Weird Foods People Ate to Get Through the Great Depression

Let’s bust one Great Depression myth right off the bat, courtesy of Megan McArdle: “even at the height of the Depression, when a quarter of the workforce was unemployed, most people were not on relief, and most were not suffering malnutrition.” Even if it wasn’t all hobos sharing beans on a garbage can lid, the American diet during the Great Depression did change dramatically, thanks to the rise of the refrigerator, and, of course, the prioritization of thrift.

#TheGreatDepression #FoodHistory #WeirdHistory

[jacquelynejohnson]

My mother made this horrible lime jello with frozen peas and Mayo and grated carrots. When my siblings and I saw it on the buffet table we would wince ! We ate it because it made her happy! Then one year we confessed, turns out she didn't like it either and was only making because we were eating it, therefore she thought we liked and was making it to make us happy. Bless her heart, RIP .

[xfuriousapex]

I once asked my grandmother about the Depression. She said she read all about in the newspaper. “We were poor before the depression. We were poor during the depression. We were poor after the depression. It made no difference to us.”

[joygernautm]

There’s actually a channel on YouTube called cooking with Clara, which featured an elderly woman in her 90s making meals that they would have during the depression. She has passed on now but her videos are still up on the channel

[WholeHeartily]

I was raised by my gramma who was born in the 50s, so her mom is from the Great Depression. She said her mom used to feed an entire family of 10 with one chicken… only later in life did she realize how amazing that was.
As an adult I understand and I’m happy to say they passed on their knowledge 🥰

…you gotta spatchcock the chicken btw, and Dad gets the biggest portion (cuz he works) and the kid’s portion depends on age. Then, you use the spine to make a broth, which you use to cook 2 cups of rice in (stretch it with water and add salt/Misc veg). It’s actually delicious and yummy and just feels like southern soulfood instead of a struggle meal.

My dads mom made a lot of cabbage, corn, beans, and meatloaf… but he was an only child so they were relatively “wealthy”

[Jaime]

The 1920s my 20s
🤝
The great depression

[Mohawks_and_Tomahawks]

This whole time I thought I was being creative, turns out I was just poor...

[lauranewlin]

My great grandmother helped to raise me. She was born in 1905. I always tell people I'm proud to have been raised by depression era folks because I know how to stretch a dollar and to make a meal out of scraps. My favorite meals she made were SOS and Chicken and Dumplings. Although she could take any leftover meat and make a croquette which she would serve with gravy and mashed potatoes. I miss her.

[marie-noelledouard]

Thanks for the video! 😁If I could just add a tiny precision: it was not Thomas Jefferson himself who came with mac and cheese in the U.S. but it was his enslaved chef, James Hemings. Indeed, after visiting Europe in the 1780s, Jefferson fell in love with this dish. After coming back to the U.S, he held big receptions where was served the famous mac and cheese cooked by James Hemings who succeeded to recreate the recipe that Jefferson adored.

[crimsonclover]

I can remember my sweet grandmother telling me during the depression, she would boil hickory nuts for oil to season her beans or vegetables, also one person in the community could afford a newspaper, after they had read it it was passed around to everyone. She was always very thrifty. She died at the age of one hundred and one, and I miss her everyday.

[alanbirkner]

I am 71. In home economics class we made mock apple pie and prune whip. My grandparents were immigrants and were famous for feeding anyone who came
to their door. Tina

[freakinfrugal]

Creamed chipped beef is still a thing. Stouffers makes it and I know actual humans who buy it with real money and eat it.

[mattmccain]

When I was a little kid in the 70s, my grand parents and great grand parents never talked about their childhood or young adult years in the depression or war years. I never could understand them and their love of food. They lived for it..Some of it quite wierd. All I learned was nothing made an old person more upset than a little kid who is a picky eater, complaining about the food put in front of them or the need to clean your plate even if you was full..wasting food was a no no. You were forced to sit at the table untill everything was eaten .
Like I said, nothing was explained or taught to me and my cousins. It was : just eat and keep your mouth shut. I didn't learn until much later what they went through and lived without. I went without solid food one summer for almost two months. It was then that I learned what hunger really is and how it alters your sense of taste and your mindset. Looking back on them almost half a century later, I am grateful. I tell young people today that they may one day face going without and gladly eating things they would otherwise never touch much less taste. That all this food they see could one day be gone easily..My grandparents called my generation spoiled back then..now I know what they mean. Be grateful for the food God puts in front of you.

[tonyapence-askin]

When I got pregnant for the first time, my husband's grandfather made me eat dandelion salad. I asked my OB if it was safe and she told me to eat all of the dandelion salad he could make me. I loved it. He grew up during the depression with 13 siblings. That man could stretch anything.

[ROBYNMARKOW]

My dad told me my grandma would make "Imaginary Sandwiches" for him & two older sisters. It was basically just ketchup on bread & u could "Imagine" any other thing u wanted along w/it..

[acuteteacher]

My grandmother (born in 1908) said that the whole time she was pregnant with my aunt (born in 1935) that about all she had to eat was oatmeal. My aunt seemed healthy enough and eventually earned a master's degree and was a high school history teacher for many years.

[jessicam.]

I didn’t live during the depression, but we grew up rather poor. A LOT of the meals in this video are things my mother made for us. The “goulash” of noodles, ground meat, and tomatoes, sh*t on a shingle, mulligan stew, hotdogs in everything, Kraft dinner with fried potatoes (for days! Lol), it’s all a part of my childhood and honestly it’s my comfort foods!!

[jacqueline]

My nana is 101 and I love hearing her talk about the Great Depression and World Wars. She was lucky enough to live on a farm, so her family didn't suffer as much as other people. They also fed people who would come by and need food, then they'd sleep on the back porch and would be gone by morning.

[cmerks]

My grandparents taught me bananas, saltines and milk was a good snack. I assume a result of the depression

[McScott]

My grandparents were married as teenagers in the beginning of the depression. Their first house was an old chicken coop on my grandpa's parents farm. They cleaned it out, fixed it up and lived in it for a few years. My grandma said they could lie in bed and see the stars through the cracks in the walls. She lived to 96 and lived on her own until age 95, carrying her own firewood and continuing to tend a vegetable garden until she was forced to move into a home. The depression gave her an iron will and a survivor spirit. They don't make them like that anymore.

[theferalboy]

my grandmother lived through the great depression and my favorite thing she made is something i rarely, if ever, see anyone mention- chocolate gravy. Sounds awful, but honestly, it was something all of us looked forward to more than almost any other meal she cooked because it was a rare treat. it was her way of being able to give her kids something sweet using ingredients she always had.