Gleaning From the Past to Help Us Through Hard Times
What do you want to know?
A lot of people right now are worried about rising costs of food and whether they’ll have a job tomorrow, especially here in Maryland where a huge number of government workers live. It’s easy to feel small as a history and food content creator + stay at home mom + grad student, wondering how I can make a difference with the knowledge, time, and resources I have.
After going on a lot of walks and thinking about what I can do, I’ve decided on a few things:
volunteer at my local food bank
focus more of my content on thrifty cooking, making use of leftovers, economical meal planning, etc.
work harder towards finishing my cookbook and fill it with wartime wisdom for our kitchens
During the pandemic, I was amazed to see how many people turned to wartime resources looking for ways to help themselves get through all of the shortages. This was really inspirational to me as a historian, but it also was a huge sign that we don’t have to reinvent the wheel. It’s been done before. So, I hope to be that bridge now — to bring all of that knowledge out of wartime cookbooks and into your hands.
I’d love to hear what it is that you’re concerned about and what things you’d like me to research. There is so much we can collectively glean from our grandparents’ time of living through shortages and rationing. Leave a comment or send me an email. I’d love to hear from you.
At this point it's probably eggless cooking and baking 😅
I occasionally look through the few wartime cooking booklets I have, and while I'm tempted to try some of the recipes, I notice that some of the ingredients are not common, or no longer a thing. So my question: "How can we make thrifty substitutions for our modern kitchens?"
It's something I will probably look into, but I think it would be a handy resource for a lot of people.