I am looking for some old recipes
 

I am looking for some of our grand mas recipes, maybe ggreatgrandmas, 1940's era
something they cooked for a meal. I have been doing some research on this era. It is sooo amazing what they had to use, get by on and so on, and we complain if we don't have things in our cupboards!

what to fix for supper? SPAM, any recipes for it? old fashioned home made biscuits? chicken pot pie? rationing this stuff, even children had rationing booklets. coffee and tea? sugar?

oopps sorry going on a tangent there.
But was and am curious how foods were prepared with the little they had. any thoughts on this? oh, any recipes on this?

When Mom died, she still had all the ration books for her 3 older children, Dad, his Mom and Dad, and one of Dad's brothers. They all lived together during WWII. They gave up the car during the war, and Dad never had another one.
My brother (15 yrs older than I) loved her butter rolls and he'd have one for lunch at school in his lunch pail (syrup bucket). It was homemade biscuit dough fried in a cast iron skillet like a fried pie, with a dollop of butter and sprinkle of suger inside.

Most of Mom's recipes and canning recipes listed ingredients only. No instructions.

Here's a banana nut cake that I remember with fondness. The "filling" was more of a glaze made in the cast iron skillet.

1 1/2 cup flour
1 cup white sugar
3/4 cup brown sugar
3 T. sweet milk
1/2 cup shortening
2 bananas, crushed with fork
1 t. soda
1/2 t. salt
1 t. vanilla
1 cup crushed pecans
2 eggs

Blend sugars and shortening. Add eggs, milk, and sifted flour, soda, and salt. Put in crushed bananas and pecans. Put in moderate oven to cook.

Filling:
1/2 cup brown sugar
1/2 cup white sugar
3/4 cup canned milk
pinch salt
few drops vanilla
Cook 1 minute. Thicken with powdered sugar and spread on cake. Put pecans on, if desired.

When husband was in College, we had spam a lot. Put it in egg wash then dipped it is cracker crumbs and fried it. We thought it was pretty good, but I sure don't want it now.

I don't have any old recipes but I do remember ration books during WWII. I did most of our family's food shopping and used the coupon books. Early Saturday mornings I would be on line at the butchers with my list of meats and coupon book. After the butchers I stopped at the open air fruit and veggies market and after lunch went to the A&P and Teddy's, our local market. We did try Spam but no one lived it as it was too salty. Meat servings were small and my mother did make a lot of starch dishes, rice with veggies, beans and greens, etc. and we always had bread to fill ourselves up with.

Sugar was rationed so we made due with brown sugarfor cake recipes, evaporated and/or condensed milk for coffee and Karo cane syrup for our pancakes. My Aunt Mary would call my mother to inform her that the sugar or coffee truck was making a delivery to her A&P and our A&P was the truck's next stop. My mother would send me runnig to our A&P to save her a space on line in front to the store.

We also missed having a chocolate bar every once in awhile.

Here's one that was popular during WWII, there are several versions - make it with nuts or without as most times we didn't have nuts. It's also called Depression Cake.

WAR CAKE

2 cups dark brown sugar
2 cups hot water
2 tbsp shortening
1 tsp cinnamon
1 tsp nutmeg
1/2 tsp cloves
1/2 tsp ginger
1 lb raisins
1/2 lb chopped walnuts and/or almonds (optional)
3 cups flour
1 tsp baking soda dissolved in 1 tsp (5 mL) hot water

Boil together all ingredients but flour and soda in water, 5 minutes. Set aside to cool, stirring often, gradually mix in flour and soda. Batter is thick. Bake 45 minutes at 350°F in two loaf pans.

My mom's go-to cookbook, which I still have, was the Lily Wallace New American Cook Book. Has a section on ration cooking. Fascinating reading!! I notice the cake recipe has no eggs, that was a big thing in WW2.

That War Cake sounds scrumptious! I LOVE dark brown sugar. I may have to try that this weekend. Thank you SO much for sharing! :thumbup:

We used to eat spam camping. I bough some the other day. Slice and fry it, or grill it. Put it on a bun with lettuce, tomato etc like a burger. My husband requested it. We haven't had any since we sold our camper 12 years ago.

My mom used to make a scalloped potato type casserole with the spam. Peel then slice potatoes into a casserole dish. Cut spam into small cubes and mix into potatoes. Mix cream of mushroom soup with a little milk then mix into potato/spam. Cover. Bake at 350 for about an hour. Check if done by poking potatoes with fork (same way you check them for potato salad).

We had spam growing up. Mother would slice it about 1/3 inch thick, place it on a baking sheet, put a dollop of mashed potatoes on top, with a pat of butter on the potatoes and would sprinkle the top of potatoes with grated cheese. BTW, she didn't put salt in the potatoes because the spam was real salty.

Well this isn't a main dish but its a dessert that I grew up with, and continue to make to this day.
Its great for road trips as it "ripens" and becomes better each day. One improvement mom made and i also do is to take and food process half the raisins, it creates a moister bar.

Old Fashioned Boiled Rasin Bar:
http://www.bing.com/images/search?q=...rs&FORM=IDFRIR

Back in the fifties my dad was in the service and his pay didn't reach mom by Thanksgiving so she took SPAM and shaped a turkey out of it and then went to the bedroom and cried. Us kids thought she was pretty inventive. Jo

Spam is still eaten regularly in Hawaii. Never know what you'll find it in.

My mother made the very same recipe but her recipe just says 2 c. sugar and 2 tbsp "lard". My family killed their own hogs and rendered the fat into lard. Bet the brown sugar would give it a great taste. Very good cake. She baked hers in cake pans instead of bread pans. Don't think that would make any difference. I included this recipe in my favorite recipe book in March 1968.

They have a Spam Jam in Honolulu. It must be in April every year. Check out the website: http://spamjamhawaii.com/

I remember Spam fried in butter every now and then, circa 1956 - 1961 or so. Don't think it was purely economics. Our refrigerator had only a small compartment as a freezer. Just about big enough for an ice cube tray and a pound or two of meat. Because of that, there was a lot of canned meat going on, Spam, canned ham and corned beef and even canned whole chickens Mom would make use for chicken and gravy. Also canned salmon (double yuk).

They used to have (and maybe stiull do have) a Spam celebration (?) in Roslyn, WA too. (They filmed a series there...Northern Exposeure if you are old enough to remember.) Complete with a Spam queen and court. Spam cook-off, manliest man toolbelt, manliest man truck...well you get the idea. We went once and it was wackily fun! LOL

I remember my Dad loving spam. He would fried it in a pan and make a sandwich from a couple of slices. Mayo and lettuce I think. Also he'd make this sauce of mustard and brown sugar, couple Tbsp of each and mix. Pour over as frying. This is really good. My daughter uses this sauce on her fried bologna sandwiches. I've seen people use spam, cut in small cubes, in macaroni and cheese (like cut up hotdogs).

This is NOT a recipe but my parents live in Cailf and Because you could not get Butter everyone used Avocado as a spread on there toast!

Good Old Pinto Beans
2 c. dry pintos
large cooking pot
Cold water to cover and drown beans
Boil for 20 mins turn off for 1 hour.
drain beans
Add cold water to drown Beans Again!
add 2 chop celery sticks, 1 sm. chop onion, 1 tsp pepper.
NO salt yet it will make you beans Tough!
Bring to a boil, turn down and simmer all day Till Beans are Soft.
Add your Salt now, And Your Meat, Small Sausages or Ham or Ham Hocks.
Have lots of bread or torttillas. By the way You will be Eating BEANS for Days LOL

Had a lot of spam growing up. Same as above-egg wash and rolled in cracker crumbs. And many other ways mom could think of.

[QUOTE= Here's one that was popular during WWII, there are several versions - make it with nuts or without as most times we didn't have nuts. It's also called Depression Cake.

WAR CAKE

2 cups dark brown sugar
2 cups hot water
2 tbsp shortening
1 tsp cinnamon
1 tsp nutmeg
1/2 tsp cloves
1/2 tsp ginger
1 lb raisins
1/2 lb chopped walnuts and/or almonds (optional)
3 cups flour
1 tsp baking soda dissolved in 1 tsp (5 mL) hot water

Boil together all ingredients but flour and soda in water, 5 minutes. Set aside to cool, stirring often, gradually mix in flour and soda. Batter is thick. Bake 45 minutes at 350°F in two loaf pans.[/QUOTE]

Thank you so much. My aunts used to make this cake with raisins and we loved it as kids. I made it often for my kids too.

We had Spam spread. Mom would grind the spam, not real fine, add mayo and sweet pickle relish. I still make it to this day. Love the stuff.
And then there were FISHSTICKS....You couldn't disquise....oh man, I'm gagging just thinking about having to eat those every Friday night...straight from the oven, no less. YUK !!!!!!!!! There was something incredibly wrong with eating those when you lived on the rockbound coast of Maine. Ya know?

Apparently Spam was a constant in the army rations during WW2. As a result, my father hated it. Once in a while my mom would serve it anyway. She would slice it, brown it in a frying pan and then make a "sort of" barbecue sauce from
Catsup, brown sugar and a little mustard, cook the slices in the sauce and serve. My husband had never had Spam but loves it this way. This was one of our frequent foods when we were in graduate school in Berkeley. We lived in married student housing with 11 other couples. On Saturdays, we would all bring what food we had left together, and make
tacos. Some pretty strange combinations. "survival food" might be another fun topic on this board.

I love fried Spam but have a horrific memory of my step mom serving us COLD spam sandwiches on the road one time. YUCKKKKK!

All that talk of spam reminded me of:

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=anwy2MPT5RE

There is a lot of handwaving about amounts in this recipe -- I watched my Mom make it to get a feel for it. It is really good!

This is Grandma's Casserole (that's the only name that I have ever seen)

1 med onion, diced
Butter
1 can tomato sauce
elbow macaroni (uncooked)
bacon

-- Saute the onion in the butter. Pour into a greased (buttered) 9" square pan and spread around.
-- Cover the onions with uncooked elbow macaroni -- a good solid 1 layer deep.
-- Pour the tomato sauce over the macaroni, then add enough water so that the macaroni floats a bit.
-- lay strips of bacon over the mixture
-- Bake 350 until all the liquid is absorbed and the bacon is cooked..
-- If desired, cook up some extra bacon.

DH makes this about once a month. Deliscious with tortillas!

We used to have a similar lunch -- ground spam, chunked cheese, pickle relish and a little mayo to bind it. Stuck in whole (not sliced) loaves of bread, sliced in nice this slices but kept the slices together and popped it in the oven to warm. Or, if it was summer and hot, would fix it like a grilled cheese. And, if we were camping, it was put in tinfoil (OK, aluminum foil) and set on the coals of the fire. The new ham or bacon style of spam works pretty good for this, or just fried (no need for oil/butter) to go w/pancakes.

Google for recipes from the 40s. You will find lots and lots. Also Google the lifestyle for that era. It was a good time for all, not like today.

Go to your public library and see if they have any cookbooks from the depression era (reprints). Also, try Spam, sliced, and cooked in pineapple juice and topped with slices of pineapple. You can also grind it up and add mayo and pickle relish for ham salad.

My mom served a lot of gravy bread. Neighbors put gravy on crushed crackers, called it Yankee potpie. Pap liked his gravy over biscuits but mom never made biscuits.

Mom made slippery potpie in ham broth and potatoes. Husband's grandmother made slippery potpie using butterbeans. Slippery potpie, fried potatoes and occasionally salmon cakes were Sunday dinner at her house. Every special occasion she made a raisin cake which I think is like the war cake. No one got any recipes from her before she died. Always made her bread from a recipe in her head.

Potato cakes from left over mashed potatoes. I would only eat the soft center out of it.

It wasn't too many years ago that they had a Spam contest at the Ionia Free Fair in Ionia, Michigan. I entered it a couple of times. Lots of things that you can do with a can of Spam.

http://archive.org/details/cbk

I have a hard copy of a 1918 cookbook - Win the War Cookbook.

You can find it on the site above under Title and click on "W".

This is a site you can spend hours viewing.

thanks for all of the recipes

I flip through the "FANNY FARMER" cook book. It has some great old recpies.
Also the "WHITEHOUSE" cook book (the older ones) they are hilarious. BTW I think there is a Whitehouse cook book published for each president.

I have one really OLD dessert receipe that starts out "Take 1 cup of cream seperated from your milk, whisk for about 45 minutes or until it will hold soft peaks..." Really makes me appreciate my electric mixer.

wow! all of you are great! I just thought that all these recipes, I sure appreciate what we have today!

as for that war cake, I noticed no eggs, I am going to have to try that one. and yes I had spam too so I do know about that.

I am going to try some of these recipes, and check those links too.

Have to share! My hubby and I sitting here I'm reading this and "said" DH makes and hes says "whats DH" I say I don't know He says "Dumb Husband" LOL.....