WWI: No One Need Be Hungry

MORE POTATOES — LESS FLOUR.

Set Aside Week to Encourage Use of More Potatoes in Place of Flour.

This is Something New.

Use of more potatoes and less flour is the aim of national potato week, set aside by the government as October 22 to 27. The home economics department at Iowa State college suggests the substitution of potatoes for part of the flour in various cake recipes, such as the following, will help:

Chocolate Potato Cake.

1-3 c butter [I am not sure if they mean 1/3 c or ?]
1 c sugar
2 eggs
1/2 tsp cinnamon
1/4 tsp nutmeg
1/4 tsp ground cloves
1 c flour
2 tsp baking powder
2 squares chocolate (melted)
1/2 c mashed potatoes
1/4 c milk
1 tsp vanilla

Cream butter, add sugar and mix well. Add egg yolks well beaten and continue mixing till creamy. Add the cinnamon, nutmeg, cloves, flour and baking powder which have been mixed and sifted together. Add the melted chocolate, hot mashed potato, milk and vanilla. Beat well. Add the stiffly beaten egg white. Pour into two layer cake pans which have been lined with waxed paper. Bake in a moderate oven for 30 minutes.

The Carroll Herald – Oct 24, 1917

Image from http://www.internationalrecipes.net

A Wheatless Recipe

Try this for the next wheatless day. They call it spider corn bread:

1-1/2 cups corn meal
2 cups sour milk
1 teaspoon soda
1 teaspoon salt
2 eggs
2 tablespoons butter

Mix the dry ingredients. Add the eggs well beaten and the milk. Place the butter in a frying pan, melt it, and grease the pan well. Heat the pan and turn in the mixture. Place in a hot oven and cook 20 minutes.

This serves six people.

This recipe is one out of 61 recipes contained in “The Cornmeal Book,” which The Milwaukee Sentinel Information Bureau will send you FREE.*

Enclose a 2-cent stamp for return postage on the book, and send the coupon to THE MILWAUKEE SENTINEL INFORMATION BUREAU, FREDERIC J. HASKIN, DIRECTOR, WASHINGTON, D.C.

The Milwaukee Sentinel – Dec 18, 1917

*Probably no longer available.

Image from http://desertculinary.blogspot.com

Washington. Sept. 8. — Have you tried “fifty-fifty biscuits” — Uncle Sam’s latest idea for saving wheat flour in hot bread? You use two cups of corn meal, soy beans which can be home ground, finely crushed peanuts, or rice flour to two cups of white flour. Or you can use one cup of corn meal and one cup of ground soy beans or crushed peanuts with the wheat product.

You can make “fifty-fifty” muffins with 1 1/2 cups of cooked and mashed sweet potatoes or Irish potatoes or cooked cereal or ground soy beans, to an equal amount of flour.

Then there are “fifty-fifty” recipes for wafers and for corn-meal cookies.

Milwaukee Journal - Dec 23, 1917

How to make all these “fifty-fifties” as well as home methods for entire corn-meal gems and yeast breads and rolls made in part of finely crushed peanuts, sweet or Irish potatoes, soy-bean meal which can be made at home by grinding soy beans in a handmill, rice, corn meal or cooked cereals, are described in detail in United States department of agriculture circular No. A 91. “Partial Substitutes for Wheat in Bread Making.” Here is a sample recipe — the one for “fifty-fifty” biscuits as worked out by Hannah L. Wessling, specialist, in home demonstration work:

“Fifty-Fifty Biscuits.”

Two cups corn meal, ground soy beans or finely ground peanuts, rice flour or other substitute.
Two cups white flour
Four teaspoons baking powder.
Two teaspoons salt.
Four tablespoons shortening.
Liquid sufficient to mix to proper consistency (1 to 1 1/2 cups).

Sift together the flour, meal, salt and baking powder twice. Have the shortening as cold as possible and cut it into the mixture with a knife, finally rubbing it in with the hands. Mix quickly with the cold liquid (milk, skim milk or water) forming a fairly soft dough which can be rolled on the board. Turn onto a floured board; roll into a sheet not over one-half inch thick; cut into rounds; place these in lightly floured biscuit tins (or shallow pans), and bake 10 to 12 minutes in a rather hot oven. If peanuts are used, the roasted and shelled nuts should be finely crushed with a rolling pin.

In making the flour and peanut biscuits the flour and other dry ingredients should be sifted together twice and then mixed thoroughly with the crushed peanuts.

The Evening Independent (St. Petersburg, Florida) – Sep 8, 1917

Pumpkin Pone (Image from http://www.stabroeknews.com)

These next two recipes actually sound pretty good. In regards to the Pumpkin Pone, I ran across a couple of  recipes online, and they include coconut and spices etc., so a bit more fancy than this war-time version.

Milwaukee Journal - Dec 23, 1917

Let’s Eat More Cornmeal

Following is a third series of cornmeal recipes suggested by the home economics department of Iowa State college, which is advocating the use of more cornmeal to conserve the flour supply of the country:

Rice and Cornmeal Gem.

1 c cornmeal,
1 tsp salt,
1 tbsp flour,
6 tbsp raw rice (1 1/2 c cooked),
1 egg,
1 tbsp fat,
4 tbsp baking powder,
Milk to make batter.

[No instructions for what to do with the ingredients, so I guess they assume everyone can figure it out? Back in the day, I suppose that might have been the case.]

Cornmeal and Pumpkin Pone.

1 qt well cooked pumpkin,
1 c cornmeal,
2 c sweet milk,
1 tbsp salt,
1 c sugar,
1 tsp soda.

Stir the cornmeal into the hot pumpkin; then add milk, salt and sugar. Add enough more cornmeal to make the mixture stiff enough that it will hold its shape when dropped from the spoon. Then stir in soda (dissolved in boiling water). Bake an hour and a half or longer. The longer it bakes the sweeter it seems.

The Carroll Herald – Jun 6, 1917

Don’t forget the children!

Every child can help. No one need be hungry.

Tags: 1917, Cornmeal, Food Shortages, Propaganda, Recipes, WWI