Rationing in World War Two

 

Ever wondered how much food a person was entitled to during World War Two?

Rationing began on 8th January 1940 when bacon, butter and sugar were rationed. By 1942 many other foodstuffs, including meat, milk, cheese, eggs and cooking fat were also ‘on the ration’.

This is a typical weekly food ration for an adult:

Bacon & Ham         4 oz

Other meat            value of 1 shilling and 2 pence (equivalent to 2 chops)

Butter                      2 oz

Cheese                     2 oz

Margarine              4 oz

Cooking fat            4 oz

Milk                       3 pints

Sugar                    8 oz

Preserves            1 lb every 2 months

Tea                        2 oz

Eggs                     1 fresh egg (plus allowance of dried egg)

Sweets                  12 oz every 4 weeks

Yes, I know what you are thinking…This doesn’t look like much, right?

In fact, ordinary people survived on such rations, although those who produced their own food were able to have that little bit extra.

You might be wondering how this was even possible.

https://www.historic-uk.com/CultureUK/Rationing-in-World-War-Two/

 

Also lots of people had an allotment grow extra fruit and veggies my mother used to tell me people used to trade what they had for other things,

We used grow alsorts a couple of apple trees and grow strawberry's in the summer.

Kids these days dont do gardening at school would come in handy right now

I fought in the first the boer war, God i'm so bored...

1 hour ago, ChipButty said:

Ration books in the UK?

Remember me mum talking about them.

Yes 

I was at boarding school and remember having rationing book to buy goodies from the Tuck Shop.  

We had the "Particulares" scheme under Castro when I lived there which was a kind of rationing..can't remember the weights allowance of meats etc...of course the Greenback always got you anything you wanted from the $ shops..same as the black market in UK

I remember that we still had I.D. cards in the U.K. in order to by sweets at the village tuck shop until 4th July 1954. You could buy two black jacks for a farthing, hich is eight for an old penny.

Oh yeah, remember my mum using when I went to the local shops with her. Today I think they have have to put cell phones on it too, Ha!.

I have my ration book from when I was a baby. I got extra eggs, sugar and milk because we were poor.

Ah yes, I remember trundling up to the local shop (actually not that local as it happens) with a little ration book and bringing back all that we were allowed, which included a small rationing of sugar, and as we were three children and two adults we got extra saccharine to help out.

 

I had a very sweet tooth and couldn't touch the sugar obviously, but on the way home I would dig into the little paper bag which contained the saccharine's and eat some of them.......not a good look when you think about it now, but that's all I had to satisfy my sweet tooth!

 

Like someone else has said, we did have little allotments in which to grow things and unfortunately for me, most of the things that were grown were the things that I absolutely hated, such as, swedes, turnips, parsnips and broad beans, to name but a few, and anyway, even if I had liked them, the butchering that my mother gave them when cooking them would have made them inedible anyway.

I fought Hitler in hand-to-hand combat, anything to get a few slices of bacon ????

1 hour ago, Estrada said:

I remember that we still had I.D. cards in the U.K. in order to by sweets at the village tuck shop until 4th July 1954. You could buy two black jacks for a farthing, hich is eight for an old penny.

Although rationing came to an end in 1954, rationing of maternity benefits were transferred to the family allowance scheme. I remember going to the chemist each week for our ration of dried milk, orange juice and cod liver oil. Hated that cod liver oil, orange juice was ok, my brother got the baby milk.

I remember it well. During the war there were very few fat people in those days but we were fit. We had a small back garden and I used to buy chicks and raise them using a hot water bottle to keep them warm. We had no electricity in those days. I also raised rabbits and of course had to dispatch them myself. I lived in London and my dad was in the Royal Navy. My mum would send me to the butchers with the ration books to say to the butcher "Half a leg of lamb, knuckle end, 2/6- Two shillings and sixpence - And any extras"? If I was lucky he might wrap something up under the counter, maybe a piece of liver or a kidney. If I was really lucky, a rabbit. 

I can remember petrol rationing in early 70's i think it was.

 

 

I lived at the seaside just after the war and when i was about 8 we used to pick blackberries and then knock on peoples doors and sell them for 3p a bowl ,also in the sand dunes there were places where ammunition was stored during the war ,once we found some hand grenades(i kid you not) and threw them and they exploded ,nothing was done ,can you imagine what would happen these days ,also we all had air pistols and used to run around fireing them ,i cant believe what we got up to ,these days armed response would come .happy days ,my life was great .

46 minutes ago, CharlieH said:

I can remember petrol rationing in early 70's i think it was.

 

 

 

1973, during "Oil Crisis".

 

They were issued in UK but not used.

 

I continued to fill the Bantam as usual.

 

 

I can, in Australia but I was just a kid so I can't remember the details.

 

I can remember going a 'lecture' before going to the shop to be careful that to shopkeeper only cut off/ kept the correct number of little squares. 

Remember Scott's Emulsion and liberty bodices with rubber buttons? By 

God  we're getting old.

I can clearly remember Thursday mornings during rationing. I was given a large brown paper carrier bag containing the ration books and a list of items and the money wrapped in a piece of paper. This I was charged with delivering to the local grocery store on my way to school, and collecting on my way home. I was eight and it was quite a responsible task at that time. As someone else remarked, some of the daft things we kids got up to back then, would probably get you arrested today. Happy days and fondly remembered. 

My parents kept my last ration book, for sweets, for me to keep. Unfortunately It got lost somewhere along the way. It had a few stamps taken out for purchases.  Must have been around 1952 I guess? 

Remember eggs, sugar and butter were the main things we wanted most.

13 minutes ago, kidneyw said:

Remember eggs, sugar and butter were the main things we wanted most.

My two years old brother had just come out of hospital after recovering from diptheria 1943, when the doodlebugs were hitting London. She asked the old boy who kept laying chickens, to sell her an egg, for him. He refused. The miserable old sod. Times were hard then. Especially for the mothers who were raising their children and being bombed while their men were off at the war. They were the heros in my opinion.

I remember it well in the late 1940s. Queuing with my grandmother, ration books in hand, at various shops. We grew vegetables in our garden. Very occasionally an unmarked van would turn up with all kinds of goodies. We didn't have much to eat, but I don't remember being hungry. I never saw a single fat person in those days.

 Being born in London in 1944, when I was a boy my mother spoke to me regularly about the war years, of course, she was marked by the death of my father a volunteer paratrooper who had been killed three months before me being born. The two things she told me about the most were the V2s which fell on London towards the end and ... the ration books!

2 hours ago, sandyf said:

Although rationing came to an end in 1954, rationing of maternity benefits were transferred to the family allowance scheme. I remember going to the chemist each week for our ration of dried milk, orange juice and cod liver oil. Hated that cod liver oil, orange juice was ok, my brother got the baby milk.

Cod liver oil , don't know about that , but I did like Cod liver oil and malt , came out the tin like treacle .  Bottles of milk at school , had to be put on the radiators to thaw out , in the summer warm and disgusting.  I feel sure those of us around 70 years are less picky with their food because as youngsters we ate what we were told too !

Only thing I never understood was sprouts with Xmas dinner.  No one liked them but there they were . I still don't care for cabbage.

18 minutes ago, Thingamabob said:

I remember it well in the late 1940s. Queuing with my grandmother, ration books in hand, at various shops. We grew vegetables in our garden. Very occasionally an unmarked van would turn up with all kinds of goodies. We didn't have much to eat, but I don't remember being hungry. I never saw a single fat person in those days.

And being born in '47 I thought I was old.  My mother said that during the war if she went out to the shops and she saw a queue she would join it just to see what was on sale. Like you I think we ate well enough and never went to bed hungry.

Yes, I remember quite clearly. As a young lad I used to have to cycle with my mother to the local CO-OP to collect the groceries. I was born in 1944 and, despite the war ending in 1944/1945, rationing continued until July 1954 when meat and other food products were the final commodities to go "off ration". By this date, our present Queen Elizabeth had just commenced her reign. Photos of a Food Ration Book:-

 

Sweets were also on ration,but you got free concentrated Orange juice,

and what was the other one, Malt ?

regards worgeordie

 

I remember the lifting of the confectionary rationing. 

Was the start of many subsequent visits to the dentist. 

8 minutes ago, worgeordie said:

Sweets were also on ration,but you got free concentrated Orange juice,

and what was the other one, Malt ?

regards worgeordie

 

Malt and cod liver oil? Dried eggs and spam from the US. Dried potatoes (Pom?)in school dinners. Horrible stuff! Whale meat and snoek sometimes which was not on ration.