Rationing Challenge - Day 4

I've found myself becoming obsessive about leftovers. Uneaten crusts, tops of vegetables, bacon fat, vegetable cooking water - everything goes in the fridge to be used later. We've eaten mince and gravy for 3 days in a row and there is still some left, so I have pasties planned for tomorrow, to be made with potato pastry, which will use up some of the leftover mash. I'm torn when the girls don't finish their plates. I have never once in their lives insisted that either of them finish everything, not wanting them to ignore their bodies. But this week, I'm so aware that if something isn't eaten, we can't just replace it. How much worse it was for those during wartime when there were posters everywhere telling them that wasting food was as good as feeding Hitler! And people were fined for giving stale breadcrumbs to birds. Necessity really is the mother of invention. When you can't let anything go to waste, it is amazing what you can come up with. We are fortunate in that I have a fairly well stocked store cupboard and haven't had to buy in extra ingredients. I've been working on the premise that most housewives would have had staples in their cupboards when rationing began, so I haven't had to go off-ration for anything yet. Flour, oats, semolina would have cost points, but I have them in already. But it would have been so much harder when those staples ran out and they were low on stock at the grocer's; then alternatives to standard recipes had to be found. Potatoes in pastry, carrots in cakes, tomatoes and cheese masquerading as crab. The ingenuity and creativity of the wartime cooks knew no bounds.

Breakfast 

Porridge and a slice of bacon each. 

Tea; milk

Mid-Morning 

Cup of tea and a honey biscuit 

Lunch

Mince Slices made using some of the leftover mince & gravy; mashed potato with chives; leek sauce; grated raw carrot; lettuce, rocket and cress from our vegetable patch. 

Recipes from We'll Eat Again by Marguerite Patten

The girls shared an apple, and we all had 1/2oz chocolate.

Tea for the girls

Pancakes leftover from yesterday. B had 1/2oz grated cheese and some more of yesterday's soup; M had a hard boiled egg. 

Plum and Apple Semolina. 

Recipe from We'll Eat Again by Marguerite Patten

Milk. 

Tea for the Hubby & Me

Fried mushrooms and Mock Fried Egg - made with a shell egg, but to make 1 egg feed two. 

Plum and Apple Semolina

Remaining Rations 

Sugar - 2lb 30oz 28.8oz 28.15oz 26.65oz

Margarine - 1lb 12oz 9.5oz

Bacon/Ham - 12oz 11.75oz 10.5oz 9.3oz

Cheese - 11oz 9oz 7.05oz 5.55oz 5.05oz

Lard - 6oz 4.8oz 3.8oz 2.5oz
Vegetable Suet - 2oz 1.25oz

Tea - 4oz 3.9oz 3oz 2.6oz 2oz

Meat - 24oz 7oz

Butter - 8oz 7.5oz 7.25oz 5.5oz 5.35oz

Milk - 20pints 18.25pints 16pints 13.4pints 11.1pints

Sweets/Chocolate - 12oz 11.8oz 10.6oz 8.6oz

Marmalade - 1lb 14.5oz 13.7oz

Jam - 8oz 6.95oz 6.7oz 5.95oz 5.55oz

Eggs - 8 7 5