"Gruel, Broth, and Bread."
http://www.theoldfoodie.com/2006/10/gruel-broth-and-bread.htmlExcerpted from the article:
"Today, October 2nd …
The general conditions of life in the workhouses of the Victorian era were often worse than in the prisons – but then there was hardly intended to be much difference, as a core principle of the Poor Law Amendment Act of 1834 was that workhouse conditions be sufficiently severe to act as a deterrent to admission. The punitive approach was in line with the prevailing feeling that the poor were that way because they were indolent and improvident – a convenient moral justification for the desire for minimal spending on social welfare.
Work in the workhouse ranged from the unpleasant to the excruciatingly hard and disgusting. One common job was the crushing of bone to make fertiliser, and there were many reports of inmates fighting over rotting bones to gnaw on – which is not surprising, when you consider the standard daily ration in 'the houses'.
Dietary orders were periodically reviewed, and on this day in 1871, the Board of Guardians of the workhouse in Aberystwyth in Wales submitted some changes for consideration by the Local Government Board. The suggestions were:
Breakfast (the same every day) was 6 oz bread, 1 ½ pint Oatmeal gruel.
On Sunday, dinner was 4 oz cooked meat, 16 oz potato, 2 oz bread, and supper was 6 oz. bread, 1 ½ pints Broth.
On Monday, dinner was 5 oz bread, 1 ¼ pints soup, and supper was 6 oz bread, 2 oz cheese.
With very slight variations (meat again on Thursday), this was the weekly ration for a man. Women, children, the elderly, infirm, and imbeciles got proportionately less...
...(From
Mrs. Beeton's)
Useful Soup for Benevolent Purposes.
Ingredients: An ox-cheek, any pieces of trimmings of beef, which may be bought very cheaply (say 4 lbs.), a few bones, any pot-liquor the larder may furnish, ¼ peck of onions, 6 leeks, a large bunch of herbs, ½ lb. of celery (the outside pieces, or green tops, do very well); ½ lb. of carrots, ½ lb. of turnips, ½ lb. of coarse brown sugar, ½ a pint of beer, 4 lbs. of common rice, or pearl barley; ½ lb. of salt, 1 oz. of black pepper, a few raspings, 10 gallons of water.
Mode: Cut up the meat in small pieces, break the bones, put them in a copper, with the 10 gallons of water, and stew for 1/2 an hour. Cut up the vegetables, put them in with the sugar and beer, and boil for 4 hours. Two hours before the soup is wanted, add the rice and raspings, and keep stirring till it is well mixed in the soup, which simmer gently. If the liquor reduces too much, fill up with water.
Note: The above recipe was used in the winter of 1858 by the Editress, who made, each week, in her copper, 8 or 9 gallons of this soup, for distribution amongst about a dozen families of the village near which she lives. The cost, as will be seen, was not great; but she has reason to believe that the soup was very much liked, and gave to the
members of those families, a dish of warm, comforting food, in place of the cold meat and piece of bread which form, with too many cottagers, their usual meal, when, with a little more knowledge of the "cooking" art, they might have, for less expense, a warm dish, every day..."
