Wartime rationing

I still have my ration book! It has been carefully updated with more addresses by my parents 😂 I was born in 1947 and sweets and material were still on the ration.

has anyone watched the ‘ 1940’s Cooking’ channel on
You Tube ? with Olga packing lunches as a Land Girl
and describing recipes, with clothes and furniture
from the 1940’s?

Oh I do remember the garden being full of soft fruit - every berry imaginable - absolutely nothing like a redcurrant and raspberry tart topped with clotted cream

1946 baby here.

I can remember the shopkeeper cutting out the coupons from the ration books. I still have one - well my daughter has it now.

I can remember 2oz of sweets in a little pointed paper bag.

Blue sugar bags. Butter pats and how the grocer folded the butter into grease proof paper.

Monica the milk lady - ladling milk from the churns into mums jug.

I don’t remember being short of anything even though my mother was not particularly creative - she never made clothes of any sort and very little knitting.

In fact childhood for me was full of sunshine, friends and play.

My Mum talked about rationing until she died at 97. She used to save butter wrappers to grease baking trays, save wrapping paper, reuse envelopes, never wasted any ingredients. I still have her little Make Do and Mend book.

I was born in 1948 so would have been 6 when rationing ended.
I lived in London so no home grown veg for us but have absolutely no memories of it at all.

I was born in 1946. The main thing I remember is the lack of variety. Margarine of course instead of butter. It was years before I got used to the taste of butter. My mother used to cook Coley Fish for the cat. Sometimes she got whale meat which was revolting. Even the cat wasn't keen. I can remember us running out of milk sometimes and having to have dried milk in our tea, which I hated. And, of course, I remember sweets coming off the ration.

Wow this brings back memories. When I started school sweets were rationed and a girl in our class used to bring coupons for sweets. Guess who became her best friend?

I seem to remember sugar was still rationed and bananas had not been invented lol 😂. Hard to believe but happy days.

agnurse

I believe that the rationing system was once used to help solve a crime.

It was made a requirement to have your fingerprints taken, I think it was, before you would be given your ration book. The authorities figured this approach would work because people need to eat, so everyone would need to get a ration book.

I believe it did work.

This did not happen in UK.

I was born in March 1947 and remember the ration books. Also food parcels from relatives in Canada and Australia. There was angel cake from Canada which was delicious. Also ornaments for the Christmas tree, little glass musical instruments, but they had broken in the post. My mother was called up and worked in the Food Office during the war, going round butchers shops checking their accounts tallied with the ration sheets they had taken from their customers.

Knittypamela

My mum went through rationing. She said her dad was entitled to an egg every day. I don't know if this was for health reasons. Each day one of the children got to eat the top of his egg as a treat. The family tried to grow mushrooms but failed. They picked shell fish off rocks to supplement their diet.

Under 5s and pregnant and nursing mothers where meant to get fresh eggs but they couldn’t always get them so powdered egg was given out same with milk that was extra for them as well

Aunt Glenda said the fresh eggs were rare but you’d get powdered no bother. Hence her mam, my gran keeping chickens.

I was born after the rationing finished but I still remember whatnotstew with dumplings which was mainly veg in the stew and the fluffiest dumplings ever as a nipper.

Aunt Glenda still makes it for us and we’re both transported back.

Bellanonna

Liz46

I seem to remember a sort of twig which we used to buy at the chemists and chewed it. It was called 'sticky lice' or something like that. It tasted vaguely sweet!

We got those in the sweet shops. Known here as liquorice wood. It was short pieces of wood, about the size of half a little finger and impregnated with liquorice. Very chewy and eventually discarded. Must’ve worked wonders on the teeth 🙄

It was liquorice root, literally the root of the plant ( a bit like a thin stick and quite hard and chewy. As kids we sometimes used to put several roots to infuse in a bottle of water to make a flavoured drink.

We also ate "Spanish" which was sold at the sweetshop in strips; black, chewy, made from liquorice and sugar. Same flavour as root but more intense.

TiggyW

My Mum was born in 1931. She always says that she wasn’t allowed bananas during rationing, but her younger cousin was because he was under 7.

There were no bananas in UK during the war years , they were banned in 1940 because importing them required refrigeration, and refrigerated ships had to be used for more vital food imports.

There was a recipe for mock banana; made with parsnips.

I am a 1943 baby and can remember sweet rationing. Our Granny and Aunt saved their sweet rations for my younger brother and me and gave us a tin of mixed sweets and chocolate bars for our birthday, Christmas and Easter. I was lucky as my birthday was in October so these treats were spread out nicely through the year and I made them last for each period. However my brother’s birthday was in January!!! Needless to say, despite all his wheedling, I can’t remember giving him any of mine. I don’t think he ever forgave me though we did have a laugh about it when we were older 😂

My mum went through rationing. She said her dad was entitled to an egg every day. I don't know if this was for health reasons. Each day one of the children got to eat the top of his egg as a treat. The family tried to grow mushrooms but failed. They picked shell fish off rocks to supplement their diet.

I have two ration books and petrol coupons from WW2.

I was born in 1945, rationing ended when I was nine. I remember going to the Town Hall with my mother to get new coupon books. She used to go to a shop called “The Buy & Save” and the grocer was called Walter. I remember large tins with glass tops low down on the counter, which housed loose broken biscuits. We used to buy a selection from them. At the back of the shop was a barrel of vinegar - you took a clean bottle with you for Walter to fill. There was sawdust on the floor which I pushed into small mounds with my feet while we waited. My mother used to ask for rations of cheese, bacon, butter, tea, sugar, etc. Walter weighed them all out and then used a thick blue wax pencil to draw a line through the coupons she had used. We never had sugar in tea and just a little on porridge. The sugar ration was saved through the year to make jam from fruit in the garden. Spam was used for everything. In sandwiches, as fritters, with chips or salad. It wasn’t like tinned Spam now, it was bright pink and had a spongy texture. I hated it. We did get chocolate, sweets were the first thing off ration but then everyone went mad and rationing on sweets was reintroduced for a time. I was allowed one square of Cadbury’s chocolate each night.

Liz46

I seem to remember a sort of twig which we used to buy at the chemists and chewed it. It was called 'sticky lice' or something like that. It tasted vaguely sweet!

We got those in the sweet shops. Known here as liquorice wood. It was short pieces of wood, about the size of half a little finger and impregnated with liquorice. Very chewy and eventually discarded. Must’ve worked wonders on the teeth 🙄

My aunt had a boyfriend in the war who posted her bananas.took 6 weeks to get there and were rotten

butterandjam

I remember rationing and so will plenty of others here; it didn't end until 1954.

My mother left me in a pram outside the shops, came back to retrieve her rationbook and found I'd eaten it.

Love this story.
You must have been a very hungry baby.

I seem to remember a sort of twig which we used to buy at the chemists and chewed it. It was called 'sticky lice' or something like that. It tasted vaguely sweet!

I believe that the rationing system was once used to help solve a crime.

It was made a requirement to have your fingerprints taken, I think it was, before you would be given your ration book. The authorities figured this approach would work because people need to eat, so everyone would need to get a ration book.

I believe it did work.

If any of you visit ( or live in ) Yorkshire visit the Eden Camp near Pickering. It is an old army barracks that has been converted to a war museum. It is absolutely fascinating and we stayed for four hours with our 15 year old grandson.

Folded on my bed is a woollen blanket from WW2. It has the utility label on it with the weight of the wool (pure wool) and its price. It's very heavy. There's another one in the airing cupboard. I still have my ration book although I was born after the war.

Mum was born 1942 and still has the ration books from her parents and other books, food wise, they never went without as they lived on a smallholding, granddad milked his Ayrshire Cows twice a day and delivered milk via horse and float, dispensing the milk with a jug out of a churn (the bottles came later). Pigs reared, half were taken towards the food effort. Mum says though it was tough, she can remember when old enough, using the pigs bladder as a football.

My granddad was one of 6 I think, 1 brother didn't go to war as he too was a farmer but in South Shropshire, the other 3 went and died. I believe the oldest sibling was a girl, married, he died, but no children as she helped raise her brothers. When you think of it, from a brood of kids, only 2 were able to have offspring and I'm from one of them (after mum that is)