Not So Victorious Gardens

*A garden summary, by TMOTH

Mary, Mary quite contrary. How does your garden grow?

As of last week we are officially done with this year's gardens so it is time to assess how we did. I wish I could say better. Should I start with the excuses now or save those for later?

Sorry, it’s not like me to be so negative but I judge myself more harshly than others and the gardens were one area of the rationing project where more responsibility rested with me. I can’t think of any reason not to say that the amount of produce was disappointing. We knew going in that even with the additional garden space shared by friends (thanks again everyone) we were far short on space recommendations for successful Victory Gardens.

Even considering our space limitations we had high hopes. Especially for tomatoes, which took up the largest share of space. While I have to admit that I could/should have been more diligent with weeding and watering, I take some solace in the number of other gardeners I heard lamenting this year's tomatoes. I’m no master gardener to explain all of the variables but I also heard some say their tomatoes were great. In fact, one of our borrowed plots had plants that just wouldn’t give up. After suffering with the rest through brutal heat and a long dry spell what thick skinned fruit was on the vine split when the rains finally came. With the help of the late summer rain those plants started growing like crazy and loaded up with fruit all over again. Most of it never got to ripen on the vine. Last week I took what I thought were mature enough to finish on the shelf and pulled out the plants. Even when I finally uprooted the plants last week they were green bushy and still producing flowers and fruit in all stages of maturity.

It was a tough decision to take down those enthusiastic die-hards but I was afraid that we were just robbing nutrients from the soil for tomatoes that would never have a chance to ripen with the shorter days and cooler nights. (Can I really be thinking of frost already?).

Sorry that I don’t have an accurate tally of what we DID get but in general the gardens gave the occasional fresh produce for meals including a variety of greens and broccoli in the spring, eggplant, tomatoes, green beans, cucumbers and a small variety of squashes later with basil on demand throughout (still growing). Unfortunately we didn’t get the amount needed to save massive amounts for later.

I won’t go too deep into the excuses I promised earlier but I will leave you with this one insight. Trying to keep up with in four different small gardens in four different locations does not mix well with trying to limit your mileage.

--TMOTH

Take That, Rationing!

I just did a kung-fu roundhouse kick to the rationing chart. KA-POW!

Okay, maybe that's more figurative than literal...

But, I MADE KETCHUP (or, actually, catsup since that's how the recipe was labeled).

Ketchup is ridanculously expensive as far as ration points go (so expensive I had to use an imaginary word). One 14 oz bottle of ketchup will set you back more than one person's weekly allowance of blue/green points.

But having kids in the house means ketchup is a required condiment. They tell me, after all, that one can't possible eat hot dogs, hamburgers, french fries, onion rings, chicken strips and such without ketchup - to do otherwise would being considered abusive.

So ketchup we must have.

Using peeled, cored and pureed Roma tomatoes grown in our Victory Gardens (little hands are great peelers), I followed this recipe (adapted from the canonical Ball Blue Book Guide to Preserving).

1. Combine 2 quarts pureed tomatoes, 1/2 cup sugar and 1 1/3 cups vinegar in a large sauce pot.
2. Add a spice bag containing 2 TB whole allspice, 2 sticks of cinnamon and 1 tsp whole cloves.
3. Add 1 1/2 tsp paprika (I used Hungarian), 1 tsp dry mustard, 1 tsp salt and a pinch of cayenne pepper.
4. Cook slowly until thick, stirring frequently.
5. When desired thickness is reached (took about an hour for me), ladle hot ketchup into hot, sterilized jars, leaving 1/4 inch head space.
6. Add caps and rings and process in water bath for 15 minutes.

The recipe said it would make 2 pints and that held true, although I used some half-pints for shelf-life considerations once individual jars have been opened. In all, I think this adds up to about 35 or 40 points worth of ketchup. Not too shabby.

The final product is nice and thick, although a bit sweeter than I expected - I think I'll reduce the amount of sugar in any future batches. The girls both like it, although Sissy remarked that it was more of a hot dog ketchup rather than a dipping ketchup. Whatever that means. TMOTH said it was a very tomato-y ketchup, which I believe was a compliment.

I think I'll try to make at least one more batch before the end of summer. Combined with what we already have in the fridge that should give us more than enough to make it through the winter.

--Rational Mama

Mommy Pickles

Pickles weren't rationed during WWII, so why-oh-why do I find myself canning homemade bread and butter pickles?

Same reasons every year:

I like the aesthetics...

I like the control over ingredients...

And I like that the girls say "mommy pickles" are their favorite pickles.

Do you have a favorite pickle?

--Rational Mama

Garlic Harvest

I love garlic harvest time. There is something magical about digging up the earth and finding these hidden gems underneath.

Up the come, and then head to the drying screens to cure.

After a few days the tops are cut off. Then they cure some more.
Eventually the dirt and outer paper layers are removed and then they are ready to store.

Oh, the possibilities!

--Rational Mama

You Say Potato...

I say, "Really? The year we don't plant potatoes because we failed miserably the last two years with the tire method, we get volunteer potato plants that actually make potatoes? Go figure."

We went ahead and harvested the volunteer potatoes a little early because I was concerned about them encroaching on some of the plants that we planted on purpose. It's not a huge harvest, but it will be tasty, boiled and buttered.
In other garden news, the peas are done and the broccoli is about three-quarters done. The basil harvest has begun and the garlic is starting to take on a slight yellowish tone which tells me this time next month we'll be harvesting garlic. This is good news, because I really love harvesting garlic. Really!

Several pepper plants have baby peppers on them and the first of the Malabar spinach sprouts are up - they take 21 days to germinate! I'll wait until they're a little bigger to sample a leaf.

Our friends at the Artists' Garden let us pick another generous batch of blackberries, so I'll make some more jam this weekend.

We've been able to comfortably catch up on some gardening work due to a lovely cold front that moved through the other night. Nightly lows in the mid-60s! Can't beat that!

And how is your garden, dear reader?

--Rational Mama

Blackberries!

We were invited by some sweet friends to partake of their abundant blackberry patch today. Wow! It's a very very good year for blackberries - the perfect weather for blooms and no late frost to hurt the buds. I couldn't believe the amount of berries on the vines, in all stages of maturity.

The girls and I headed out into the thicket with our buckets, but they soon found other diversions once they realized how thorny blackberry vines can be. I continued to wade through the vines, which managed to grab my arse more than a drunken construction worker (note to self: wear heavy-duty jeans when picking blackberries).

In the end we came home with roughly four pounds of fresh, organic local blackberries. Wonderfully huge and sweet, blackberries are no doubt my most favorite berry (strawberries are a close second). And they way the vines are drooping with unripe fruit we'll probably be able to do at least one more round of picking (thank you, friends).

The absolutely crazy schedule this week doesn't allow for any canning, so this time we'll eat the fresh fruit as-is which, after many months of very limited fresh fruit intake, is an easy sacrifice to make. The blackberries should get us through to the early apple season, which we're all quite excited about.

What fruit would you most look forward to eating after a long hiatus?

--Rational Mama

The (Produce) Seasons Are A Changin'

As if the new influx of hot and sultry weather wasn't enough of a reminder that summer is moving along, the changing inventory of our weekly CSA bag also serves as a harbinger of summer's prime.

Initially, our CSA bags were mostly salad greens (and you know how I feel about salad greens), radishes, green onions and the like. Typical early summer fare.

Today's CSA bag consisted of carrots, zucchini, potatoes, snow peas and a decent (and an increasingly rare) head of lettuce.
Ahhh...summer IS progressing. Soon our bags will be filled with more zucchini, peppers, eggplants and, and, AND tomatoes! Oh, how we are looking forward to those first fresh tomatoes! It has literally been around 9 months since we had decent tomatoes in the house.

I have a feeling we'll be eating most of this produce raw, since cooking seems to be falling to the wayside now that both outdoor and indoor temperatures are creeping up. As I write this at 8:35pm the current temperature outside is 86 degrees (after a high temperature of over 90 degrees) and the humidity is at 70%. Unfortunately, the situation isn't much different in the house.

TMOTH has been plugging away on the whole house fan project. The fan is completely framed and installed and the wiring is planned out. We need to make alterations to some of the windows in the attic to increase ventilation (whole house fans need lots of attic ventilation to work properly). I know TMOTH really wanted the completed window changes to be sufficient, but numerous calculation checks tell us we need more.

Poor TMOTH - he's been working in the considerably hot attic for days and did not take this news well. He needs to go refresh in a cool shower so that the world is a better place.

And maybe have a nice cool beer. That usually makes the world a better place, too.

What's your favorite way to cool off?

--Rational Mama

(Kinda) Historic Recipe: Rhubarb Strawberry Crisp

While I was going through more newspapers from the spring of 1943 this week (What? You don't do that, too?) I noticed lots of rhubarb recipes on the ladies' pages. In honor of this fine tradition (and local rhubarb AND strawberries at the farmer's market today!) I whipped up the following dessert for tonight. It's a little rhubarb-heavy (I have other plans for the strawberries so I couldn't spare too many) but it was delicious. Yum!

Ingredients:
1 cup flour
3/4 cup oats
1 stick melted butter (or margarine, but ewww)
3/4 cup brown sugar
1 tsp cinnamon
3 1/2 cups chopped rhubarb
1/2 cup chopped strawberries
1 cup granulated white sugar
1 cup water
2 TB cornstarch
1 tsp vanilla extract

Directions:

• Combine flour, oats, brown sugar and cinnamon and press half of the mixture into the greased bottom of a 9" x 9" square pan.
• Top with rhubarb and strawberries.
• Combine sugar, water and cornstarch in a small saucepan and cook until thickened and syrupy. Take off the heat and add the vanilla.
• Pour syrup over rhubarb and strawberries.
• Top with remaining oat mixture.
• Bake for one hour at 350 degrees Fahrenheit.

We had ours with all-natural vanilla ice cream. Such a wonderful late spring/early summer treat!


--Rational Mama

Shhh...

When I went to pick up the CSA bag this week I was surprised to find four small bundles of asparagus available. I was literally stunned (it was 4:40pm) and kept staring at the dry-erase board that lists bag options, trying to figure out just what was going on.

The CSA representative was amused.

Finally, I asked "What are the asparagus a choice with?"

"Oh, well, technically you're choosing between the mushrooms or the asparagus," she replied. "But I took the asparagus off the listing board since we were almost out. I set aside a few asparagus bunches for those who come a little later."

My wide eyes communicated a silent, sincere gratitude.

"Just tuck them down in your bag so the folks up front don't see them."

Apparently, the asparagus gods heard my laments. Or maybe the CSA reps had heard numerous complaints.

Of course, this serves as positive reinforcement for my bitching.

Either way, we're having asparagus tomorrow night.

--Rational Mama

A Tisket! A Tasket! Our First CSA Basket (of the year)!

Friday was the first pick-up day for our CSA subscription through the local natural food co-op. Here's what it contained:
Just in case you can't tell from the photo, that's a half-dozen farm fresh/free-range eggs, a bunch (literally) of carrots, a bag of dried Nameko mushrooms, a bag of salad greens and a bag of spinach. This collection is a little bit smaller than the usual weekly pick-up (the growers had a hard time harvesting with all the rain we've had), so they charged us a bit less than the normal weekly fee.

Yum! All fresh, all local and all un-rationed! One of the best parts, though, is the newsletter that comes with the weekly bag. This week's newsletter explains that, "each week's bag holds gastronomic treasures and culinary mysteries for you to behold." Seriously. Is this not the most awesome food newsletter ever?

With the fresh greens available through our own garden, the farmer's market and our CSA subscription we've eaten a ridiculous amount of salad in the last week. This makes me very happy.

Not tonight, though. Tonight's dinner is very fitting for the cool, rainy day we've had here: chicken pot pie. Eowyn requested it late last week and so I just took my second attempt at making pie crust (you can revisit my first attempt here). I used a different pastry recipe and the results are much more aesthetically pleasing. The contents of the pie also include a homemade white/cream sauce, which replaces the store-bought can of cream of chicken soup I would have used prior to rationing.

And if tonight remains cold and dreary I might just need to make a batch of homemade chocolate chip cookies - no cookies from a tube here.

Ah, how some things have changed!

--Rational Mama

Historic Recipe: Cabbage Delmonico (and, a farewell to a good friend)

Friends, throughout the course of this experiment you've read my ruminations about cabbage. Ah, that staple of restricted wartime winter diets; the only source of semi-fresh green leafy things for many months. We've baked it, made various salads out of it and had moments of frustration with it.

Today, I honor cabbage with another historic recipe: Cabbage Delmonico. The recipe comes from Joanne Lamb Hayes' Grandma's Wartime Kitchen: World War II and the Way We Cooked and is described as a "meatless main dish." Here's my version as I made it...

Ingredients:
2 lb head of cabbage
2 TB butter
3 TB all-purpose flour
1/2 tsp dry mustard
3/4 tsp paprika (Hungarian is best)
3/4 tsp salt
2 cups milk
1 cup grated extra-sharp Cheddar cheese
1/2 cup bread crumbs

Cut cabbage into 6-7 wedges and cook in boiling water for about 5 minutes (the recipe said to boil for 8 minutes but I didn't want to overcook my cabbage, per grandmum's instructions). Drain the cabbage.

In a small saucepan melt the butter over low heat. Gradually stir in the flour, mustard, paprika and salt until smooth. Gradually stir in the milk, stirring constantly over low heat. Add in the cheese bit by bit and stir until all the cheese is melted.

Place cabbage in 9" x 9" baking dish and top with the cheese sauce. Sprinkle the bread crumbs and extra paprika over the top and bake for 20 minutes.

This is what it looked like coming out of the oven:

And this is what it looked like on the plate:

Sigh. Can't cabbage ever look attractive? If you have an even half-way decent imagination then you can ascertain how this dish turned out. After all, it's pretty much just cabbage and a mild cheese sauce. I'm not sure if the "meatless main dish" description is historically true, or just one the cookbook's author felt fit well. Either way, there's not enough protein or carbohydrates to make this a satisfying meal.

Cabbage, dear cabbage...you're like the Susan Boyle of rationing. Humble? Yes. Comely? Yes. Underestimated? Yes. And then you get your chance to shine and surprise us all by how tasty you can be in such dishes as baked cabbage and Asian cabbage slaw.

But like Susan Boyle, your moment to shine will fade...and so fade, you must.

Due to the seasonal restrictions on our produce selection, this will be the last time we purchase/prepare cabbage in the house until late summer. The next few months will be filled with fresh spinach and lettuce and many other green vegetables which have waited anxiously to have their moments of recognition.

And so, cabbage, this is farewell. At least, until late August.

Adieu.

--Rational Mama

Temper Tantrum

You know that howling three-year-old in the store, screaming at the top of her lungs, eyes red and wet from her emotional outburst? The one you can hear half-way across the store, exclaiming her certainty that the world is unfair and justice must be served to her NOW?

That's kind of how I feel about rationing right now.

I'm tired of the constraints and the rules and the can't haves and can't do's.

I was already feeling this way a bit (I think it's part of the natural stir-crazy feeling that comes at the end of winter) but it reared it's ugly head big-time in the past few days when we went on a mini-vacation with our good friends.

Late Monday afternoon we went to a local indoor water park/hotel combo (using some of our saved-up miles) and got away from the everyday mundane, if only for a day.

No points. No counting.

Since both families were doing a vacay-on-the-cheap we both brought our own breakfast and lunch supplies for the second day. We did eat out at a restaurant Monday night, but our ration points for the week were reduced as a result.

No points. No counting.

And then back to reality.

I didn't want to leave vacation. I didn't want to be subjected to the rationing rules again.

We arrived back home early Tuesday evening and I didn't want to stop being on vacation. I didn't want to fix our ration-friendly meal and deal with the dishes and the clean-up and the work. So Sissy and I headed to the neighborhood Chinese restaurant (TMOTH and Eowyn had eaten enough junk throughout the day and weren't hungry for dinner).

This was a contraband meal.

I think it's even getting a little to TMOTH, who is typically a very easy-going guy. Last week his self-imposed rationing-year ban on liquid forms of caffeine came to a crashing end when he had two Cokes in one day (and proceeded to feel a little queasy).

Sigh.

I can only imagine that what I'm feeling was par for the course in 1943, as families adjusted to the new wartime rationing system. Granted, at this point in 1943 canned goods rationing had only been in effect for six or seven weeks and meat/fat/cheese rationing had only been enforced for two weeks.

This coming Saturday we will be entering our 13th week of rationing.

On the bright side, we will be 1/4 of the way through our rationing year. In 1943 no one knew how long the rationing would last (or who, more importantly, would win the war).

I can only hope that the next six months will be easier, as more fresh produce options become available and healthier menu plans can be accommodated. It will be nice to work in the garden and feel the sunshine on our skin and feel like we're making progress towards preserving a stash of produce for winter.

Until then, I might be a little pouty about this rationing thing.

So bear with me, folks, while I have my tantrum.

Like the three-year-old in the store, I'll be done with it in 15 minutes and get distracted by something shiny and forget what it was that I was upset about.

I promise.

--Rational Mama

Garden Plans, Part I

Isn't this great?

It's from the February 26, 1943 edition of the Topeka Daily Capital. At this point sugar had been rationed for nine months and canned goods rationing was set to start within a week. Red point rationing of meats/oils/cheeses was still over a month away.

But can you see the excitement in their eyes? That's how the Rational Living family has viewed the seed catalogs this year, too.

We've always perused the catalogs in spring, dog-earing and asterisking (whoa, that's a real word) interesting options and day-dreamy ideas. Typically, we might try one new thing a year (or we might try - and fail - at container potatoes twice), but we normally just fall back to the standard, small tomatoes-n-such garden.

But this year, gardening is serious business. Really serious business.

We will really need to maximum our garden harvest this year so that we have plenty of fresh produce during the summer to eat PLUS have enough extra to store-up for winter. The more home-preserved produce we have going in to the fall and winter the fewer precious ration points we will have to spend.

In order to do this we must be more selective about plant varieties and expand our garden size from modest to massive. This post will cover the varieties and a future post will take you on a tour of our gardening spaces.

The article on the left is from Feb. 23, 1943 and it includes a thorough list of what vegetables were recommended for Victory Gardens. Over the past few months we've developed our own list of what we will plant, based upon family preferences and growing conditions. Here's what we have so far:





Spring Garden
Lettuce
Mesclun
Spinach
Peas
Garlic (Inchelium Red, already in the ground)
Radishes

Summer Garden
Tomatoes (cherry, standard and paste)
Peppers (bell and jalapeno)
Garlic (harvest in July)
Cucumbers (standard and pickling)
Eggplant
Yellow squash or zucchini
Green Beans (pole)
Malabar spinach
Melon (space permitting)
Dill
Basil
Mint
Lemon Balm
Sage

Autumn Garden
Lettuce
Spinach
Mesclun
Kale
Garlic (back in the ground)
Beets
Broccoli
Radishes

We're not going to bother with some items (such as carrots, corn, cabbage and okra) because they are readily available at our local farmer's market for very reasonable prices. Additionally, we will have some surprises each week because we've signed up for our local CSA again.

In the spirit of not wasting, I'm vowing to use up most of the produce seeds that we have leftover from previous years. This includes seeds for tomatoes, pickling cucumbers, spinach, lettuce, mesclun, beans, radishes, some cucumbers and most of the herbs. We ordered the rest of our precious seeds from Seed Savers.

We'll be starting seeds in the greenhouse before the month is over and the peas should be in the ground by then as well. Of course, that means we need to get supplies and start turning over the soil and mixing in compost and the like. We've had so much moisture on the ground for the last several months that that everything is too wet; hopefully some dry, sunny days are in our near future.

That's our list...what are you planting, dear reader?

--Rational Mama

Brilliant! Oczywiscie!

I don't know why I didn't think of this earlier...

If my undergraduate alma mater allowed non-education majors to have minors like other universities (really, KU, why not?), then I would have more than enough credits for a minor in Slavic Studies, with an emphasis in Polish language and literature. This may be news to some of you, and just genuinely weird to others. What can I say? I'm a Slav at heart.

Anyhoo, here I've been fretting over finding good recipes for our seasonal (and therefore non-rationed) produce, which right now consists mostly of cabbage, carrots, onions, potatoes and mushrooms.

And then I had an epiphany the other day, while calling my little cabbage kapusta, which is the Polish word for cabbage.

If you've ever flipped through a Polish cookbook then you will know that like 90% of the recipes consist mainly of combinations of cabbage, carrots, onions, potatoes and mushrooms, with modest amounts of cheese, butter or meats for flavor. Okay...maybe 90% is a bit of an exaggeration, but seriously - it's crazy high.

So I went to the library the other day and checked out a few Polish cookbooks.

Jackpot!

The cabbage dry spell may be over!

--Rational Mama

1 Month Check-In

Today we mark one calendar month into our year of living on WWII U.S. civilian rations.

How are we doing?

We used 248 of our 251 red ration points. Assigning these every week is quite a math game - there are definitely never too many red ration points!

We used 538 of what should have been only 192 allotted blue/green points (refer to the "And Then Things Became REALLY Interesting" post from a few weeks ago). The good news is that while I was doing some research I learned that all families were allowed to claim, without penalty, five cans per person at the start of rationing. Assuming that an average can was worth 14 points, that would be an additional 280 points worth of canned goods that I could have credited the family for at the beginning of ration. If we subtract those points from our total, that brings us down to 258 points. That's still about 18 can's worth of points, or 18 cans too many. But there's not much I can do about that now. I have a modest amount of canned goods in the cabinet right now (beets, spinach, corn and carrots), so I was not hoarding during those few weeks of excess point usage. I'm not happy with the situation, but I'm at peace with it.

We've purchased all our sugar and coffee allowances.

I didn't track gasoline/mile usage for that first partial week, but for the following three weeks we used 300 of our 576 miles. I'm really happy about that number. Even if we didn't get the extra gasoline/miles for The Man of the House's job equating to a wartime industry, we would be well within the reduced allotment for families without the added gallons/miles. Of course, TMOTH (as he likes to be called) would like to hoard all those extra miles. There will be a post on that compulsion soon!

And how are we doing mentally?

Eowyn and Sissy miss fresh fruit (Eowyn = bananas, Sissy = apples) and both are no longer amused by the increased appearance of soups on the menu.

TMOTH is frustrated with the fact that few people he talks to "gets it" and understand why we undertook this project.

As you are all aware, I greatly miss fresh vegetables - and lettuce most of all. Rational Living reader Kari had a great idea about this which I will be posting about soon. Otherwise, I'm also feeling the time drain of the project: time looking up points, extra time spent making menus and grocery lists, extra time spent cooking more meals from scratch, time spent tracking usage and time spent posting on the blog. But all of these except that last point help make the experiment that much more authentic, so I can't complain too loudly.

And I have to admit that I look forward to Mr. Bowles' Marketplace Scenario Randomizer with giddy expectancy.

And let me add a note of thanks for all those who read the blog and use the comments section to ask questions, suggest recipes (I'm still loving the baked cabbage!) and give us emotional support. This project wouldn't be nearly as interesting if it wasn't for the ongoing dialogue. Thank you!

And what do we think the next month will hold for us? I imagine the reduced blue/green points will become painfully real in the next month, and we will plan our garden. And I'm sure we'll try at lease five other ways to cook cabbage.

In fact, sometimes I think the official title for the project should be: "Rational Living...or...50 Ways to Cook a Cabbage."

--Rational Mama

And Then Things Became REALLY Interesting...

Tonight I was working on menu planning for next week, deciding which meals sounded yummy and their corresponding point values. And something kept nagging me...we have too many blue/green points - you know, the points used for canned and frozen foods (I know that you knew what blue/green points were used for because you are all rationing experts now). 192 points is too many - I have a hard time using that many per week and that doesn't seem right.

So I went back to my research I did during the initial phase of the project and looked at my notes.

And I compared it with my research I did last weekend at the Kansas Historical Society.

My suspicions were correct. Apparently, there was an error in my original notes...we do not have 192 blue/green points per week.

We have...are you ready?

We have 48 blue/green points per week. That's it.

Take a look at the handy-dandy point chart again, my friends.

Things just got substantially more interesting.

Oh. Boy.

--Rational Mama

Historic Recipe: Hot Cabbag Slaw (and a Plea from the Rational Living Household)

Friends, we knew there would be times during our year of living on WWII rations that we would be discouraged, discontent and otherwise dissatisfied with the situation in which we had put ourselves. Little did we know such a circumstance would arise so quickly within the year.

Lemme 'splain.

Remember how one of the limitations we're working with is that the only fresh produce purchased must be seasonal? That means for the months of January through March the only fresh produce items allowed are cabbage, carrots, mushrooms, onions, parsnips, potatoes, turnips and winter squash.

Now, the majority of the household has a fondness for green leafy things and as such we've been eating far more cabbage than the average modern American family. Cabbage salad, coleslaw, Asian cabbage salad, cabbage vinaigrette and so on. One of the recipes we tried was the "Hot Cabbage Slaw" recipe in Joanne Lamb Hayes' Grandma's Wartime Kitchen: World War II and the Way We Cooked.

Ingredients:
1 small head (1.25 lb) green cabbage
1 large red bell pepper (stems, seeds and ribs discarded)
1 cup water
2 TB bacon fat or vegetable shortening
2 TB all-purpose flour
2 TB lemon juice
1.5 tsp sugar
1/2 tsp salt
1/4 tsp ground black pepper

*I substituted 1 large carrot in place of the unseasonable bell pepper

[Warning: the following pictures contain images of over-cooked, slimy vegetable products. Children and the squeamish may want to look away.]

Directions:

• Rinse and shred cabbage. Thinly slice pepper (carrot) lengthwise.

• Combine cabbage, pepper, and water in a heavy 4-quart saucepan. Bring to a boil over medium heat. Cook 10 minutes
• Pour into a colander and drain very well, reserving 1 cup liquid. If necessary, add water to liquid to make 1 cup.
• In same saucepan, melt bacon fat; stir in flour until smooth. Gradually stir in 1 cup reserved vegetable liquid, the lemon juice, sugar, salt and pepper.
• Bring to a boil, stirring constantly.

• Stir reserved cabbage and pepper (carrots) into thickened sauce and return to a boil. Cook, stirring, until vegetables reach desired tenderness, 5 to 10 minutes.

• Transfer to a bowl and stir.

I believe the culinary term is...ewww. Sadly, this recipe did not work for us; it was a combination of slimy cabbage, bacon flavor and lemon that no one found palatable. The children wouldn't touch it, The Man of the House and I ate our allotted serving and then I'm afraid, my friends, that the remainder ended up in the refrigerator and, after a week, went to visit trash mountain. So sad. One of our goals is to not waste food this year. So sad.

And it also makes me feel very thankful that this type of meal is a choice - not a necessity.

And this brings me to the plea: please oh please oh please oh please oh please if you have any fabulous, ration-friendly recipes for cabbage, carrots, parsnips, potatoes, turnips and winter squash can you please post them? They would make the Rational Living household happy and renew our faith in seasonal eating.

From the bottom of my stomach,
Rational Mama

This Week's Scenarios and Menu

Mr. Bowles' Amazing Marketplace Scenario Randomizer has spoken! Our scenarios for this week are:

Processed Meats - no new purchases available

Coffee - limited availability, only 1/2 the normal purchase amount available

Whew! I am so thankful that cheese and butter were not restricted, since we're saving them up for Sissy's birthday party on the 15th!

We'll be fine with the processed meat we have on hand (leftover pepperoni from last week's purchase) and since we're not big coffee drinkers we're doing quite fine with the 2 pounds I purchased at the beginning of rationing.

We have a few left-over anachronisms in the refrigerator and cupboard that we'll get rid of this week to put us on the up and up. Hence, the tortillas and wonton wrappers mentioned in the menu below:

Saturday: Homemade pizza (pepperoni, olive, onion and pineapple for the girls)
Sunday: Homemade tacos and (canned) corn
Monday: Mushroom and barley soup with fresh-baked bread
Tuesday: Out for Rational Mama's birthday!
Wednesday: Egg puffs and (frozen) mixed vegetables
Thursday: Turkey wontons and (frozen) broccoli
Friday: French toast casserole and (frozen) blueberries


For this week's menu we used 62 of our 64 red points on ground beef for the tacos, canola oil, turkey for the wontons and cheese and butter for Sissy's birthday menu.

We used 125 of our allotted 192 blue/green points on canned pineapple and other fruit, canned corn, spaghetti sauce and beef broth. Mostly, though, our blue/green points were used for frozen produce; we are desparately missing the variety of fresh produce normally available to us. Everyone in the household agrees that this is the hardest part of rationing so far.

I also purchased an additional 2 pounds of sugar.

Tuesday night's dinner out with family will be the first time we've eaten out since at least December 26th. Not a new world record, I know, but a good change. We have a no-rules policy towards eating out during the rationing year, since we will be doing it so rarely. This gives our modern souls a little break and is still in line with the historical example. Early in the rationing period purchases at restaurants were not included, but the government quickly decided that wasn't in the best interest of the general food supply. Folks still ate out in restaurants during the war although selections were often, but not always, limited and ration points were usually recorded.

As for the gasoline ration, last week we used 73 of our allotted 193 miles. Pretty impressive, but the horrible weather we've had has made us more home-bound than usual. I expect that number to increase significantly once warmer weather is the norm.

It will be interesting to see exactly how lunch and dessert for 17 people will work out on the 15th. I've got one more week to prepare and plan and calculate ration points.

Oh, and there's at least two more historical recipe posts on the way! One was nice and comforting, the other was...well...you'll see. If points allow then next week we will try our first SPAM recipe!

--Rational Mama

Rationing Points: Week #1

So, wondering how we did on using our ration points this week? Here's a quick break down !

RED POINTS (Meats, Cheeses, Fats and Oils) -
TOTAL AVAILABLE: 64 pts
Turkey 5 lbs (bone in) - 15 pts
Macaroni and Cheese (2 boxes) - 1 pt
Butter (1 lb) - 16 pts
Canola Oil (32 oz) - 10 pts
Cheddar Cheese (1 lb) - 8 pts
Cream Cheese (8 oz) - 3 pts
Bologna (10 oz) - 3 pts
Bacon (1 lb) - 8 pts
TOTAL USED: 64 pts.

Whew! Barely scraped by, but if we weren't also rationing poultry we would have had much more wiggle room. That bacon was a last minute addition for Wednesday's dinner once I saw that we could afford the points. It's bacon!


BLUE/GREEN POINTS (Canned/Frozen/Dried Produce) -
TOTAL AVAILABLE: 192 pts.
Green Beans (2 cans) - 12 pts
Cream of Mushroom Soup (1 can) - 4 pts
Frozen Snap Peas (1 lb) - 12 pts
Fruit (2 cans) - 32 pts
Spaghetti Sauce (1 can) - 8 pts
Carrots (1 can) - 6 pts
Dried Black Beans (1 lb) - 2 pts
Chicken Broth (5 cans) - 20 pts
Raisins (3/4 lb) - 3 pts
Applesauce (25 oz) - 21 pts
Juice (48 oz) - 9 pts
Spinach (1 can) - 8 pts
TOTAL USED: 137 pts

Hmm...we still have 55 blue/green points to play with...which may come in handy (I'll 'splain later). We're really feeling the lack of fresh produce, especially fruit, since we are subject to seasonal availability just like our WWII civilian counterparts. I did splurge and by some clementines, though.

We also purchased our allotted two pounds of sugar and one adult's five-week coffee rations.

Here's our plans for all these rationed items, plus their non-rationed compadres:
Saturday: Roast turkey with gravy, green bean casserole, and stuffing (using day-old bread that had been stored in the freezer)
Sunday: Turkey and homemade noodle soup with cabbage salad
Monday: Sweet potato and (frozen) butternut squash soup with fresh-baked bread
Tuesday: Baked potatoes with cheese and sour cream and (frozen) snap peas
Wednesday: Pancakes, bacon and canned fruit
Thursday: Spaghetti marinara with carrots
Friday: Black bean soup with corn bread

Lunches this week consist mostly of left-overs, peanut butter and honey sandwiches and non-rationed dried soup mixes. Speaking of soup, the soup on Monday night was not that great. Really. Not good. Orange mush with too much pepper. But we ate it and I rewarded the family by baking our first historically-accurate treat: Lafayette Gingerbread (historical recipes will get their own blog post shortly). And I will fully disclose that we also finished off the last of the ice cream that was hibernating in the freezer since Eowyn's birthday party a few weeks ago. But that is gone now...long gone. Adios. Sigh.

Anyhoo, back to those extra blue/green points...we're getting together with a few friends on New Year's Eve and we need to bring some party noshings, so I imagine we'll be dipping into that surplus, plus providing some baked goods. No traditional little smokies or sweet and sour meatballs or cheese ball. But I also promise to not bring cans of cooked spinach and navy beans, either. I'll let you know what I come up with for that occasion.

Tomorrow night is our first experience with Mr. Bowles' Amazing Marketplace Scenario Randomizer. As challenging as it was to make a menu this week just keeping to basic points my mind already cramps a bit when I think about meal planning with key ingredients either missing or worth more points. Of course, they could also be worth less points...gotta keep the optimism going. Needless to say we'll keep you posted on what restrictions we'll be working with next week!

Be safe - there's a war on, you know!

--Rational Mama

A Rational Review

Now that we've survived the first day of rationing, I thought I'd review all of the rations/restrictions that we are following during this rationing year.

These allotments follow traditional U.S. civilian rationing during WWII:

Gasoline: maximum of 193 miles per week combined for our two vehicles (equivalent to the 11 gallons per week we would have been allowed during the War).
Sugar: maximum 2 pounds per week for our family of four.
Meat/Cheese/Oils: maximum 64 red points per week, following point values on this handy dandy chart (we are including poultry, which was not part of the original WWII U.S. civilian rationing program).
Canned, Frozen and Processed Fruits, Vegetables and Soups: up to 192 blue/green ration points per week following the handy dandy chart. [Editorial Note: during the 4th week of the rationing year it was discovered that we are only allowed 48 blue/green points. Big change!]
Coffee: Up to 1 pound per adult every 5 weeks.

All of the above restrictions, as well as some additional food items, are subject to change as a result of Mr. Bowles' Amazing Marketplace Scenario Randomizer.

In addition to the above we have also incorporated a host of additional restrictions during the rationing year:

Eating Out: we will eat out at a restaurant as a family only once a month, and I will have one weekend lunch out with the girls just once a month as well.
Limited Processed Foods: minimally processed and/or minimally-packaged foods will be preferred over other options (i.e. "real" carrots vs. bags of mini peeled carrots, no prepackaged snack cakes).
Seasonal Produce: only seasonal fresh produce may be purchased, following this list (if off-season, produce must be dried, canned or frozen and thus cost more rationing points).
Soda: permitted at a maximum of three 12 oz servings per week, per adult.
Limited New Purchases: all purchases must be evaluated for needs vs. wants and when possible second-hand options should be considered (Craig's List, Ebay, Goodwill and Freecycle).

We're also in the process of re-evaluating our energy usage in the Rational Living household, so additional energy ration guidelines may be added. We're notoriously bad about leaving lights on in unoccupied rooms and don't use power strips to power-down idle electronics. But that will be fodder for a future post!

In the meantime...pretty much the entire gang at the Rational Living household suspects that the eating out restrictions are where we will feel the most pain.

How often does your family eat out? Do you have a family plan about eating out, or is it more loosey-goosey?

Thanks for stopping by!

--Rational Mama