World War Two

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Wartime Rations – Day 1

What was it Robert Burns said about the best laid plans…? I decided over a month ago to start eating ‘wartime rations’ today, so you’d think I’d have been a bit more organised about it. Wrong! Having cleaned out my fridge yesterday of all the non-rationed foods and eating porridge for breakfast this morning (milk and a wee bit of sugar)…

Porridge

… lunchtime found me racing down to Safeway to buy my rations for the week.  Healthy ‘perimeter’ shopping which cost a fraction of my usual bill. (The carton of eggs you see is three weeks supply of shell eggs – I still have to pick up powdered eggs.)

safeway

Last time I ate wartime rations it was spring/summer, so I could enjoy lettuce, tomato and cucumbers in my  ‘Oslo meal’ sandwich. (Oslo meal = sandwich, piece of fruit and glass of milk).  But with no salad available in January – and little advance prep on my part – I had to make do with a carrot sandwich.  It looks a bit odd, but actually tasted okay. Fortunately, I had made some homemade soup yesterday evening, so that was nice and warming on a cold day!

Oslo Meal

While discussing dinner with my husband last night. I told him I would be making vegetable curry for our first evening meal. (I want to keep the bulk of my meat ration until later on in the week.) However, when I came downstairs this morning to discover he’d really got into the spirit of things and made himself porridge for breakfast I relented. Sausages were available during the war off ration, but were hard to get and the quality was not always the best.  Tonight they were available and, along with more homemade vegetable soup, we enjoyed a Stewed Sausage recipe of my mother’s  – probably my grandmother’s too – made with apples, leeks and carrots with beetroot and mashed potato on the side.

dinner

Okay, on to some historical stuff.

As this is the first day back at school for most children after the holidays, what was discipline like in wartime schools? During those years, Anne went to school in Glasgow and was also evacuated into the countryside, so here are her recollections.

At Hillhead, very strict. All of us had to sit with arms folded or hands clasped behind our backs, according to a particular teacher’s whim, unless we were actually writing. A whistle was much used in the playground to stop unladylike behaviour. At Hyndland/Balfron it was a bit looser: my history teacher for instance didn’t mind that I listened to his lectures with my head resting on my arms on the desk – he took it that I was listening, which I was. But that would never have been countenanced at Hillhead. 

As for what was going on in the war on this day… although it wasn’t voted in until March, on January 6th, 1941, FDR asked Congress to support Lend Lease, offering the allies money and supplies in the war effort. According to Wikipedia, the vote was split down party lines with the Republicans against, seeing it as a step to war. Through Lend Lease, the US supplied the Allies with  $50.1 billion ($659b in today’s money) worth of goods.  Repayment of the British debt started in January 1951 – although the annual payments were deferred for 5 years.  Britain submitted its final installment of $83.3million to the US on January 29th, 2006.

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WW2 Month of Rations – Research

As with last time, I will be including the images of the wartime food I eat each day with a little history of the war.

What I personally enjoyed most about my previous ration challenge was hearing the stories my Aunt Anne, who was a child during the war, contributed to my blog, as well as her advice on what I was doing right… or wrong.  (No rice pudding!)  I’m thrilled she’s given me some more stories this time around.

anne2013

For research,  I’m using The Chronicle of the 20th Century, which describes the events of each day of the century.  There are all kinds of WW2 sites available online, but I recently found a link to ‘Real Time’ WW2 Tweets.  It’s absolutely fabulous and I can’t recommend it highly enough.

history book

When it comes to the food, I’ll be mostly using three books of Marguerite Patten’s wartime recipes published by the Imperial War Museum –  We’ll Eat Again, The Victory Cookbook and Post-War Kitchen.

cookbook

There are also some great wartime ration websites out there, my favourite being The 1940s Experiment.  She has some great recipes and information, so please check it out!

And of course, there’s always Youtube.  Here’s an excerpt from an informative (and funny!) documentary series the BBC released a few years ago.

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WW2 Month of Rations – The ‘Rules’.

1) Despite food being rationed during WW2, it didn’t mean rations were always available in the shops.  If there were no eggs available one week, it didn’t mean that you got 2 the following week. However, for the purposes of this challenge, I’m going to assume that all my rations are available.

2) I’ve figured out our weekly ration allowance and am coming to grips with the point system. From our 16 points (each) for January, I’m going to allow ourselves one tin of peas and one tin of golden syrup.

3) I’m going to assume I have some basics already in my cupboards: 8 oz of lentils and 8 oz of sultanas left over from the previous month’s point allowance, plus some bisto, mayonnaise, dried ginger etc.  Also, I’ve been told by a friend’s mother, who was a housewife during the war, that flour (wholemeal) and oatmeal were freely available off ration, so I will be making the most of them!

4) We’ll eat only fruit and vegetables in season in the UK during the war.  For January, that means – beetroot, Brussel sprouts, cabbage (yuck!), cauliflower, kale (double yuck!!) leeks, carrots, parsnips, potatoes, red cabbage, turnips, carrots, apples and pears.  Hmmm – no sign of onions in there, and I know there were long periods when they weren’t available during the war.  As I’m not a gardener who would have Dug for Victory, how will recipes taste using leeks instead of onions?  I guess I’m going to find out!

5) Factories, offices and schools provided un-rationed meals for workers and school children. In addition, a system of ‘British Restaurants’ was set up to provide a filling three-course meal to the general population for the modern equivalent of about 1.50GBP or $3. Statistics suggest that people ate out about 4 times a week during the war, which gave housewives a happy respite from struggling to come up with interesting meals on the ration. My husband is participating in this programme (for the first week, at least) so he will be able to eat lunch out on weekdays. If I go out for lunch, I will ensure I eat only wartime food – eg fish and chips – available at the British restaurants.

6) Wartime propaganda might have suggested that everyone was ‘in it together‘, but as is always the case, those people with money continued to eat better than most of the population. (When I ate wartime rations back in May, I referred to it as ‘Eating at The Savoy.) The only restriction in the high-class hotels was that meat could only be served for one course.  So… as my husband and I have an office winter party coming up at the end of the month, we’ll be ‘Eating – and drinking – at The Savoy’ that night!

Tomorrow, I’ll provide a list of the references I’ve used for this challenge.

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Wartime Rations

Back in May last year, I spent a fortnight eating World War Two British rations. It was a great experience and I’ve decided to repeat it for four weeks this January. My initial instinct was to start on January 1st, but we have so many leftovers from Xmas/New Year it would go against the wartime spirit of eliminating waste – it was illegal to waste food –  so I’m going to start on Monday, January 6th and will finish on Sunday February 2nd.

My husband has agreed to join in – at least for the first week. (When he discovers that the main vegetable available in the winter months was cabbage, he might change his mind.) Until then, I’m going to spend the next few days explaining the ‘rules’ and how I plan to structure my posts.

Rations varied throughout the war – and didn’t end until 1954! – but I’m going to adopt the same rations as last time. The foods that were rationed were mostly dairy, meat, sugar and tea.  Un-rationed foods included vegetables, bread, fish and offal (when the latter was available). There was also a ‘points’ system with each person getting 16 points a month. In general 16 points could buy you – for example – 1 can of fish or 2 lbs of dried fruit or 8 lbs of pulses.  Certain foods  – eg bananas – were not available until long after the war ended.

ratiions

Rationed food per person per week: (Just because it was rationed didn’t mean it was always available!)

Bacon – 4 oz

Meat – 8oz

Fat:  10 oz.   2 oz butter, 4 oz margarine and 4 oz of lard, but I’m going to use all butter.

Cheese  – 2oz

Milk – 3 pints

Sugar – 8oz

Jam – 2oz

Tea – 2oz (I read somewhere it was 15 teabags, but I measured out 23!!)

Eggs: 1 shell, 3 powdered.

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Christmas in Wartime

Starting one week today (Monday, January 6th 2014) I plan to return to eating World War Two British rations for one month. As before I’ll be adding in tidbits about the war, while Anne (my aunt) will once again add her own recollections of living in Scotland during that conflict.

To get my mind in the right headspace, I’ve recently been watching a few WW2 documentaries and dramas. A Wartime Farm Christmas, a documentary which can be found on Youtube, is a wonderful antidote to the excesses of our 21st Century festive season and a great tribute to the resilience of those wartime civilians.

Enjoy!

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Remembrance Sunday

My Dad, who served in WW2, was one of the 350,000 soldiers rescued from the beaches of Dunkirk in May 1940. Thereafter, he attended church for only one of 4 reasons;  Baptisms, Weddings, Funerals and Remembrance Sunday.

The Saturday evening before Remembrance Sunday, we’d gather around the TV as a family to watch the Festival of Remembrance from The Royal Alberta Hall in London.

Then, as now, the two minute silence and falling of the poppies, each one representing a soldier (male or female) who perished in a British War, remains one of THE most profound ceremonies I have ever witnessed.

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Forget-Me-Not

I’ve been a bit quiet on the blog front recently. No excuse, really. Just distraction.

Elona Malterre talked to The Alberta Romance Writers’ Association a few weeks ago on Writing The Short Story. She’s a multi-published author and one of the founding members of The Alberta Romance Writers’ Association. One of the comments she made really stood out for me: A short story involves unity of Place, Time and Action.

I’m probably not going to be blogging much next week. I’m hosting a writing retreat at my house next weekend, so between then and now I’m going to be busy cleaning, cleaning, cleaning! Until then, here is a short story for you to read, Forget-Me-Not.

I hope you enjoy it.