Wartime recipes, substitutions and other related austerity hints

Brambling

Luckily liberty bodices were out of fashion for me but not for my older sisters . A family story which was repeated at mums funeral was the day mum found where my eldest sister had hidden hers and went up to the little village school with it and spoke to the teacher who called my sister out in class, loudly announcing that your mother says you have left your liberty bodice off today. :rotfl: as my sister still points out they went home for lunch every day so it could have waited.

Primrose

Ironic isn't it.? As a small child I ranted and raged against having to wear a liberty.bodice, no matter how cold the house was (only one small coal fire to heat the whole house)

Now I'm a chilly pensioner, my quilted body warmer (albeit worn on top of everything else rather than underneath) is one of the first things I reach for on chilly days.

Truly with age comes wisdom.......or at least a degree of common sense. :rotfl:

[Deleted User]

And zippers which are so much easier to fasten at any age than all those weird little white rubber buttons on liberty bodices!

Hard_Up_Hester

And the rubber buttons on the end of the suspenders!

Brambling

Primrose wrote: »

Ironic isn't it.? As a small child I ranted and raged against having to wear a liberty.bodice, no matter how cold the house was (only one small coal fire to heat the whole house):

By the time you worked your way to the being the closest to the fire you would be sent on a chore and lose your warm spot, those relegated furthest away would also have a cold back I remember the excitment when my brother who was a gas fitter brought my parents some big storage heaters he had removed from a client rather than tipping and fitted them in the lounge and two of the bedrooms. They were about a foot wide and heavy

Primrose

Brambling wrote: »

By the time you worked your way to the being the closest to the fire you would be sent on a chore and lose your warm spot, those relegated furthest away would also have a cold back I remember the excitment when my brother who was a gas fitter brought my parents some big storage heaters he had removed from a client rather than tipping and fitted them in the lounge and two of the bedrooms. They were about a foot wide and heavy

We had some of these cumbersome new heaters fitted in the ageing maisonette we bought when we first got married, which had no form of heating whatsoever. We were so excited at having some heating at last we overlooked their size. . What we hadn't fully realised was that new ones had to be run at full heat for the first 2 or 3 days to "burn off" some internal material to make them fit for use.

The first night they were running, in the middle of a freezing winter, we woke to find ourselves choking with the fumes, and had to spent the whole night with all the windows in the property wide open. We had to go to work the next day leaving the windows open too. Luckily we were an upstairs property, so no risk of burglars stealing things - not that there was anything worth taking as we had hardly any furniture or possessions.

I'm not sure what the fumes were, but they made our eyes red and streaming for about 48 hours. I'm sure whatever substance was used would have been banned under today's Health & Safety regulations!

PipneyJane

Hard_Up_Hester wrote: »

And the rubber buttons on the end of the suspenders!

Does anyone know a reliable supplier of those? Seriously, I have a pure silk suspender belt where those buttons have gone and I can't find a replacement. Mine have the rubber nob on a cotton backing - it's the cotton that's gone. (Mind you, it's been years since I've last tried to find a replacement, but I can't bring myself to throw these out.)

TIA

- Pip

Artytarty

Oh think I might have some of those upstairs in a tin, I in berries sewing stuff from several relatives. I'll have a look.
I'll not be using them anyhow!

Blue_Doggy

PipneyJane wrote: »

Does anyone know a reliable supplier of those? Seriously, I have a pure silk suspender belt where those buttons have gone and I can't find a replacement. Mine have the rubber nob on a cotton backing - it's the cotton that's gone. (Mind you, it's been years since I've last tried to find a replacement, but I can't bring myself to throw these out.)

TIA

- Pip

A temporary substitute was an aspirin tablet (yes, really; just don’t let it get wet!). Or a sixpenny piece (old style, pre-decimalisation) - you could use a 5p coin in this modern age!

[Deleted User]

HWK has just been to the allotment and brought me back some very muddy leeks, a good sized celeriac and the last of the sweetcorn cobs to go with the grapes he harvested this morning. Grapes have been stewed with a lemon and will be dripped through the jelly bag overnight to make grape jelly tomorrow, sweetcorn have been de-husked, topped and tailed and are now in the freezer (which gives us 12) leeks and celeriac have been trimmed and washed and celeriac will be part of a casserole with some pork tomorrow and the leeks will be wrapped in ham and oven cooked in a cheese sauce for Thursday. Any leeks left will be part of a soup for the end of the week. All trimmings have been put back in the bin for the compost heap.