Thriftlady's wartime experiment

shelley1977

hi,
i wondered if the recipe for syrup loaf near the begining of this thread would be suitable for freezing? my children love it so it would be nice if i could cook a few extra

thriftlady_2

shelley1977 wrote: »

hi,
i wondered if the recipe for syrup loaf near the begining of this thread would be suitable for freezing? my children love it so it would be nice if i could cook a few extra

It'll freeze fine- most cakes and biscuits do;)

bonsibabe

thriftylady - thank you for starting this thread, am planning the carrot cookies tomorrow to see if the family like them. If they do then i can make a batch for DD1 for her school snack box. Might just make enough that she can take them into school for her class so they can see what wartime biccies were like! She is only 6 but understands a little about the war. Loves to tell people that her great-grandad is a superhero from the war lol. Add to that the fact that he is older than god!

Thanks again for the thread, it really is an inspiration!

Rossy2692

Well with things as hard as they are nowadays I am thinking of adopting a few ideas from the time of WWII. I can remember my dear old nan telling us how she used to feed a family of 6 with hardly any money and the use of her rationing book. Those hard times seemed to me like a lesson for us now, not in a big way i would like to be clear I AM NOT COMPARING NOWADAYS WITH THE HARSHNESS OF WWII, I would just like to clear that up. They just seemed to make the most of things and get on with it, I like this idea, so to does anyone have any ideas about really stripping things back to the bone?

Thanks

Pink.

Hi Rossy,

There's a brilliant thread on Wartime rationing started by Thriftlady that should help so I've added your post to it.

These threads may interest you too:

War ration blog

World War 2 rationing - meal ideas, games and memories.

Book on World War Rationing ?

Pink

shetitasatic

My Mum was in service before the War, and was always a frugal and inventive cook. She used to make a 'wartime omelette' with breadcrumbs added to beaten eggs and water/milk. This made quite a substantial omelette and I still do this sometimes. She also made a version of bakewell tart using ground rice and almond essence instead of ground almonds.
I was born in 1947 and remember rationing - I had my own card for sweets!
My Nan and Grandad lived in the country and had 1/4 acre garden. They kept chickens and grew everything they needed. I remember Nan making fowl pie when they had to kill an old layer. She boiled the hen first and then let it go cold. She skimmed off the fat on the surface and used this to make the pastry - it was deep yellow and just melted in the mouth! My nan made her own wine - I remember the corks popping on the dandelion and burdock kept in the pantry under the stairs!
I remember getting up at 5am to go mushrooming - the best ones were in the fields where horses had been.
She picked most things that grew wild - little wild strawberries, loads of blackberries for b'berry and apple jam and bramble jelly, crab apples for jelly
elderflowers and berries for wine and stinging nettles to cook, and sloes for sloe gin.
She used to make 'sad cake'( a sort of lardy cake?) and potato cake in the rayburn, I only wish I had the recipes.
This all makes me realise how much I miss my Mum and my Nan, and how hard they worked to give us such a good upbringing in difficult times

Spamfritter

Hi, my girlfriend and I are planning to try a week or possibly 2 on a 1942 diet.

I have all the information i need on recipes and the basic weekly ration, what i am lacking is information on what you could buy with you monthly 16 extra point... Does anyone have information on average point values for produce? so far all ive tracked down is 1 point for dried peas and 36 for a tin of salmon! doesnt give me much idea on what else i could get. As this is partly as a social experiment i want to be as acurate as possible. Dont want to have to get by on a jar of bovril and some golden syrup if i may be able to get a little more (gravy granules, condensed milk etc) but i also dont want to have more than i should. Any help gratefully recieved!

thriftlady_2

Hello Spamfritter-love your name!

I found it extremely difficult to find out exactly how the points system worked. There's very little information out there. The most useful information I found was from a 1998 article in the BBC Good Food magazine. This is what it says:

Extras available with points

16 points allowed per person each month, so the family (this was a family of 4 who were living on rations for a week) has 4 points each for the week.

Biscuits (poor selection) -100g/4oz
Cornflakes (sometimes out of stock) -2 helpings a week
Ovaltine/Horlicks (sometimes hard to obtain) -2 mugfuls a week
Rice (sometimes scarce) -225g/8oz
Canned salmon -200g/7oz
Honey -50ml/2 fl oz
Beer - 3.6l/6 pints
Gin or whisky -6 measures
orange juice -1 litre/1 pint 15 fl oz

Other foods available on points included:baked beans, salt, gravy browning, malt vinegar, dried fruits and dried vegetables.

That's it, not very clear really but that's the best I can come up with. Hope it helps a bit and best of luck with your experiment. Please let us know how it goes:)

Spamfritter

Ive found a website with some more detailed information on the points system and also the meat ration (which was based on value not weight) after reading this i calculated that the weekly meat ration of 1 Shilling and Tuppence would have a modern real value of about £2.62 (not the 6p some people quote it as.. they have not recognised inflation..you cant buy anything for 6p!)

Here is the site, lots of good stuff

http://www.bbc.co.uk/ww2peopleswar/stories/84/a4537884.shtml

We made a start on our diet last night with a Woolton Pie with gravy (not nearly as bad as i expected) followed by Brown Betty. Porridge for breakfast this morning, ham sandwiches for lunch (much more sandwich than ham!) and corned beef rissoles for dinner followed by the last of the brown betty.
As i sit with a cup of bovril writing this I have a tray of sugar and golden syrup flapjacks in the oven to use up some of our sugar ration (this took a chunk out of our margerine but should last the week).

Day 2 and we havent even bought our meat ration yet!.. off to the butchers tomorrow to buy £2.60 woth of meat then on to tesco as ive discovered they sell powdered egg.

... maybe i should start my own topic!...

thriftlady_2

sproggi wrote: »

According to this site 1s & 2d in 1944 was worth £1.77 in 2006 using the RPI:eek:

http://www.measuringworth.com/ppoweruk/

Sproggi

The site Sproggi mentions is very useful for calculating monetary values. If you go to Sproggi's post there are a few other posts discussing the amount of money available for meat for a family.