What a busy day! My house is so messy, must deal with it tomorrow now I have the weekend off. I cooked a vegetable & oatmeal goulash for dinner this evening and was craving something sweet but didn’t want to put the oven on and bake something so did a 2 slice bread and butter pudding in the microwave and it hit the spot!
With the cost of energy and the cost of living, modern appliances and quick ways of doing things, are going to be embraced this year!
C xxxx
Day 4’s Thoughts below!
We started with porridge, with fruit and a small glass of home made kefir.
Lunch was two mini sausage rolls, and dinner was a fried chicken thigh each with steamed carrot, purple sprouting broccoli and courgette. Pudding was some preserved damsons with cream.
I have been poorly recently, we started the Aldi Christmas cake today. The size fits the idea of rationing, it lacks both width and depth. We made a generous one with lots of butter, dried fruit, marzipan and icing for Christmas a year ago. Sigh.
We gave some of our hens few spare eggs to a friend who cooks lunches for pensioners in the Church hall. They are glad of a cheap, hot meal, (off ration,) and some warmth and company. We used to give then a meat rabbit we had raised, at harvest, a lot of them remembered rabbit pie and rabbit stew as regular staples.
Hi Nellie Grace, I do hope you are feeling better now and your health is improving, and enjoy your Christmas cake! I was looking through lots of wartime recipe books last night and I did notice lots of rabbit recipes and offal recipes too. That’s so nice of you to give your friend some of your spare eggs for the pensioners lunches… a good deed. C xxxx
Thank you Carolyn. There are a lot of viruses going around now people are going to meetings and social gatherings again.
There was a useful little booklet , https://archive.org/details/how-to-keep-well-in-wartime
Sorry Carolyn, the link to the book How to Keep Well in Wartime doesn’t work. Could you remove it please.
Hi there, its working for me and I’ve downloaded it, thank you xxxx
“…and I did notice lots of rabbit recipes and offal recipes too.”
Likely because neither were on ration.
I’ve read of something called ‘an offal queue’ during the war, probably because word got around that the butcher had taken a delivery, it wasn’t on ration, and back then it was relatively cheap and nutritious.
Compare that to today, where many kids are unlikely to even know what offal is let alone eaten any!
Since I’m a diabetic, do you think I could use broccoli and cauliflower with a smaller potato, onion, and 1 carrot.
Absolutely!!! Recipes are there to chopped and changed according to taste and availability!!! Hugs xxx C
Hi there Caroline I just want you to know that you are an inspiration to me and I would say many others.My name is Debby Rogers and I live on the East coast of New Zealand. I am 117kg so morbidly obese. I have just decided that I will also follow along with rations.I enjoy reading your posts and and the recipes on your page.God bless Sent from my Samsung Galaxy smartphone.
Oh gosh, that’s so nice of you to say that! Hi Debby! Good luck with your challenge too! I think their comes a stage where you just have had enough of carrying around extra weight, for me anyway. I’ve felt like that for many, many years though, lose weight and then put it back on again, hoping therapy and other support will help me stop that. Sending much love to you C xxx
I am closely following your plans for this year. You inspire and encourage others and I hope that ricochets right back to you.
Thank you Cyn, I’ve gotta keep trying! One thing I will say, even though I’ve gone through a couple of rough days detoxing, I can already feel that I feel more brighter already without all the sugar! xxxx
Hello Carolyn
As you know, I am following your exploits but not eating 1940s meals.
I have just read your menu for yesterday and you havent eaten any cabbage or green veg. I’m guessing you dont like green veg but its full of vitamins and might help you to est less potatoes. Growing up, we always had cabbage this time of the year. My brother didn’t like it and would have preferred baked beans!
Hi Franky, don’t worry. I normally eat a ton of green veg either raw as salads or love my dark leafy green cabbage. Yesterday I only had a salad but normally enjoy green veg once or twice a day. Last night I fancied something stodgy!! 🙂 Haha! xxxx C
You’re doing great Carolyn and i am looking forward to more. I am intrigued by your microwave bread pudding, would you share the recipe please?
Hi Tammy, rather than switch the oven on to make one small portion, I literally took two slices of wholemeal bread, buttered them, sliced each into 4, put three on the bottom of my bowl, sprinkled with a little sugar, cinnamon and a few sultanas, poured a little milk over, repeated again and finally added the remaining two squares of buttered bread to the top, a little more milk to make sure all the bread in the bowl was damp, drizzled a little golden syrup over the top (any syrup) and put it in the microwave for a minute, checked it and cooked it a little longer. Of course its not browned on the top but for something quick its fine! I’m looking forward to lots of baking in my main oven tonight and tomorrow, its been a challenge during the week with work and everything so have mostly enjoyed stews, salads, sandwiches but have had sausages (vg) and mash, green veg… have eaten really well and all the pulses/lentils I’ve had haven’t given me too much wind! 🙂
We had bread and hot milk for breakfast as children, with a little bit of butter and a sprinkle of Demerara sugar. It was a traditional breakfast or supper, and much cheaper than breakfast cereal.
Cinnamon would be warming.
“…Flopsy, Mopsy, and Cotton-tail had bread and milk and blackberries for supper.” The Tale of Peter Rabbit by Beatrix Potter
Lovely and so quick too, I do enjoy bread pudding, thank you
You are going to be sick if you can’t balance those carbs with some protein.
Also, can you make liberty bread or wacky cake with your rations?
You cannot not use an oven and live on WWII rations and stay marginally well.
I am worried for you.
Please consult with a nutritionist so you don’t become malnourished. Yes, you can be malnourished without ever missing a meal.
Luck to you.
By the way, starch is not your friend.
An armload of spuds is like consuming a bowl of sugar without the enjoyment.
You will not like this, but you may need to have some Spam in your “food arsenal”.
I have to agree with Rosemary on this. You would be better to cut back (gradually) on bread and potatoes. Growing ip, my mother used tne gas rings to cook most things to save money and food was on the whole stodgy, to fill us up! But we were very active. My mother did not have a washing machine or a hoover so she used up a lot of energy just doing housework. Maybe you can get some smaller plates???
Your menus are great and I hope you are going to enjoy this year of seasonal foods. Goid luck
Bless you, thanks for your concern Rosemary xxxx I am having my bloods checked regularly on this, I have blood tests on Feb 10th and my last bloods showed optimal protein and Vit B12 and Vit D levels (really pleased with these results) so I try and be careful with nutrition being a vegan. I have high-protein pulses, beans and lentils, soy mince, and higher-protein meat alternatives regularly too. Totally agree with potatoes/sugar, I have to slowly work on that to balance those with other things. Thanks again xxxx hugs
Dear Carolyn,
The vegetable & oatmeal goulash looks really tasty, the fried green veg on toast equally so, and I would never have thought of making bread and butter pudding in the microwave; what a brilliant idea!
We are still finishing off the leftover Christmas food shop, mainly crackers and cheese, now, as due to Covid, we didn’t have the whole family for Christmas Day evening nor Boxing day, so I certainly haven’t kept to any rations as such.
Our vegetable seeds and seed potatoes have arrived today, although our allotment and garden are like a quagmire with all the rain we have had of late. Am I right in thinking that seeds and seed potatoes weren’t actually rationed but a limited range was available and, at times, could be in short supply?
I’m still having a total crisis since Carolyn explained that one could only over the 2oz a week tea ration per adult! I don’t even like strong tea, but the thought of being limited to only three cups a day, not even three mugs, is a terrible thought! I suppose less tea to drinks will equate to fewer biscuits eaten, as a glass of water and a biscuit isn’t as appealing.
My elder son has a passion for steam railways and has a lot of old footage. Almost every person in these old films and photos is the correct weight for their height. Whereas, when you look at news footage today, a very large proportion of people are overweight to varying degrees; I am one of those overweight people. I think I would have very much stood out in that footage 80 years ago.
I have a passion for sewing & knitting and love old patterns. And have just purchased a 1940s “Greenock” Lady’s Cardigan knitting pattern ‘For The Outsize Figure” it knits to a 42″ bust size. It seems that if you were any larger, you would need to adjust the pattern yourself! It just shows how the ready availability of high-sugar and high-fat processed foods has had such an impact on our incomes and health.
Frances xxx
Dear Frances,
Do you use loose leaf tea and a tea pot, kept hot with a tea cosy? Two rounded teaspoons of tea will brew a two mug pot full of tea, (one and a half pints.)
We top the tea pot up with boiling water for a second cup each as soon as the first has been poured. If we are not going to drink a second cup it it strained into a heated vacuum flask, without the milk, to have it later. It won’t go scummy like tea bag tea.
The Ministry of Information made a film with advice on making a good cup of tea.
https://m.youtube.com/watch?v=kOpRJrNiU_k
Oxiclean is good for removing tea stains from pottery tea pots and tea cosies.
“Oxiclean is good for removing tea stains from pottery tea pots…”
A much gentler way without using products containing chemicals is the good old fashioned Bicarbonate of Soda. Two heaped teaspoons, boiling water, leave for 15-minutes, then wipe out with your sponge or scourer, and Bob’s your uncle.