Post-war New Zealand cooking

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daisyhill, Oct 22, 6:04am
I am reading up on wartime and post-WWII cooking (when rationing was in force) for no particular reason except that it is interesting. I was born long after all that was merely a memory, but I know a reasonable amount about how it affected people in the UK and Ireland. How did it affect people in NZ, and are there any wartime recipe books (like those from the indomitable Marguerite Patten, and the Ministry of Food, in England) or anything like that still available!

daisyhill, Oct 22, 6:04am
I am reading up on wartime and post-WWII cooking (when rationing was in force) for no particular reason except that it is interesting. I was born long after all that was merely a memory, but I know a reasonable amount about how it affected people in the UK and Ireland. How did it affect people in NZ, and are there any wartime recipe books (like those from the indomitable Marguerite Patten, and the Ministry of Food, in England) or anything like that still available!

Edited to add: I know that NZ probably ticked along mostly as usual, apart from all the men who went off and often didn't come back, but imports to here must have been affected. And there are probably things that I would not even think of that were also affected. I'd love to know more.

duckmoon, Oct 22, 6:20am
Wonder if Alexia johnson's cooks would comment on this.

elliehen, Oct 22, 6:44am
Here's a start.There are many such books and lots of serious collectors of them.

http://www.waikatomuseum.co.nz/page/pageid/2145844154

daisyhill, Oct 22, 7:01am
Ooh, I like that link, thank you! (Although fish custard sounds disgusting based on name alone.)

veejay13, Oct 22, 7:20am
We had rationing of meat, sugar, butter, tea, clothing, petrol (I was very young at the time and these are a few I can remember).Cream was not obtainable - it all had to be turned into butter.I believe we were rationed to keep UK supplied.You couldn't buy knickers with elastic ( buttoned waistbands instead) nor could you buy the elastic - all rubber went to making tyres for war vehicles.

Our houses all had to be "blacked-out" and there wardens on inspection duty every night.My Dad dug a trench in the back garden for us to shelter in if the bombers came and he was in the Home Guard - "Dad's Army".

Because so many men were overseas fighting, the females were put into what previously would be classed as men's jobs - land girls on farms, factory workers e.g.

That's all I can think of for now, and apart from all that we did tick along mostly as usual and were very well aware that there was a war on.

daisyhill, Oct 22, 7:32am
I never even thought of supplies from here going to the UK (I *knew* there was stuff I wouldn't think of). Thank you - that is very interesting.

Were there fruit and vegetable imports arriving here at the time or was everything grown locally!

Was there ever an air raid over NZ or was it just preparation in case there was one! I feel so clueless asking this, but it just hasn't been part of any history lesson I was ever taught and it didn't occur to me to look into it until now.

veejay13, Oct 22, 7:49am
Thanks for your interest, daisyhill.I should point out that although the rationing was related to keeping up supplies to UK,we were more scared of being attacked by the Japanese.I can't ever recall an air raid, (although we had lots of practice runs), but I understand on several occasions Japanese submarines secretly visited our shores.The inter-Island ferry between Lyttelton and Wellington would sail at a different time each night, i.e. passengers had to be aboard by, say, 7 p.m. and the ship would sail any time between then and 10.p.m.this to confuse the enemy, of course.

Tropical fruits were pretty much unobtainable (bananas, oranges, pineapples) but as you know NZ grows lots of fruit so we were never short of apples or pears.or black currants, or gooseberries etc. etc.And many many houses were built on a quarter-acre section so plenty of room for vegs.Believe me, everyone was "digging for victory"!

daisyhill, Oct 22, 8:08am
I can well believe that everyone had a very productive garden! I moved here from Ireland a few years ago and was stunned by how big the houses were and how much space nearly everybody had around their house. My terraced house in Ireland had a back garden about 5m x 10m, (so mine was the place to go for summer parties as I had so much outdoor space!), and no front garden or space for one at all, just a berm. We hardly knew ourselves when we ended up here with a big vegetable garden and fruit trees as well as a front garden and a proper big lawn! I am still learning but I am very excited by how much we can produce ourselves that ends up on our plates. I suppose that led on to my interest in how people coped when they couldn't just pop to the supermarket for a big trolley full of food.

I really must go to the library this week and see what they can lend me on this subject. Random ferry departure times, fear of Japanese subs. this is all new to me.

cgvl, Oct 22, 10:03am
In country areas a lot of bartering went on too. My grandmother had a milk cow and would swap things like butter for eggs as an example. they also had nearly all their yard in garden. basically if you didn't grow it you didn't eat it, unless you could swap what you had in excess for a product you didn't have.

davidt4, Oct 22, 8:05pm
Alexa's baking books would be just the thing.They include the history of each item.

http://www.ladiesaplate.co.nz/

red2, Oct 22, 8:12pm
In good antique shops you can buy The "peace" recipe book - usually around $ 25 .Not sure who produced it - my copy does not say . It originally sold for 2 x shillings and sixpence . Some recipes state no coupons required . Its an interesting read

rema, Oct 22, 8:41pm
Although I was a late war baby I do rememb er eggs being put into a brine to preserve them ! yukky

gilligee, Oct 22, 9:39pm
School children were drilled to hide in ditches with corks in their ears for protection against bombing. Families sent butter and tins of dripping to England plus cakes. Red Cross parcels of faceclothes and soap. Petrol was rationed for many years after the war.

elliehen, Oct 22, 9:46pm
This is the definitive website - The New Zealand Food History Society.

http://nzfoodhistory.macmate.me/NZ_Food_History/Home.html

I have the first two issues of The Aristologist - compulsive reading!

daleaway, Oct 22, 11:43pm
Mothers went out and collected rose hips to make syrup for Vitamin C for their babies, as oranges could be scarce and expensive.
I remember the sugar rationing very well. Sweets were a novelty in my childhood, and we had a small bag shared between the family - at weekends only!
Cakes in cake shops were bright yellow with egg powder, and much smaller than today's gargantuan efforts.
My grandfather kept chickens and used the eggs to swap for many scarce items. When he had too many, we preserved them in stone crocks, rubbing them with Ovoline, and used them for baking when the hens went off laying.

By the way, fish custard is definitely NOT disgusting.
We make it from a modern recipe (called Argentine Fish). The custard mixture goes on top of the fish, and contains some lemon rind and juice and also some cheese, and is topped with breadcrumbs, then the whole thing is oven baked till the custard is dryish and the crumbs are crispy. It's an extremely tasty dish.

daleaway, Oct 22, 11:50pm
And thank you for that website elliehen.

gilligee, Oct 23, 12:13am
Check some Aunt Daisy recipe books and also early Edmonds books.
There used to be lots of 'mock' recipes eg Mock whitebait fritters made with grated potato.

kay141, Oct 23, 2:45am
I don't think it was a brine. I seem to remember a mixture called isingglass (sp). The eggs were submerged in that but occasionally one went off. Oh the smell. Our least favourite chore was to get eggs out of it for Mum in the winter, it was slimy, cold and generally yucky. Also during the war, wool, milk and oranges were rationed. When you got pregnant, the doctor gave the mother a script which entitled her to 1lb of white wool ( it was all being dyed navy, khaki or air force blue), 1 extra pint of milk a week and some oranges if she could get them. I'm not sure about the quantity or frequency of the oranges but in those days they were mainly imported and so were scarce.

jaez1, Oct 23, 4:00am
Bread with dripping spread on for a meal were not uncommon in our house. It was not too bad, with salt and pepper to taste.
Later we were never allowed to tell the visiting health nurse that we had it though! We always said we had something good and healthy. Now, that's a lesson for the present time, when the Govt. are thinking of sending health nurses into families!

davidt4, Oct 23, 4:32am
My Scots grandmother used to make me bread and dripping with thinly sliced raw onion.It was delicious.

daisyhill, Oct 23, 8:04am
Thanks for the links and all the details. This is all so interesting! (Although I'm still sceptical of the fish custard, sorry!)

My mum used to send us out to pick rosehips and then make rosehip syrup to ward off colds during the winter. I remember liking it.
My dad, who was born in rural Ireland just after WWII ended, wasn't subject to rationing [as far as I know] but certainly didn't have much selection when he was a boy. He used to be given bread and dripping, or "goody" which is just bread and warm milk in a bowl if I remember rightly. He still enjoys those things now although the rest of us turn up our noses at them! Suppose they have comforting childhood memories for him.

mustu, Oct 23, 8:13am
I'm really loving reading this interesting thread! I was born after the war but I remember my mother saying how during the war she would have killed for silk stockings! The only ones she could get were apparently thick and very unflattering.

solarboy, Oct 23, 8:40am
Fertilizer for home vege gardens was virtually unobtainable but the milkman ( in Petone ) did his deliveries by horse and cart and everyone with a garden kept a hearth shovel and bucket handy and would rush out and collect any contributions made by the horse as it made it's way down the street.

flutterby08, Oct 23, 11:16am
Wow! There's like a whole group of people out there like me - I have some of the books in the picture gallery in my collection.