Food in the Forties

The other day I was remembering what eating was like for us 70 years or so ago.  It is obvious Moms spent most of their time with food preparation.  And as a prenote it is important to know that even though we ate three carb filled meals all of my friends and I had 23-24 inch waists as teenagers.  Of course, we did a lot of walking and outdoor exercise, we were not couch potatoes at any time.  It was great, you could eat lots of comfort foods and still look great.  It is only since I started dieting after having babies that I have had to be concerned about my weight...interesting.

Dry Cereal--Wheaties, Corn Flakes, Rice Krispies.

Cooked Cereal which I did not like--Cream of wheat or oatmeal.

Other breakfast foods--Swedish pancakes, oven pancake, french toast, (syrup was often homemade), cinnamon toast, biscuits, eggs.  My dad loved fried mush (cooked cereal) with syrup.

Home canned--peaches, cherries, pears, yummm.  And we did eat a lot of store bought canned goods, fruits and vegetables. 

Bread--Lots of homemade and I loved plain soft white bread and bologna, salami or cheese sandwiches.

Jam--homemade chokecherry--store bought strawberry.

Homemade goodies--cinnamon and butterscotch rolls, doughnuts, raisen filled cookies, oatmeal cookies, pineapple upside down cake, apple pie, date cake, date bars, raisen bars, prune whip, ice box desserts, pink jello, apple crisp, peach pie, vanilla ice cream, root beer, tapioca pudding, rice pudding, bread pudding, lemon pie, rhubarb pie.  
We always had dessert at night.  Even if it was only frosted graham crackers and apple sauce or pink jello.  There was always a dessert and dinner was always on time at 6 pm.  It was something you could count on and you did not want to be late at our house with eight hungry people.

Sunday dinner was usually roast, mashed potatoes and peas, green beans, or corn, fruit salad with whipped cream and yes, there was always a grand dessert, often cake with delicious frosting or pie.  If we had missionaries in town, they were usually at dinner.

The big dinner at noon were things like scalloped potatoes and ham, meat loaf and potatoes, creamed spinach with hard boiled eggs on top, pot roast with carrots and potatoes, tuna casserole, spaghetti, macaroni and cheese.

Supper at night was like creamed chipped beef on toast, toasted cheese sandwiches and tomato soup, chicken noodle soup, chili, goulash, vegetable and beef soup, hot dogs and beans, hot beef sandwhich (beef and gravy on toast).

After school snacks were usually homemade cookies or graham crackers and butter (stacked four or five high).

I don't remember potato chips except at picnics till we were older and then I felt that if I ate one greasy chip I would break out with a new pimple.

We did not have chinese or mexican food at all.  I was in college before I had either and I didn't have pizza until I was teaching school in San Diego.

The drink of choice was a big glass of milk, which we generally had with each meal.

Store bought fruit like oranges was a big treat.  We grew our own crab apples and apricots.  We had victory gardens of lettuce, carrots, squash, potatos, corn, green beans, tomatoes and melons.  A great treat was fresh lettuce rolled up with sugar or rhubarb stalks eaten with salt.

Treats at teenage parties--home made taffy, fudge, popcorn, brownies, divinity, rootbeer floats, potato chips, hot dogs, ice cream sundaes.

We had three good meals a day.  Some snacks but no fast food.