Week Seven ... and the Final 'Vegetarian' Rations

 

This week is the seventh week of my rationing journey.

It's also the final time I will be using the 'vegetarian rations'.  Yep, it struck me as so complicated when I dropped eggs from my diet again and reintroduced fish into my meal plans but continued to use the vegetarian rations.  And if I'm confused then surely you are!!  😄

Last week I found a picture of an old information leaflet from the Ministry of Food that immediately made me realise what I could do.  Don't you just love it when something that has been preying on your mind suddenly becomes clear ... I know I do. 

Anyway there will be a re-jig of my rations in time for the new month and my new set of 20 points will also become available.  Making last 'months' points stretch out over six weeks has been quite good in some ways, helping me to be able to use up some of things from my pre-rationing cupboard and whittle down the contents of the freezer.

The best meal of the week last week was this Sausage, Mash, Cabbage and Gravy meal.  Gosh that was delicious.  Who knew that I suddenly really love Savoy cabbage, I think cooking it the wartime way is the real gamechanger ... it's lovely.

I also made a real effort last week to use up all my weekly rations of spread and cheese, but even though I thought I had done well I still ended up with lots for a sandwich on Saturday.

I am also really getting ahead with my coffee.  

The two ounces that I top the jar up with each week has now brought me right to the top of my small jar, I will have to revert to my former larger jar on the counter.  I think I am using between an ounce and an ounce and a half each week.  I still have the monthly ration of 4oz untouched in the cupboard as well.

There wasn't any space in my little jars of oil to top them up this week, so I weighed what was in them both and then weighed the oil in my dispenser and there was just under what I needed, so now my oil bottle is back in use and will be topped up each week.

This weeks Menu Plan is designed to use up a few of the things in my freezer and get a couple of my more 'modern' foods out of the way.

I'm looking forward to the re-jig next week, but first there are lots of lovely things to have this week ... and it's the last time I will be having a full four ounces of cheese, so I thought I would take cheese and beetroot sandwiches to Mum's this week for our lunch, Alan has his own cheddar and me and Mum both have Violife.

Sue xx

Memories, Old Photos and a Re-Jig

 

My posts on this blog seem to be bring out so many memories for so many people, myself included.  

I am just hoping that the majority of them are good, and that the bad ones at least make us realise just how far we have come in the past few years.  

Today I am just sharing a photo of the kitchen from The 1940s House. 

 I recently re-watched this and although I have the book I have never read right through it.  Perhaps I should as I do like to pore over photos like these, picking out the details remembering the versions of things that we had in our tiny little pantry-sized kitchen in my Nana's house growing up.

 I do have the large saucepan that is on the cooker and lots of other enamelware, which I absolutely love.  If I had more space in my tiny home I would love to get an original kitchen cabinet, my Nana had a beautiful cream coloured 1940's version, and then in the late sixties my Mum got one with a Formica worktop instead of the enamel as they used to be.

Now I need to go and weigh out next weeks rations.  

This will be the final week that I will be having these sort of rations before I have a re-jig the following week.  I have very luckily found a way to simplify things, well I think it will be simpler!!

It can't possibly get any more complicated ... can it?

Sue xx

Blitz Spirit. Why?

 

I'm currently half way through watching Lucy Worsley's latest programme Blitz Spirit. 

To be honest I'm finding it heart-breaking to watch, hearing it through the words of the people who lived it, and to find out that our own Government kept so much from the general news as it was happening during the war years.  I understand the need for some things to be delayed ... reports, information etc ... for all sorts of national security and morale issues, but it must have been horrendous for the people going through the absolute terror of the worst days of the blitz for it to be hushed up for so long and not reported on.  As though they were going through it alone.

As for photographs of bombed buildings being censored to show only part of the destruction and having to include an untouched building and 'happy people' ... words fail me.

It seems the more you learn the harder it is to accept that humans do this sort of things to each other so very regularly.  There has never been a time on this planet without a war raging somewhere.

Why?

Sue xx

IZAL Toilet Paper & Extra Shopping - Beans

We were chatting about IZAL toilet paper on the Facebook group the other day and it brought back all sorts of memories.  It was the only sort of toilet roll that we even knew existed as children, although I have just found out that soft paper was launched by St Andrew's Paper Mill (later to be known as Andrex) in England in 1942, so it was around ... gosh my Mum kept that quiet!!

I have just  found out that it was only in 1935 that toilet paper was advertised as being 'splinter free', gosh that must have been a relief.  😨

 As a child I thought the best use for IZAL was as tracing paper.  😄

This weeks only shopping has been the £1 that I spent on these two packs of Heinz baked beans, which I bought at Booths using the six pounds in vouchers that Heinz/Kraft sent me last week after my polite complaint about being short changed.

So my week six shopping bill was just £1.

I will be putting these in the lower food cupboard and 'buying' them with my Points spend each month.  Baked beans come in at 2 points per tin, so I can have at least two tins every month for the next four months.

Sue xx

Do I Follow the Menu Plan? One Days Meals

 

Someone asked me if I followed the menu plan rigidly, most days the answer would be yes.  

I am doing a menu plan to help keep myself on track and to take that 'What can I have for tea?' quandary off the table each day.  There's nothing worse to me than standing in front of the fridge or cupboard, hungry and wanting something quickly and just not knowing what to have.  That's the time when all good intentions can fly out of the window and I risk eating rubbish, which then leaves me unsatisfied and leads to nibbling all evening.

But ... I am very open to switching the meals or the days around.

So I will eat a Tuesday meal for Monday's tea and vice versa.  The main thing for me is to have seven evening meals, seven lunches and seven breakfasts written down and ready for inspiration.  Some weeks, like last week for example, things crop up, time runs away with me or we go out and a meal isn't eaten at all.  That's when I can add the missing meal to the next weeks Menu Plan to make sure that nothing gets wasted and everything gets enjoyed while it is in the best possible condition.

So to me a menu plan isn't written in stone, it is a daily reminder of what I think will be balanced for me over the course of the week, what is ready and waiting to be eaten and what I hope to be eating each day.

As you can see from these photos and this weeks Menu Plan Monday went very well.  😁

Sue xx