How did you “Eke out” back in the day when hard up?

During a lengthy period of unemployment (no-one wanted a 63 year old proof-reader) I bulked up the contents of a tin of baked beans with two tablespoons of economy brand porridge oats and dressed it up with Worcestershire Sauce. Like caviar or what?

I really did the opposite! I came from an impoverished single parent family to a marriage to a man, or boy really, who earned a good salary, so although I did most of the cooking at home, suddenly money wasn’t so tight. I had £5 a week for food, more if I needed it, and it seemed a fortune. I had never eaten so well!

I remember once we had no money at all and three student teenagers, one of which was the girlfriend of eldest son, to feed. It was in the 1980's. DH was self employed so no benefits. The kids biked ten miles to a warehouse and brought back envelopes to stuff with passport documents. They biked them back just before 5pm and got enough money for cheap sausages, potatoes and baked beans. They did that for weeks till DH was employed again

Thank you, teabagwoman, for reminding me of pressed ox tongue. I remember my heavy cast iron tongue press and only recently got rid of it after it had remained unused for many years. I married in the 1960s and my guide for economic meals was "Cooking in a Bedsitter" by Katherine Whitehorn. Our maisonette had a tiny garden whch DH made good use of to grow veg. Now, almost 60 years later, he still grows a lot of veg and fruit having progressed from our first tiny plot to a kitchen garden + allotment.

I was 60s baby but we were never starving we also ate lot of mince and spuds and homemade pies and cakes my aunt used to say you won’t go hungry if you got spuds but all our meals were cooked from scratch nothing out of a tin but carnation cream lol

I can't go back 50,60 or even 70 years, but when I married in the late 80s, we had a high cost mortgage and sadly very low wages. I would add baked beans and chopped tinned tomatoes to minced beef to stretch it further, making 1lb (or today's 500g) of mince stretch to 4 (sometimes 5) meals (8-10 servings).
I still do this today but now as in a tin of chickpeas too, which can stretch that same 500g of mince to 10/12 servings, the majority of which get frozen for use at some later date.

In 1968 when I was first married, on very little money, I used to keep 10 shillings (50p today) to buy whatever was a bargain. Once much hilarity among friends about my bargain 6 pence (2-1/2p) tins of plums, but my goodness they made great plum crumbles with half flour and half porridge oats made it more crunchy. My husband played rugby with others and they used to descend for a meal after matches. Loved - and still think it is the best flavour - shin beef. Cooked in a pressure cooker, made the most lovely stew with super gravy, some of which I saved to go in with mince for another day. Tins of corned beef for corned beef hash on days when no money left for fresh meat. A favourite when I am on my own - even today - was pigs kidneys with onions and mushrooms. Cut kidney up into pieces and put a little oil in and fry onions and add peppers and then kidney and fry. then add celery and make a gravy and let it bubble slowly , it tastes lovely.Makes a great meal with potatoes and veg. Love celery both cooked and raw, and it adds good flavour to casseroles. Jacket potatoes these days do first bit in microwave and then finish in airfryer as you get the good outer skin. Tin of tuna and some sweetcorn make a good filling to share out. Go shopping , not delivered , as I see what is in the reduced bin first to decide what I will be having and buy accordingly. Have a wok and often do chicken thigh with lots of veg onions and celery of course carrots and whatever else I have around. Make great stir fry. Dont use packet sauce, just use soy sauce and sweet chilli sauce to make my own a lot cheaper. Used to go strawberry picking especially on wimbledon final day as no one around. Pick the strawberrys and go home and make jam. Always came out very well and lovely to eat in November when it was miserable . Making me hungry now!

Still have The Paupers Cookbook! Lived on beef shin, ribs and mince. Couldn’t do it now as I am mainly veggie!
Fortunately much better off now and we eat a lot of organic food, fish and plants which are not cheap.
Still thrifty though and make my own kefir, yoghurt and water kefir drinks. Never ever waste any food and my grandson laughs at me for freezing leftovers!

Aldom

HelterSkelter1

Slightly off the point, but when I spend £5 in the supermarket on hardly anything I often think of my sister newly married on £5 a week housekeeping in 1963. And that was probably slightly above average. But a good local butcher, baker, dairy and fishmonger must have helped. I can't remember much about our early married years food wise although we had several good butchers in our town I must have used together with a fish shop, greengrocers etc, but that £5 has stuck in my memory.

In 1963 £5 was worth (in today's money) £100.
So in no way a struggle to make ends meet.
In 1968, with two children we lived well on £6 a week housekeeping money. I could easily afford a whole rib of beef at the weekend.

I too had £6.00 a week housekeeping in the late sixties. That amount funded food, everything for the house, dry cleaning, haircuts, shoe repairs, packed lunches for work, and to feed two fussy cats. We had friends come for dinner sometimes; I didn't find it a struggle but I was always careful to check prices and didn't buy anything we absolutely didn't need. My Mother had a really limited budget when I was a child and managed to make delicious meals out of thin air sometimes.

Yes when first married,still do! Buy a whole chicken...roast dinnerMade a fab meal with left over chicken 1 tin Campbells mushroom soup, sliced onions, sweetcorn, 1/2 tin of pineapple mixed chicken in and served wth white boiled rice. Bones got boiled for stock to make soup. Like wise with mince or stew all eeked out!

I can.remember dividing out the sticks of spaghetti into probably 4, for 4 days and then 4 pairs of eyes looking at me expectantly and having to say there isn't any more. A period that didn't last long, fortunately.

Greyduster

One thing I used to cook when things were tight that I learned from my mother were slow cooked beef short ribs which were as cheap as chips. Cooked in a covered casserole with vegetables they were delicious. I still cook them but they are for high days and holidays. You need to take out a second mortgage to buy them now since they were popularised by certain celebrity chefs.

Love that we still use ‘cheap as chips’ when they are a bit of a luxury now. The local chippy charges £5 a portion where my daughter lives (midlands), ours charge £4. Takeaway fish and chips for us and one grandchild was £42 recently. I digress, our real treat when first married was chips and curry sauce from the local takeaway in the 70s. It cost 36p for both of us, two portions of chips at 8p each and two pots of curry sauce for 10p each. We couldn’t afford it every week mind. We were saving for our deposit like crazy and to reach our goal by the time the house was available (new build) I had £2 a week for food shopping, not a penny more. We ate quite well though, having a chicken that made three days’ meals plus soup. Roast dinner with the two breasts, cold with jacket spuds the next day, then my mother in law showed me how to scrape the carcass and make delicious chicken rissoles with the leftover mash and onion. Macaroni cheese was a weekly meal, I think cheese was reasonable. Ate a lot of tinned peas. I really thought we’d made it when we could have frozen garden peas. Happy days.

We married in 1965. Heys and was newly graduated and joined the RAF. We had to buy him some decent clothes. It was fortunate that I had managed to save some money while living at home (and paying my keep) to pay for these items. We lived in rented accommodation not much better than rural slums. Cooking was on a baby belling with a pressure cooker bought from a club at two shillings a week. Rent was seven pounds each week and electricity was bought from the landlord. I am sure he set the rate himself.
Because DH was under 25 we had to manage on a single man’s pay. Food was mainly shin of beef stew or breast of lamb stew. Later brisket (delicious cooked in the pressure cooker).
We were forty before buying our first house. Trying to save the deposit while paying increasing amounts of rent for married quarters.
Eldest son bought me a modern electric pressure cooker a few years ago because he said he remembers most of our food coming from a pressure cooker. It didn’t last long as the digital lights stopped working.
Life is much easier these days but I still cook cheap cuts of meat.

£100 per month to feed and clothe and provide cleaning materials etc for a family of 4 in 1986 meant that I wore blinkers in the supermarket, simply avoiding any aisles which contained unnecessary items like chocolate biscuits, sweet cereals or fizzy drinks. I baked and cooked everything from scratch. The children wore clothes given to them and charity shop items. I knit for them and also for my daughter’s dolls, which had been mine. It was hard at the time, because all around me other families lived easier lives financially; however, looking back those days seem like good times!

Harmonypuss

I can't go back 50,60 or even 70 years, but when I married in the late 80s, we had a high cost mortgage and sadly very low wages. I would add baked beans and chopped tinned tomatoes to minced beef to stretch it further, making 1lb (or today's 500g) of mince stretch to 4 (sometimes 5) meals (8-10 servings).
I still do this today but now as in a tin of chickpeas too, which can stretch that same 500g of mince to 10/12 servings, the majority of which get frozen for use at some later date.

And all that time you were actually making it healthier Harmonypuss.

We used to eat all the cheaper things. My Mum used to have us to dinner a couple of times a week. We had no car and no telephone. We were very lucky that we lived in a tied house. Tied to my husbands work. So rent was super low.

Maybe we should show these to the young families of today. They are so sure we've never had any hardship. They don't believe us. I even remember my own Mum having to be careful. That would have been 50-60s. I was lucky as an only child we were a little bit better off than some of my friend families.

We have my DHs first married pay packet. £8 a week. Even so, with a baby who came quite quickly, we managed. Andwewere very happy.

MaggsMcG

Maybe we should show these to the young families of today. They are so sure we've never had any hardship. They don't believe us. I even remember my own Mum having to be careful. That would have been 50-60s. I was lucky as an only child we were a little bit better off than some of my friend families.

Nothing I've read here is any different to the families i know today.

They, and I, have done exactly the same over the years.

2016. Had sepsis, 6 weeks in hospital, then discharged home to a very cold house, loss of income as not able to work. I was lucky that a lovely kind lady, who I had only met once, cooked me enough meals for a fortnight. After that I shopped wisely, buying mark-downs, cooking several days meals in one go; lucky I don't mind shepherd's pie 4 days in a row... I didn't put lights on unless I really had to, wrapped up in extra layers and a blanket to keep warm. No TV, read books by the window to get the daylight. It was an interesting time, but I got through that bad patch.
Unfortunately, many people nowadays wouldn't be able to manage in the same situation.

I've always loved cooking from first vesta meals, (so exotic and very much a treat), so at uni I always cooked for, usually, the lads who hadn't a clue and they shared the cost of my meal. When we moved out of school accommodation into our own house, went part-time just as interest rates absolutely soared in 1988, we ate everything with vast amounts of carrot grated into it 🤣. Mince is a gift for carrying flavours and spice. Make things really hot, you just need a little with a mountain of rice 🤗. Lentils ♥️ Having more money nowadays we appreciate a lot being comparatively flush and still couldn't countenance buying coffee to take out for £s haha but our dds are very different, it's part of their culture/lifestyle.

Thank you Calli. I do have a slow cooker. It is in packing case somewhere!! Unlabelled by the removal people! Where is it?

My Crockpot died a death, so I bought a new slow cooker last year. Made a BIG mistake. It is far too large. I am still totally unable to have a mental image of metric measurements. It is one of those blocks. I shall have to sell it. However, my (as yet unused Ninja) has a slow cooker incorporated, as well as a pressure cooker!! Really must get my act together!!

My slow cooker seemed to large after the first one I had but it's fine.
I often cook enough for eating for one meal, freezing for two more

I havent advanced to a Ninja yet!

We had a lot of veggies, not so much meat. Also a lot of pasta. When we first arrived inAustralia, early 70s, we absolutely went nuts because first grade fillet steak was really cheap then and I could never afford it in England. Not the case now, sadly. We seem to be going back to the high cost of food , life is circular. Briefly, because of difficulties with the Chinese export market, we were flooded with local lobsters. 🦞 How good was that ? Only lasted a few months of course

Sarahr Many many people are still managing not just in the situation you were in but in many other situations where there incomes are so small that they and their families are living in charity.