'Butter papers' and other "Once apon a Time"s

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rog.e, Feb 17, 8:08pm
I just folded and put into the freezer a butter paper. Set me thinking how I used to line loaf tins with these.
Now I use them mostly to grease pie plates, casserole dishes and cake tins.
Kinda good-housekeeping-recycling-se-
cond-use stuff.

When you first started out cooking what did you do that seldom done today?

maxwell.inc, Feb 17, 8:24pm
Used grains and sugar with wild abandon!

510, Feb 17, 9:50pm
I can picture Lard in fridge, dripping container sitting on bench. I was a child so didn't use it but it was used. Brown paper for lining and newspaper to put on fruit cakes when baking so cake wouldn't burn. Muslim type clothes for straining things. Sacking to make pot mitts.

eastie3, Feb 17, 10:23pm
Mum taught us how to cook on a coal range, it made great scones but I love my fanbake oven.
We made lots of milk puddings and fruit loaves in those days.
Used lard and dripping, olive oil was sold by the chemist and was most definately not ev.
Probably one of the biggest differences is not boiling veges to death !

lulu239, Feb 17, 10:37pm
Eastie, I remember my mother boiling the cabbage to death and then putting a pinch of baking soda in it to make it green again! I always thought I would never, ever do that. I cook my cabbage in a smidgen of water with a wee bit of butter and some celery until it is barely cooked. It's scrumptious like that.

bedazzledjewels, Feb 17, 10:41pm
Yes 510 - I remember the lard and dripping, and must get back to it!
I'm especially keen on saving duck fat. Gorgeous stuff!

wahinetoa62, Feb 17, 10:46pm
this isnt about cooking but i do miss the top of the milk on weetbix... . and we used the bread wrapper to wrap our sandwiches in for school... gosh those were the days

uli, Feb 18, 12:05am
Uh oh - don't do it now Val!
Those butter "papers" are mow lined with plastic sometimes - not all of them - but some ... so you are going to eat cake with melted plastic ... .

rog.e, Feb 18, 1:16am
Oh - how do I tell uli? This one looks OK.

I have another one from way back:

Lettuce leaves rolled up and sliced as thinly as one could possibly slice.
Competitive stuff - women vieing for the most delicate lettuce salad with a few beautiful slices of egg and tomato spread over the top.
OMG!

cottagerose, Feb 18, 1:21am
I still do that salad for a change from a tossed salad or if Im short on ingrediants for a tossed salad

korbo, Feb 18, 3:08am
yep i remember the lettuce, used to think auntie had put grass clipings in the salad, as it was soooo finely cut.
i still prefer that kind of lettuce salad, with cheese, eggs and toms on top. chunky cut tho... . . and that cream on the milk, was so different from cream in the bottle today... .

dollmakernz, Feb 18, 3:17am
When I arrived in NZ as a newly wed in 79 all I had to cook on was a coal range, and I'd never seen one before! LOL! I was obsessed with keeping it looking immaculate and used the wax paper wrapping from the bread to keep the black top looking really black!

anne1955, Feb 18, 3:17am
Your making me smile :) I remember going to a friends after school and when she asked her mother what we could have to eat was told bread and dripping... I'd never heard of such. . asked my Mother when I got home was told 'poor people' ate that. . what a great thing missed that haha we need to turn back the clock just a bit... not the over kill on the vegies... and I always keep the butter paper in the fridge for lining tins, putting over top of fruit cakes to keep them from being too brown on the top... and korbo yes remember Mother doing the very fine cut and Dad doing the other haha I go with the torn... .

wahinetoa62, Feb 18, 3:20am
not really the same feeling. . you just felt so lucky to get to open the new milk and enjoy the top of the milk... .

anne1955, Feb 18, 3:21am
Sorry I remember running after the milk cart at our holiday home to get the milk and no I am only just over 50 haha but think he might have been the last around that was in Central Otago. . Clyde...

510, Feb 18, 4:00am
What about fresh bread when it was delivered to the mail box Iyou would walk home eating holes in the end of the bread. Not food but just how things were done, if you lived in town food was delivered by grocer's boy on his grocer's bike. In the country we had grocery delivery by a van. Getting the milk from the cow shed in a billy. Butchers also delivered their meat as well.

amazing_grace, Feb 18, 12:27pm
I personally think we need to get back to the "good old days"... . it saves money and gets a nicer result. I keep my dripping in the freezer and make soap out of it. I also use my butter papers all time, I dont think I have ever found one that is lined with plastic! but I'll keep a lookout for that. My grandfather used to make the most amazing flaky pastry on his coal range, just with soured milk etc. His coal range went all day and all night, and the wetback boiled his hot water tank all day and all night! there was a large stain in the bath cos he kept the hot water tap in the bathroom running so that the tank wouldnt make so much noise (cold water had to constantly go into the his hot water tank). . LOL. When we visited we always had a bath!

uli, Feb 18, 3:29pm
Yeah I know that - when I had my Jersey cow we used to get two thirds cream and one third milk in the bottles - and everybody just used the "top milk" LOL - and the rest went into the pig bucket ...

griffo4, Feb 19, 1:22am
l remember when we got the milk from the cows and it was scolded and the cream on top next day was the best and we fought over it. We used to put it on our weetbix with sugar on top, oh so nice.
Great to read this thread there are so many things you forget about and town milk reminds me of coloured water it is see through

glendeb, Feb 19, 2:33am
Oh yes, my Oma used to have a lidded tin in her cupboard for the old butter papers, they were used to grease cake tins and trays.

Also everything was in a tin or glass jar - not much plastic around then.

There was an old scarred metal bowl for the compost, and it was so much fun to take it out to Opa to add to the heap. These days we have an old icecream container.

summersunnz, Feb 19, 2:51am
I remember the 'Barracuda Loaves' of bread delivered by the rural delivery mailman - we'd collect them from the letterbox and walk home, carefully pulling the centre join apart (is that where the name of 'pull-apart loaves/rolls' originated from! ) and scooped out the soft white bread inside. The loaf would reach the house completely hollowed!
We always thought our mother would truly not notice!

flutterby08, Feb 19, 3:35am
The smell of soup bubbling away on the woodstove, and Dad would forget to move the pot when he stoked the fire so he'd get sworn at by Mum because everything stuck to the bottom!

fisher, Feb 19, 4:41am
Rendered down lard. . two aluminum containers... one for new, one for used and to be used again for bacon and sausages. .
Being first and racing out to get the milk... whoa betide anyone who shook it up. . put the nice creamy top on ya hot porridge with sugar...
The old huge wooden valve radio turned on first thing in the morning and taking 3 or so minutes to warm up. . dad had made a special cupboard for it. .
The pan and grill we used under the gas to melt our cheese on toast, got three slices on it. . slightly over melted so it went all gooey and burnt on the edges. .
The grey watties peas out of the tin in winter after such a magic harvest over summer. .
Picking capsicum from the plants from the fields. . 20 cents for 4...
Picking boysenberries and strawberries by the bucket load for mum to make jam. . grubby lips and sore bellies...
Peeling the peaches from the trees so mum could preserve in jars. .
Making potato vodka... peeling the spuds and chopping them up and then watching the old aluminum pressure cooker hiss and huff. .
Going across to the dairy and buying the super fresh "chubby" loaves or the "vienna" loaves. . breaking the chubby apart and pinching some of the fluffy bread from inside... :}
The butcher, (sawdust on the floor and bl**ded chopping block) giving us a slice of luncheon or a small saveloy. .
Driving out to Pukekohe to get the spuds, onions fruit and fresh veges. . that we didn't grow in our garden...

jenniemc1, Feb 19, 4:57am
52years ago as a 19yr old bride (very green) I thought I had to copy my m-in-law and bottle my own Baked Beans & Spaghetti ! Mostly they didn't seal and we lived on which ever until they were all eaten ! No freezer of course !

nzhel, Feb 19, 6:01am
Fresh warm scones and pikelets with plenty of butter - we didn't know about saturated fat then. Homemade sponge filled with jam and cream, always a dessert after tea like steamed puddings with real custard, junket, apple pie, bread and butter pudding. We weren't fat either - quite the opposite! My mother baked every Sunday to 'fill the tins' for the week for lunches - Louise Cake, Marshmallow slice, Ginger Kisses (how I loved the mock cream) Sultana loaf etc and glorious Custard Squares - divine!