Kitchen Garden Forum

Gardening efforts completed for the day I sat down this afternoon with a cup of tea and enjoyed some time with a library book recently borrowed - SPAM, The cookbook . It's a slim book covering the history of Spam, its invaluable use in feeding the nation during the war and it took me back to my childhood when my mother would always try to hoard a tin of it in the larder as a wartime treat.

I've not eaten any for years but flicking through the book has reminded what a flexible food it was. There are recipes for Spam fritters, Spam fondue, Spam Caesar salad, Swedish Spam salad with dill & gherkins, Spam tortilla, Spam stuffed aubergines or other veg, Thai Spam cakes, Hawaiian Spam & pineapple, Spam & Pineapple Chinese type stir fry, Spam steaks in a wine sauce. Spam paella. Spam pizza. I doubt all the ingredients for these were available in wartime even if people had the time and energy to cook them,but we recently bought a tin of it with the intention of having a nostalgic culinary experiment.

Do any of you have any childhood memories of foods which you haven't eaten for ages ?

My Grans tomatoes & onions on toast. There was more than just those 2 ingredients but I have no idea what, but would be dried & no doubt old of date herbs, but could all be down to the superior flavoured older varieties of veg available or just happy memories!

Monty Python sort of put me off Spam, in answer to your second question, ginger nut biscuits soaked in warm custard, then left in the fridge for a day and eaten cold, my Gran used to make that in the early 50's.

What used to be called shilling diner , slices of potatoes ,onions , and bits of bacon cooked in a casserole dish long before bacon was 50% water

In my early days in the Air Force as an apprentice my favourite was corn beef stew which involved keeping back some corned beef from a meal and getting anybody doing jankers in the cookhouse to nick the vegetables when they could and a store of said veg established. This was duly cooked in a mess tin and shared by a all in the billet. As a 16 year old I was always hungry.

I have a tin of corned beef in the cupboard. I actually like a version of corned beef hash containing mushrooms and fried onions cooked In the frying pan as rissoles with both sides crispy brown , but my husband doesn,t like it so a I never seem to get round to using it up. I suspect his mum just mixed corned beef and mashed potatoes together in the old days which is a rather unappetising and flavourless mixture. Often the addition of some extra herbs or seasonings can make all the difference to how a dish tastes.

My mum used to make a dish using leftover stew or casserole, a tin of vegetable soup and some baked beans. All mixed up and heated up together. It was my absolute favourite!

Fond memories of beef dripping on toast,condensed milk on toast an banana sandwiches

Ooh yes Snooky, bread and dripping. Fresh crusty white bread with beef dripping especially the brown jelly and sprinkled with salt. The health police would have a fit today.

Don't get dripping like you used to.

MMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMM bread & dripping. As you say Plum.

PLUMPUDDING wrote:Ooh yes, The health police would have a fit today.

It was always brown sauce or sugar butties up here

Yes beef dripping immediately came to mind. Picture the white bowl full of left over dregs from the roast joint or frying pan that was turned upside down to get tat the jelly at the bottom.

Was in the chippy a while back when a big lump of lard was put in the fryer, guess that is why they taste so good.

What entry were you, JB? I was 64th, at Halton, 1950-52.

Yes, I remember the beef dripping on toast. A Sunday beef joint was a fairly rare treat in our house. These days we often roast duck breasts and the dripping from them is unbelievable delicious too. There's always a battle for that on toast the next day.

The other thing I haven't eaten since a teenager is Tiger Nuts. Have no idea if they're still available.

I used to use tigernuts as bait for Carp fishing, didn't know you could eat 'em.