What's it all about?

I actually started working on the background for this experiment a fortnight ago, but as there is quite a bit of interest in my project, I thought I'd set up a blog dedicated to it.



I've always been interested in WW2.

I grew up with stories of my dad (Royal Engineers) in North Africa, Palestine, Italy, my Uncle (Royal Artillery) in France and Germany, and of course my Mum, at home, digging for Victory.

A combination of things have conspired to make me come up with this idea.

1. Food price/wasteage.

I've had many a rant in recent times about how people seem able to waste so much food, at the prices we have. The news recently gave an astonishing figure for food wasteage in Britain.

I had to physically restrain myself last weekend when I saw a friend throw half a perfectly fresh cabbage in the bin, because there was only a bit needed for his fancy "Jamie Oliver" mash. (I think Jamie would have had a fit at the binning of the cabbage too)

2.I have just got Foyles War Series 2 on DVD for my Birthday :) (yippee)

This has been a great series, and rewatching it I got to thinking about food, or the lack of it, again. Even I, who is very careful about wasting food, am wasteful in comparison to the frugality of the Second World War. So I came to a decision about a little project I wanted to try.

I have unilaterally decided, and "him indoors" will have to live with it, that we are going to have a week surviving on WW2 rations. I think I'll go for the rations set in 1942, which was the height of rationing.

I'm in the process of gathering all the information I need, and hunting for obscure things like "dried, reconstituted egg".

Useful reading so far has been "We'll Eat Again", a cracking book I actually bought for my mum years ago, and inherited when we were sorting out her estate. Also some weblinks I've got from some friendly WW2 reenactors online.


Earlier this week, I made veg stock with veg peelings. It's worked very well. I usually compost the bits of veg I cut off/peel, so this was my first attempt at using all the "scraggy" bits for stock. Of course I have the huge advantage that I can freeze it! I'm not going to use 1940s technology, just the rations. :^)

Well, I think that's all for now. I'll post again soon.