Wartime Chocolate Spread

 

I just had to do it after watching Utility Jude's YouTube video, see the last post if you're wondering what I'm going on about.  😀

I made it to her exact proportions:

2 tbsp. Mashed Potato

1tbsp. Sugar

1 tbsp. Cocoa Powder

a dash of Vanilla Essence - or extract in my case as that's what I had.

Simply mix all the ingredients really well together.

Making sure that you get rid of any lumps of mash or coco powder ... the cocoa powder highlights all the little lumps of mashed potato that you might not have realised were still there!

You get this amount from the mix.

Which is enough to cover two slices of a large loaf of bread.  

I wouldn't cut your bread too thick or this will be a very stodgy snack.  Of course I knew what it was as I pondered over the taste for a while, so then I decided in the interests of a fair test I would give a piece to Alan to get his un-informed opinion.  A proper blind taste test.

He said it tasted like Nutella with not enough nuts, he said it was very chocolatey, and very edible ... he DID NOT guess that it was made with mashed potatoes and was very intrigued when he found out.

We both thought that if you had no chocolate in the house and were craving a chocolatey fix, this really would hit the spot.  After Alan's comments I think I will try it with almond extract next time in place of the vanilla and see if it gets even closer in flavour to Nutella.

It is a very filling snack for sure.

Sue xx

Pie, Mash and Chocolate Spread

 

It was Pie and Mash for tea last night, with the now obligatory Bisto gravy.

I didn't really think the gravy would go that well with the pie, as it was a Saag Aloo pie from the freezer that I wanted to use up, but it really did.  It made me think that I will try to make a curried vegetable pie for myself, after all curry powder was available during the war years and I have a whole drawer of spices to use up.  I only had a little bit of mash as I wasn't that hungry, but I still made enough to have some left overs.

During the war years mashed potato was used in a lot of ration recipes as you were advised to eat around 1lb of potatoes a day per person.  I may not be quite managing that at the moment but I am trying to make sure I have some available.

And there's a very specific recipe I wanted to try, so I separated out two tablespoons of the potatoes before I added any salt or butter.

https://youtu.be/iOK6zYFDloU?si=-AcrtkZiZFaJlamI

  

I'll let you know how it tastes.  😀

Sue xx

The Victory Garden ... and at last a Homegrown Large RED Tomato

My little garden with it's two wooden raised beds and the few pots and planting boxes that I have,  has now been officially renamed - The Victory Garden.

And as if to celebrate the renaming, my monthly subscription of Kitchen Garden arrived with it's usual three packets of free seeds for me to plant this month.

Cabbages, Parsley and Lettuce seeds will be going in the beds in a couple of weeks.  And I decided to take them up on the cover offer of 'Free Autumn Planting Onions Sets', I also ordered some garlic to put in at the same time.  So that will be all the beds filled again by the end of September.

The Victory Garden is not having the Winter off this year!!

And just in time for breakfast this morning my first large red tomato turned red.  Seen here with it's cousin who's plants have already given us a few red cherry tomatoes.

And of course we've already been eating the yellow ones, just a few up to now but they are very tasty.  I've had my eyes on that beautiful big tomato for days now, watching it change from green to pale tinged red to full blown red this morning.

And my gosh was it delicious.

I sliced and cooked it gently with some garlic powder and the green tops of a spring onion, also from the garden and ate it on a piece of buttered toast.  The simplest and most delicious meal I've eaten for ages.

I'll be watching all the other tomatoes very closely now. 

Sue xx

 

This Week's Non-Ration Shopping ... and Scrumping

 

The fridge was looking pretty bare so I decided it was time to go to the supermarket and pick up my non-rationed foods.  There's also an invader in amongst all the almost authentic WWII goodies.

A banana!!  🍌

Alan wanted one, and it seemed a bit much to make the cashier do a single banana as a separate transaction so it's on my receipt and therefore in my photo.

The single potato as well as the bag of potatoes is there because I could get 60 extra Nectar points by buying loose potatoes ... so one was enough to qualify me for that.

I weighed all the potatoes together before putting them away and I have just under 7lbs of spuds.  Enough for me to be able to have the recommended 1lb a day.  It's a good job I like potatoes!!

And on the subject of potatoes, I have really been fancying some crisps this past week, so I thought what are the oldest crisps around, I'll buy those.     In the UK seemingly it was Smith's crisps, and by 1934 they were selling 200 million packets of crisps in Britain each year.

Smiths Potato Crisps, now owned by Walkers and called Salt & Shake.  

I remember getting these as a child and loving the little twist of salt in the blue paper.  Now it's a sealed packet of salt but back then it was just twisted closed.  The thrill of getting two, and the disappointment of not getting one at all, is still in my memory.

Here's my receipt ... and the apples that I scrumped from the park while I was walking the dogs on the way to the supermarket.   There were some lovely looking larger ones higher up the tree but even shaking the branches a bit couldn't dislodge them yet.  I'll have to go back with Alan and see if they're ready to fall off in a couple of days.

 Free food ... yes please.  😄

I know I went over my aimed for £10 per week spend this week, but as I was so far under it last week I thought I would let myself off with the overspend.  What took me over was buying the packet of fish portions.  

Fish was never on ration as it was regularly unavailable or only in the shops in small quantities.  So if you were near the front of one of the long snaking queues you might have been lucky.  I'll allow myself some sort of fish two or three times a month ... if I get in the queue in time.  😉

Sue xx

The Ever So Famous Woolton Pie

 

I realised the other day that I hadn't show you my little individual Woolton Pie in all it's gravy covered glory.  

I showed you it the other day, naked in it's little enamelled dish, but not with it's pastry lid and ready for eating.

I rolled the lid out a little bit thinner to accommodate the piled up vegetables and once trimmed used those trimmings to make the letters for the top.

I've always found the best recipe for it is in this book, which is actually an amalgamation of three of Marguerite Pattern's wartime books - We'll Eat Again, The Victory Cookbook and Post-War Kitchen.  I'm guessing the Woolton Pie recipe will be in at least two of the three individual books.

It would be a HUGE pie if you used one pound each of your chosen vegetables so I always just use leftover vegetables when I making another dish.  It's a very basic and forgiving recipe, you just cook your vegetables and then assemble them in some sort of gravy or sauce under a pastry or mashed potato lid.  If you are a meat eater you could also add some leftover, chopped up cooked meat to the dish before covering it with pastry.

Simple and very tasty, and possibly one of the most famous of all wartime recipes.

Sue xx