Garden And Gossip Forums

Hodmedod's have UK lentils https://hodmedods.co.uk/collections/lentils

Thanks VC - have you looked at the recipe section??? Some interesting recipes there...

https://hodmedods.co.uk/blogs/recipes/lentil-ragu

Yes, I have, its a great recipe section - I have some of their lentils too.

(13-08-2022, 09:48 PM)SarrissUK Wrote: [ -> ]Rice I'd definitely not want to be without, but I could, if I had to. Imported pasta I could live without as I often make my own fresh anyway.

The UK may well be able to grow rice, water levels permitting, after all it's been grown in northern Italy and southern France for hundreds of years and the south of England might now be as warm!

Excuse me while I waffle.............
I've been reading about food rationing in the 1940s on a blog where the owner has followed a wartime diet for a year https://the1940sexperiment.com/2023/01/2...e-rations/  The recipes are fascinating and there's a lot of similarity with the Eat only UK Plants for a year diet.
On the back of an envelope I've scribbled 5 different eating regimes that I would like to follow :-
Free Food,
UK Grown,
Home grown/self sufficient
Rationing
Real Food (no additives, colourings etc).
The common theme in all of these is the Home grown veg/fruit which could be eaten whichever regime was followed. Its spurring me on to try harder to grow and eat more of my own produce.
OK, you can wake up now, I've finished.

I'm interested in rationing food too, and recipes from the WW2 era. I wouldn't mind trying out all of those you mentioned Veggie, although I know I couldn't do all of them at the same time.

Have a look at the 1940s blog - lots of recipes, with photos. I've always found it fascinating but only tried to follow it for a couple of weeks at a time.

With  an enlightened mind, if I could I would. If I was forced to during the war I may not have been so enthralled about it though?

I'm going to start the WW 2 Rations Diet - on Monday, giving me the weekend to get my rations in.
Bread, potatoes, UK grown fruit & veg and fish were off-ration most of the time and they're the mainstays of my diet anyway. 
If you're interested, there was a weekly ration and a Points system that you could use to choose extras every 4 weeks. Sometimes the amounts changed according to whether there were supplies available but this list is an average one!
Weekly ration -
Bacon & Ham 4oz
Meat about  £2.50 worth in present day money
Butter 2oz
Cheese 1 oz
Marg 4oz
Cooking fat 2oz
Milk 3 pints
Sugar 8 oz
Preserves 1lb every 4 weeks
Tea 2 oz
Egg 1
Sweets 8oz every 4 weeks

You could give up your meat ration and swap it for an extra 3 oz of cheese and an extra egg, which I'll be doing.
On top of that you had 16 Points every 4 weeks which could be used to buy a pound or a tin of the following:-
Baked beans 2 points
Dry biscuits 2 points
Sweet biscuits 4 pts
Herrings 2 pts
Lentils or split peas 2pts
Rice 8 pts
Sardines 2 pts
Sultanas 8pts
Currants 16 pts
Skimmed Milk 5 pts (not sure how much?)
Rolled Oats 2 pts
Salmon 16 pts

I'll be spending some of my Points on Lentils & Split peas, Oats & sardines. Also converting the weekly amounts to 4 weekly as its easier to buy a pack of butter or block of cheese that buying a  couple of ounces. I'll make each pack last 4 weeks and if I run out, go without. 
A slight bend of the  rules - if I pick up any free food it doesn't count - it'll be the undercounter food that the grocer kept for his special customers.

Interesting to follow your progress Veggie but can't see me joining in, we get through between 16 and 20 pints of skimmed milk a week which doesn't include the longlife milk I use for custard and cereal and I daren't count the teabags we use!

I hope you will report regularly. As for your freebies, you do realise you're contributing to the black market, don't you? I well remember mum and gran talking about their struggles during rationing, but at least everyone was in the same boat.