Flourless - Home front rations

In Australia we are in lockdown, shelter in place, stay at home, the only time to leave home is for essential shopping and exercise.  As I mentioned I do my part to stay home when I'm not needed as a carer for essential driving. Now is the time to stay home, do what you can with what you have, and be kind to one another. 

As I follow the wartime home front of the 1940's much of what is in the news today, seems to be what was happening then but for a different reason.

 Focusing on the home and family is important for today,  but also remember we are in anxious times. Not everyone can be productive in the home, many still work out side the home, have health issues, or are elderly.

Just focus on what you can do. Take the time to give yourself some leisure time too, remember we can still go for walks and do hobbies.

It is a good time to prepare, even now. Make sure you have what you need without hoarding unnecessarily. Return to  simple living as much as possible by doing: Home made, home cooked, home grown, and, home living.

Returning to simple home living is a way to stay home in this time where it is expected we aren't doing 'unnecessary spending'. Not only that, it also means by supplying what we need at home we aren't putting on a strain on the lack of supplies available in the shops.

Keeping things simple is important. Focusing on 'plainer foods for health & energy' as the wartime advertisement says. 

Return to meals that are 'economical',  don't waste electricity, or time. Be prepared to use leftovers for  second meals as this will save going out for more essentials and not be wasteful with food.

With the shortages now, it is a good idea to start writing down alternatives you can use for cooking if you don't have or can't find the necessary items. Writing things down is important because the internet may not be available or with everyone home it will become slower and more difficult to navigate. 

Find out substitutes for eggs, and or, flour like this wartime recipe for 'flourless French cake' (if you click on the picture it will bring up a larger image). It does use flour but not the usual types of flour that is currently being limited to the amount everyone can buy, if they can find it. If you don't have yeast for bread there are other substitutes such as potato yeast or sourdough. You can also make dampers and scones, which don't use yeast. These are handy recipes to know because you don't have to use eggs or milk (substitute with water) as well.

Most of all, remember to keep calm and carry on (at home).

I hope everyone is having a good day or evening where ever you are. Be safe.  Be kind. Stay at home. 

Home Stay- Useful hints for the garden

Like everyone, I am self-Isolating with family and staying home as much as I can because I'm the designated driver for shopping essentials. While I'm at home I have been looking through my treasure trove of saved household hints, tips, and recipes. I thought I would start to share these along with the regular posts from the Wartime era. 

Many of these useful hints and tips are tried and tested over time, in today's world they still are relevant.  The useful hints and tips for today are all about gardening. As always these are frugal tips and won't cost you the earth and many of the items can be already found at home.

GARDENING TIPS:

1 tbsp (20g) Epson salts dissolved in about 1 pt (550ml) luke warm water is a marvellous tonic for plants, especially roses.

Eggshells ground finely may be used not only as a fertiliser but also a slug deterrent.

After putting garden waste on a compost heap, cover a black plastic bag weighed down with stones. This gives the best and quickest conditions for rotting.

Don’t throw away those nettles; when they have rattled put them into a bucket outdoors, cover with water, and leave for 2 to 3 weeks. The resulting strongly smelling liquid is an unrivalled fertiliser, especially good for tomatoes.

Bury banana skin and crush eggshells near the roots of rose trees to supply them with extra vitamins and minerals. 

Garlic grown near roses is supposed to keep them clear of Aphids (greenfly).

Use leaf mould on your garden instead of expensive fertiliser. Collect autumn leaves in sacks, put a brick on each sack and by spring your free leaf mould is ready for use.

Use an old bicycle pump as a pest killer spray in the garden.

To get rid of ants in the garden, sprinkle some talcum powder. 

Sprinkle salt on paths and brickwork crevices to get rid of weeds and grass. Salt will have the same effect if sprinkled on the roots of weeds in the garden. Sprinkle salt on slugs to kill them. (*Always be cautious about using salt as it will also kill everything else too.)

Spread soot or coal around the lettuce bed to keep off slugs.

Remove green fungi from a cement path or patio by pouring on water containing bleach, then scrub with a brush.

I hope everyone is having a good day or evening. Staying safe at home. And being kind to one another.

Not a penny spent

The weather is changing into our Autumn and the days are becoming a little bit cooler and we're still have rain as well. All in all a very good time for the garden if you have one. 

In the wartime letters there is talk about tomatoes growing even though they were experiencing a bit of a heat wave and nothing else was growing in their gardens. Tomato recipes were also included in the kitchen section. 

There is still a lot of talk of saving and making do. I'm currently saving a lot of orange peels to use in potpourri crafts.  During the war they wouldn't waste full orange slices for crafts. The peels were put to use in recipes like marmalades, and candied, if sugar was available.

Savings were encouraged more often now and plenty of advertising gave the call to save for war bonds. The money saved was sent to the government to help with the war of the time.

Even though there isn't a war to send savings to, it is still a good idea to put away the 'pennies' for the rainy day emergency. There's lots of ways to save a few dollars here and there, for myself I'm not thrifting which is a hard thing for me, but a nice thing for my savings purse. I'm also considering my no spend challenge again. Perhaps in April.

Also, for now I've turned off comment ability on my blog as sometimes it is just nice to look and not have to participate...well, I think so.

I hope everyone is having a good day or evening where ever you are.

A return to Austerity

I took a break from blogging after dealing with some personal issues. I thought by now I would be well settled into a new home, however drama happened and a move hasn’t occurred just yet. I usually refrain from posting in-depth personal setbacks and drama in detail on my blog so I’ll just move onto blogging.

The return to blogging is going to include the letters posted in Eleanor Barbour’s “Dear Eleanor Barbour” from the wartime newspapers. A lot of the ladies wrote in letters giving an account of their day to day life, what they were doing to make savings, recipes and home hints. The letters give a wonderful insight into the era for homemakers of Australia.

As I continue with the 1940’s homemaking theme there will also include advertising of the time, as now coupons have become introduced to  Australians and the adverts show how much something cost the average homemaker or if a coupon was needed to purchase the item. Without a coupon you could not receive the item. Australia had a lot of items available but things like the Nivea creme stopped being produced after 1939 due to it being a German product. English Yardley perfumes and creams became more popular to support the British and were widely available.

As the war continues, many are still fighting with the Germans, for Australia the bombing of Darwin brought home the war and soldiers were also enlisted to fight the Japanese. Now more than ever, Australians were encouraged to help the war effort and send what they could to the war bonds. Austerity became the key focus of homemakers, spending less, making do, and travelling less developed into a major theme of the era. The homefront became important for many families and home made became a necessity. Home made meals were part of keeping a home and supporting the troops by spending less to save for war bonds.

With the make do motto, I’m going back to creating items for the home using what I have and putting those items away for a future home. The main aim is to spend less and be at home when I can be. The advert above shows pillow cases were available and no coupons were needed. Transfers were also available and in keeping with the era but did not become very popular until the 1950's.

With the state of the world today, all of this sounds very familiar. By posting the letters, the adverts, and continuing with a 1940’s lifestyle, I hope to pass on something useful for today’s homemaker.

I hope everyone is having a good day or evening wherever you are.

Holiday cheer

DEAR “A PEACEFUL HOMEMAKER” READERS,

Today is Christmas day for us in the Southern Hemisphere and in the next week we will have New Year’s Day. Like my 1942 counterparts we are all wondering what the next 12 months will bring to us.   The last year has taught me many things as I attempted to live like 1942. It has taught me that I can do without luxuries which are considered necessities and unattainable during 1942.  Living like 1942 has taught me that I can manage with a limit to my clothes, sugar and tea. The 1942 ethic of Australian of the time has shown me they sacrificed a lot to help their country to save that country and its people. The Austerity living didn’t deter those to lend their bit to “Save their all”.

While researching the time period of 1942 I realise it had been a sad one for many. You cannot have war without sadness and 1943 will bring more of it as the war of the time goes on. 1942 reflects much of what is current today with most of us struggling on the homefront and times are hard.

 Even during the difficult times many of us are learning to live simply and make do like our 1942 folks. We are still keeping the home fires burning, preparing meals with less money, making do with less things, and hurrying to keep up with the housework while we also have jobs to do outside of the home.

Next year, no doubt, looks like it will be a continuance of the work of the last year, and perhaps even more intense. For myself, my vintage life will continue while I wait to go into my own home. I will continue this blog taking it now into 1943 to follow the homefront of the time to see how they continued to live under the hardships of world war 2. 

There won’t be another issue of  “A PEACEFUL HOMEMAKER” until after the New Year, so let me now wish you all the best that the year has in store, and a very merry holiday for Christmas day.

Have a good day or evening where ever you are.

When there is no sugar, make a batch of scones -1942

Light Hands, Light Scones.

Scones are as simple as ABC to make. A proper scone maker will tell the first lesson for the cook who says they are never able to turn out a decent scone is to remember scones need lightness.  They are not like bread, where you have to roll and roll, and then knead and knead. And wielding flour will never turn out a fluffy scone. A good solid scone, maybe, but a scone that has lost all chance of lightness before it reaches the oven.

The secret of a scone is they must literally be tossed together, and quickly into the oven with a light hand (and light heart, too, if you can manage it), and the oven must be very hot. The whole process of mixing and cooking need only be around ten or twelve minutes.  

Scones are the next best thing to a cake that requires a lot of sugar and that they require very little in way of ingredients also makes it a top list for the wartime Austerity meal of 1942. Scones can vary in plain, sweet, or savoury.

A useful savory scone:

Add about half a cup of grated cheese to two cups of flour, you can also make up onion scones, which are tasty even if the name doesn’t suggest so. Here is the recipe:

Two large cups self-raising flower, 1 tablespoon butter, 1 cup grated cheese, 1 beaten egg, 1 small very finely chopped onion, 1/4 teaspoon salt, and about 1/2 cup milk. Sift flour and salt, rub in the butter and mix in the cheese and onion. Mix to a soft dough with the egg and milk, roll out and cut into usual shapes.

Bake about 10 minutes in a very hot oven.

I hope everyone is having a good day or evening where ever you are.

40 vintage ways to cut costs

Vintage living is renowned for having a life-style based on frugality. Adapting the rules from a no-nonsense era can stretch today’s dollar and cut household costs. 

As I continue the year of living like 1939, I can hardly be anything less than a careful housekeeper. The suggestions that follow are all I have learnt so far.

1. Grow as much food as possible to lower the food bill, and freeze or can what you can’t use immediately. Even tomatoes can be frozen and used in soups and stews.

2. Save leftovers to make potato scones, soups, stews or fried vegetables.

3. Sheets can be reversed to extend their wear, putting the top border at the bottom end of the bed.

4. A sheet that’s worn in the centre can be put “sides-to-middle.” Cut it in half lengthways, seams the sides together and hem the raw edges.

5. Turn back bedding in the morning to help keep sheets to stay fresh longer. Which will cut back on frequent laundering. 

6. Cleaners should be bought in the most economical size (not always the largest) and decanted into spray bottles. Use just a squirt instead of pouring out a large amount.

7. Don’t use more laundry detergent than you need. If you don’t have a measuring cup, use a 470g jam jar (fill it halfway for a cup measure).

8. A slightly soiled wash may not need as much detergent as the manufacturer recommends.

9. Towels need watching. At the first sign of weakening along the edge, take bias tape and sew it with strong thread on both sides. 

10. A ripped towel can be cut into squares for use as washcloths.

11. Worn-out towels, cut into squares and bound together in four or five thicknesses, make good washable pot holders. Hem with binding tape and leave a piece at the end to make a little loop of tape to hang them up.

12. Wash blue towels, sheets, pillowcases with your whites to brighten up the white wash. Of course, any new coloured items should be washed separately for a few times.

13. Camouflage unremovable stains on children’s clothes with embroidery. Paint, rust spots, small rips can all be concealed with stitched flowers, a butterfly or a fish, using washable beads or old pearls for centres and eyes.

14. Soap is said to harden with keeping. Buy it six months ahead and store. unwrapped, in the linen cupboard. It smells good too.

15. Use soap holders to prevent soap being wasted.

16. If your bath oil label suggests using two capfuls, then half a cap is probably just as good.

17. You can get rid of paper table napkins, too. An inexpensive bangle for a serviette ring for everyone in the family and a hemmed square from a worn-out towel make free substitutes.

20. Scrub the dirtiest spots on clothes first to cut down on the washing time.

21. Boil only enough water for the cups of tea or coffee needed.

22. Have everything ready before the kettle comes to the boil, turning off the heat as soon as the water is boiling.

23. Use the minimum amount of water to cook vegetables. Add a tablespoon of water and a dab of butter to the vegetables, shake to coat, then cover and cook slowly.

24. A properly insulated oven retains heat. Turn it off before dishes such as casseroles are quite ready.

25. If the oven is already on, cook frozen vegetables in it. Put them in a covered casserole with a little water, butter, and salt, and cook for 39 minutes.

26. Keep your mending up-to-date, or that pair of ripped pyjama pants will sit in the mending box until it’s been out-grown. Organise a mending or sewing circle among your neighbours, for one or two afternoons a month.

27. Worn-out clothes should have zips, buttons and binding tape removed. The old binding is more suitable for mending older clothes, since new tape is stronger and causes more stress. 

28. A patchwork quilt uses up old clothes. Make a cardboard template about 20cm square, and cut squares from the better parts of old garments. Back the quilt with an old flannelette sheet and interline with an old swollen blanket. Pillow slips can be fashioned in the same way.

29. Short dresses can still be used by buying or making a wrap skirt in a complementary colour to wear over the dress.

30. Lengthen accordion-pleated skirts using a remnant of fabric lining. Unpick the waist. Make a circle from the lining by seaming together a strip 17 cm wide and hop measurement plus 5cm long. Stitch the circle tot he top of the skirt - this portion will be hidden by an overblouse or seeker - and make an elasticised waist.

31. Hand-knitted sweaters are warmer and can be unravelled when outworn or outgrown. Wind the yarn loosely around a large book, tie the skein in several place and hand-wash.

32. Sometimes there is enough fabric in a pleated skirt to make into another garment by unpicking and pressing out the pleats. The material can then be reassembled.

33. Carry a notebook with your family’s current measurements. If you see an unexpected sale, you’ll be prepared.

34. Jot down metres or wool requirements for a pattern. That way you won’t buy too much or too little.

35. Thermal cot blankets can be saved and seamed together to make a bedsize blanket when the cot is outgrown.

36. Bean sprouts are an excellent and cheap source of vitamin C. 

37. Worn-out sheets cut into handkerchief-chief size pieces are softer on the nose than tissues.

38. Conserve heating oil or gas by keeping the thermostat about 19 deg C (66 deg F) during the day and turning it down at night. Better still, turn the heat off.

39. Cook roast beef slowly to minimise shrinkage. Rub it with oil but no salt, and place on a rack in a shallow pan fat side up. Do no sear or add water. Cook, uncovered, in a preheated 150 deg C (300deg F) oven for 32 to 34 minutes per 500g (1lb) for medium.

40. A clothes dryer can use up to 100 kilowatt hours a month; drying clothes on a line is free. Clothes can be partly dried in the dryer, then hung on a line under cover.

I hope everyone is having a good day or evening where ever you are.

Is it frugal living or is it vintage living?

There has been a short pause in blog posts for a variety of reasons. One of the main reasons for the length between posting was to cut back on my internet time. I’m still a heavy Internet user and separation anxiety is real, but my phone isn’t like a third arm extension any more. Cutting back gave me some experience in what was do-able with Internet expenses.

Other ways I’ve cut right back on household expenditure: 

Using the library for books, magazines and such. I also find the cheapest books I can through the thrift stores and I very rarely have anything new on my bookshelves. The thrift stores are also my go to place for all craft material and home goods. 

I rarely use the dryer and only on days where it has been raining consecutively making it difficult to hang out clothes to line dry. We do have an indoor hanging rack for clothes but towels and sheets need a larger space.

I’ve started to plant what I can to bring food in the kitchen. Now that it is going into early Autumn here, I don’t need to water as much but I do have to find a way to use less water. I’ve currently gone back to using a watering can and using house water that doesn’t have any food scraps in it to water the garden. 

In the garden I plant vegetables to season and what I know will be eaten in the kitchen.  I also tried planting out some very old seeds to see if they will sprout and have some varying success with those seeds. I plant flowers, both edible and ones for show. The bees need both and the garden needs the bees.  I also make sure to have a good supply of herbs to make plain meals a little more tasty. Basil, Chives, Mint, Parsley, Sage, Thyme are all good  herbs to have on hand.

When I am out and about I now bring a small lunch box and pack lunches anytime I cannot be home to have a meal. I avoid going to get take aways as much as I can.  And I bring my own water.

I recycle everything I can. If I think I can find a use for it I try to do something with the item. In the craft room I make junk journals and I cut up old clothes for crafting with. I re-use old shopping bags and don’t buy shopping bags.

In the kitchen I use small cooking portions and eat leftovers the next day. This may mean making a second meal such as bubble and squeak.

There’s so much more I do to cut back to save the pennies. This all sounds similar to the way of living frugal during days of hard times in modern life. Even as modern as this sounds, many of the articles in the newspapers and women’s magazines of 1939 discuss similar saving ideas. While the internet savings obviously wasn’t a part of those times, all other suggestions to cut back and save with in the homefront are part of the time.  

The 1939 timeline I am studying is carefree and without worries. It is late April, there’s articles for soups, autumn fruits, buying woollens, along with cold and flu remedies. But there’s a dark cloud hanging over the era with articles in the news of Germany’s advances and possible war. In 5 months time, war will be announced and the need to be ‘Frugal’ has a new urgency. 

Living within your means is both frugal living and living vintage. Importantly, this way of living is a means to be prepared for hard times and it is a wise way to be.

I hope everyone is having a good day or evening where ever you are.

Oh, for a cool change

The articles for early January 1939 talk about the need to keep cool. Nothing much seems to change and the weather is still hot in 2019! The newspaper article for how to keep food fresh without an ice box is an interesting read. Depending on where you live refrigerators were advertised and many had them.

The garden for January 1939 talks about keeping up with the watering during hot days, and to plant out celery. Now a days gardeners don't bother with the trench method, they blanch the stems when they are almost fully grown by wrapping cardboard or newspaper around the plant to exclude the light to blanch the stem. Blanching the stem of celery will make the plant less bitter tasting.

I've planted my celery out. I left them a little too long in the seed planter but they will bounce back. It is important to keep the water up to the plant.

I'm going back to old fashioned bar soap this week, instead of using liquid soap. I've chosen to go with the Lux soap as the brand is advertised more than Palmolive soap. I wonder if I will end up with a complexion as: 'lovely as Joan Blondell!'

The scrapbook I have for the newspaper articles of the time is starting to fill up with a wide variety of home and garden sections. There's a lot of things I can't do with the articles I do have due to the obvious reason some items are no longer available or they are not something I want to do just yet. But I save what I find and it will be a good record to have on hand.

Don't get me wrong, I love vintage, but I also love our modern cons and technology. Without the latter, I wouldn't be able to research and save what I find. It would also mean long trips to the library. I think eating and living like our older generations once did makes sense in these times of uncertainty we seem to be in, but it is also wise to balance our technology with theirs too.

I hope everyone is having a good day or evening where ever you are.