1940s experiemnt

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Mock duck – No 73

Ignore the fact that my squished up vegan sausage used in this recipe with the addition of my lovely yellowy cheese sauce,  makes this look like a dessert dish served with custard… it’s not. Infact it was a most awesome and delicious “Mock Duck” recipe that I would highly recommend you try. It was simply delicious!

When you use “real” sausage for your recipe, aesthetically, it will be more pleasing. Vegan sausage has very little fat in it, real sausage will be fattier and squishier and you will be able to form into a smooth duck breast shape..

This would be most excellent served with small buttered new potatoes and some lightly steamed asparagus and some cranberry sauce!

Mock duck

    • 1 lb sausagemeat
    • 8 oz of onions grated
    • 8 oz tart apples peeled and grated
    • 1-2 teaspoons of fresh sage or 1/2-1 teaspoon dried sage (I used two of fresh as I love sage)

Method

  1. Spread half the sausagemeat into a flat layer in a well greased baking tin or dish (I used some foil to shape into a duck breast shape)
  2. Top with a layer of the grated apples, onion and sage
  3. Add the rest of the sausagemeat and try and form into a duck breast shape
  4. Cover with well greased paper or foil and bake in the centre of a moderately hot oven for 40 minutes or until the sauasagemeat is cooked.

Serves 4

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Not 1940’s but my other passion..

I hate waste… I guess the 1940’s housewife during WWII would have been very mindful of waste. Supplies were scarce, foods were rationed and many manufacturing industries were scaled back. People were encouraged to “Make do and Mend”, use their food scraps up and what they couldn’t use was donated to the community “pig swill” bin or fed to garden livestock.

In todays society we should perhaps take notice of this early form of recycling..

And that is another of my passions… trying to make things last longer, repairing, reusing, not throwing things away because we need something newer and shinier…

And that is precisely what I did with my beautiful bouquet of Valentine’s Roses this year. I couldn’t bare to see them just thrown away so I kept them and watched them as they became crispier and crispier. Work colleagues made comments that it was about time I perhaps threw them away but I waited. And today my roses were dry enough to make “Valentine Rose Petal Pot-Pourri” and now I can treasure the petals for many months more..

CLICK HERE FOR MY HOW-TO WITH PHOTOS!

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Salad Dressing for immediate use

saladdressing

So, so very hot yesterday- especially my house which seems to enjoy sitting at 85 F most of the day if the sun comes out (great in winter, lousy in summer)..

Looking through my 1940’s cook books I just couldn’t bring myself to slave in the kitchen over a cooked meal so a big plate of salad leaves, cucumber and tomato was called for. But what to drizzle over it? In one of my books there was a recipe for a quick salad dressing and luckily I had all the ingredients to hand. Well the taste was interesting…wasn’t exactly horrible but wasn’t exactly nice either. However, it did the trick..

wasn’t exactly horrible but wasn’t exactly nice either..

Salad Dressing for immediate use

  • Blend 1 level tablespoon of household milk powder with 1 level tablespoon of dried egg powder (just don’t sniff the dried egg or you’ll never use it again..), 1/2 teaspoon salt, a little pepper and dried mustard powder
  • Add 1 tablespoon of water and 2 tablespoons of vinegar and mix until smooth and beat well until thickens a little
  • Place in fridge until chilled and then use

PS Weight loss photos– initial photo now uploaded. Keeping the really gruesome ones back until I have lost some more!!!