Stretching Meat

I think the hardest thing for me is getting use to stretching meat. I will state right here that I have never been a fan of beef... but every once in a while I really miss it. So far – I pretty much eat a lot of poultry, fish, or go without. It is amazing how many ways you can get protein without eating meat!

Well I tried this new recipe from “Grandma's Wartime Kitchen: World War II and the Way We Cooked” by Joanne Lamb Hayes and Jean Anderson. It is called Veggie burgers. This recipe uses potatoes, carrots, unions, and an egg to make ½ pound of Hamburger feed 6-7 people. It is a basic recipe for a meat loaf… but instead of bread (which I didn’t have) it uses shredded (8 cups) of vegetables and a big helping of chili powder.

I was not sure I would like it… but I don’t think I will ever eat hamburger plain ever again! It is the best meat I have ever eaten … and it made enough for a full week of lunches.

In the pictures- I made homemade pickled beets to go with it. Ummm – beets are the best!

This picture shows a meatless night. I curried a pile of vegetables and cracked an egg on top for protein. The crock pot has my steal cut oats cooking for breakfast the next morning. The kettle has a beautiful tapioca pudding for desert (I had to cut the sugar in half, only one egg, and did half milk, half water to save on the amount of milk used... it still tasted good :)

Milk, milk everywhere – not a drop to drink!

This Monday- I got up and went to pour milk on my oatmeal. Much to my surprise – it came out in like old Elmer’s glue. It had soured! I had to decide what to do – throw it out… and not get milk again until Tuesday (my shopping day) or to use it to make some food. I looked at it … and it had not turned different colors – nor had it gotten fuzzy… So I decided to cook with it.

Looking through the 1944 “Good House Keeping” book – I discover that I could use it to make biscuits, bread, and doughnuts. Like any coffee respecting individual – I decided to make doughnuts.

The recipe didn’t call for to many rationed items… I did have to use ¾ cups of sugar and half of my Crisco rations… but I thought that was a fare exchange for a sweet treat. (A modern substitution that I did do is make them out of stone ground wheat… at least I could say they were kind of healthy).

I had to mix up the dough then let it chill for an hour… so I used that time to cook my meals for this week. (To make it fun- I put on “the Russians are coming, the Russians are coming!” and splurged on my beer rations… having a pint of Finnegan’s while I worked.) I had cooked a Turkey breast the week before... and had been eating turkey with a rice/plumb side dish. I had saved the drippings and the carcass (the bones). I put the carcass in my stew pot and made a nice turkey and egg noodle soup for this week. It is nice that this one turkey will feed me for three weeks. I also mixed up some biscuits (using the last of the sour milk) with soy flour to go with the soup.

Making the doughnuts was fun… I cooked them using the shallow oil method... to conserve my oil – and the recipe made 3 ½ dozens. They are the old fashion style – they are not covered in frosting or anything but the dough is slightly sweet and uses cinnamon, clove, and nutmeg to add flavor. They are just perfect for dunking in the thin rationed coffee.

Making these doughnuts helped me understand what a sacrifice woman made to make sure there were plenty of homemade doughnuts available for soldiers going off to war. Many women volunteered to make doughnuts and then hand them out to the men on trains as they traveled through their towns. Some women, in the Red Cross and the USSO, had doughnuts for soldiers who came in from the front lines… I can just imagine how the taste of those doughnuts would have brought the soldiers home, to their warm kitchen, just for a little while. How simple of a recipe... but how important it was.

I felt good at not wasting food – using all that I could. The doughnuts were a tasty treat at my workplace and I froze a few as well. I never knew that sour milk could taste so good!

Here you can see my weeks worth of food... I have turkey soup, soy sour milk biscuits, and blessed doughnuts!

Pot roast Update

I realised that I never updated the Pot roast!

It was wonderful!!! I ate it for a week and a half. It was so good - I never did get a picture of it after it was cooked ! I ate it all up. Here is a picture of the oatmeal bread that I made... Now I have an over abundance of pumpkin in my freezer - so I believe I will be eating pumpkin pudding and bread for a while :) Does anyone have suggestions on what else to use pumpkin for that doesn't use to much sugar?

WWII Extra Curricular

Some of you know that I have taken up a new hobby. In researching this hobby – I was surprised to find out that it had mostly died away- but during WWII – this became a popular hobby for women. The reemergence started in New Zealand then spread throughout the world. It is the hobby of Spinning.

Like many woman during the war – I have learned how to wash raw wool (again in my bathtub J), Dry it, pick out the weeds and seeds, card it straight, and finally spin it into lovely yarn (to make warm scarves, mittens, and hats for our fighting soldiers). I have to say I never knew how much work it is!

I bought two pounds of unwashed wool. I will tell you it is nasty! I started by washing a half pound. It is washed in very hot water with dish soap. You put the water and soap in, then lay the wool into it (no agitation or you get felt). Once it is washed three times and rinsed twice … it is laid out to dry. Once dry… the fibers are pulled open to get rid of any twigs and seeds that are stuck in. Then it is carded between two huge cards (they look like dog brushes for Clifford the big red dog). Once carded, it can be spun. I use an Ashford spinning wheel (that I received from my aunt – nicely decorated by goats chewing on it).

Even though it is a lot of work – I see the value of it. If there was not a lot of wool production – due to the war… it provided processed wool for knitting. The other thing it provides is a way to release stress. There is a meditative quality of hearing the rhythm of the wheel spin… then the feel of the wool in your hands. It is my favorite thing to do when I come back from a really hard day at the hospital. When spinning – all your cares drain away and you are left with the joy of having made something.

What a wonderful thing it would have been for these women that had the whole world’s cares on their shoulders.

Caring for Clothes

I have not been to a new clothing store since this experiment started. Practically this is because I started a new job and I had purchased a new wardrobe before I started (two suits, two pants, and a skirt). The knowledge that I cannot get many new clothes and especially that I only can buy one pair of new shoes…. Has me looking at how I treat my clothes and shoes.

By the end of the first week – I realized that my shoes would not last long if I wore them to walk back and forth to work. I wear my pedometer and I walk 5-7 miles every day (depending if I am on call or not) at the hospital. A mile and half of that is my walk to and from work. Practically to save my feet, and also to save my shoes… I now wear my tennis shoes to work, and carry my shoes in my bag. Shoes are not made as they use to be – and I need my work shoes to last. I don’t know how I would fix them if they broke…

Clothing is interesting… I have had to re-sew the hem in my dress pants already. That is something I have always done. But now I am aware that these clothes need to last a long time. I have also started to look at consignment and second hand stores. Buying clothes from these places would not use up rationing coupons, and it save money. It helps that I live in a very corporate town – I found the cutest suit and a suit coat to match my own skirt. I was also very tempted to buy a suit that was much too big – but was made from beautiful wool … I wanted to cut it down and remake it.

The challenge that I discovered is that Nylons do not last very long… does anyone know how to mend (darn) stockings? Even though I am not following the nylon rationing… I would like to make mine last longer – and clear nail polish does not cut it sometimes.

Knowing that these are the only clothes I get… I have started washing things by hand that I need to keep longer. If you ever visit me on laundry day… you will notice that my bathtub is filled with my suits and (dry clean) items. I am willing to do anything to make these clothes last … but it does take up time!

Coffee

It has been so long since I have written… and I am learning that keeping a house, working and all that goes into life – especially when rationing – keeps a person’s life very busy. I cannot imagine what life would have been like for a 1940’s woman – especially if she had children. She probably had a job, and then also had to keep house and the clothing of everyone… and she would have to creatively cook 3 meals a day for her family. A never ending job….

That is where the joy of coffee comes in –

There is nothing better than the wonderful smell of coffee brewing in the morning. That lovely smell of freshly ground beans – and the beautiful gurgle of the coffee maker (would have been a vacuumed coffee maker then – or an old enamel pot that boiled it).

The trick is- each person, age 15 and older, was allowed one pound of coffee every 5 weeks. One pound of coffee for five weeks? This I was not sure I could survive.

I started making 8 cups of coffee each week day morning – just enough for a small cup of coffee with breakfast and the rest went in my thermos for work. (I also allowed myself one cup of hospital coffee each day – you can tell me if that was cheating or not – I mean… its Hospital coffee!)

After the first week- I realized that I needed to keep track of how many scoops of beans I ground each day. Soon I switched from a table spoon to a teaspoon measurement. Then I carefully counted out eight scoops. A few times there would be left over coffee that I could not drink in the morning… There was no way that I was going to throw it out – it is valuable… so I found myself pouring it into a jar in the refrigerator – and using it to make cold coffee when I came home (add a little milk, sugar (very little), and some vanilla).

Each day – that bag got lighter and lighter… I still have a few weeks to go – so I cut the beans down to 5 scoops – and I made less coffee (which meant that I bought more hospital coffee – not sure how to handle this because restaurants still had coffee… but often it was mixed with chicory.) I knew that I had fully embraced this endeavor to live out WWII rationing when I realized that I was on my hands and knees in the kitchen with a broom- trying to retrieve every coffee bean that had fallen under the fridge and stove… I got them all, brushed them off, and put them in the grinder for coffee!!!

I will state that I made it! It was a celebration when I went and bought another pound of coffee… the second week of October.

The history behind coffee rations – Coffee was the second thing to be rationed. It actually was rationed before the US was fully in the war – all because of the supply routes were cut off from South America, Indonesia, and Arabia. It was the same reason for the rationing of sugar – the raw ingredients could not be gotten as much – and it was patriotic to let the troops to have what they needed first.