Frugal Depression Era Recipes

Depression Era Recipes from Taste of Home. Good eating from when times were very hard. Yes, even harder than they are now!

I remember eating many of these meals when I was a child too, especially the creamed eggs on toast, and the ham and white bean soup. We ate these a lot and they were very good.


There are so many great recipes from the depression era in this forum, plus the stories from those times are so inspiring and interesting to read. Click on the link below and check them out for yourself.

http://community.tasteofhome.com/community_forums/f/30/t/44025.aspx?PageIndex=1

 

creamed eggs on toast is a yummy comfort food

Creamed eggs on toast

1/4 c butter 
2 cups milk
3 tbs. flour
6 hard-boiled eggs, sliced or chopped 
1 tsp salt
1/8 tsp pepperMelt butter or margarine; add flour and seasonings. Blend well and cook over low heat until bubbly. Add milk all at once; cook, stirring constantly, until thickened throughout. Add eggs and heat thoroughly. Serve hot on toast or  corn bread.  Makes 4 servings

 And this recipe for eggless, milkless, butterless cake is really good too!

Vintage WW1 Eggless, Milkless, Butterless Cake

1 cup water
2 cups raisins
1 tsp. cinnamon
1/2 tsp. cloves
1 cup brown sugar
1/3 cup lard (shortening)
1/4 tsp. nutmeg
1/4 tsp. salt
2 cups flour
1 tsp. baking soda
1/2 tsp. baking powder

Place water, raisins, cinnamon, cloves, brown sugar, lard (shortening), nutmeg and salt in a saucepan and mix. Place on heat and bring to a boil. Cook 3 minutes. Allow to cool, then sift together the flour, baking soda and baking
powder. Stir into cooked mixture.
Place in a greased loaf pan and bake at 350F for one hour.

white beans and ham soup

NAVY BEAN SOUP Printed from COOKS.COM 16 oz. dried navy beans Ham bone 1 med. onion, chopped 2 c. celery, diced 1 1/2 tsp. Italian seasoning Salt and pepper Soak beans overnight; drain off water. Fill Dutch oven with water. Add ham bone, beans, onions, celery and seasonings. Simmer for at least 4 hours. Remove ham bone; cut up ham and return to soup. Continue to simmer. Serves 8-10. This soup can simmer all day; it enhances flavor and thickens soup. Wonderful! Here are some more frugal ideas for good eating from the great Depression: these come from Depression Era Living. In the depression, it was common to eat meat no more than once a week, if at all. Some of the kind of meals you might expect were: bread and baked beans,bread and gravy, breaded tomatoes (garden tomato sauce on bread - sugar and butter can be added), buttered noodles, cornbread in buttermilk, creamed eggs on toast,  dropped dumplings in broth, fried cornmeal mush (ash cakes), fried egg sandwich (mayo optional), fried egg with a slice of onion, fried eggs on toast, gnocci (pasta made with flour and mashed potatoes), ketchup on egg sandwich, noodles and tomatoes (onions optional), pasta and bean soup (pasta y fagioli, pronounced pasta fazool), potatoes and gravy, potatoes fried in bacon fat, raw onion sandwich [marinated onions recipe below], sauerkraut and boiled potatoes, scrambled egg with potato and onion [recipe below], sour milk pancakes (raw milk sours and does not go bad like pasteurized milk), spaghetti and tomatoes, spaghetti and sauerkraut (depression era spaghetti -- recipe below), tomatoes and onions on toast, tomato sandwiches and tomato and cheese sandwich.  Obviously, different combinations of inexpensive eggs, flour, potatoes, onions, cabbage, beans and corn made up a lot of your diet. You got tomatoes if you grew them in your garden. Rice wasn't popular during the last American Depression, but I think it should be more popular during the next now that there is more US-grown rice available. If you were lucky, you got meat once a week, usually on Sunday. The menu could be something like: Fried chicken or bacon, blackeyed pea soup, mashed potatoes and gravy, parsnips. Dessert: bread pudding with cream The Irish dinner of corned beef, potatoes, cabbage and carrots would also fit in well, but make the cabbage sauerkraut rather than eating it boiled. No mention is made of the traditional cheap dessert, but peach cobbler would be a good choice. Restaurant meal for the price of a cup of coffee: Order a cup of coffee, extra light, and a cup of hot water (which should be free). Put ketchup in the hot water to make "tomato soup", and then crumble saltine/crackers into it (assuming restaurant has cracker packets at the counter). Salt and pepper to taste. Breakfast:Tear up a slice of bread in a bowl, add sugar and milk. Comments: Raw milk Many depression-era families had access to raw milk from a goat or cow-owner in walking distance who would sell excess milk from the cow inexpensively. Many families owned the goat or cow themselves. Pickles and sour cream All these carb-heavy menus would be greatly enhanced nutritionally if a raw, lacto-fermented pickle or sauerkraut were added to them. Cucumber and apples can be made into a pickle easily, either sweet or salty.[recipe below] and are inexpensive. All these meals would be better with "a raw, lacto-fermented pickle or pickled fruit or veg and some raw, cultured or clabbered milk or cream."* added to them. (*raw sauerkraut and yogurt basically, but there are many variations once you learn how to make pickles/sauerkraut and culture dairy) Other sources of food Many families grew tomatoes, probably because they preserve so well which can then be stored through the winter. Beans were bought in large quantity (25-50 pounds) from a dry goods store, white flour was bought in 50-pound sacks. White flour doesn't need refrigeration like whole grain flour, can be kept in a cool storage area. That much whole grain flour would have to be kept in the freezer. Whole grains can be kept in a cool storage area if you have a way to mill them into flour when you are ready to use the flour. Rice was not popular during the last depression but it would make a good addition to the list.  Bad as this diet may sound to people used to meat every day, studies have shown that children fed a depression-era diet were healthier than children fed a modern diet high in processed foods, and many children who were fed these depression-era diets loved them, and grew to have fond food memories when they became prosperous, often having a favorite comfort food being a food from their impoverished past. The best foods to grow for a depression are tomatoes, cabbages and onions. Buy beans and rice at a dry-goods store, and milk from the nearest cow or goat. Bacon should not have synthetically made nitrates in it. In the old days, they used bird guano as a naturlal source for the nitrogen needed to make bacon and sausages safe. Now, if you don't want or can't get guano-cured meats, you can keep them refrigerated the meat instead. If you butcher the pig, have the butcher cut the bacon area of the pig into chunks, it is not necessary to have bacon long and thinly sliced. If you buy bacon from a farm or butcher, be sure to include all the fat and any surrounding areas meat that is otherwise less expensive. What to expect If you are a woman with children, you will most likely be living in a house -- someone will take you in -- but it may be as a charity case and you will be expected to appreciate it and contribute to the running of the house. If you are a man with a family to support, you will be more likely to keep your job, but you will be paid less money.  If you are a single able-bodied man, you may be living in a tent city. You won't do much of your own cooking beyond coffee on a communal campfire, but will get most of your food from the community your tent city is in. There will almost  always be a campfire going. If it gets really cold, you'll go sleep in a shelter. At that shelter, if you want coffee and doughnuts in the morning, you'll either have to do some work beforehand like chopping wood or you'll have to listen to a religious-oriented lecture while you get your coffee and doughnuts. If you live in a house, you will have to provide occasional meals to hungry beggars. Since you're going to have to do it anyway, you may as well believe you're doing it out of christian charity rather than for fear of an unfortunate accident to your property. When your children are old, they'll fondly reminisce how "Mom could never turn away someone hungry." Hopefully, you have a home and can save your mortgage, but, if worse comes to worst, you can sleep for free in a car or tent. Put some black cardboard over the windows to shut out the light.  Hooverville In the first Depression, shanty towns were built with tin and wood. Because of the prevalence of old cars, it is possible the next Hoovervilles will inlude a lot of car living, but the availability of cheap, easy-to-pitch tents may make them the residence of choice. Blue tarps can be spread over a couple cars and tents to make a home or small community. Lots of blankets or sleeping bags in your car will help keep you warm through all but the coldest (below freezing) temperatures. Depression era grocery list:  Buy in large quantity:  flour, beans, rice, sugar, cornmeal, potatoes, sea salt Grow in garden/front lawn:  tomatoes, cabbages, onions Get from a farmer: Raw milk and cream, (make your own butter from the cream.), bacon or pork with fat (fatback/back fat), eggs, soup bones Whole grain/brown flour/rice or white? The human digestive system needs fiber to move food along. The best sources for that fiber are the bodies of the bacteria and microbial symbionts that digest the food, making its nutrients available to us. The second best source is plant fiber, whole grain flour and brown rice. If you have a superlative digestive system (unlikely in anyone growing up on a modern diet), you could get away with white grains. If not, it is probably better to stick to whole grains. There are some anti-nutrients in the fiber areas of the grains, so whole grain foods should always be soaked overnight before consuming. If pre-soaking is not possible due to the particular recipe involved, then unbleached white is better.