2021 Fashion On The Ration Challenge

CAFCGirl

@Laura_Elsewhere

Insightful stuff - thankyou for sharing.
I think I'm a generation out for knowing much about wartime rationing, my nan was very young during so she remembers very little of how food rationing impacted. She also lived rurally so I think there was quite a few differences compared to inner cities and urban areas.
My parents probably saw some of the bigger changes in food production, and the more to factory based food 'stuffs'. 

I think in line with much of what you outlined, it's the processing that does the damage. I may be wrong but I'm pretty sure none of that was happening 100 years ago, and small scale operations if so.

Also - I LOVE A FAIRY CAKE! Pixie cakes sound utterly adorable! I remember fairy cakes from my childhood (80's baby) and the party buffet type foods but again, that was at party buffets - not in the weekly shop. With a small spoon of icing on top.
I despise cupcakes - how on earth do people fit them in their mouths?! Its just messy and chaos

Cherryfudge

@CAFCGirl, there are a number of compilations of wartime recipes. I had a quick trawl through my recipe books and found Victory Cookbook and Feeding the Nation (both by Marguerite Patten), The Wartime Kitchen and Garden (Jennifer Davies) and We'll Eat Again (a selection by Marguerite Patten and the Imperial War Museum).

I remember some good threads on here about food rationing too... @PipneyJane usually knows where these things are but I'll have a look and see if I can find some.

joedenise

Although there were many more carbs and fat people were also a lot more active than they are nowadays so certainly burned off those extra calories!

Laura_Elsewhere

joedenise said:

Although there were many more carbs and fat people were also a lot more active than they are nowadays so certainly burned off those extra calories!

Absolutely! No TV in most households, and even if you were sitting of an evening listening-in you were probably knitting or sewing so you were not inert... I can't recall where but I do remember some research 2-3 years ago that found hat teenagers' metabolic rates dropped when watching tv, compared to just siting doing nothing...!!!! 

Laura_Elsewhere

@CAFCGirl, there's a very good book which is literally all the Ministry of Food leaflets, simply reproduced, with a useful intro by Jill Norman - the book is called Eating for Victory and there's a companion volume of Make Do and Mend. I have some of my Gran's original Min of Food leaflets, posted out to her during the war... 

One of the things many people don't realise is that rationing got tighter after the war ended, and it continued til 1953 iirc - I've mentioned before that my Dad was a babe in arms at the outbreak of war, not even a year old, and he didn't experience sweets off-ration til he was 15, Feb 1953... he does love chocolate and marzipan but has never had the capacity for quantity that I have...
Dental health was far better for his generation than for mine or yours. As one very good dentist put it to me, you want to have a period of several hours between breakfast and lunch, again between lunch and evening meal, and again between evening meal and bedtime, when all that goes into your mouth is water, milk or cheese. Whereas we swig non-water drinks all day every day, wine or beer of an evening, constantly disturbing the balance of our Dental Defence Systems...! 

A very good physio once told me that the best thing you can do for your back, knees, etc., is to make life inconvenient - constantly make yourself have to get up: put the printer across the room, put the phone across the room, keep the remote control on top of the tv so you have to get up to change channels, do anything you can to interrupt yourself so you are never inert for longer than about 20 minutes.... she reckoned that is a huge part of how our foremothers managed to live such physically-demanding lives without all being crippled with knackered backs and knees by their 50s... some were, of course, but I know an awful lot of young people now with back, shoulder, knee, foot, etc., problems, and I do wonder how much of it is because it is now normal not to change position for three or four hours at a time, whether that's sitting at a desk or slouched watching telly... 

Cherryfudge

This was a great thread:
Proper old style! Living on WW2 rations — MoneySavingExpert Forum

PipneyJane

@Cherryfudge - here's the link to Thriftlady's Wartime Experiment.  

@Laura_Elsewhere - don't get me started.  (I mean seriously don't.)  I can do a full-blown rant about lack of exercise, lack of muscle tone, low fibre diets, and the glucose/fructose insulin cascade.  Did you know that most 60-year old women can't lift a 10kg bag of shopping?  (Sorry, I can't remember where I read that or I'd cite it.)

The short answer is that we can't undo what has already been done BUT we can make changes today, tomorrow and every day in the future, in order to build better bodies for ourselves.

- Pip (And that's why I run...)

ETA:  @Cherryfudge - I'd forgotten about the thread to which you linked, even though I'd posted on it.  Might be worth a re-read.

Baileys_Babe

I am unfit and not as healthy as I would like.

I am gradually making permanent changes to what and how I do as part of regaining my health and fitness. Including increasing how active I am throughout the day, drinking plenty of water and eating a good range of proper foods. I also need to be more aware of portion sizes.

Thank you @Cherryfudge & @PipneyJane for sharing the threads on rationing I will add them to my reading wishlist.

Bigjenny

Just visiting so popping in village hall for a quick cuppa

I was born in 1946, I don't remember anything about the meals, but I do remember my mother visiting the shops and having  the ration books marked.

PipneyJane

Bigjenny said:

Just visiting so popping in village hall for a quick cuppa

I was born in 1946, I don't remember anything about the meals, but I do remember my mother visiting the shops and having  the ration books marked.

Welcome, @Bigjenny.  Cup of tea?  How about a slice of chocolate cake?  (I must confess, it's not my best baking, but it's ok.)  Please stay and chat to us!  Do you like to craft?

- Pip