As someone who loves cooking and experimenting with ingredients at hand, I have always been fascinated by the Wartime kitchens and rationing. I won't say that I wish I had gone through that, but sometimes I wonder if we are just too used to having everything at our fingertips, to having life be so easy that we have become lazy.
As with everything else that I go into, I like to research and read and watch as much as I can about certain periods in time, different eras, different ways of doing things. Why? Because I yearn for a simpler time, for a time where we may not have had everything readily available, but family came first, neighbors helped each other and really opened their homes to everyone around them.
Unfortunately nowadays, and I'm speaking from my own personal experience, I've noticed that it's every man for themselves and how can we make a quick buck with the least work possible. Honestly, it seems that if there was a robot that could do everything for us, many would jump on that bandwagon pretty quick.
But back to the topic at hand. The Wartime Kitchen, rationing and surviving through it.
Rationing was introduced in England on January 8, 1940. Here is a little info about it:
At the beginning of World War II, the UK imported 55 million tons of foodstuffs per year (70%), including more than 50% of its meat, 70% of its cheese and sugar, nearly 80% of fruits and about 90% of cereals and fats.It was one of the principal strategies of the Axis to attack shipping bound for the UK, restricting British industry and potentially starving the nation into submission.
Each person would register with their local shops, and was provided with a ration book containing coupons. The shopkeeper was then provided with enough food for his or her registered customers.
When purchasing goods, the purchaser had to give the shopkeeper a coupon as well as money.
Rations were the fairest way to ensure people had enough to eat, and many poorer families had the healthiest diet they ever had. Children benefited greatly from this. For example, the number of children in Scotland who died before they reached 1 year of age fell by 27 per cent between 1939 and 1945. In Glasgow, the average height of 13 year olds increased by almost 2 inches (5 cm) by the end of the war.
Weekly ration for 1 adult
- Bacon & Ham 4 oz
- Meat to the value of 1 shilling and sixpence (around about 1/2 lb minced beef)
- Butter 2 oz
- Cheese 2 oz
- Margarine 4 oz
- Cooking fat 4 oz
- Milk 3 pints
- Sugar 8 oz
- Preserves 1 lb every 2 months
- Tea 2 oz
- Eggs 1 fresh egg per week
- Sweets/Candy 12 oz every 4 weeks
In addition to
this a points system was put in place which limited your purchase of
tinned or imported goods. 16 points were available in your ration book
for every 4 weeks and that 16 points would enable you to purchase for
instance, 1 can of tinned fish or 2lbs of dried fruit or 8 lbs of split
peas.
Here is the Food Minister talking about the food rationing in 1939....
He explains what the Ration books are and how to use them.
Women really had to become inventive, they had to learn to make do with the little they got and food was stretched as far as it would go.
Aside from the ingredients, there were ways to save on fuel as well while cooking, things like "cooking two at a time", which meant covering a cooking pan with a biscuit tin lid then standing a second pan on top. I don't know how safe that would be or how well the food would turn out, but I think in those days and time, it was a matter of survival.
From 1942, there was no more white flour available, so that meant that everyone was consuming the National Wholemeal Bread.
There were no supermarkets, so shopping for groceries would mean going to different stores, such as the butcher, grocer etc.
Actually, growing up I remember that is the way we did food shopping too, we went to the butcher, we went to the market and the bakery etc.
Eggs were extremely hard to come by, so most people used powdered eggs. One packet would be equal to 12 eggs and those had to last you at least 8 weeks, as even the powdered eggs were rationed.
One of the items not rationed and available probably most of the time, were potatoes.
The Government even came up with a "Dig for Victory" campaign, encouraging everyone to grow vegetables in their gardens or on any spare piece of land they could find.
The Ministry of Food organized local cookery classes and demonstrations to teach people how to cook with what they had and how to use the vegetables they grew in meals.
It was hard to come by food. Once you registered with a certain shop, you couldn't really go anywhere else to get your rations, so it usually meant standing in long lines for a very long time just to get your food.
It was about this time that the Black Market came into play, and even though if you were caught you were punished with huge fines, people still risked it in order to get butter, sugar and even cigarettes and often times at exuberant prices.
Rationing officially ended July 4, 1954.
I've often thought about trying to cook just Wartime recipes for a pay period, and seeing how we do. I think the only thing that has held me back from trying, is the family, I'm not sure my husband and children would be interested in this sort of experiment.
I may just come up with a menu anyway and introduce a few meals here and there, might be easier to do it that way than shock them into it LOL
When it comes to wartime cooking and depression recipes, there are a few places online you can go to. I think one of my favorite YouTube Channels is the Great Depression Cooking with Clara. Love it :)
Great Depression Cooking with Clara Season 1
Another great one to watch is Granny Doris, though I've only found 3 episodes so far.
Here is a PDF booklet with some recipes for you....
Home Front Recipes
You can find many on Clara's videos and by googling for wartime recipes.
I think if anything, after all the reading and the video watching I've done, it's taught me that I need to be more flexible in the kitchen, to really push myself to use what I have on hand and not just ignore the ingredient because it doesn't fit into a specific dish or recipe.
I don't know about you all, but I will admit that I have stuff in the freezer, refrigerator and pantry that tends to just sit there and not get used, and yes, I've even had to throw something out because it's past it's due date.
In a day and time where everything is getting so expensive, I want to be able to use what I have available and not be wasteful. Will I succeed every step of the way? Probably not. But I am determined to give it a good try.
I'm going to continue researching, applying what I have learned and strive towards a more self sustainable way of life. Growing some of my own vegetables is definitely a step in the right direction.
I do hope you have found some of this information interesting, matter of fact I'm using it with my kids for homeschooling and they find it just as fascinating as I do. Though with them, we're not just concentrating on the cooking side of the wartime and depression eras, but on everything else too.....the war itself, air raids, etc.
I'm off to watch The Wartime Kitchen and Garden. It is quite an old series that unfortunately was never made into DVD or sold to the public (much to my chagrin). I managed to find a few episodes on YouTube so you can watch too if you would like :)
Episode 2
Episode 3
Hope you enjoy it :)
Images found online through BBC. Videos from YouTube
32 comments
I remember watching the Wartime kitchen with my Mother, I too am surprised it wasnt made into a dvd, there was also The Victorian Kitchen Garden I seem to remember.
1. They probably wouldn't eat it.
2. A lot of the foods we choose not to eat because they are ultimately unhealthy, like powdered eggs.
3. We have certain digestive issues in the household that we have to be mindful of.
Still, the concept is a good one. It can help put us in focus for making do, making our own, and holding to a stricter budget.
Thank you for sharing this. You really did your homework. We are down to the last of what's in the house before I go grocery shopping and I'm trying to use what I have instead of scrounging for money somewhere to go get something. I thoroughly enjoyed reading this...and boy are we spoiled today, with an overabundance of food at our disposal.
I have a friend who came over from Romania several years ago and she was in awe of our grocery stores and the variety of items that could be bought. Her mom came over a year ago and felt the same way. It was quite overwhelming.
I recently watched a cooking show by Nigella lawson and she was sharing how she had to buy her peanut butter chocolate chips online. I was like "what?" they're on every shelf here...so many options of chocolate chips...I just assumed they were available everywhere. A friend said when a relative of theirs came over from some country (I don't remember which one) they would bring back tons of chocolate chips
It is a great series from 2008 where previous eras are relived by food, clothes etc and brought into relation with today, the health aspects of it etc.
Really great!
Greets,
Marion
In Him,
Crystal
Stewart's kitchen? lol..
I mostly cook with what I have on hand because we're poor and we were poor growing up and so was my mother and my cooking style is generational, we all learned to cook that way. I do use recipes, but I often cook with what's on hand as well. I also think it would be interesting to take a month to live off my food storage and use emergent ways of food prep as a trial, just to see. I mean natural disasters happen all the time, it would be nice to be prepared.
The other thing that really struck me is the total lack of vegetables. I know people then grew them, but thinking about that line about how for some people, all that meat and those fats were the healthiest diet they may have ever had. Fascinating!
I loved your post...
You have put in words the things that I have in my mind..
Here in India we are developing about now , around 100 years back things where very different and I too love to watch movies or tv serials from that period when life was simpler and right now I am watching one such serial about a life of a girl who is married at 11 to a widower of 32 who is a social reformer.. He educates his wife (women were not allowed to study in some families) and she in turn managed to educate many women of her time too..
I love to see the costumes, the houses, the day to day life and food made which is depicted in that serial
THANKS FOR THE INFO AND THE TROUBLE YOU HAVE TAKEN TO GATHER IT..
would love to know more about the food cooked..during those times and the recipes.
Your comment about potatoes not being rationed reminded me of the book 1493, which I just finished reading (it's about the Columbian Exchange). In the author's section on potatoes, he cites multiple original sources noting that 17th and 18th century Europeans who primarily ate potatoes were in better health than those who did not eat potatoes but had access to a more varied diet. He then explained that, nutritionally, potatoes contain everything one needs except vitamins A + D, complete protein, and fat. People who had access to potatoes generally had access to milk too, which filled those gaps. That meant that people who lived almost exclusively on a diet of potatoes and milk were better nourished than most other people in Europe at the time. Potatoes are also famous for growing in wretched conditions--making them the perfect famine/wartime food. Provided, of course, that you can keep the crop safe--as Europe learned from terrible experience. The women who kept wartime kitchens in the 1940's had grown up knowing people who were children during the Europe-wide famine of the 1840's, meaning they had access to information and habits that we don't today.
This may be a silly question but with the dig for victory campaign in place, why so few chicken eggs?
Hens wouldn't have taken up much space but would certainly have increased the egg supply!
The last couple of days, the kids and I (we homeschool too) have been watching various 1940s homefront videos- the 1940s house, The Wartime Kitchen and Garden (well the part I could find online) and Wartime Farm.
I admit, rationing seems so hard, I have no idea how my grandmother managed!
I will also admit to having a hankering for the old fashioned wrap around apron after watching all these!
http://www.earthlypursuits.com/AllotGuide/DigforVictory1/DigForVictory1_1.htm
Sharon
Be blessed!
Laura of Harvest Lane Cottage
But everyone pulled together and just got on with it.
You might like this
https://youtu.be/nkJv1HgA-0A
Happy watching jane
Shortages existed in America too, but we were not getting bombed, strafed, invaded, etc., as any other wartime country in Europe or Asia. This put us in the position of being able to produce and export vast quantities of food, weapons, other wartime military materiel, vehicles, farm tractors to England to help increase their own food production, airplanes, and even clothing to the wartime countries of Europe, in addition to supplying our own military. We were, in the terms of the time, the "Arsenal of Democracy," and glad to do so. Our vast advantage being the size of the country, allowing for much higher rates of production, and the vast population involved in doing such work. We experienced high rates of loss in terms of our military fighting overseas as well - over two seas, and joined by the militaries of many smaller countries.
The Channel Islands of Great Britain were not as lucky though, due to their being actually invaded and occupied during the War by the Nazi regime, who co-opted all the foods available to the island residents, leaving little for the residents themselves.
One thing I noticed here, which may have been added to provide context, while not specifically referring to the World War Two experience, was the chart provided covering the fines and punishments for Black Market participation. The chart shown here covered World War One, that being levied during a short period of 1918, not the Wartime Forties. You can certainly get a certain feel for the drastic fines levied for such activities, given the economy of one over the other by contrast, but I still have to wonder how much higher such punishments were during World War Two.
The total lack of civilian automobile usage was much more drastic for England though. Even with our wartime rationing of petroleum products, yet still allowing for exportation of various oil based products for our own military needs, there was still a greater need for them here, because of the vastness of our cities and towns, and the swaths of land between them. Although automobile production, except for strictly military usage, was completely stopped during our participation in the war directly during the period covering the late December, 1941 invasion and bombing of our military in the Hawaiian islands by the Japanese, to past the final surrender of 1945 by the Japanese in late 1945, it still took considerable time to retool, and resupply the automobile industry after the War's end. We did have the considerable advantage of being able to drill for and process our own oil supplies, and devise the production of artificial rubber materials as well. Something England could not do, due to the lack of available native oil supplies.
Many War era wedding bands can be found for sale on the usual internet sources, and in second-hand jewelry stores in Great Britain, both online and off. While the prices are generally accessible if you want to collect or even wear them, the sizes are generally quite small, given the tiny fingers of women who grew up during the prior decade of the 1930s and the Depression, and the resulting food shortages. I happen to prefer buying only the ones I can wear myself, but wearing a British size Q to Q-1/2, or an American size 8, means they are even harder for me to find! So far, I own ONE. Always look inside for a special ration mark, which looks like a "( )" or an "O" with the top and bottom pieces missing.
Thanks for putting together such an informative piece! It has been added to my own research of this particular subject!