One thing I forgot to mention yesterday was that the Griddlecakes recipe calls for "melted shortening." Vegetable oil must have been just coming onto the market in 1945 and not yet widely available. It certainly saves some time - not having to melt a tablespoon of shortening on the stovetop - but maybe vegetable oil's one of the reasons my pancakes weren't very good.
LIFE magazine has just made its photographic archives available online and there's a sweet little series of pictures called "Occupation: Housewife" that were taken in a Kankakee, Illinois home in September 1941. Since I don't have much news to report from the home front today, I'll post a few of these photos and add a few more as soon as I have a chance. Here's a real '40s housewife hard at work... Enjoy!
Housewife & mother, Jane Amberg, 32, posing w. her husband of eleven yrs., Gilbert & their three kids Pamela, 4, Tony, 5, and Peter, 7, in front of large two-storey house they lease.
Jane Amberg, shushing her husband Gilbert, as they sit having quiet 6:30 a.m. breakfast before their three kids wake up, in kitchen at home.
Jane Amberg making one of the four beds she does daily after doing breakfast dishes and getting the kids to school, at home.
Jane Amberg loading the automatic washing machine w. several days dirty clothes in basement at home.
8 comments:
cute pics... hmmm, not really sure how good microwaved pancakes would be... are they soggy?
Nope. Not soggy. Not too much different than they tasted yesterday, actually. I was hoping they'd have magically improved in the fridge overnight! I think I'm going to try heating them up in the toaster tomorrow morning and see if I can get 'em a little crispier.
my father (who was a child in the depression) said that pancakes were cheap and often used the next day in place of bread. One of his favorite food memories was sitting on the curb with his twin brother eating cold pancakes rolled up with butter and sugar. He often did this when I still lived at home, sometimes replacing the sugar and butter with whatever jam we had going, and it was quite good. Tho, I preferred my nuked, a luxery he didn't have in the depression ;)
Aha! So there's a pre-microwave way to reuse leftover pancakes. Rolled up with butter and sugar, they must have been a great substitute when Mom's cookie jar was empty, too.
Do you have a link to the Life article? I'd love to read it.
You may have already linked it in a later post, but I haven't gotten there yet!
Roxanne
I've never seen the article itself --- which is too bad. It sounds interesting! Only the photos, which LIFE has posted in a new Google-based database online.
Though we are now over a decade past this Blog post, I’m fascinated! Here’s a link to all the Life Magazines. If I find the particular article for these photos, I’ll either edit or do a new comment.
https://books.google.com/books?id=N0EEAAAAMBAJ&source=gbs_all_issues_r&cad=1&atm_aiy=1940#all_issues_anchor
Article Link: Life Magazine, September 1941...Just think, World War II is still on the horizon.
https://books.google.com/books?id=fU0EAAAAMBAJ&pg=PA79&dq=Occupation+Housewife&hl=en&sa=X&ved=2ahUKEwitvaKg4oHsAhVLC6wKHc-jAmIQ6wEwAXoECAAQAQ#v=onepage&q=Occupation%20Housewife&f=false
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