Marguerite Patten

Anyone interested in cookery will know Marguerite Patten but if you remember rationing you'll recognise her name as a godsend.

Marguerite trained in domestic science before joining the Ministry of Food during WWII as one of a team of food advisors drawn from education, industry and nutrition backgrounds.

"Our job was to help people make the very best of the food that was available," explains Marguerite.

"We were based around the country in food advice centres which were basically shops we took over and installed cookers on platforms. Some had refrigerators but most didn't because they were difficult to get hold of and less than a quarter of British homes had one anyway. We very rarely worked in these centres because we preferred going out to wherever the people were who needed help. My first demonstration was on a market stall in Cambridge but we also gave demonstrations in hospital outpatient departments, in factory canteens and in big stores all over Britain."

Rationing was declared in January 1940, just a few months after war had been declared and didn't end completely until 1954. Most staples such as butter, milk and sugar were rationed whilst other items, such as cereals, were issued on a more complicated points system.

"The points were complicated," says Marguerite. "With rations you knew what you were going to get, but both systems depended on the availability of the food.

"Before the war we were a nation of great breakfast eaters, so it was difficult when people were faced with a ration of three rashers of bacon to last a week. The egg rationing was severe and many people, even in towns, kept hens to supplement their diet.

"When dried egg was introduced at the end of 1941 we were generally allowed a packet every four weeks which was equivalent to 12 eggs, but how much we got depended on how much managed to come over from America.

"Some people used paraffin for baking and thought it made lovely sponges but then the nutritionists discovered that liquid paraffin does a lot of harm to your stomach so we had to do demonstrations and try to persuade people not to use it. It sounds awful but if you were faced with having no fat you would try anything.

"Meat was the most difficult thing of all," she continues. "It was rationed by price, not by weight and you could have 1s 2d (6p) worth per person per week which would be about the size of two small lamb chops. You'd get more stewing steak or mince because that was cheaper."

As an example here are some of the rations:

butter 2oz (55g)/week
margerine 4oz (115g)/week
cooking fat/lard varied between 2-4oz (55-115g)/week
bacon 4oz (115g) or 3-4 rashers/week
eggs 1/fortnight
sweets 3oz (85g)/week at best
milk 2.5 pints/week
cheese 2oz (55g) although more for vegetarians
sugar 8oz (225g)/week
jam 1lb (450g)/eight weeks

It was up to Marguerite and her team to devise ways of eking out supplies and making the best of what was available.

Most people grew their own vegetables and allotments were like gold.

"People begged to have allotments and if you had a garden you dug up the flowers and replaced them with vegetables, although some people used to grow carrots in between their roses," laughs Marguerite.

"A wartime dinner plate, if you were going to feel well-fed, would have a tiny bit of meat, fresh peas in summer, carrots, turnip, parsnips and cabbage. There were no citrus fruits at all so we had to teach people how to use raw vegetables in salads to supplement their intake of vitamin C."

In the summer people would grow tomatoes which they'd bottle for the winter and if they got hold of summer fruit they also tried to keep enough sugar to make jam. Winter time was definitely the worst time of year to deal with rationing.

"Potatoes helped to fill us up," Marguerite continues. "We used it grated in steamed puddings and it gave a nice, moist texture so you weren't aware that you'd used so little fat.

"My favourite rationing recipe was for Woolton Pie, named after the most famous Minister for Food, Lord Woolton. He was having lunch one day in the Savoy Hotel and the chef produced this beautiful pie, even although hotels were rationed just like everyone else. It was a vegetable pie and we developed the recipe so that the public could use it.

"We told people that if they didn't have enough milk for the sauce they should use some of the stock from the vegetables. To thicken the sauce we advised a little oatmeal and if you didn't have enough fat for the pastry you could add some mashed potato which makes a very soft pastry or for a stiffer pastry you added grated raw potato which crisps up a treat. If you didn't have the ingredients for pastry you could top it with either plain mashed potato or mashed potato and swede."

Marguerite remembers the Ministry of Food fondly as always trying to make people happy in the face of adversity.

"We would devise recipes for special occasions such as Christmas or New Year," she explains. "In fact, I used my recipe for Christmas pudding long after rationing had finished.

"Another example of the Ministry's human side was that once or twice a year a ship would come in to a city such as Glasgow, carrying a small supply of oranges. They would be sold only on the children's ration book or sometimes special items would be diverted to areas that had been bombed to boost morale.

"It's often thought that we must have had extra rations for the VE Day street parties but we didn't – rationing was severe right up until 1953 and didn't end until a year later," she continues. "By 1945 we'd just got very clever at managing.

"Imagine you were living in a street in Glasgow and were going to have a street party to celebrate VE Day. Lots of people would have come knocking at your door offering help. During wartime we knew everyone round about us because we always looked out for our neighbours to make sure they were safe and well. Some neighbours would offer to make sandwiches, give the odd pot of jam or spare cheese rations. There was a wonderful feeling of everyone working together and it was a time when we cared about each other."

And what about Marguerite's own VE Day – what does she remember of it?

"I can't believe that I really was there," she laughs. "I had a young daughter and my husband was flying with the RAF and on VE Day he was in the air over West Africa.

"Like many young wives at the time I was living with my mother and when I got home from the Ministry that day my mother said that my sister and I ought to go to London because it was going to be an occasion we'd never forget.

"We didn't really understand what she meant until we got there. We were among the hundreds of thousands of people in front of Buckingham Palace and my mother was quite right – it was the most incredible evening. We laughed, we danced, we sang, we embraced people we'd never met before and would never meet again – it was wonderful. We got the train home in the early hours of the morning and for the first time in years we weren't frightened.

"My brother was in the Merchant Navy off the coast of Australia and his ship had been chased by a Japanese submarine so although we rejoiced during VE Day the war wasn't over for us until VJ Day."

After the war Marguerite became the country's first celebrity chef with regular shows on television and radio. She has also written over 100 books and was awarded the OBE in 1991 for her "services to the art of cookery".