What were the most popular dishes in the 1930s and how can we make them today?
With the Great Depression hanging around, everyone had to compromise. No one had enough money to go around, so if people wanted to eat, they had to get creative.
Therefore, what were the most popular dishes to have existed in the 1930s, and how can we make them today?
Answers ( 1 )
The Thirties were the beginning of the of the Great Depression; jobs were scarce, farms were failing, food was still generally grown or very locally produced- and that last one cost money no one much had. Recipes were generally special; it isn't that cookbooks didn't exist, it's that books cost money, and learning to cook wasn't something you got from a book, you got it from observing and cooking.
You started young, helping peel potatoes, mix the bread dough, chop the cabbage. Meat was not necessarily scarce, but unless raised on the property, had to be purchased, and there wasn't much money around, so you learned to make do with what you had, and stretch that as far as possible. Canned goods had become quite common-place by the Thirties, but still, that was not necessarily money well-spent when there was likely a canner, stove, jars, rings and lids ready and waiting to be filled from the garden. Nearly all of every meal was home cooked.
Chicken was an inexpensive meat protein, and likely the reason for the GOP's promise Hoover would make sure there was "A chicken for every pot" in 1928- before the Crash of '29. A whole chicken provided eleven to twelve pieces of meat* to large families, or a chicken stew or soup that would feed the same group a few meals with dumplings or biscuits. Home canned green beans, mashed potatoes and gravy, biscuits or bread, and a cooked and sweetened fruit of some sort for dessert would round it out.
Fried chicken would've been cut up from whole, pieces soaked in buttermilk, seasoned with salt and pepper, rolled in flour, and fried in a few inches of lard in a huge black skillet. *yum* You can just hear your arteries clanging shut, can't you? Pour the leftover grease through a strainer into a can, and save that lard for later. Brown flour in the lard-coated skillet, then add the broth made up of gizzards and other chicken innards and the neck to make gravy while one of the kids mashed the 'taters. The green beans have been simmering, and when done are dressed with a knob of bacon grease- with crunchy bits. Slice some bread made with the potato water from the day before- coarse-grained and slightly sweet- and dessert was likely apples chunked up, and simmered till tender in a bit of sugar or honey or- wonder of wonders- a smidge of Karo syrup, and that there is food god eats. And none of it cost much- other than sweat.
Breakfast was likely bread and butter, maybe toasted over the flame on the stove, oats or grits, sometimes, as a treat, leftover biscuits or cornbread drizzled with a bit of homemade jelly and warm milk. Lunch might have been leftovers, but more likely a sandwich of cheese and homemade mayonnaise, or egg salad, or soup.
Company coming might get meatloaf- minced or ground beef mixed with breadcrumbs, seasoned with onions and bits of herbs hard come by. Ketchup might be store bought, might be homemade for a piquant topping- nothing like Heinz today- or rich brown gravy steaming on top and in the gravy boat rounded out the main dish. Dessert would be pie or maybe even rice or bread pudding.
Custards, tarts, aspics, casseroles and soups, meals were heavy on vegetables and starches (simple carbs) and filled with flavor from being fresh or home preserved. Women were expected to be at least "a good, plain cook", but even men could rustle up a hot meal for themselves if they had to..
You can make every single one of these today. Google the dish you want, then look at the recipe, and try the ones that say, "This was my Grannie's..." or "...found this in my Great Aunt's recipe box...." If a cook today discusses how they changed the recipe somehow, consider why- was it for convenience, flavor or substitution of a flavor better enjoyed; if that isn't clear, might steer clear of that recipe. Best idea, though, is to scour the thrift stores, Goodwill, antique shops and find those old cookbooks. One of my prized possessions is a Betty Crocker's Good and Easy cook book from 1954- it takes old-fashioned recipes and updates them a bit with some shortcuts (still not as short as sticking something in the micro) but leaves enough 'real' cooking in that you know you made something good. I think you can find one on Amazon- yup, sure can: https://www.amazon.com/Betty-Crockers-Good-easy-cookbook/dp/B0007FLKCA Look for older church ladies' cook books they self published as a fundraiser, and don't forget to search out old recipe boxes on file cards from older relatives.
All of those foods are available to you today, all you have to do is give it a try.
*Two legs, two thighs, two wings, four breast, one back, and one neck if not used for gravy broth- or even if it was!