Halloween Scots-style

Here in Australia, we think of Halloween as being mainly a North American tradition. However, it actually had its origins in the Celtic culture over two thousand years ago. It was known then as the Samhain festival, and was a day on which the Celts believed that the souls of the dead and/or evil spirits could visit the living world and wreak havoc.

Eventually, the Catholic church made 1st November All Saints Day (possibly in an attempt to curb the Pagan Samhain festival) and the day before it became known as Halloween - the eve before All Hallows or All Saints Day.

As a Scottish-Australian, only one generation removed from the land of tartan, it is my Celtic duty to examine the Scottish Halloween traditions that date from before our time.

And who better to consult on these traditions than my own personal experts on Scottish culture, my Mum and my Aunt? These ladies were children in Scotland in the 1950s and I asked them what they remembered of Halloween traditions.

My Mum, who grew up in a small farming village in the South of Scotland said:

When we were young we used to carve out a swede turnip (they were the size of footballs). We would hollow out the stalk for the chimney. A candle was fixed in the bottom, a wire handle attached and we carried it out with us. The stink of hot turnip was unbelievable.

The end of October was very cold to be out walking at night but we never seemed to mind that. We went round the village dressed as witches, ghosts etc and received apples and homemade treacle toffee and fudge. The clever mums would make toffee apples--- and the occasional rich farmer would give us a shilling.

Most households would make the toffee and fudge in the days before the 31st. One year my mother had made all the toffee and put it on the cold floor behind the kitchen door to cool off and set. One of my brothers came in the back door and without looking stripped off his dung-laden wellies and tossed them behind the door. Imagine my mother's horror when she went to get the toffee and found the wellies sitting nicely in it! It was panic that year to get more made so that the children wouldn’t be disappointed.

If someone had a Halloween party, we would play games such as dooking for apples, or eating treacle-covered scones hanging from a string.

My Aunt recalled:

We carved turnips not pumpkins for lanterns and as you made the design you were careful to leave a thin layer of neep for the candle to shine through, not actual holes!

‘Guising’ was done from house to house and you tried to make yourself unrecognizable. You only went to houses where you were known and in order to gain a treat you had to entertain the household in some way.

I wouldn’t be taking my research seriously, if I didn’t at least attempt to carve a swede, but there’s a couple of problems with this:
a) swedes in Australia are around the size of a cricket ball, not a football, and
b) swedes are not currently in season here, being a cool-season vegetable.

However, in the interests of accurate experimentation I did it.

Before Our Time is about revisiting the wisdom of the past and evaluating its application to today’s life. So I have concluded that we would be better in Australia to start a tradition of carving Halloween lanterns out of an item which is large like a pumpkin, and readily available in October.

Ta-da!

Halloween melon lanterns.

A Scottish tradition that is a keeper, I think, is the fudge (or tablet) making for Halloween. My Mum sent through a recipe from The Home Book Of Scottish Cookery by Aileen King and Fiona Dunnett (1967) which I whipped up to send in to my daughter’s class at school.

The ingredients were just water, sugar, condensed milk, butter and vanilla essence. Torture on the teeth and the hips, but oh-so-delicious! (edit: see below for my version of the recipe.)

I wrapped it into individual serves with a spider sticker on each one.

If you know any Scottish bloggers, send them this way so we can get a more up-to-date analysis of Halloween Scots-style.

Happy Halloween! What traditions do you have for this day in your part of the world?

(Edited to add the recipe!)

Scottish Tablet or Fudge
500g white sugar
150ml hot water
60g butter
1 small tin condensed milk
1tsp vanilla essence

Add sugar to water in a saucepan over low heat. Stir until dissolved. Add condensed milk and heat, gently stirring all the time. When combined, add the butter in small lumps. Stir while waiting for each to totally melt before adding the next. Turn the heat right up and bring to the boil. Boil rapidly for around 5-7 mins until the mixture forms a soft ball when dropped into cold water. Remove from heat and allow bubbles to subside. Add vanilla essence and beat until creamy and thick. Pour into a lined 22cm x 30cm tin and refrigerate. Cut into squares when set.

Edited 11 Nov: It seems some people are having trouble getting the fudge to set. I'm no fudge expert, so I really don't know what is going wrong! I boiled mine really rapidly for the full 7 minutes, and it did start to turn streaky with a darker colour at that point - if that helps!

The Hotwater Bottle Fights Back as a Techno Gadget

I love a hotwater bottle. Nothing better on a cool winter’s night or when in pain and in need of a little attention. Wheat packs and electric blankets really don’t do it for me. Hotwater bottles are cuddly, you can knit clothes for them and they have history.

Here are some of the lovely clothes I have knitted for hotwater bottles:

How many wheat packs do you have with interchangeable outfits?

There’s nothing really exciting to say about the history of hotwater bottles except to say that we have been trying to figure out ways to keep ourselves warm at night since before we wore mammoth-skin cloaks. Records exist of beds being warmed with containers of hot coals, and later ceramic bottles of hot water, but it wasn’t until Slavoljub Eduard Penkala developed the rubber hotwater bottle did it really hit its straps as a leave.in.all.night snuggle-fest.

But history has not been kind to the hotwater bottle. Reports of burns due to improper use have diminished its glory in favour of electric blankets or wheat packs. So I was excited to read a new and thoroughly modern use for this fabulous item. The hotwater bottle has hit the techno big time as

... a laptop stand for your lap

Yes, Lifehacker Australia recently reported a blogger who uses a [tepid] tap-water-filled hotwater bottle as a comfy stable table between laptop, and lap. The hotwater bottle is ready to take on a new role in this millennium.

You can’t do that with an electric blanket.

I must confess that in the interests of thorough research I tried the hotwater bottle laptop stand and found it to be ... a bit wobbly. But it was comfortable.

How about you – do you love your hot water bottle or are you a modern microwaveable wheat pack or electric blanket user? Do you have a modern use for your trusty hotwater bottle?

Washcloth Winner!

A suitably before our time Royal Doulton Dickens-Ware bowl was selected

The names were written out and folded

Miss 10 baggsed the right to draw the winner

Congratulations Gramma Ann!

You are now the proud owner of a Pink Ribbon washcloth knitted in pale pink 100% Egyptian cotton.

Gramma Ann please contact us at beforeourtime@bigpond.com and this item will be flying to your house very soon!

Who is teaching our children to cook?

“First of all we have a scheme of education which fails to provide instruction in a girl’s domestic duties; then we have the wife who undertakes the task for which she has never been properly trained; next, instead of well-cooked and very much varied meals, we have a conspicuous and a disastrous failure; and finally, we have the bread-winner driven to the public-house—and happiness has left that home for ever.”

Philip Muskett, The Art of Living in Australia(1893)
Chapter VIII on 'School Cookery and Its Influence on the Australian Daily Life'

If Mr Muskett is to be believed, bad cooking in the home is a sure-fire way to send the inhabitants on a downward spiral into drunkenness. Some of the meals I attempted to cook in my early twenties verged on the disastrous, but I can honestly say they never forced anyone out the door to the pub.

Muskett’s chapter on school cookery did however highlight the role that domestic education plays in creating a healthy and happy population. In her 1995 article, “When did we teach our girls to cook?” Beverley Kingston suggests that for most of the nineteenth century Australian girls had little opportunity to formally learn about cooking. It wasn’t until the last 20 years of the nineteenth century that cookery and other domestic skills were added to the curriculum (for girls) of schools in the various Australian colonies. Critics of the introduction she says, “argued that both cooking and sewing were things that girls could and should learn at home from their mothers and were a waste of time and money in schools.”

Leaving aside the obvious focus on girls only being the ones for whom domestic education was deemed to be appropriate, this did make me reflect on the role of the education system in the teaching of domestic skills.

In Australian schools, food preparation and cooking now goes generally by the name Food Technology, although none of the high schools we are considering for our daughters offer this subject. A recent article in The Age highlighted that Victoria's peak health promotion agency, Vichealth, has proposed in a submission to the Federal Government’s obesity inquiry that food technology be made a compulsory subject for students up to year 10.

While we wait for cooking to end up on school curricula, perhaps we should look to the wisdom of those 19th century critics: is cooking something children can learn at home from their mothers and fathers?

There is nothing like total immersion to learn a new skill, so at the start of this year we allocated one night a fortnight to our then ten-year-old daughter as her ‘cooking night.’ She has to plan what she wants to cook, write up a list of ingredients she needs and go shopping for those ingredients at the markets. We offer advice and assistance if required during the cooking process, but she is in charge.

Last week, she chose to cook (for the family and two guests):

- Racks of lamb served with herbed mashed potato, steamed beans and broccoli
- A fruit and cheese platter (selection of three cheeses)

Over the past months, she’s learned some really valuable lessons in choosing foods at the market, preparing ingredients, timing and coordinating the cooking process and catering for people with food intolerances.

The pride on her face when (several months ago) she cooked a pork roast with vegetables and all the trimmings for one of her school friends and her friend’s father made the entire process worthwhile.

We don’t see this as a girl/boy issue. If we had a son we would also do the same with him. The ability to cook fresh, tasty, wholesome food is an essential life skill.

And so far, on her cooking night, no-one has been tempted to nip out to the pub!

How did you learn to cook? And who is teaching the children in your lives to cook?

Art Deco on the streets of Melbourne

The recent blockbuster Art Deco 1910-1939 exhibition at the National Gallery of Victoria, has given many Melburnians and visitors a new-found appreciation of this glamorous and spectacular era of design, art and architecture.

The NGV website describes Art Deco as follows:

Spanning the boom of the roaring Twenties and the Depression–ridden 1930s, Art Deco came to epitomise all the glamour, opulence and hedonism of the Jazz age. It was the era of the flapper girl, the luxury ocean liner, the Hollywood film and the skyscraper.

The exhibition, which was organized by the Victoria and Albert Museum of London contained over 300 works from a variety of artistic media such as painting, photography, fashion, film, architecture and jewellery.

While I think exhibitions such as these are must-see experiences, in this fair city there are many opportunities to enjoy Art Deco without stepping inside a gallery. Sometimes we take for granted some of the art and beauty that surrounds us everyday.

Within the CBD alone, there are many examples of Art Deco design and architecture. These are some of my favourites.

Manchester Unity Building, (Cnr Swanston and Collins Streets)


Century Building, (Cnr Swanston and Little Collins Street)

Newspaper House, (247 Collins Street)


Myer department store, (314-336 Bourke Street) David Jones, (294-296 Bourke Street)
Australian Natives Association Building, (28-32 Elizabeth Street)

Commonwealth Bank, (225 Bourke Street)

Are there examples of Art Deco in your neighbourhood?

PS: don't forget to leave a comment on the washcloth post for your chance to win the fabulous, hand-knitted pink ribbon washcloth.

Washcloths, 1930s style: Prize Giveaway!

Back, long before our time if you wanted a washcloth (flannel, face-washer, dishcloth) you would knit one, or have one knitted for you. School children knitted face-washers for the war effort, along with socks and scarves; all, I imagine in army green or navy blue cotton or linen.

Earlier this year I sent my children to a beginners knitting class in the city. I had tried to teach them to knit but I knew this would end in arguments so I decided to outsource to a professional – a lovely 19 year old who didn’t know what she was in for.

After the class we were discussing the best sorts of ‘first projects’ that beginner knitters should tackle. Traditionally beginners start with a scarf but they require considerable commitment to finish to the required length, usually more commitment than a beginner has. Beginners would be better advised, the instructor said, to knit a washcloth. These 20cm square projects are quick, easy and can be used immediately no matter the weather.

Today when it is easy to purchase cotton towelling or synthetic washcloths in bulk it seems a quaint out-of-date practice to knit them yourself, and yet people still do. Type “knitted washcloths” into Google and you will get thousands of links to patterns and photographs of completed projects.

I decided to buy some cotton yarn and give hand-knitted washcloths a go.

This is a simple pattern called, appropriately, Grandmother's Favourite. I found the pattern here and it is so simple to knit.

My husband thinks I’m kooky but I love these. I knit while watching TV. Each washcloth takes me two or three tv shows to knit and I find they are excellent for scrubbing my face in the shower.

They also make excellent gifts.

If you’re looking for a quick, satisfying project that won’t sit around unused, knit a washcloth. Cotton is inexpensive so these should cost about $1 - $3 each to make so is a great option for the thrifty among us.

Oh, and if you’re not interested in using one as a face-washer – apparently they are excellent for scrubbing glassware.

Anyone else out there knitting washcloths? Did you have knitted washcloths as a child? Do you think this is a skill that belongs before our time? Tell us your story in the comments section.

BREAST CANCER AWARENESS MONTH: WASHCLOTH GIVEAWAY!

We will draw a comment by random to receive their own hand-knitted Pink Ribbon 100% Indian cotton washcloth to try (see pic at left). The lucky prizewinner will be drawn out of a hat on Friday 24th October*. Good luck!

Please also take time to visit the official Breast Cancer website here to see how you can help.

* Winner's name will be posted to the sidebar

Reader Stories: Line-drying

Thank you to all of you who have been leaving comments and/or emailing your stories to beforeourtime@bigpond.com.

Here at before our time we love to hear all your stories. Below is a small sample of the stories we have been sent, a kind of "letters to the editor" feature if you like. To read more reader stories click here.

Read and enjoy how different, and how the same we all are:

"I live in the middle of a small town in the Pacific Northwest, United States. I love line-dried clothes. I remember them smelling so good as a child. The climate here is so very damp about 9 months of the year that outdoor line-drying can be a real challenge. The energy crunch and consequent cost of power of the last few years has encouraged more line-drying. However, over the past couple of years I have noticed that my lovely line-dried laundry smells like exhaust fumes! We live on the side of a river valley that a main interstate highway system runs through. I assume that traffic and the consequent exhaust fumes (we have many diesel trains go through town hourly, as well) are to blame for the foul smelling sheets and pillow cases. I haven't put my laundry out to dry for about 18 months now. "DENISE, WASHINGTON STATE, USA (by email)

"Never having owned a dryer (or lived in a house with someone who did) I guess I dont know what I'm missing. One thing I've noticed is my friends who have dryers tend to have less of each item than I do. For example, they survive with only 2 sets of sheets, because the turn around can be so quick and not dependent on weather. Whereas I need at least 3 sets as what if it rains for 2 weeks and I cant dry them outside? same for towels.Now I have a baby (who is partially cloth nappied) any visitors are aware they may be used as a clothes horse if they stand still for too long." QOTFU (BY COMMENT)

"I'm from the US, and while I somehow managed to find a home outside the grasp of a homeowner's association, and while I love the idea of line drying, and the smell of sun dried clothes, I'm a full on tumble dryer in practice. It rains most of the year around here, so that's one lame excuse, and we live on a busy street with much traffic, so it would seem that clothes might end up with an extra coating of grime if left to dry outdoors (but that's speculation). If I had a drying room where the door could be closed, I'd be much more inclined to hang dry indoors. Other reasons not to dry outdoors - my husband who lived in Missouri for a time said that they line dried, but had terrible trouble with wasps and bugs getting in and on the clothes. Now that would freak me out, so one more excuse not to line dry! I do have very fond memories of line drying in the summer as a kid. We had one of those ancient open top washing machines with the roller press (don't get your hand stuck - I did that once) that did a fantastic job, and sun dried clothes smelled divine.." SUEEEUS (BY COMMENT)

"Some winters I have thought how nice it would be to have a dryer "just for sheets and towels" but have never thought seriously about owning one, it's just something I would never buy and I don't know why that is, just something we can live without. We are used to the house looking like a Chinese laundry I guess and I try to keep the wet washing as neat as possible. I hang Out towels and sheets knowing the they will be there at least 24 hours to dry in winter. It just takes a little planning, and yes definately if my kids throw something in the wash that took 2 days to dry and it is not dirty, I give it back to them to wear again!! I love hanging washing out on a nice day, and if it's sunny AND windy I actually rush to do it and get it out!! Am I crazy? I am definately not obessive about housework and washing, but not having a dryer is just the norm for me! "LINDA (BY COMMENT)

"I rarely (ie once a year) use our dryer, it is purely for emergency back-up. I think the fact that we have a big old Hills Hoist in the middle of our backyard (rather than the skimpier but neater fold away line on the side of the house) helps me with achieving my maximum potential for line drying. And also that I do not have a Gloria Soame (glorious home) so I don't feel its aesthetics are compromised by laundry racks in front of the heater." STOMPER GIRL (BY COMMENT)

Parenting 101: Line-drying your way to parental happiness?

Miss 10 displaying the clothes-folding ability of the typical 10 year old (Tweenus Non-domesticus)

Some years ago I heard that the recipe for a well-adjusted family was to have four children, and one bathroom. They would all learn to share, and to have the occasional cold shower.

The one bathroom, shared bedroom, home that was part of the domestic landscape before our time has largely disappeared in favour of ensuite bathrooms and one bedroom per child; and so too have the times when children would have to wait days, not hours, for their favourite top to be washed. Before our time most families did not have tumble dryers, they had to line-dry all laundry, no matter the weather, and children could not expect to have the jeans they got muddy at the park today ready for a play-date tomorrow.

The most often lauded benefits of unplugging your clothes dryer is the effect on your hip pocket and the effect on the environment. However it is the effect on your family which may have lasting consequences.

Last Winter I went dryer-free. Seeing the laundry hung all over the house, waiting for days to dry, brought the sheer volume of washing in the home into perspective and family members realised that if they wanted to wear a specific pair of jeans on the weekend, or have gym clothes ready for Friday they would have to plan ahead.

Conversation during the dryer-free period:

Miss 10: Mum, I don’t have any tights to wear to school.
Me: Have you looked in your drawer?
Miss 10: Yes, and I need them NOW.
Me: Well there’s one pair on the line, but they’re still wet. You have another pair somewhere in your room.
Miss 10: I can’t find them, could you put my tights in the dryer?
Me: We don’t use the dryer anymore. If you can’t find your other tights you’ll have to wear socks
Miss 10: [unrepeatable sentences involving tantrum like movements, stomping and huffing] I can’t wear socks, it’s too cold.
Me: Well you’ll have to look harder for your tights.

Miss 10 went to school wearing socks. I later find the tights in her drawer.

Old me would’ve put the wet tights in the dryer ‘to save trouble’. New me is tougher, more resilient. Miss 10 knows that the consequence of not planning ahead or bothering to look for her tights means her legs will get cold.

Have you experienced similar unexpected benefits of approaching household chores in an old-time manner?

Knitting for the war effort

While the Australian diggers were fighting the Second World War on the battlefronts of Europe, the Mediterranean, North Africa, South-East Asia and the Pacific, those left at the home front were bolstering the forces’ efforts armed with knitting needles and skeins of wool.

Women (generally) and children knitted at home, at schools, on public transport, in groups and in public places. They produced socks, scarves, hats, jumpers, gloves and balaclavas by the thousands.

The tradition started during the first World War and by World War II, it was endemic. Able-bodied women were expected to work in paid-employment during the war, but for those who were house-bound due to age, illness or caring for young children or the elderly, knitting was one way they could contribute to the war effort.

Although some were accomplished knitters, not everyone was and standards for the finished products were strict. During World War I, the Red Cross produced an official sock measure. It stated that ‘to be of use to soldiers, socks must be free from knots and lumps’. Socks should also be ‘cast on loosely’, with a top that stretched ‘at least 15 inches.’

Nowadays, I’m not sure our defence forces in their high-tech, flame retardant uniforms have much need for handknitted items, however the concept of knitting to assist others who are facing personal battles is alive and well.

There are a number of organizations and websites that coordinate handknitted donations for charities. These items are given to individuals such as orphans, the homeless, cancer sufferers, or premature babies. Some charities distribute the knits overseas, others locally.

Knitting for the troops during the War allowed those at home to feel like they were contributing to the war effort in a practical and tangible way, and the items themselves were seen to deliver a message to their recipients of the support of the people at home.

Likewise, knitting for charities allows those who feel they want to make a contribution to do their bit.

A friend of mine is a tireless volunteer for wildlife rescue in Victoria. At all hours, day or night, she answers the call to go pick up injured or orphaned wildlife. Often they are baby possums abandoned by a sick or distressed mother or orphaned in the mother's pouch when she has been killed by a car or another animal, or birds that have been injured.

Talking to her about her work, I discovered that the animals are put into knitted bags of various sizes to keep them warm and safe. These bags need to be washed everyday, so rescuers go though a lot of them, and can't get enough to keep up with demand. They're not just used for possums and birds either - snakes, bats, lorrikeets, wombats and baby kangaroos are just some of the animals that have found themselves inside a handknitted bag.

I offered to knit some bags for her, then quickly evaluated my knitting-speed history and enlisted the help of my Mum and Megan who are knitting speed-demons.

I’m usually more of a quick-knit chunky yarn knitter, and I thought that to tackle something on smaller needles, with a finer yarn would have been too much of a challenge to my patience. So I started with thick wool and big (8mm) needles.

I chose to knit tiny bags for individual baby possums or little birds. They were relatively quick to knit and easy for a knitting-novice. As a bonus, I gained a real sense of satisfaction in knitting something I knew was going to be appreciated by someone else.

And I found that I really enjoyed the therapeutic aspect of the knitting itself. The repetitive nature of knitting creates a tranquil almost meditative state, and I imagined that the World War II knitters would have found knitting to be a relaxing escape in what was a time of great stress.

The end result would definitely not have met the Red Cross’s strict sock measure standards though.

And, in less than the time it took me to knit one baby possum bag, my mother produced all of these.

Here at Before Our Time, we’re taking the charge as wildlife footsoldiers (knitwear division). If you would like to help, the pouches need to be bags (with or without a drawstring top) of varying sizes from around 15cms w x 20cms h (for a single baby possum) up to 40cm x 40cms (for a joey or a baby wombat).

They can be knitted in any yarn, but preferably one which will wash well. And colour doesn't matter.

When you have completed one (or some!), you can email me for delivery details.

Just like those left at the home front during the Wars, it takes all types of knitters to fight the battles on behalf of others in need. The fast ones, the slow ones, the ones who have to repeatedly unravel.

What kind of knit-soldier are you?

I'm just so busy being busy.

Well before our time, during the Victorian era, a leisured life was something to aspire to. The amount of time a Victorian gentleman could devote to unpaid pursuits was an indication of his social status.

Now, it seems the amount we do and the hours it takes us to do it are instead the status symbols. “Being busy” has replaced “being useful” as a measure of an individual’s self-worth.

I’ve noticed this particularly in the language we use to describe ourselves. Until fairly recently, the expected response to the question, “How are you?” would be something along the lines of:

Very well, thank you.
Fine, thanks, and you?
Not bad, mate.
or even,
Good. Accompanied by determined nodding of the head. (Let’s not start on the grammatical merits of this choice!)

There is however, a creeping tendency for all of the above to be replaced by:

I'm so BUSY.
Keeping busy.
You know, busy as always.

In fact, “How are you?” is also in danger of being made obsolete by the query, “So. Are you busy?”

Busy has become a highly desired state of being.

How many e-mails start with the line, “Sorry I've taken so long to get back to you, I've been busy with [insert appropriate activity here]”?

Busy is worn as badge of honour. There is a degree of smugness accompanying the use of the busy descriptor when it’s used to decline a request for assistance: "I'm sorry I can't help you organise Christmas lunch for 50 of our closest family and friends. I'm just too busy at the moment. How about I bring some Christmas crackers?"

The implication is, “I have important activities to do, and what you request of me is frivolous.”

Let’s face it, we’re all busy. We all have the same number of hours to fill in a day, and we all fill them. If some people choose to spend most of those hours watching television and sleeping, then they are still busy - with their own priorities.

Telling someone you are too busy to do what they request of you is an attempt to illicit agreement from the requester that your own activity is of greater importance than theirs, or to denigrate the value of the activity you have been requested to complete.

A more honest response would be, “I know that spending time with our families during the Festive season is important to you, but I have higher priorities at the moment.”

Try replacing the word busy with the term “out of control”.

Now, being busy doesn't look like such a desirable state of being, does it? It means you haven’t planned and prioritized your day.

So to test a pet theory, I devoted an entire week to declaring a state of non-busy-ness. Every time I was asked how I was, I replied that I was very well thank you, and had everything under control.

When my osteopath asked, “How's your week? Busy?” I replied, “No. Not at all.”

In doing so I discovered a sure-fire way to kill any conversation.

Try it out. Next time you’re asked, “Are you busy?” watch the tailspin the questioner goes into when you respond, “No, not at all. I have stuff on, but it’s all under control.”

It’s just unacceptable for you not to be BUSY and it leaves nowhere for the small talk to go!

When my daughters asked me to do something for them and I was otherwise engaged, I didn’t tell them I was busy, I said, “Sorry. I won’t do that right now. I am doing something else I would prefer to finish first.” This process really made me stop and think about which activity actually was the higher priority.

Without the catch-all ‘busy’ safety net to explain my actions (or inactions) I found I really had to examine my priorities.

The next time I’m asked if I’m busy, I may just reply, “No, I’m not. And how about you? Are you useful?”

Would your great-Grandparents recognise your food?

The object, then, is not only to live, but to live economically, agreeably, tastefully, and well. Accordingly, the art of cookery commences; and although the fruits of the earth, the fowls of the air, the beasts of the field, and the fish of the sea, are still the only food of mankind, yet these are so prepared, improved, and dressed by skill and ingenuity, that they are the means of immeasurably extending the boundaries of human enjoyments. I. Beeton The Book of Household Management, S.O. Beeton 1861. Ch4 Section 76

All these foods were sourced from the Hawkesbury River region on the outskirts of Sydney, and purchased direct from the producer/maker.

I’ve been thinking about food a lot lately. I want to live more lightly on the planet but I don't easily give up the life I have become comfortable with. This is a life in which I need to buy my food in a one-stop shop so I don’t have to trudge all over town finding ingredients; a life in which I take for granted that I can stock up on meat to the extent that my freezer will hold it all; a life in which I am annoyed at food that doesn’t ‘keep’ because it means I have to trudge back out to the one-stop-shop all over again.

I am the last person who wants to live exactly as my great-grandparents did, without our modern food conveniences. However, I do find myself debating which whether our quicker faster food really makes our lives easier, in the long term.

"Make [food] simple and let things taste of what they are."
Curnonsky (Maurice Edmond Sailland), French writer (1872-1956)

These deep thoughts are all the fault of Barbara Kingsolver, Michael Pollan and, most recently, Alisa Smith and JB MacKinnon of the 100 Mile Diet fame. I’m thinking about what I’m eating, where it’s coming from and damn it, whether it’s good for me.

I have been making my own stock ever since I noticed that the stock I was using had no recognisable food in its ingredients list (except water and salt); I have become the whiny pain at the grocer when I notice that the garlic comes from Mexico and the Asparagus from Peru*; and I won’t let my kids drink clear apple juice because it contains things other than apple juice (it contains added colour and flavour for heaven’s sake, I always thought apples were the flavour). In the US most of the fruit juice I bought contained high fructose corn syrup. Why?

We now only buy apple juice that is made of ...apples

Our diet has changed remarkably over the last 100 years. The onset of industrialised agriculture may have made it easier to feed the greater number of people with vastly cheaper foods but these foods often have to travel a vastly greater distance to get to our plate which not only uses additional energy but means producers must add preservatives and additional packaging to ensure that the food is edible when it gets to us.

If we go way back before our time, back to our Great Grandparents, or great-great grandparents, what would they make of the food we eat? Or how the food tastes? Many of the simple foods that great-grandma would've known were made of one or two ingredients (eg. apple juice, butter). Many of these are now multi-ingredient foods containing inputs unknown in our great-grandparents time (can you imagine great-granny serving apple juice with colour and added flavour, or high fructose corn syrup?)

I recently met a sufferer of adult reflux and chronic indigestion. She finds her condition is controllable provided she only eats foods whose ingredients she recognises as a real food (not a number or chemical compound) otherwise she is reliant on medication to control her condition. This just seems to make sense, perhaps there’s a lesson in that for all of us.

Is this something you’ve started to think about? It has certainly made me stop and think about what I am buying before I pick something off the supermarket shelf and it has encouraged me to try to cook meals from simple ingredients whose provenance I can prove. Just like my great-grandmother would've.


*Dear Mexicans and Peruvians I am sure your products are fabulous, but they had to travel too far to get to me and I just feel I should wait until my local producer can supply these in the right season.

Do you have the stomach for blancmange?

One of my favourite books growing up was Louisa May Alcott’s Little Women. I read it many times, and I know I wasn’t alone. Although it was published originally in 1868 and is set in the far-off world of four sisters growing up through the American Civil War, it has been a staple on the reading lists of generations of Australian girls.

As is often the case when we read fiction set in another time or place, I encountered in that book things which seemed alien or strange.

What, for instance was the ‘blanc-mange’ that Jo took next door to the neighbour, Laurie in Chapter Five?

“Here I am, bag and baggage,” she said briskly. “Mother sent her love, and was glad if I could do anything for you. Meg wanted me to bring some of her blanc-mange; she makes it very nicely, and Beth thought her cats would be comforting.”

“That looks too pretty to eat,” he said, smiling with pleasure, as Jo uncovered the dish, and showed the blanc-mange, surrounded by a garland of green leaves, and the scarlet flowers of Amy’s pet geranium.

“It isn’t anything, only they all felt kindly, and wanted to show it. Tell the girl to put it away for your tea; it’s so simple, you can eat it; and being soft, it will slip down without hurting your sore throat…”

From these passages, I assumed it was a foodstuff of some kind, that it had to be made, and that it was cool and soft. The only reference I’ve ever heard in contemporary conversation to blancmange was someone in my mothers’ group referring to her post-pregnancy stomach as having the consistency of blancmange which, without being too unkind, I took to mean soft, squishy and perhaps a little wobbly?

So, what is this mysterious blancmange? Armed with my trusty Household Cookery book from the Emily McPherson College of Domestic Economy in Melbourne (1945), I set about to find out.

Sure enough, Section VIII devoted to Hot and Cold Puddings, contains three ‘Blanc Mange’ recipes: plain, chocolate and lemon.

So I started with the plain. Simple enough ingredients: milk, sugar, cornflour, lemon rind and a bayleaf.

An easy recipe to follow too, although I can’t emphasise how important the word “stir” is in the “stir to the boil” instruction. The cornflour thickens the milk very quickly, and the slightest distraction on the part of the cook could result in a lumpy, burnt mess. (Yes, I almost learnt that the hard way.) The blancmange sets overnight in a wetted mould.

I served it with a strawberry compote. All members of my household were underwhelmed. They said it lacked flavour. I thought the flavour was subtle. I was being kind.

So then I tried the Lemon Blanc Mange, which was a little more complex to make. I’m not sure it really qualifies as a blancmange in the strictest sense, as it doesn’t actually have any milk in it, and every definition I found of the word ‘blancmange’ in various dictionaries contained somewhere within it, the words ‘milk’ or ‘milky’.

The lemon blancmange was made with a water base thickened with arrowroot, and then folded with whipped egg whites.

The addition of lemon rind to the boiling water sure packed a punch flavour-wise, but the end product had the appearance and consistency of snot.

And it certainly didn’t hold its shape when I turned it out of the mould. I’m not sure what went wrong. Perhaps arrowroot today isn’t quite what it used to be in 1945?

The Chocolate Blanc Mange, which is just a variation on the plain recipe (no lemon rind, but melted chocolate instead) I made into small portions as a lunchbox treat. Mindful of the ‘lacking in flavour’ accusations, I doubled the amount of melted chocolate in the recipe. See below for my tweaked version of the recipe.

My oldest daughter was delighted with the end result. It’s a bit like some of those chocolate desserts you can buy from the supermarket, but without any additives in the ingredients. It wasn’t much cheaper than the supermarket options though (I made ten 70gm serves for around 45c each) because I used good quality chocolate. If I had skimped on the amount of chocolate and used a cooking chocolate instead, the unit cost would have been a lot lower.

My overall verdict on blancmange? It wobbles. There is just no other way to describe it. Blancmange would be a great food for someone recuperating from an illness, as it literally slides down the throat. The chocolate version was the most palatable, and kids seem to find it fun to have that as a treat.

In general, however I think it should stay firmly within the pages of classic fiction.

Chocolate Blancmange

600 mls milk
4 tablespoons cornflour
2 tablespoons sugar
1 bay leaf
60gm chocolate, broken into small pieces
Splash of vanilla extract

Blend the cornflour with a little of the milk in a large jug. Heat the rest of the milk in a saucepan, with the bayleaf. Once heated, pour over the blended cornflour.
Return to the saucepan and stir to the boil. Add the sugar and continue stirring while the mixture cooks for three minutes. Remove the bayleaf. Reduce the heat.
Add the chocolate pieces and splash of vanilla and stir while the chocolate melts.
Pour into a wetted mould (or individual containers for lunchbox treats) and leave to set in the fridge overnight.
Turn out onto a pretty dish.

Line drying your clothes: Could you go dryer free?

Before our time electric clothes dryers were not commonplace in the average middle class home. Our forebears had to master the art of drying their clothes in all types of weather.

At the beginning of winter I embarked on a challenge to forego the electric clothes dryer in lieu of line drying all my laundry, not as an overt environmental statement, although that is a valid reason, but to understand the impact on our family of letting go of a modern convenience. Some of you may line dry your clothes all year 'round but for a laundry-hater like me this was a real challenge.

In the US around 60 million people are unable to hang their laundry on outside lines due to Homeowner Association rules prohibiting this practice. The notion is that on-view laundry affects property values and many view the requirement to line dry as a mark of poverty. This has spawned a “Right to Dry” movement with homeowners flouting the rules to hang their washing.

Here in Australia few homeowners face these restrictions. We also live in a mostly laundry-friendly climate with plenty of sunshine and few places experiencing extremes of cold, and yet we love our tumble-dryers.

mmm...there won't be a Vogue Living shoot at my house anytime soon...

Tumble dryers are a convenience designed to make life easier but does line-drying make my life harder? Until this challenge I would've described myself as a wet-weather user of the dryer and I would often throw socks and underwear in the dryer because they're fiddly to hang.

It would be easy to start this challenge in high summer but to get the real feel of the lives of our forebears I started this challenge on the first day of winter. To further test my resolve it rained on consistently for first two weeks.

Hanging the sheets indoors was a challenge to my senses and my creativity.

For the two weeks of rain and for most of the winter I hung all my washing indoors on clothes racks over heating vents, on hangers from an un-used curtain rod in the dining room and sheets were draped on a portable hanging robe that I use when we have guests to stay. I have never been more aware of the weather in my life, or the amount of laundry my family goes through a week.

However, at the end of the challenge I would have to say that, despite the weather, it was not difficult. Sure the house took on the appearance of a Laundromat and sure my daughter couldn’t have her favourite jeans RIGHT THIS VERY MINUTE, but I found that I started to take notice of how we wore our clothes, to question what was really dirty and what could be sponged down. I did not find it acceptable for the kids to wear pyjamas once only. And I found that damp clothes make for an excellent humidifier in the home (I got good at looking at the positives).

"Doing the laundry is still a hated chore, but no more so than when I used the dryer more often"

We make the mistake, I think, of assuming that the dryer is a quicker option for busy couples and families however I felt it was quicker to hang the washing than to line it up, load by load, for the dryer.

Line-drying did, however, increase the total laundry cycle time. I couldn’t expect my laundry to be washed, dried, folded and put away within the day. But then I couldn’t find a compelling reason why my washing had to be completed within 24 hours. Once I accepted that the laundry cycle could be 3 days, not 1, I relaxed and it made no difference.

Line-drying is so much easier to support when the sun is out!

Now that Spring is here I am hanging my washing outside again. I just love the smell of sun-dried clothes.

What about all you busy people? My question is – does hanging your clothes really take longer than queueing them for the dryer? I found not. But if laundry drying on racks in wet weather is not your idea of a hot design statement you may struggle with the concept on that basis alone.

I have been mostly dryer-free now for four months. In that time I have used the dryer only a few times. I'm no saint, I'm tempted to dry off the sheets on cool days, but I've changed my previous habits and I feel better for it. The laundry is still a hated chore but no more so than when I used the dryer more often.

Have you tried to go dryer free? Do you never use the dryer? Do you have nifty techniques to get your clothes dry in unpleasant weather?

Tell me your stories at beforeourtime [at] bigpond [dot] com. I'll publish the best advice in a future post.