Waffles and those molasses bars look good. Baked rhubarb is just too much of an everyday thing from where I grew up. I literally grew up on that stuff.
My Grandmother taught me to cook. She was a young mother of three during WW2. One of the things I remember about her was the Dripping Bowl she kept in the fridge. She only ever cooked with lard and saved all her bacon grease. She made the most amazing roast potatoes with the dripping. She passed in 2008 aged 98. I'm 54 and I also have a dripping bowl in my fridge and I only cook with lard and try to not eat processed food. With rationing you ate well but never overate. People were healthier. Thanks for this video. It's such a great reminder of my Granny ♥️ She was just marvelous.
Great job! I'm a 60s baby (Father born in '37, mother in '46). One of the things your video brought to mind that they had frequently (and inflicted on us as kids) was creamed chopped hard boiled eggs and asparagus on buttered toast. Looked horrid, but tasted great. Just needed a lot of salt. Also, with the cucumbers: My grandparents (mother's side), regardless of what else they were serving, always had 4 things on a noon or evening meal table: Ice water, bread, sliced tomatoes, and sliced cucumbers. Definitely think this was a throwback to the depression, and rationing. Thanks again!
i ADORE creamed chopped hard boiled eggs on toast or biscuits. My parents were born in 1948 and my mom m made often as a treat back in the 1990s when my family was financially challenged. OH man, i might make it for Sunday breakfast this weekend! (Thank God eggs are cheap again)
Ok I'll have to try creamed chopped hard boiled eggs on toast! Sound like I'd enjoy it. Thank you for the lovely image of your grandparents' table. Sounds like the beginnings of a wonderful meal!
I’m nearly 50 and from TX and in my family growing up, in the summer there were sliced tomatoes and cucumbers on the table with every meal because they were coming from everyone’s garden like crazy! Oil & vinegar were there if you wanted it. I have a few great aunts and uncles who won’t eat store bought tomatoes to this day. Even into the 70’s if you left your car unlocked at church people would put a bag of zucchini in it to get rid of the excess they grew. I could never understand why they didn’t just grow a single plant of it so they wouldn’t end up with so much. There was also a fruit pie or cobbler nearly every day with fruit or berries they grew or picked. Bread, butter, and iced tea or hot coffee was always there too. My guess about the bread and butter is that while they helped stretch a meal a bit, things didn’t keep as long as they do now in many cases. Even store bought bread didn’t have a ton of preservatives so it went bad fast. If you were in the south and didn’t have a/c, you didn’t get dried out bread, you ended up with moldy bread.
I remember rationing from WW2. I was just a very small child. Now, I find myself editing what I cook and eat. Cooking and eating real - from scratch - food is not so common now which is too bad. It is cheaper and healthier. It doesn't have to be complicated. Simple food is wonderful, but we seem to be taught that new and improved and novel taste sensations are required for our pleasure centers. I find it a pleasure to have enough to eat and to use my intelligence to edit with wisdom. It is not the same as the deprivation of rationing that I remember; it is a privilege.
As a southerner cucumbers have ALWAYS been a big part of our food culture including during the depression. Cucumber, tomato, onion salad is a staple we use with a lot of meals even today. Cucumber sandwiches too when we want to feel fancy at church socials❤
@@lceec7012 When I was a young wife in 1980 I made a cucumber, tomato, onion salad but substituted ranch dressing and it was delicious. Such a fresh, easy salad to throw together.
I am NC Southern and just like my mother and all of my relatives, I keep my bacon grease in an aluminum container on the back of the stove. I am 75 and have not been poisoned yet! This episode brought back a lot of memories. Thank you, Anna!
My great grandma had children during the depression era. In the late 90’s she showed me to make that cream sauce, but we used green peas and little smokies. It was so cheap and easy to make to feed my family for about a dollar back then!
A lot of people would collect dandelion roots to roast them and make a non caffeine coffee like drink. Some would add it to a weak coffee to make the coffee ration last longer. Dandelions were very well thought of and many would allow a part of their yard for growing dandelions for eating of the greens, roasting the roots and make medicinals from the plant.
The house where I grew up in Wisconsin had a big rhubarb patch in the back of the garden when we moved in. My step-dad often made rhubarb crisp or strawberry rhubarb crisp. 40 years later it's still growing there and he still makes his fruit crisps.
One Easter after we kids (6 of us) got through hunting eggs, my mom and uncle made creamed hard boiled eggs on toast sprinkled with paprika. It was so good and so pretty. They used what they had to feed 6 hungry small kids. A great childhood memory from over 50 years ago.
Re: cucumbers: over time cucumbers have been selectively bred to reduce the amounts of Cucurbitacins in the plant. Older varieties of cucumbers were usually salted and seeded or brined to remove these bitter alkaloids- that’s why the most common use for cucumbers was as pickles. Bitter flavors are stimulating to the appetite, which is why they were more popular in the south (where the heat is an appetite suppressant). This is also why cucumber salads and sandwiches often add sugar- it helps mask the bitter flavor.
I wish my Maternal Grandparents were still here. I know we could talk about the depression.My Mother was born 1939. They traveled from Tennessee to Indiana to find jobs. Great video!
I would love that as well. My mother, the eldest with the remaining 5 being boys, she was born in '45, the only one born in the '40s. Her youngest brother was born in '60. She grew up in the South, and did a lot of going to bed without supper. She recently made a mention of tomato pie. My grandparents were born in '06 and '18.
I had to comment that my grandfather lived on a farm and they always had bacon. Fortunately, many people in the countryside who lived in farms or had a farm as a neighbor didn’t have to ration eggs and meats as much as others. Also, neighbors helped each other out and my grandmother said they shared everything they had.
My father lived on a farm during the depression. They had extra butter from the cow that they would share with family or bartered for things they needed. The lunch meal with the tomato cheese sauce looked like a photo from a 1940s cookbook for sure! :)
I have my mothers 1975 edition of Joy. I fell in love with it. I was 12 and read it like it was a novel! I had been cooking full meals since I was 10 and the book inspired me to plan dinner parties. My mom worked full time and there was always outside work to be done so she encouraged me to cook anything I wanted as long as we could afford it. My summers were split between the garden and the kitchen. What a wonderful gift she gave me by letting me learn thru trial and error. I will be trying the tomato cheese sauce.
Also, part of the reason the waffle instructions are vague is because the cooking time would depend on the heat of your stove/fire (even different types of fire wood would impact cooking time. Yes, I know this from experience. I was once an hour late with the dinner because I used the wrong wood in the cookstove 😅). I love vintage stuff for the most part, but you will need to pry my electric automatic waffle maker from my hands with force.
If you look at most waffle irons today, the "standard " is the so-called "Belgian" waffle, which is much thicker. The bottom and top grids are considerably deeper. "Old school" waffle irons had much more shallow grids (think the average "Eggo" waffle). Using a vintage waffle iron might yield a crispier waffle. Honestly, I prefer the thinner old school waffle. Even so, this recipe looks amazing. Could almost smell them in the video!
Fun fact, the burpless cucumber was introduced sometime in the mid century as a response to indigestion! So the varieties we accessed as consumers changed pretty radically to be more digestion friendly over the last half century
I never had any digestive issues from cucumbers and thought people were crazy when they refused to eat them because of gas... then someone gave me some homegrown "regular" (non-specialty bred/non-hybrid) cucumbers. 🙃🙃🙃
Lol lima beans. My older sister and i had a secret deal because we were not allowed to leave the table( our own kids table) until we cleaned our plates because my parents lived through rationing. I would eat her lima beans if she would eat my spinach.😅 The hot digs cut up into the casserole was important: gave a smokey flavoring to the sauce and the bland lima beans. Really made them taste better! Today you can still buy " canned seasoned lima beans". They have a smokey seasoning.😉❤
I was born in 1940. This brings back memories of going downstairs to my grandfather's general merchandise store with ration tokens to buy sugar and coffee. As for remembering foods, I do remember eating pain perdue (a local term for French toast) and eggs and rice. Your molasses bars were so interesting.
I just found your channel today and am really enjoying it. My mom worked at a diner right after she got out of high school at the beginning of WW 2. They had a couple customers who would always ask for rubarb pie. Of course because of sugar being rationed they would tell the customers that they couldn't make rubarb pie. They finally decided to play a trick on these gentlemen and told them that they had managed to get enough sugar to make a rubarb pie. You can imagine the shock they had biting into a nice slice of pie with absolutely no sugar in it at all. Everyone had a good laugh and that was the last time they asked for rubarb pie. 🥧
@@thefunfam1433 oh memory unlocked. Sat at the dining room table with my mum, a plate of sugar between us. Her dipping chopped rhubarb into it and me with sliced lemons.
Hi Anna,I’m72 born in 1951, I know you were saying where you found your information for food rationing during World War II I found mine, just growing up in the three family house in Brooklyn with all my relatives. All the men in my house were fighting during the war, including my father, and all of the women grow up during the depression, too, and during the war, the food rationing was something we knew about in my house you never wasted anything but my mom and dad (with their five children who lived on the first floor) always put the table 1st. They always thought the table had to be first to feed there kids and they always stuck with me. I realize what a hardship they went through and how difficult it must’ve been to grow up during that time. Love your videos, Thank you for the memories. I’ll be following
Niche thing about rhubarb (and I apologize if this was mentioned in another comment) - growing up, we were told to always pair rhubarb with something milk-based, because rhubarb has a lot of oxalic acid and you need calcium to balance it out. This is probably mainly applicable to places where rhubarb is an actual thing (Finland for instance…) and it’s fine to have on its own if you’re not having, like, a lot of it.
During ration times with the war you would reuse and save your used grounds and made a weaker cup of coffee. (Double Dipping) In the states the called it "Roosevelt Coffee". Those bacon drippings were important. Not just to fry but they would let it become a solid like butter and lightly spread it on their toast.
I'd been gifted a Joy of Cooking cookbook in the mid 1970s when I got married and really did enjoy having it over the years. There was a substitution section that saved me a few times when I realized I was out of something I thought I had. I lived in a rural area and a trip to the store and home could take 90 minutes. Anyway, when my son got married I bought the latest version of the Joy of Cooking and gifted it to my daughter in law. She was really insulted by my gift, informed me she knew how to cook. She completely misunderstood my intention. I was trying to share something with her that I liked and had found very useful over the years not insult her ability to cook at all.
Oh wow. That sucks your daughter in law misinterpreted it. I would’ve thought that was such a sweet gesture! Like a passing of the torch almost. I hope she came around and understood.
Modern day cucumbers are a different breed than the oldfashioned ones. They were way more bitter with bigger kernels. My grandmother salted and kneaded them, let them sit for half an hour, kneaded them again and threw the juice away. They were seasoned with sweet cream, vinegar, salt, dill and a table spoon of sugar, but they didn't taste sweet at all.
Forgot to mention, The Joy of Cooking was the first cookbook I received. It was gifted to me by an aunt for my high school graduation. I still refer to it.
I'm so glad you did another full day of recipes - I love those! White sauce skill is always impressive, but as far as I'm concerned, it's 10% skill, 90% patience. Such a useful sauce to make.
I love the midcentury modern plates with starburst. I've said it before, you're a natural on camera. As you do more videos, I notice the editing gets better. (please take this as a compliment - editing isn't easy and is the last thing anyone thinks of when they start making videos. People generally get better at it as they make more videos. Having an "eye" helps, and I suspect your "eye" for editing is that you're making the kinds of videos you would want to watch, which is the right approach.)
The baked rhubarb would be something I would enjoy - it's like a "crust-less" fruit pie. I have grown rhubarb and it's very easy and comes back each year; so I imagine many folks with a victory garden would be growing rhubarb.
This is great! I think you’re being “farmer-accurate.” Some of your rationed or rare ingredients, like meat, dairy products, and maple syrup, would have been more easily available to farmers who grew/raised/harvested them themselves. 😊👍
I was born in 1947. I remember meals beginning with 1950-ish. Don’t let anyone throw you shade. The breakfast was spot-on. My Dad loved corn meal pancakes or fried corn meal mush, and he loved real maple syrup. These were things from his growing up years. We did not have unlimited strips of bacon either. Once a week Mom made a meatless dinner. She would make Mac and Cheese (always Velveeta) and two vegetables. That plate you used-Atomic Starburst by Franciscan. My favorite pattern. Love your channel!
I have a Vintage 1950’s Official Girl Scouts of America cookbook for camping. It was my grandmothers, then mom’s, now mine. It had the craziest recipes, teaches you how to cook over a fire, and then some other handy camping cooking tips.
I just found your videos! Yes coffee cups were smaller, and if you used a peculator on top of the stove, you could make stronger coffee by cooking longer. 10 to 15 minutes. I remember my grandmother making very strong coffee!
I was raised by my grandparents mostly and they were born in the 1930’s. I really enjoy your channel. Brings back really good and tasty memories. Thank you.
The 7/8th of a cup measure has to do with the flour. If you were using cake flour, it would have been a full cup. Generally when a recipe calls for cake flour, you can use regular all-purpose flour (bread flour) by subtracting 2 Tblsp per one cup. And 2 Tblsp is equal to 1/8 of a cup!
Yay this decade is a favorite of mine. Rationing must have been hard but it brought out a lot of creativity and inventive usues for things, which is super relevant today. Love it 😄
Erma makes a bigger appearance in the HBO series about Julia Childs. And the most interesting thing I learned is Irma did not test all the recipes in The Joy of cooking! Scandalous!
I would recommend Joy of Cooking to anyone. Especially if you only know how to cook a few things and want to branch out. I learned so much from this cookbook, especially about sauces and flavors that I really enjoy using in food. I also baked a pound cake using their recipe and I still think it is the best pound cake I've ever had.
Ohmygoodness... dried beef! My mom used to make chipped dried beef (it was chopped into strips in a jar) with cream (béchamel) on toast when I was a kid. Sometimes she would add peas to it. You just brought back memories! :) Love your vintage pots and glasses. My mom had the Joy of Cooking cookbook and yes, she used it all the time! I think my sister has it now and it's all falling apart. We also have the Betty Crocker vintage books. And Julia Child's famous first book. Love your videos. :)
I love cooking from 1940s cookbooks-when I have the time! The menus that are usually included in the cookbooks are vegetable-heavy and use such a variety of vegetables, much more than modern cooking. Luckily, my family will try pretty much whatever I cook. I skip all the gelatin chapters, though!!
Vegetables, as noted, were not rationed and could be grown at home, negating the need for transportation as well. Good reason to focus on them; wish we still did.
re:Pyrex: revolutionary invention to be sure, and of course, the longer it’s been around, the more collectible it becomes. while people almost always associate this glassware with cooking, Pyrex is also the universal birth sign of all test tube babies ❤️
Bacon was also rationed in the 1940’s! I remember my Dad telling us when he was still in the service, after WWII, the Service Men & Women would get a one pound slab of bacon! Daddy would bring it home and cut it into how ever many slices him and Mother would eat. Then the rest would be wrapped up and put in the refrigerator! I like the sound of the Molasses Bars!! I will try that! I grew up eating molasses poured on my biscuits, I loved it!! Also, now days, you can buy Bacon Lard!! It comes in a plastic container similar to butter. It’s found in beside the shortening and Lard on the Baking Aisle! Thank you! NORMA COLLINS FROM TEXAS
I have collected old cookbooks for 35 years and I read them like novels!😂I follow a low carb lifestyle (after cancer in 2019) so I do not cook from them but I love to watch you try the recipes out! So much fun! You have such a beautiful calming voice to! Thanks so much for bringing them to us!❤
Gosh YES I read them too! One of my favorite things to do on a cozy evening is curl up with a nice blanket and some cookbooks. 😂 Glad you enjoy watching my recipes!
Same here! I love old cookbooks ❤️ my collection is mainly from 1970 s and 1980 s and i have a book from about late 1940 s 💚 in australia we had the margaret fulton cook books and the austalian and new zealand cookbook 🇦🇺 i love to read cook books when im eating a nice bowl of soup! 🍜
Even as a little girl, I loved to read and look through cookbooks. I may never make anything from them, but I enjoy just looking. Used to borrow them from the library as well. ❤
Ha! That's how I used to steam veggies - I just put a small metal bowl into a bigger saucepan of boiling water and put the veggies in the bowl and put the lid on. No water gets in and veggies steam perfectly. Love it!
Boontonware Insta-brewer?! I work at the public library in Boonton, NJ, and learned about Boontonware from my coworkers who live in town, but I thought the company only ever made dishware, never coffee pots. What a fun surprise to hear Boonton mentioned in your video!
I've been loving your channel.🥰 I'm a sucker for all things vintage, especially kitchenware, so I like it when you show off your cute glasses/bowls, etc. I can really relate to that since I get excited when I find something unique from the past and want to share it with someone else as well.
I was born in 1956 in Texas. The women in the cafeteria of my Elementary School often made the molasses bars. I knew what they were the minute you made them. I really loved them. And because of your video I’m going to make some. I know my husband will be pleased. 😊
My mom lived in a small city at this time. She was 17. Said they never had butter, only rationed margerine. Much cheaper. So naturally we grew up with margerine and only had butter for special occasions ; holidays, and corn on the cob in summer. Even being in a small city they grew a garden, wrnt and pucked wild berties nearby and had a few chickens fir eggs. When the chicken no longer layed eggs they butchered it for meals.
My mom used to make those molasses bars. They were amazing. She would make meatball sized balls of dough & shape them like small eggs & called them Molasses tongue cookies. She didn't use the nuts or powdered sugar. Had the consistency of cake tho. Most milk was raw straight from the family cow. Mandatory pasteurization began nationwide in the USA in the late 40's. When I was young, the milkman came in horse drawn carriage to deliver raw milk in glass jars. We could either pour the cream off the top for special recipes or coffee or we could shake it up for full fat milk.
I think for the waffles, I'd close the iron and let the bacon cook for a bit, even most of the way, before I added the batter. Maybe waffle irons were hotter back in the day.
Great (and accurate) observation about the heat of the waffle iron. Mine is 1951 and it gets thermonuclear hot 😂 But more to the point of this recipe: the waffle irons of the day were square, and the waffling pattern is tiny compared to the beligian waffle iron she's using. Mine would cook these, made with a regular grind cornmeal as would have been more widely available in 1946, very brown & crispy
I love your videos! I have my grandmother's "cornflower" bowls! I am so lucky. I love them. Ironically - I was missing the medium size bowl; lo and behold, my husband owned it! At 65, I feel blessed to own them!
Mom was married in 1968 and got TJoC for a shower gift. We had it all during my growing up years but I don’t think we ever used it! She said the main reason she didn’t use it was because it had no pictures of what the dish was supposed to look like. I just found your channel and I think it’s so charming. I’m drooling over your cookbooks! ThriftBooks here I come! 😊 we had so many of those Pillsbury Bake Off and BC cookbooks that you get at the checkout line, but over the years we’ve mostly kept the holiday versions. Have you done an episode about church or charity cookbooks? One of the favorite books in our house was from our church’s ladies group. Bittersweet to flip through it because most of those ladies are passed on.
Love your show!! yes that's how we ate. In the late 40 & early 50 we were still not able to get a lot of products. Gardens gave use fresh veggie as we had mostly canned in winter. Molasses was use a lot cheaper. Squares were cut half the size you had remember in 50 60 family's were large. Small plates not like today. We had 3 meals a day and that's it. Dessert was small or none. Bedtime a hot cocoa.
Your channel popped up in my feed and I'm pleasantly surprised. I read cookbooks and collect them too, so I know I'll enjoy your channel. I like to cook and eat the oldies. I think we kids growing up in the fifties had a great life, which you are now sharing with the new generations. You bring back great memories, and I appreciate it. I've subscribed to your channel too. I think "Cooking the Books" is a clever title!
I learnt about cooking as a child from my Nan's old recipe collections. So that style of recipe is familiar to me...and somewhat nostalgic. Writing the recipe like that saves valuable ink and paper , also giving more value for space...so more gets transported for less etc.
Your video reminded me of a story my grandmother told. During WWII she lived across the street from her sister-in-law, her brother’s wife. Aunt Nell did a lot of baking and my grandmother drank a lot of coffee, so they would swap their ration coupons. And you’re right; The Joy of Cooking is a classic cookbook.
I have at least 50 cookbooks- possibly closer to 100 (it’s a sickness) but The Joy of Cooking is one I’ve never considered buying. Now I’m rethinking my life choices…❤️
I stumbled upon your video this evening. So nostalgic! Born in 1949, I distinctly remember Mom using Joy of Cooking or as she referred to it, as Rombauers. Years later as a new bride, she gifted me with my own copy. Your vintage kitchenware is SO CUTE. One of my daughters collects the “old” sets of dinnerware she uses, and displays in her hutch. I shall peruse your other vids another day. For now, I’m subscribing and thanking you for stirring up some priceless memories of Mom and Rombauers 😊
Just recently came across your posts, really entertaining, especially enjoyed this era, very interesting to see how they ate/ cooked in the past, I love cooking so always eager for inspiration . ❤
I have the same cookbook❤ you can also use baking molasses which isn't as tangy and works really well for things that you just want a mild molasses flavor.
Grandma had that cookbook. Mom had a copy of that cookbook, too, and now I have one of theirs. It has some great recipes. Brings back fond memories of a simpler time.
My mom talked about the rationing during WW2. People didn’t eat like in the cookbook everyday, but those recipes were for “the good times” or celebrating. Sugar, coffee, gasoline and heating oil were scarce. But in the Northeast maple syrup was usually available, so that was our sweetener. Mom said they were asked to donate their metal pots and pans for the war effort, which everyone did.
I just love your channel!! I found it recently. What an interesting channel! I, too, love all things vintage. Your dishes, cookbooks, and stories are fantastic!! ❤❤ Keep it coming!!❤❤😊
Which of these recipes would you try? Let me know in the comments!
Those waffles look good🧇🥓
Oh my dried beef scrambled eggs and asparagus,that sounds wonderful🍳
Waffles and those molasses bars look good. Baked rhubarb is just too much of an everyday thing from where I grew up. I literally grew up on that stuff.
waffles look good but I would use cooked ham/sausage instead
@@dreamweaver3406 Oh yeah that sounds tasty too!
My Grandmother taught me to cook. She was a young mother of three during WW2. One of the things I remember about her was the Dripping Bowl she kept in the fridge. She only ever cooked with lard and saved all her bacon grease. She made the most amazing roast potatoes with the dripping. She passed in 2008 aged 98. I'm 54 and I also have a dripping bowl in my fridge and I only cook with lard and try to not eat processed food. With rationing you ate well but never overate. People were healthier. Thanks for this video. It's such a great reminder of my Granny ♥️ She was just marvelous.
Good memory of your grandma
Sweet memories for you❤
Dripping on bread. I loved that my Nanna gave me that all the time. Love from uk 🇬🇧
My Great Grandma’s both cooked with lard. Saved bacon grease.
Great job! I'm a 60s baby (Father born in '37, mother in '46). One of the things your video brought to mind that they had frequently (and inflicted on us as kids) was creamed chopped hard boiled eggs and asparagus on buttered toast. Looked horrid, but tasted great. Just needed a lot of salt. Also, with the cucumbers: My grandparents (mother's side), regardless of what else they were serving, always had 4 things on a noon or evening meal table: Ice water, bread, sliced tomatoes, and sliced cucumbers. Definitely think this was a throwback to the depression, and rationing. Thanks again!
i ADORE creamed chopped hard boiled eggs on toast or biscuits. My parents were born in 1948 and my mom m made often as a treat back in the 1990s when my family was financially challenged. OH man, i might make it for Sunday breakfast this weekend! (Thank God eggs are cheap again)
Ok I'll have to try creamed chopped hard boiled eggs on toast! Sound like I'd enjoy it. Thank you for the lovely image of your grandparents' table. Sounds like the beginnings of a wonderful meal!
My grandparent ( on my dad’s side ) always had to have bread and butter, which I’m convinced was from the depression era.
We ate creamed tuna on toast! You can cream almost anything.
I’m nearly 50 and from TX and in my family growing up, in the summer there were sliced tomatoes and cucumbers on the table with every meal because they were coming from everyone’s garden like crazy! Oil & vinegar were there if you wanted it. I have a few great aunts and uncles who won’t eat store bought tomatoes to this day. Even into the 70’s if you left your car unlocked at church people would put a bag of zucchini in it to get rid of the excess they grew. I could never understand why they didn’t just grow a single plant of it so they wouldn’t end up with so much. There was also a fruit pie or cobbler nearly every day with fruit or berries they grew or picked. Bread, butter, and iced tea or hot coffee was always there too. My guess about the bread and butter is that while they helped stretch a meal a bit, things didn’t keep as long as they do now in many cases. Even store bought bread didn’t have a ton of preservatives so it went bad fast. If you were in the south and didn’t have a/c, you didn’t get dried out bread, you ended up with moldy bread.
Considering the current cost of groceries we have to self-ration. These ration recipes are definitely worth revisiting.
I remember rationing from WW2. I was just a very small child. Now, I find myself editing what I cook and eat. Cooking and eating real - from scratch - food is not so common now which is too bad. It is cheaper and healthier. It doesn't have to be complicated. Simple food is wonderful, but we seem to be taught that new and improved and novel taste sensations are required for our pleasure centers. I find it a pleasure to have enough to eat and to use my intelligence to edit with wisdom. It is not the same as the deprivation of rationing that I remember; it is a privilege.
As a southerner cucumbers have ALWAYS been a big part of our food culture including during the depression. Cucumber, tomato, onion salad is a staple we use with a lot of meals even today. Cucumber sandwiches too when we want to feel fancy at church socials❤
I love cucumber sandwiches
Cucumber sandwiches on very thin bread & cream cheese!! Nothing better!
Yes cucumbers in vinegar and sugar with a glass full of green onions a plate of sliced tomatoes at lunch and supper
Amen! Tomato, cucumber and onions are always on Sunday after church table in the south. Had them last weekend with my salmon patties.
@@lceec7012 When I was a young wife in 1980 I made a cucumber, tomato, onion salad but substituted ranch dressing and it was delicious. Such a fresh, easy salad to throw together.
I am NC Southern and just like my mother and all of my relatives, I keep my bacon grease in an aluminum container on the back of the stove. I am 75 and have not been poisoned yet! This episode brought back a lot of memories. Thank you, Anna!
My great grandma had children during the depression era. In the late 90’s she showed me to make that cream sauce, but we used green peas and little smokies. It was so cheap and easy to make to feed my family for about a dollar back then!
A lot of people would collect dandelion roots to roast them and make a non caffeine coffee like drink. Some would add it to a weak coffee to make the coffee ration last longer. Dandelions were very well thought of and many would allow a part of their yard for growing dandelions for eating of the greens, roasting the roots and make medicinals from the plant.
Dandelion tea is actually really bomb, super rich and nutty tasting.
The house where I grew up in Wisconsin had a big rhubarb patch in the back of the garden when we moved in. My step-dad often made rhubarb crisp or strawberry rhubarb crisp. 40 years later it's still growing there and he still makes his fruit crisps.
One Easter after we kids (6 of us) got through hunting eggs, my mom and uncle made creamed hard boiled eggs on toast sprinkled with paprika. It was so good and so pretty. They used what they had to feed 6 hungry small kids. A great childhood memory from over 50 years ago.
I use not just Salt and pepper, but paprika on eggs too!!❤🎉
tradition at my hpuse was to hunt the eggs,,then make deviled eggs with them. Sometimes egg salad sandwiches. Iloved it.
Re: cucumbers: over time cucumbers have been selectively bred to reduce the amounts of Cucurbitacins in the plant. Older varieties of cucumbers were usually salted and seeded or brined to remove these bitter alkaloids- that’s why the most common use for cucumbers was as pickles. Bitter flavors are stimulating to the appetite, which is why they were more popular in the south (where the heat is an appetite suppressant). This is also why cucumber salads and sandwiches often add sugar- it helps mask the bitter flavor.
I wish my Maternal Grandparents were still here. I know we could talk about the depression.My Mother was born 1939. They traveled from Tennessee to Indiana to find jobs.
Great video!
I would love that as well. My mother, the eldest with the remaining 5 being boys, she was born in '45, the only one born in the '40s. Her youngest brother was born in '60. She grew up in the South, and did a lot of going to bed without supper. She recently made a mention of tomato pie. My grandparents were born in '06 and '18.
I had to comment that my grandfather lived on a farm and they always had bacon. Fortunately, many people in the countryside who lived in farms or had a farm as a neighbor didn’t have to ration eggs and meats as much as others. Also, neighbors helped each other out and my grandmother said they shared everything they had.
My father lived on a farm during the depression. They had extra butter from the cow that they would share with family or bartered for things they needed. The lunch meal with the tomato cheese sauce looked like a photo from a 1940s cookbook for sure! :)
Not sure if you've seen my 1950s video, but I didn't realize how similar my 1940s and 1950s lunches looked. I used the same plate and everything! 😂
@@cooking_the_books My Great Grandma Was Born In The 30's She'd Make The Best Fudge
I have my mothers 1975 edition of Joy. I fell in love with it. I was 12 and read it like it was a novel! I had been cooking full meals since I was 10 and the book inspired me to plan dinner parties. My mom worked full time and there was always outside work to be done so she encouraged me to cook anything I wanted as long as we could afford it. My summers were split between the garden and the kitchen. What a wonderful gift she gave me by letting me learn thru trial and error.
I will be trying the tomato cheese sauce.
Also, part of the reason the waffle instructions are vague is because the cooking time would depend on the heat of your stove/fire (even different types of fire wood would impact cooking time. Yes, I know this from experience. I was once an hour late with the dinner because I used the wrong wood in the cookstove 😅). I love vintage stuff for the most part, but you will need to pry my electric automatic waffle maker from my hands with force.
That makes sense! And I totally agree on the waffle maker. 😂
If you look at most waffle irons today, the "standard " is the so-called "Belgian" waffle, which is much thicker. The bottom and top grids are considerably deeper. "Old school" waffle irons had much more shallow grids (think the average "Eggo" waffle). Using a vintage waffle iron might yield a crispier waffle. Honestly, I prefer the thinner old school waffle. Even so, this recipe looks amazing. Could almost smell them in the video!
Substituting milk for cream doesn’t work well.
Fun fact, the burpless cucumber was introduced sometime in the mid century as a response to indigestion! So the varieties we accessed as consumers changed pretty radically to be more digestion friendly over the last half century
I never had any digestive issues from cucumbers and thought people were crazy when they refused to eat them because of gas... then someone gave me some homegrown "regular" (non-specialty bred/non-hybrid) cucumbers. 🙃🙃🙃
Lol lima beans. My older sister and i had a secret deal because we were not allowed to leave the table( our own kids table) until we cleaned our plates because my parents lived through rationing. I would eat her lima beans if she would eat my spinach.😅 The hot digs cut up into the casserole was important: gave a smokey flavoring to the sauce and the bland lima beans. Really made them taste better! Today you can still buy " canned seasoned lima beans". They have a smokey seasoning.😉❤
I was born in 1940. This brings back memories of going downstairs to my grandfather's general merchandise store with ration tokens to buy sugar and coffee. As for remembering foods, I do remember eating pain perdue (a local term for French toast) and eggs and rice. Your molasses bars were so interesting.
I just found your channel today and am really enjoying it. My mom worked at a diner right after she got out of high school at the beginning of WW 2. They had a couple customers who would always ask for rubarb pie. Of course because of sugar being rationed they would tell the customers that they couldn't make rubarb pie. They finally decided to play a trick on these gentlemen and told them that they had managed to get enough sugar to make a rubarb pie. You can imagine the shock they had biting into a nice slice of pie with absolutely no sugar in it at all. Everyone had a good laugh and that was the last time they asked for rubarb pie. 🥧
Oh my gosh...the looks on their faces had to be priceless!
😂
When I was little we grew ruhbarb and I grabbed a stalk thinking it was like celery! It was so sour they gave me a spoonful of sugar lol😊
@@thefunfam1433 oh memory unlocked. Sat at the dining room table with my mum, a plate of sugar between us. Her dipping chopped rhubarb into it and me with sliced lemons.
Hi Anna,I’m72 born in 1951, I know you were saying where you found your information for food rationing during World War II I found mine, just growing up in the three family house in Brooklyn with all my relatives. All the men in my house were fighting during the war, including my father, and all of the women grow up during the depression, too, and during the war, the food rationing was something we knew about in my house you never wasted anything but my mom and dad (with their five children who lived on the first floor) always put the table 1st. They always thought the table had to be first to feed there kids and they always stuck with me. I realize what a hardship they went through and how difficult it must’ve been to grow up during that time. Love your videos, Thank you for the memories. I’ll be following
Niche thing about rhubarb (and I apologize if this was mentioned in another comment) - growing up, we were told to always pair rhubarb with something milk-based, because rhubarb has a lot of oxalic acid and you need calcium to balance it out. This is probably mainly applicable to places where rhubarb is an actual thing (Finland for instance…) and it’s fine to have on its own if you’re not having, like, a lot of it.
During ration times with the war you would reuse and save your used grounds and made a weaker cup of coffee. (Double Dipping)
In the states the called it "Roosevelt Coffee".
Those bacon drippings were important. Not just to fry but they would let it become a solid like butter and lightly spread it on their toast.
I'd been gifted a Joy of Cooking cookbook in the mid 1970s when I got married and really did enjoy having it over the years. There was a substitution section that saved me a few times when I realized I was out of something I thought I had. I lived in a rural area and a trip to the store and home could take 90 minutes. Anyway, when my son got married I bought the latest version of the Joy of Cooking and gifted it to my daughter in law. She was really insulted by my gift, informed me she knew how to cook. She completely misunderstood my intention. I was trying to share something with her that I liked and had found very useful over the years not insult her ability to cook at all.
I used to pour over my mother in laws copy when I was learning to cook.. lucky daughter in law! ❤
I'm so sorry she didn't understand your lovely and thoughtful gift.
Oh wow. That sucks your daughter in law misinterpreted it. I would’ve thought that was such a sweet gesture! Like a passing of the torch almost. I hope she came around and understood.
Her loss
I also received joy of cooking book for a wedding gift in the 70's. I loved it.
Modern day cucumbers are a different breed than the oldfashioned ones. They were way more bitter with bigger kernels. My grandmother salted and kneaded them, let them sit for half an hour, kneaded them again and threw the juice away. They were seasoned with sweet cream, vinegar, salt, dill and a table spoon of sugar, but they didn't taste sweet at all.
Forgot to mention, The Joy of Cooking was the first cookbook I received. It was gifted to me by an aunt for my high school graduation. I still refer to it.
I'm so glad you did another full day of recipes - I love those! White sauce skill is always impressive, but as far as I'm concerned, it's 10% skill, 90% patience. Such a useful sauce to make.
Thank you!! I really enjoy making these videos, and I think I"m getting a little better at trying to plan them out.
I love the midcentury modern plates with starburst. I've said it before, you're a natural on camera. As you do more videos, I notice the editing gets better. (please take this as a compliment - editing isn't easy and is the last thing anyone thinks of when they start making videos. People generally get better at it as they make more videos. Having an "eye" helps, and I suspect your "eye" for editing is that you're making the kinds of videos you would want to watch, which is the right approach.)
Thank you! And I do take it as a compliment. I have actively tried to improve my editing a little with each new video.
I'm loving these videos - two of my favorite topics, history and cooking 🥰
The baked rhubarb would be something I would enjoy - it's like a "crust-less" fruit pie. I have grown rhubarb and it's very easy and comes back each year; so I imagine many folks with a victory garden would be growing rhubarb.
I love the rhubarb so much. Not sure why I hadn’t tried preparing it like that before!
Yes!!! I cook peaches similarly and love it. I recently cooked a mango like this
A way to cut out too much molasses taste add half molasses and half honey. The honey is the same consistency.
This is great! I think you’re being “farmer-accurate.” Some of your rationed or rare ingredients, like meat, dairy products, and maple syrup, would have been more easily available to farmers who grew/raised/harvested them themselves. 😊👍
I was born in 1947. I remember meals beginning with 1950-ish. Don’t let anyone throw you shade. The breakfast was spot-on. My Dad loved corn meal pancakes or fried corn meal mush, and he loved real maple syrup. These were things from his growing up years. We did not have unlimited strips of bacon either. Once a week Mom made a meatless dinner. She would make Mac and Cheese (always Velveeta) and two vegetables. That plate you used-Atomic Starburst by Franciscan. My favorite pattern. Love your channel!
I have a Vintage 1950’s Official Girl Scouts of America cookbook for camping. It was my grandmothers, then mom’s, now mine. It had the craziest recipes, teaches you how to cook over a fire, and then some other handy camping cooking tips.
Waffles are ready when there is no more steam!
I just found your videos! Yes coffee cups were smaller, and if you used a peculator on top of the stove, you could make stronger coffee by cooking longer. 10 to 15 minutes. I remember my grandmother making very strong coffee!
I was raised by my grandparents mostly and they were born in the 1930’s. I really enjoy your channel. Brings back really good and tasty memories. Thank you.
The 7/8th of a cup measure has to do with the flour. If you were using cake flour, it would have been a full cup. Generally when a recipe calls for cake flour, you can use regular all-purpose flour (bread flour) by subtracting 2 Tblsp per one cup. And 2 Tblsp is equal to 1/8 of a cup!
Yay this decade is a favorite of mine. Rationing must have been hard but it brought out a lot of creativity and inventive usues for things, which is super relevant today. Love it 😄
You are so right! 😀
Erma makes a bigger appearance in the HBO series about Julia Childs. And the most interesting thing I learned is Irma did not test all the recipes in The Joy of cooking! Scandalous!
You've really found a niche with the decades of meals. Well done. New sub. Love your style!
Thanks so much! 😊
I would recommend Joy of Cooking to anyone. Especially if you only know how to cook a few things and want to branch out. I learned so much from this cookbook, especially about sauces and flavors that I really enjoy using in food. I also baked a pound cake using their recipe and I still think it is the best pound cake I've ever had.
Ohmygoodness... dried beef! My mom used to make chipped dried beef (it was chopped into strips in a jar) with cream (béchamel) on toast when I was a kid. Sometimes she would add peas to it. You just brought back memories! :) Love your vintage pots and glasses. My mom had the Joy of Cooking cookbook and yes, she used it all the time! I think my sister has it now and it's all falling apart. We also have the Betty Crocker vintage books. And Julia Child's famous first book. Love your videos. :)
Thank you so much! Glad you're enjoying my videos. 😄
I love cooking from 1940s cookbooks-when I have the time! The menus that are usually included in the cookbooks are vegetable-heavy and use such a variety of vegetables, much more than modern cooking. Luckily, my family will try pretty much whatever I cook.
I skip all the gelatin chapters, though!!
I am totally with you on those gelatin chapters. 😂 Thanks for watching!
I won’t cook from American cookbooks from after the early 1960s. My observation is that the testing and accuracy went way down by 1970
Vegetables, as noted, were not rationed and could be grown at home, negating the need for transportation as well. Good reason to focus on them; wish we still did.
That steamer pan is so stinkin' cute!! And it matches your pan set--I just love that! The blue & green combp of '60s decor is my favorite.
You're a great culinary anthropologist. I love seeing the vintage recipes. I was born in 1962.
My favorite edition of the "Joy of Cooking" books!
re:Pyrex: revolutionary invention to be sure, and of course, the longer it’s been around, the more collectible it becomes. while people almost always associate this glassware with cooking, Pyrex is also the universal birth sign of all test tube babies ❤️
Waht mate
Bacon was also rationed in the 1940’s! I remember my Dad telling us when he was still in the service, after WWII, the Service Men & Women would get a one pound slab of bacon! Daddy would bring it home and cut it into how ever many slices him and Mother would eat. Then the rest would be wrapped up and put in the refrigerator!
I like the sound of the Molasses Bars!! I will try that! I grew up eating molasses poured on my biscuits, I loved it!!
Also, now days, you can buy Bacon Lard!! It comes in a plastic container similar to butter. It’s found in beside the shortening and Lard on the Baking Aisle!
Thank you!
NORMA COLLINS FROM TEXAS
I have collected old cookbooks for 35 years and I read them like novels!😂I follow a low carb lifestyle (after cancer in 2019) so I do not cook from them but I love to watch you try the recipes out! So much fun! You have such a beautiful calming voice to! Thanks so much for bringing them to us!❤
Gosh YES I read them too! One of my favorite things to do on a cozy evening is curl up with a nice blanket and some cookbooks. 😂 Glad you enjoy watching my recipes!
Same here! I love old cookbooks ❤️ my collection is mainly from 1970 s and 1980 s and i have a book from about late 1940 s 💚 in australia we had the margaret fulton cook books and the austalian and new zealand cookbook 🇦🇺 i love to read cook books when im eating a nice bowl of soup! 🍜
Even as a little girl, I loved to read and look through cookbooks. I may never make anything from them, but I enjoy just looking. Used to borrow them from the library as well. ❤
I borrow from the library too!! What is wrong with me!😂😂😂 No matter, I love cookbooks so much and this channel is so much fun!❤@@CDForney
Ha! That's how I used to steam veggies - I just put a small metal bowl into a bigger saucepan of boiling water and put the veggies in the bowl and put the lid on. No water gets in and veggies steam perfectly. Love it!
My grandma always made molasses cookies, but she added cinnamon. Those molasses bars you baked look good!
Boontonware Insta-brewer?! I work at the public library in Boonton, NJ, and learned about Boontonware from my coworkers who live in town, but I thought the company only ever made dishware, never coffee pots. What a fun surprise to hear Boonton mentioned in your video!
Oh that's so cool! It's the only piece I have in my collection and I love it!
My mother had a set of dishes with the design on the waffle plate. It's funny how you remember those things.
I've been loving your channel.🥰 I'm a sucker for all things vintage, especially kitchenware, so I like it when you show off your cute glasses/bowls, etc. I can really relate to that since I get excited when I find something unique from the past and want to share it with someone else as well.
So glad you're enjoying my videos and vintage kitchenware! 😊
Corn meal waffles sounds absolutely delicious to me...I need to do this!
I collect 1940s cookbooks - I love The Joy of Cooking ❤
I was born in 1956 in Texas. The women in the cafeteria of my Elementary School often made the molasses bars. I knew what they were the minute you made them. I really loved them. And because of your video I’m going to make some. I know my husband will be pleased. 😊
I was born in '42 and remember a lot from them. As best I remember we mostly had canned vegetables green beans, corn etc. Never asparagus!
Your videos were randomly recommended to me and they are so interesting. My four year old son enjoyed watching as well. 😊
The fact that your 4 year old son enjoyed my video is the highest of praise! 😄 Thank you so much for watching. ❤
My mom lived in a small city at this time. She was 17. Said they never had butter, only rationed margerine. Much cheaper. So naturally we grew up with margerine and only had butter for special occasions ; holidays, and corn on the cob in summer. Even being in a small city they grew a garden, wrnt and pucked wild berties nearby and had a few chickens fir eggs. When the chicken no longer layed eggs they butchered it for meals.
I still have my Joy of Cooking from the 1980s!! It’s a treasure!
Irma and Betty are my no fail go-to’s…
I really loved making the molasses nut bars, so good!
My mom used to make those molasses bars. They were amazing. She would make meatball sized balls of dough & shape them like small eggs & called them Molasses tongue cookies. She didn't use the nuts or powdered sugar. Had the consistency of cake tho.
Most milk was raw straight from the family cow. Mandatory pasteurization began nationwide in the USA in the late 40's. When I was young, the milkman came in horse drawn carriage to deliver raw milk in glass jars. We could either pour the cream off the top for special recipes or coffee or we could shake it up for full fat milk.
I think for the waffles, I'd close the iron and let the bacon cook for a bit, even most of the way, before I added the batter. Maybe waffle irons were hotter back in the day.
Great (and accurate) observation about the heat of the waffle iron. Mine is 1951 and it gets thermonuclear hot 😂 But more to the point of this recipe: the waffle irons of the day were square, and the waffling pattern is tiny compared to the beligian waffle iron she's using. Mine would cook these, made with a regular grind cornmeal as would have been more widely available in 1946, very brown & crispy
I have my Mom's copy of The Joy of Cooking she got for her wedding in1955. It has helped me learn so many techniques and general cooking tips.
I literally want ALL of your dishes and pots!!
What an interesting life you have. It's fun to time travel with you through vintage cookbooks and kitchen utensils.
I have that exact edition. It was a high school graduation present that my mom received. I still use it.
I love your videos! I have my grandmother's "cornflower" bowls! I am so lucky. I love them. Ironically - I was missing the medium size bowl; lo and behold, my husband owned it! At 65, I feel blessed to own them!
Mom was married in 1968 and got TJoC for a shower gift. We had it all during my growing up years but I don’t think we ever used it! She said the main reason she didn’t use it was because it had no pictures of what the dish was supposed to look like.
I just found your channel and I think it’s so charming. I’m drooling over your cookbooks! ThriftBooks here I come! 😊 we had so many of those Pillsbury Bake Off and BC cookbooks that you get at the checkout line, but over the years we’ve mostly kept the holiday versions.
Have you done an episode about church or charity cookbooks? One of the favorite books in our house was from our church’s ladies group. Bittersweet to flip through it because most of those ladies are passed on.
Love your show!! yes that's how we ate. In the late 40 & early 50 we were still not able to get a lot of products. Gardens gave use fresh veggie as we had mostly canned in winter. Molasses was use a lot cheaper. Squares were cut half the size you had remember in 50 60 family's were large. Small plates not like today. We had 3 meals a day and that's it. Dessert was small or none. Bedtime a hot cocoa.
Absolutely love your channel thank you 😊
Your channel popped up in my feed and I'm pleasantly surprised. I read cookbooks and collect them too, so I know I'll enjoy your channel. I like to cook and eat the oldies. I think we kids growing up in the fifties had a great life, which you are now sharing with the new generations. You bring back great memories, and I appreciate it. I've subscribed to your channel too. I think "Cooking the Books" is a clever title!
Thank you so much!
I use about 19g coffee to 12 oz water, so 13g (.45 oz) with 6 oz water seems like it will be a nice strong cup of coffee.
Excellent!
I have a 1973 reprint of the 1961 edition. The recipe for the molasses bars did not change, it was however in a Cookies and Bars section.
I learnt about cooking as a child from my Nan's old recipe collections.
So that style of recipe is familiar to me...and somewhat nostalgic.
Writing the recipe like that saves valuable ink and paper , also giving more value for space...so more gets transported for less etc.
I have this book! It was my great Aunt's. If I remember correctly there is a recipe for popcorn balls. I used to make them for my kids❤
Your video reminded me of a story my grandmother told. During WWII she lived across the street from her sister-in-law, her brother’s wife. Aunt Nell did a lot of baking and my grandmother drank a lot of coffee, so they would swap their ration coupons. And you’re right; The Joy of Cooking is a classic cookbook.
I'm 52 and I always keep bacon grease for everything.. including buttering my bread before I put preserves on it 😊
It's the seeds in cucumbers that cause issues with some folks. ❤
I have at least 50 cookbooks- possibly closer to 100 (it’s a sickness) but The Joy of Cooking is one I’ve never considered buying. Now I’m rethinking my life choices…❤️
Enjoyed!
Thank you! Great choices for meals. This gives me a look into my parents and grandparents lives. 😊👍
I stumbled upon your video this evening. So nostalgic! Born in 1949, I distinctly remember Mom using Joy of Cooking or as she referred to it, as Rombauers. Years later as a new bride, she gifted me with my own copy. Your vintage kitchenware is SO CUTE. One of my daughters collects the “old” sets of dinnerware she uses, and displays in her hutch. I shall peruse your other vids another day. For now, I’m subscribing and thanking you for stirring up some priceless memories of Mom and Rombauers 😊
Just found your channel today. Enjoying watching you cook these vintage recipes. Can't wait to try some if them!
I love all the pyrex cookware but my favorite is the friendship pattern.
Just recently came across your posts, really entertaining, especially enjoyed this era, very interesting to see how they ate/ cooked in the past, I love cooking so always eager for inspiration . ❤
That was fun to learn about. Thank u.
As someone from Texas, we ALWAYS save the bacon grease! That stuff is gold.
Looks cool and refreshing! Also, I love this older video format where we can see your face while you cook!
would definitely try the lima bean casserole and rhubarb pie
I have the same cookbook❤ you can also use baking molasses which isn't as tangy and works really well for things that you just want a mild molasses flavor.
Grandma had that cookbook. Mom had a copy of that cookbook, too, and now I have one of theirs. It has some great recipes. Brings back fond memories of a simpler time.
My mom talked about the rationing during WW2. People didn’t eat like in the cookbook everyday, but those recipes were for “the good times” or celebrating. Sugar, coffee, gasoline and heating oil were scarce. But in the Northeast maple syrup was usually available, so that was our sweetener. Mom said they were asked to donate their metal pots and pans for the war effort, which everyone did.
My mother had a set of those starburst dishes!! Wow!
You're a wonderful cooking host!
Your content is always fascinating and well thought out! ❤
i just love your channel, and I'm so glad I found it. so nostalgic. I'm a kid from the 70's and 80s. keep on with great content please.
I just love your channel!! I found it recently. What an interesting channel! I, too, love all things vintage. Your dishes, cookbooks, and stories are fantastic!! ❤❤ Keep it coming!!❤❤😊