Ration Book Savoury Supper Dishes

A trio of ration book recipes, these recipes originate from a 1918 edition of The People’s Friend magazine, and use everyday store cupboard and pantry staples.

Following on from last week’s recipe post, WARTIME HIGH TEA RECIPES, where I shared three wartime sweet recipes, today I am sharing three more recipes from the same era.

Today’s Ration Book Savoury Supper Dishes are Sausage Cakes, Cressy Soup and “A Nice Supper Dish”, which is a simple baked vegetarian patty, similar to a crust-less flan or quiche.

All three recipes use basic everyday store cupboard or larder ingredients, and would be more than suitable for a family supper or lunch.

The Cressy soup is a very tasty, frugal and filling recipe from a 1918 copy of The People’s Friend magazine.

I suspect that this recipe is a mispronunciation of a classic French carrot soup, Potage Crécy, which is made with carrots and which I used to make when I lived in France.

I omitted the original suggestion of sugar from the ingredients, as I felt my carrots were sweet enough already, and I also used butter in place of the roast dripping/fat that was suggested in the original recipe.

“A Nice Supper Dish” is a fabulous supper dish, that uses bread crumbs, eggs and ham which are baked in a patty tin.

Serve 3 patties per person for a tasty supper with potatoes, steamed greens and tomato ketchup.

Although eggs were strictly rationed during WW2, the rationing was slightly laxer during WW1. Dried eggs can be used in this recipe, it’s usually 1 dessert spoon of dried eggs per 1 fresh egg*.

These are also a great idea for breakfast, serve with grilled tomatoes and mushrooms. *Follow the instructions on the tin.

Sausage cakes is a frugal recipe that makes good use of sausages, or sausage meat.

Using only three main ingredients, plus the seasoning, these are browned and then baked in a self-saucing gravy.

The original recipe says that you cook these for 1 ½ hours, which seemed like long time. So, when I tested the recipe, I cooked them for 45 minutes and they were perfectly cooked, still moist and tender.

Use any sausages to taste, we love this recipe when using pork sausages with apple or pork sausages with leeks too. These are a perfect Ration Book Savoury Supper Dish.

Just like my last post for Wartime High Tea Recipes, these Ration Book Savoury Supper Dishes were made by me, for a special Centenary of the Armistice Day commemorative issue of The People’s Friend magazine in 2018.

I recreated the recipes from the original manuscripts, but with a few modern day substitutes and changes.

I have copied the original recipes above each of my modern day interpretations, which are shared in printable recipe format below, for historical interest.

PLEASE do let me know if you make any of these recipes, I’d love to hear your thoughts, Karen

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Sausage Cakes – Original Recipe

Take 1 lb sausages (skinned), 3 or 4 bread crusts, soaked, crumbled, and seasoned with pepper and salt; mix together, and form into small round cakes on a floured board. Fry in clarified fat till brown. Brown a little salted flour; add hot water or vegetable stock, and make a smooth gravy. Stew the sausages gently in the gravy for 1½ hours. Serve apple sauce with it.

Cressy Soup – Original Recipe

Scrape the carrots and cut the red parts only into strips, discarding the insides; 2 lbs are required for this soup. Melt 2 oz roast fat in a saucepan, add the carrots and let them stew, stirring occasionally; add salt and 4 pints stock; let the whole simmer till the carrots are soft. Pour through a sieve, and boil up again with ½ teaspoonful sugar; stir in ¼ pint milk or cream, season with pepper and salt, and serve immediately.

A Nice Supper Dish – Original Recipe

Take a small quantity of chopped cooked ham, and mix with an equal quantity of breadcrumbs. Have ready some small patty pans, grease these and strew with the ham and breadcrumbs. Into each drop an egg, sprinkle over ham and breadcrumbs. Bake in a fairly hot oven for 10 minutes. Served with brown or tomato sauce and potatoes, these patties are delicious.