using it (especially such modern cuts as boned breasts), but I want to use it up rather than buy fresh meat. I reckon a whole chicken will count as our week's ration. I think I will use it -I suppose I could pretend it was rabbit -the opposite of what they did in the war

Perhaps it is an old hen that has outgrown its laying days, & you are making the best use of it by eating it? If that is the case, you could have it as well as your ration if you wanted.

dianadors

When I was little, my greatgrandad often used to make me his favorite wartime dish - Milk Sops. Break bread into pieces and pop into a bowl (I think only white bread would work). Add a spoonful of sugar and hot milk, stir and eat. I used to love it.