Say Cheese - A tasty cheese spread

Tasty cheese sandwiches.

The adult weekly ration of cheese was 2oz (57g), while for vegetarians, as this was a source of protein instead of meat, their ration was 5oz (approx 142g).
So you would do your best to "stretch" your cheese ration.

Today Salem and I had some very tasty cheese sandwiches for lunch using very little cheese.
I used margerine and a few other ingredients to come up with a very tasty filling.
An adult's weekly ration of margerine was 4oz (113g), which when there are three of us, is quite a bit.

I'm sorry I can't give you exact measurements of the ingredients as I don't really measure when cooking unless I really have to.

Tasty Cheese Spread

Grate some cheese ( I use a fine grater as it makes the cheese go further)
Equal amount or more of margerine to the grated cheese (don't squash cheese when comparing)
Finely chopped spring onions, onions, fresh parsley or whatever fresh herbs you have
Worchestershire sauce
Salt and pepper
A small amount of warm water

Place in a bowl the cheese and margerine.
With a fork, mix the cheese and margerine together adding a little hot water to help mix and thin it out a little.
Add a good swig of worchestershire sauce, salt and pepper and the onions/herbs.
Spring onions are my favourite.
Mix together.
Taste and see if it needs any more seasoning.
Spread on your bread as thickly as you like.

Tonight's dinner.

A tip for spring onions - as soon as you get your spring onions home, put them in a jar of water (as in the first photo) and you will have spring onions growing for months.  Just cut off the ends like you do for chives and they will keep growing back.  Just remember to water them.  I've got some that are now flowering so I will be able to have the seeds to plant out more.  Free food!!!!!

Tonight I had some leftover rice which I made fried rice with.
Fried rice is best made with leftover rice from the day before.  It doesn't go gluggy.

The following recipe is roughly how I made it tonight, adapt it to how many serves you want.
This serves two very hungry teenage boys and me, with leftovers.

Egg Fried Rice

Eggs
dripping or cooking fat or oil
1 or 2 onions
2 or 3 carrots
2 cups leftover rice
1 - 2 cups fresh or frozen veges (corn, peas, beans etc)
Salt
Soya sauce (optional)

Beat together some eggs with a little cold water and salt and pepper.
Use how many eggs you have left from your ration or some powdered egg, it works well for this.
Fry this in a wok or large frying pan with a small amount of dripping or cooking fat/oil.
When cooked put aside in a bowl, chopped into smallish pieces, for later.
Add about 1 tablespoon of dripping or cooking fat/oil to the wok/frying pan.
Then add in chopped onion and carrots, stir often and cook until tender.
Add the rest of the veges, keep stirring through.
Then in goes the rice and the egg.
Stir through and cook until rice is hot.
Add seasoning and soya sauce if you have it.
Serve hot.
Actually it is very nice cold too in a packed lunch.

These recipes are very easy and are great if you are on a budget too.

Mmmmm...... Egg Sandwiches

Today's lunch.

During WWII, in England, eggs were rationed to one per week, vegetarians had two.  You really had to decide what you wanted to use your egg for.
You had to make do with powdered egg for the rest of the time.
If you had your own chooks, like we do, you weren't so restricted but you had to give up your egg and egg powder rations for chook food which would be hard in winter when they hardly lay, if at all.

Last night I boiled up some eggs so I could make egg sandwiches for me and the boys today for lunch.  Well needed after this mornings ballet lesson.  We came home starving.
I slept in a bit to long to make porridge for breakfast and toast just didn't fill us up for long enough.

I know putting in a recipe for egg sandwiches seems a bit silly but this way you get more sandwiches for your egg.  And very tasty too.

Egg Sandwiches

Hard boiled eggs (as many as you want or have to spare)

margerine (1/2 to 3/4's the volume of the eggs)

fresh herbs -  parsley and/or chives, spring onions or celery leaf 

salt and pepper

In a bowl, place your shelled hard boiled eggs and the margerine. 

I like to have the margerine at room temperature as it makes mashing easier.

Mash both together with a fork so it is nicely combined but not too smooth that you loose the nice bits of egg white.

Add finely chopped herbs, what ever you have.  No set amount, I like lots.

Plenty of salt and pepper.

Make sure you do season well, as you want your sandwiches to be tasty.

It is ready to spread on your bread, no buttering necessary, as thickly as you like.

The flavour developes more if you leave it in the fridge for a couple of hours before spreading.

Cut the crusts off your sandwiches and cut into triangles for a posh lunch or afternoon tea.

Remember not to throw out the crusts, use them in something else, like croutons.

I hope you enjoy this as much as the boys and I just have.

Back to Rationing, Making Poppies and WWI

In the local paper.

Yes, we are back!!!!!

Back to WWII wartime rationing, not that we fully left it but we have been having too much "black market" and convenience food due to a hectic shedule and not having the time for all the cooking etc, a lot of time spent away from home etc.......
But I am going to make the time.

Over here in Kiwiland, it has been a cold winter so I have been making lots of pots of warming vege soup which is a meal in itself.  Served with either toast or crunchy croutons.

Yummy vege soup.

Vege soup is so easy to make, just use what ever vegetables you have at hand and how many you want.

This is how I made it last night.

Vege Soup

3 medium potatoes

2 onions

2 large carrots

3/4 cup of soup mix (split peas, lentils, pearl barley)

1 or 2 cups frozen or fresh veges (corn, peas, spinach, beans)

1 or 2 stalks and leaves of celery

2 oxo cubes (vege, chicken or beef)

soya sauce and/or worchestershire sauce (whatever you have)

parsley fresh (if possible)

salt and pepper.

In a large pot add your potatoes, onions and carrots which have been sliced and diced, along with the soup mix and oxo cubes.  Full the pot half way with water, sorry I never measure the amount.

Bring to the boil then turn down the heat and simmer for an hour.

At this stage, I grab a fork and mash some of the potatoes and carrots against the side of the pot.  This makes the soup thicker.

Then add a good swig of soya sauce and or worchestershire sauce, celery (chopped) and the other vegetables.  Stir in well.  At this time add parsley if you only have dried.

Leave simmering until needed.

Add fresh parsley and salt and pepper to taste.  

Your soup should be well seasoned.

Serve with a little grated cheese on top if you have any.

Also with hot toast or croutons.

I will post our yummy crouton ideas next time.

Enjoy!!!!

Eggs from our lovely ladies.

Our lovely ladies of the backyard, our chickens,  have been laying lots of lovely eggs for us.  I've got some serious baking to do over the next few days.

Also keeping us occupied on our many train rides and any spare time in the evening, is our poppy making.
We are helping our local libraries with making 2,721 poppies for a display next year commemorating the 2,721 New Zealanders from Kapiti (Paraparaumu, Waikanae and Otaki) who died in WWI.
So far Salem and I have made 900 and we are still going.
I came up with a nice easy crochet pattern which I will post soon, so keep an eye out for it.

Not bad for our first blog post for a while, nice to be back.