WHAT SOLDIERS EAT IN ENGLAND

Dominion, Volume 34, Issue 44, 15 November 1940, Page 9

WHAT SOLDIERS EAT IN ENGLAND

Outline Of The Menu FOOD COSTS £lO.OOO A MONTH (From the Official War Correspondent allached to the New Zealand Forces in Britain' l . October 23, 19-10. Last week, according to amateur statisticians in the Divisional Supplj Column of the Army Service Corps, the N.Z.E.F. (U.K.) ate its two millionth potato. Two million, that is, since coming to England. By the time yon read this, assuming menus to run to routine in the interim, we shall have come to the end of our thirtieth mile of English sausages, ami to the last slice of 150 tons of bread.

"What are you doing? ask the people at home. And: "Do you get. enough to eat?’’

• Well, in four months we have peeled all those potatoes; and though we coinplain, as soldiers should, of the porridge and the stew and the tea, the chief difficulty of those who play football seems to be to get their weight down. So we are not doing so badly, now that quarter-masters and cooks have got the hang of the ration scale, and have had a little 'Tommy coaching in how to make the most of it. Wives and sisters used to tell us, back in New Zealand, that we were extravagant with butter. They would eat their words could they but see us now, with half an ounce a week, and that soon about to peter out to nothing. Yet we make do with vitaminized margarine. and —shame on a New Zealander to have to confess it.—sometimes cannot be sure whether the issue is margarine or butter. When the world becomes sane again,- and European supplies re-enter competition, somebody is going to have a man’s size job reestablishing New Zealand butter in the taste of Old Country palates grown used to margarine.

The Army ration of margarine is an ounce and a half a day. .We have benefited hitherto by a gift of some seven tons of New Zealand butter, supplementary to our half-ounce ration. Now that is almost done; and through the season of bare supplies the Army issue of butter is to be replaced by an equivalent weight of margarine: so for the future we shall get two ounces a day of margarine, and no butter. That will help the footballers to reduce. Other bulk gifts from home—do we thank the Patriotic Fund? —include 5000 cases of dessert apples and a consignment of tinned fish. We finished the apples last week.

It is recorded that General Dreyberg, pursuing on a recent field exercise his practice of -bobbing up unexpectedly in odd corners, came upon a company of infantry at its evening meal "Is that beef or mutton?'’ he asked one soldier. “Neither, sir.” was the heartfelt ireply. “It’s stew.” Army cooks are a little partial to stew, it must be admitted. But on the whole they make a vei;y good job of it; and it is probably far and away the best dish for getting full value from the meat and vegetable rations. It can be varied, too. A. story is current at the moment of one unit in which the men, having been served with stew straight for 27 days on end, issued an ultimatum to the cookhouse that it could expect trouble unless there was a change bn the twenty-eighth day. There was. A sponful of curry powder was added to each dixie, and on the twenty-eighth day the stew became curry. Actually, most cooks vary the monotony much better than this. The best of them manage to avoid monotony and to feed their units well from the daily issue of 10 ounces of meat. In theory, this should be more or less evenly divided between beef ami mutton. In practice we ger, mostly beef: all. of it imported, some of it from New Zealand. Varied Diet. Breakfast does not entrench on the daily 10 ounces of meat. We get also three ounces of bacon, or six ounces of fish, or four ounces of offal (meaning liver), or four ounces of sausages (both beef and pork), or four ounces of baked beans. These are alternative rations. Early experience proved that the New Zealand soldier has little taste for kippers or bloaters—the form taken by the fish ration —or for liver; so now neither fish nor offal is drawn. We breakfast three mornings a week on bacon, three mornings on sausages, and once a week on baked beans. Three ounces of bacon is not much, and the issue of sausages is only two each. Fortunately we do not otherwise eat our full 12 ounces of bread every day, and an occasional slice fried ekes out the meagre bacon or sausages. There is porridge also, or stewed English apples from the orchards around us: five-sevenths ot an ounce of rolled oats or oatmeal for porridge; but the preparation is not always a success. “Charlie’s a chan*>ion,” commented one critic from a corner of his stable billet the other morning, “at burning thq porridge without cooking it.” In fairness to Charlie, who is always a trier, it should be added that when he does strike form he can cook a pot of porridge fit to rank with any north of the Tweed or south of the Waifaki. Cheese seems tq go quickly : wo draw four ounces a week. Maybe we are extravagant with it. too. One meal a day, lunch at noon or tea al 5 o’clock, according to what wo are doing, is “dry”—bread, margarine or butter, perhaps meat paste or meat loaf, jam. and (till we have eaten the week's issue") cheese*, with tea. The Army lea ration, three-eights of an ounce a day, is more generous than the two ounces a week allowed the civil population: but on thirsty days the boys are left looking for more, and can usually "stop a mug.” as they say. when the Y.M.C.A. or Church Army van comes along. The Food Controller opens his heart to canteens serving the armed or civil defence forces, which for practical purposes, and subject to necessary safeguards, are exempt from tea and sugar rationing. Our sugar is limited to two ami a hall" ounces a day: and when Charlie forgets to pul any in tile porridge, we probably have some of our daily three-eights of an ounce of suit. An ounce and a hull’ :i day of jam lor tiiliriimlade. or syrup) is litlii' enough. Unit qua I'ternuisters seldom exorcise the marmalade option: our boys much prefer jam. which is supplied in reasonable variety. with plum predominating. Tin- daily dry ino::l is further aided by weekly issues of three ounces of tinned salmon or other fish, throe ounces of meat or tisli paste, three ounces of meat loaf, and four ounces of slat) cake (not in Hie same street ns the cake that conies out of tins from New Zealand). "Milk in the field is mostly condensed : while we wore at our base camps we got fresh milk: seven ami a half fluid ounces a day. The equivalent allowance of condensed is two and a half ounces. Cocoa is a regular issue: lliree-six-leenlhs of nn ounce a day. Kepi steaming hot in big containers I hnl can lie carried on the back like a pack, it

is especially welcome on cold days in the field.

Rice the Backbone of Sweets Course. Rice is the backbone of the sweets course at the big meal. Throesevenths of an ounce is the daily issue for eacli man. Here again cooks do their best to vary: and where they cannot vary they cun now and again camouflage. “When available." macaroni, semolina, barley or tapioca may be drawn in place of rice; but they appear from results to be rather less “available.” Dried fruit, however, is in the regular supply: six-sevenths of an ounce daily, two-thirds of it stewing fruit —prunes, apricots and the like—and one-third sultanas mid currants. The daily two and a hull’ ounces of flour then allows mi occasional steam pudding with fruit in it: mid when there are no stowed prunes to go with the boiled rice, a handful of sultanas relieves its untemptlng nakedness. Once a week we each get a one-ounce fruit pie-—a Lyons pie. Soon we shall be baking our own. A team of N.Z.E.F. pastrycooks has been taken into the famous Lyons bakehouse for two months’ tuition. When they return they will practise on us. A soldier’s potato ration is 12 ounces a day, except that, “when new potatoes are supplied” it. is reduced to nine ounces. It is not laid down at what stage of the year a new potato becomes old. Fresh vegetables are normally issued five days a week. at. the-rate of eight, ounces a day for each man. On the other two days there is mi issue of two ounces of dried vegetables. Quartermasters and cooks may, and usually do, iron out the rigidities of issue routine by building up their own reserves. Five issues of fresh vegetables can easily be made to last, the full week; and the daily stow probably always includes onion from the dried vegetable issue. Tn summer, units wishing so may have fresh vegetables every day. Those we have had include cabbage, spring onions, marrow, carrots, turnips, cucumber, beetroot, runner beans and tomatoes. In season, fresh fruit—cooking apples, plums, damsons —may be substituted for dried on three days a week.

Condiments are measured out to last a hundred mon for four weeks: 3! pounds of mustard and of pepper; 28 pounds of pickles and two gallons of sauce; two pounds each of curry powder and gravy salt: 10 pints of vinegar and a pound and a half of spices and herbs. On the same basis there is a four-weekly issue of 16 pounds of custard powder and 12 pounds of baking powder. Mixed peel and dessicated coconut, now making their appearance in what a scientist would call "traces,” may be intended for Christmas puddings and cakes.

Taking all in all—that sounds like a recipe for stew, but let it pass—taking all in all, there is lit tle ground for complaint with either variety or quantities. British ships carry onr supplies, for Hie most part unhindered, from the four corners of the earth; and the New Zealand taxpayer pays for them .to the tune of £lO.OOO a month.