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JOY Then and Now

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Meeting the Challenge with JOY
by Susan Becker

Anyone who knew her says that lrma Rombauer rose to any occasion with action and wit.  For instance, when she realized that the cooks of World-War-II America were going to face difficulties, she adapted her newest cookbook to meet the particular needs of American homes in the 1940s. Out of curiosity, we reviewed the information that was compiled and written for the "wartime edition" of the Joy of Cooking. We found excellent recipes, tips and advice for the budget-minded cook of 1943, all of which are still useful to the budget-minded cook of today.
Even though we are not using ration cards in America, we are all looking for ways to live within a tighter budget in an uncertain time and a struggling economy. We are all looking for comfort in our American tradition. With these things in mind, we send you this little bit of America, this little bit of comfort, this little bit of JOY.

We offer you the encouragement we found when we went back and read what Granny Rom wrote in another time of war: approach this difficult time with a sense of hope and determination to get the most out of every day...and every dish. She also reminded us, "The ability to adjust oneself and one's needs to an altered condition is a valuable asset. The conviction that the present adjustment is necessary and if properly met, temporary, makes the adventure both interesting and thrilling. Above all, let us be cheerful about it."

So get out your cooking spoon, fill your table with nourishing food, and eat, talk, and laugh together. After all, America is still the land of plenty.

With thousands people suddenly out of work and the threat of unpredictable hostilities, the comfort of home, family and good food gives us one of our most cherished and accessible joys. Our modern lifestyles – working couples, children with myriad activities, and television entertainment – have drawn us away from one of the most important gathering times, the meal. In times when external forces require us to adapt, we need to pay more attention to making time for meals with friends and family to help us discuss and make sense of our present circumstances. And, even if we are not able to offer elegant fare, we can provide comfort and love in the form of tasty and wholesome dishes.

What prior generations learned, while making do with less during national emergencies, Granny Rom packed into the pages of her books, reminding us that we do not need expensive ingredients to prepare wonderful meals. There are endless ways to stretch meat and use fresh and canned ingredients to create tasty and wholesome meals. While presenting us with elegant meals for all times, she was also the mistress of leftovers and frugal cooking, adding cheese sauce to recycled Brussels sprouts; adding cauliflower and cream sauce to leftover ham; creating elegant soufflés from minced chicken, mushrooms, grits or cheese; and even making a lovely meat roll from biscuit dough and meat ends.

Managing hearty meals while on a budget is best accomplished through two disciplines: careful planning before you shop – a list and NO impulse shopping – and the determination to waste nothing. For instance, a chicken can go from a festive dinner to a casserole of leftover minced chicken simply by using canned soup and a few added ingredients. The carcass can then be made into a broth or base for soups or sauces, reducing the cost per meal to pennies.

You can also save a quantity of meat bones from your meals in a bag in the freezer and boil them all at once for a quantity of nutritious broth to add to your creations. To make broth:
For every pound of bones and leftover meat, add 2 to 2½ cups of water along with chopped vegetables (onions, carrots and celery for flavor) and simmer for about an hour. Strain, cool in the refrigerator and skim off fat. Re-simmer for another hour with fresh vegetables, seasonings and barley, lentils or rice.

And don’t forget the tremendous nutritional value of dried beans, foods used by peoples all over the world for their protein value when combined with rice! Bean dishes are a wonderful substitute for proteins such as meat, fish, poultry and eggs. Neither beans nor rice alone have the 22 known amino acids required for a complete protein. However, in combination they provide the needed nutrition. There are literally hundreds of delicious available recipes for beans, from soups to main dishes and even dips.

Some ideas from Irma for stretching foods are:
*Make leftovers festive by putting them inside casings such as scooped out tomato or pepper halves and baking them. Gelatin desserts, such as mousses, inside scooped out citrus fruits are also a pretty addition.
*Use stale bread (not moldy) for bread pudding, stuffing for chicken, or make into breadcrumbs by drying in a slow oven and then processing in a blender for use in meat loafs, stuffing, puddings or as a coating for fried foods.
*Use leftover meats, scraps of bacon, cheese, or vegetables in an omelet or as the filling for a quiche.
*When you use egg yolks in a dish, save the egg whites and make meringues or angel food cake.
*Mix scraps of jelly together and melt for a pudding sauce.
*Pour spare gravy into an ice tray and freeze and bag the cubes to enrich soups, add to casseroles, or mix with rice, potatoes or pasta.
*Add a well-seasoned cream sauce to leftover sliced potatoes and top with cheese. Or use extra mashed potatoes for fried potato cakes or as a topping for shepherd’s pie.
*Use washed vegetable parings in soups or stocks.
*Make rice pudding from extra rice.
*Buy ham with the bone in and save your ham bones for pea soup or add them to boiled greens like collard, chard, spinach or kale.

The secret to variety is the little tasty additions and seasonings that raise ordinary food from the boring to the sublime. Granny Rom had a favorite herb mixture borrowed from her friend, Herman Smith, author of Stina: The Story of a Cook. Stina prepared this mixture of home grown herbs at the end of summer, but you could as easily use packaged herbs and keep the mixture in a jar to add to your cooking:
“two ounces each of sweet marjoram, savory, parsley and thyme; and ounce of basil; a half-ounce each of sage, bay leaves, celery tops (you can dry your own in a very slow oven, ed,), and dried lemon peel. These she would pound to a powder with a wooden pestle (today we have blenders and food processors, ed.), and it was this delicious concoction which was the secret of so many of Stina’s masterpieces.”

Keep a number of basic savory and useful additions on hand, such as capers, mustard, curry powder, pickles, olives, tomato, mushroom and cream of chicken soup, breadcrumbs, and dried mushrooms. You can also chop and freeze in plastic containers onions, peppers, tomatoes, parsley and chives to perk up your dishes at the last minute.