World War 2 Rationing Challenge: too much food?

[StoatofDisarray]

My partner has bet me I can't follow the UK world war 2 ration for November 1943 for a week.

I've just done the shopping for it and it seems like too much food. I can't work out what I'm doing wrong. Has anyone done this?

Show us all the food then! Without seeing or you at least listing it then I doubt anyone can say.

What is the food?

Details of what you got please, what the ration is and the source for where you got the information!

But most food wasn’t rationed? You would be limited on certain things but could eat unlimited other things.

What is the food?

And remember you have only a fairly lean store cupboard (after about 4 years of war, nearly everything would be gone)

Maybe this is a poorly disguised "I can only eat a thimbleful of air and I'm full" type thread.

Just had a google

Allowances fluctuated throughout the war, but on average one adult’s weekly ration was 113g bacon/ham (about 4 thin slices), one shilling and ten pence worth of meat (about 227g minced beef), 57g butter, 57g cheese, 113g margarine, 113g cooking fat, 3 pints of milk, 227g sugar, 57g tea, and 1 egg

Other foods such as canned meat, fish, rice, condensed milk, breakfast cereals, biscuits and vegetables were available but in limited quantities on a points system

Fresh vegetables and fruit were not rationed but supplies were limited. Some types of imported fruit all but disappeared. Lemons and bananas became unobtainable for most of the war; oranges continued to be sold but greengrocers customarily reserved them for children and pregnant women, who could prove their status by producing their distinctive ration books

Yeah come on show us what you've got.

There was a huge black market going on during food rationing. I doubt anyone starved in England.

I'm so lazy: I was just going to put out a general query pending me typing up what I bought.

I see what I've done: I messed up the conversion for ounces to grammes!

Omg it certainly isn't :-) typing it up with the new conversion hang on!

Whether or not that is enough food for you is personal isn't it.

Looking at a previous post I am surprised to see 227g of sugar for a week, I think I bought 1kg about 1 year ago (for a Christmas Cake) and am still not 1/2 way through.

You get loads of bread (national loaf) and potatoes plus dried peas and vegetables. Reading up on rationing is fascinating.

The challenge to OP was to live on the ration. Not ration plus random extras attributed to the black market.

Bread wasn't rationed during the war (it was afterwards) so there would always be something on the table

Bread and potatoes weren’t rationed at all. So you wouldn’t be hungry as you could just eat unlimited amounts of them. Just very boring and bland.

Because back in the day we would have made cakes ,lies, biscuits etc all using sugar.

Most people buy their cakes etc. now.

Ok then, show us a picture of all this food you've just bought with your ration book list.

Ok here we go:

Unlimited seasonal UK grown fruit and veg
Unrationed beer, oats, brown bread, game (limited to one item, e.g. a piece of venison or a pheasant)
Meat costing 1s2d which was worth about £2.68 in 2021 so I'm upping it to £2.75 so I bought minced beef
113g smoked streaky bacon
227g sugar
Homemade damson jam 57g
Cheese, lard and butter: 57g of each
Flora hard margarine 113g
Equivalent of 12 eggs in dried egg powder
5 points spent on: 3 x 85g spam and 2 tins baked beans
1 meal out costing no more than the equivalent of 5 shillings (£13.95): I'm going to have fish and chip supper

Here's the photo evidence as requested!

The honey was from my fridge and I've had it for six months so I'm going to use it in case of an emergency. There are two pheasants on the table but I ate one for dinner tonight. And half the mince went in the freezer.

There really wasn't much available as vital crops were grown in every available acre suitable for tillage, and animals were raised for meat too.

People with a garden of any size often grew fruit and veg or raised rabbits or chickens for the table, and for eggs, but there were millions who lived in cities and towns who had no soil to cultivate.

Even those who had a garden or an allotment were often restricted to crops like rhubarb, cabbage, carrots, spinach, onions, strawberries, etc, as it takes time for a currant or gooseberry bush or raspberry canes to grow and produce fruit.

Shortages of fuel meant that transporting fruits or veg grown in, say, the SE, to the north of England and to Scotland was difficult.

Just because things weren't rationed doesn't mean they would have been freely available to them or that people could afford to buy unlimited amounts.

This is an interesting challenge: do keep us posted with what you make and eat!

Hmmm OP I am wondering whether you'd have had a freezer back in the early 1940s. I found:

Separate freezers became common during the 1940s; the term for the unit, popular at the time, was deep freeze. These devices, or appliances, did not go into mass production for use in the home until after World War II

So whilst they existed, possibly you wouldn't have had one.

Also I'd challenge 'unlimited vegetables' because I bet many weren't available - if you are going on November then you should only buy veg/fruit available home grown in this month.

I suppose you're right, still a huge amount for our family though because whilst I am an enormous fat pig, it's from savouries.
I only make/buy cakes at Christmas and birthdays, and a crumble when blackberries are in season.

What are you planning on drinking coz there's no tea or coffee there. Was that rationed as well?