Recipes from World War I (Part 3) - Sweetless (Sugarless)

[This posting of Special Collections News follows the ones of January 16 (Meatless) and February 12 (Wheatless) that presented recipes for meat and flour alternatives.  Today we focus on sugar alternatives, as revealed in the same publications read by farm women:  the weekly Progressive Farmer and the pamphlets and newsletter of the North Carolina Agricultural Extension Service (now called North Carolina Cooperative Extension).]

During World War I the U.S. Food Administration did not promote “sugarless” days as it did “wheatless” and “meatless” days, but it did encourage Americans to consume less so more could be sent to Europe for our troops and allies.  At the time, sugar was considered nutritional because it was thought of as a high energy food.  Although the United States didn't ration sugar, increased demand resulted in shortages.  A number of published recipes were created or revised with a variety of sweeteners in mind, including molasses, corn syrup, honey, and others (some called for only partial substitutions and used some sugar).   This posting of Special Collections News presents a few of these. 

Baked Goods

Sweet baked goods, such as cakes, pies, quick breads, muffins, etc., typically included substantial amounts of sugar, so home economists of the time published recipes that used less.  The Extension publication Plans for Community Club Work in the Study of Foods and Household Conveniences suggested making pies from dried fruit because they require “very little sugar."  More common were recipes that used sugar alternatives, such as molasses gingerbreads and similar spice-type cakes, such as this one for applesauce cake in the 12 January 1918 Progressive Farmer (p. 17):

Two cups apple sauce (unsweetened), two cups Orleans molasses, half a cup shortening, two teaspoons soda, three cups flour, one cup chopped raisins and nuts, one teaspoon each allspice, nutmeg, and cinnamon.  Simmer together the apple sauce and molasses until dark red or brown.  Let cool and add shortening, soda, flour, floured fruit and spices.  Bake in a slow oven from two to two and a half hours.

Honey was another sweetener featured in World War I recipes.  The Progressive Farmer for 1 December 1917 (p. 15) carried this one for “Persimmon and Honey Brownies”:

One-third cupful shortening, ½ cupful extracted honey, 1/3 teaspoonful soda, one egg, 1 2/3 cupfuls flour, ¼ teaspoonful salt, 1 square melted chocolate, 2/3 cupfuls raisins or persimmons, 2/3 cupful chopped nuts.

Warm honey slightly but do not let it get hot.  Add the soda and then the shortening.  Beat well.  Add the well-beaten egg, the melted chocolate, then the flour and salt sifted together, and lastly the persimmons, and nuts cut and floured.  Stir stiff, adding more flour if necessary.  Drop by spoonfuls on well-greased tins and bake in a moderate oven.

Candy

Alternative sweeteners for candy were more tricky because of the consistency and texture that sugar provides.  The 24 November 1917 Progressive Farmer (p. 15) flat out told people not to eat candy at all.  It did concede that “the craving of the child for sweets however, should not be disregarded.”  Instead, it recommended giving children “oatmeal candy,” which combined sugar and molasses: 

Three and one-half pounds of sugar, one and one-half cups molasses, one-half pound of the oatmeal, two ounces of powdered ginger, and two and a half cups of water.  Put the sugar, water and molasses into a saucepan over a hot fire and let boil ten minutes.  Take from the fire and with the back of a wooden spoon stir slowly until the whole looks creamy.  Then mix the oatmeal and ginger gently into the syrup.  Stir well and pour into well buttered and papered tins.  Let stand for four hours.  With a sharp knife cut into cubes, and roll each cube in oiled paper.

A year later the Progressive Farmer contained the article “Thanksgiving Sweets without Sugar” (16 November 1918, p. 21) that included these recipes:

Popcorn Balls.—1 cup syrup [corn, sorghum, or home-made; see end of this posting], 1 tablespoon vinegar, 2 or 3 quarts of popped corn.  Boil together the syrup and vinegar until syrup hardens when dropped in cold water.  Pour over freshly popped corn and mould [sic] into balls or fancy shapes.

Honky Dory.—2 cups popped corn, 1 cup pecan or walnut meats, 3 cakes sweet chocolate, 2 tablespoons rich cream.  Break the chocolate into small pieces and melt it over hot water.  As soon as it is melted, add the cream, corn and nuts.  Stir quickly with a silver fork and lift out in small lumps.  Place on waxed paper to dry.

Jams, Jellies, and Canning

Throughout the 1910s (and later), a major project of Extension’s home demonstration program was teaching farm women to can fresh produce, and sugar was an essential ingredient for many canning recipes.  During the war it distributed many pamphlets, some authored by Jane McKimmon, such as Canning and Preserving with 4-H Recipes (Extension Circular No. 11) and The Canning of Fruits and Vegetables by 4-H Recipes (Extension Circular No. 76). 

To cut out sugar completely would affect the canning process negatively, but the amount of sugar could be reduced.  In Extension Farm-News on 22 June 1918 McKimmon said “all fruits and berries are much better in flavor when canned with a certain amount of sugar, but it is not necessary that enough sugar should be used to make the fruit as sweet as may be desirable when it is served for the table.”  She recommended making a syrup by boiling 1 pint of sugar in 1 gallon of water and packing the fruit and berries in that solution.  (For other syrup types, see the end of this posting; for sugar amounts used in canning prior to the war, see Canning and Preserves with 4-H Recipes, p. 16).  The resulting canned produce would require less sugar when served, “and the total amount used [for both canning and serving] will be far less than what would have been required to sweeten satisfactorily fruit canned with no sugar at all.”

A few months later the Progressive Farmer (24 August 1918, p. 13) published  recipes that used sugar “as the family will want a few jams and preserves if the sugar allowance permits.”  It said people could get sugar from county food administrators--if there was a supply and “only by signing a paper which declares that you will use it only for canning and preserving.  This as you see is necessary to prevent unthinking persons from making candy, pie and puddings with it.”

That summer Extension encouraged use of sugar alternatives for canning and recommended sorghum, corn, and cane syrups.  In the 28 September 1918 Extension Farm-News (under “Keep the Sugar Going to the Boys”) McKimmon said “the State has produced the home-made sirups, and with a little changing of recipes, really delicious desserts can be concocted, using them in the place of sugar.”  The article gave this table for substituting corn syrup for sugar in canning:

1 3/5 cup corn syrup for 1 cup sugar.

1 1/5 cup corn syrup for ¾ cup sugar.

4/5 cup corn syrup for ½ cup sugar.

2/5 cup corn syrup for ¼ cup sugar.

1 1/15 cup corn syrup for 2/3 cup sugar.

The 10 August 1918 Extension Farm-News recommended these proportions for sorghum, molasses, and “home-made syrups” in canning:    

Canned peaches – ¼ cup syrup and ¾ cup water for each pint jar

Peach marmalade- ½ cup of boiled syrup for each cup of cooked fruit

Apple marmalade - ½ cup of boiled syrup for each cup of cooked fruit

Mixed fruit marmalade – ½ cup of syrup to each cup of fruit mixture, with these suggested mixtures:

                1 cup cooked peach, 1 cup cooked apple, ½ cup raw grated pineapple

                1 cup cooked apple and 1 cup cook quince

                1 cup cooked pear and ½ cup raw grated pineapple

The article recommended that when using syrups for marmalades and fruit butter “to use little or no water in the cooking of the fruit and cook the fruit till soft and tender before combining with the syrup.  For sorghum and other home-made syrups [but not corn syrup], the article suggested they “are improved by this boiling with soda and skimming before using in the fruit combinations.”  The article also included this recipe: 

Fair jelly can be made from currants, sour, juicy apples, partly ripe grapes, quinces, and clear yellow corn syrup by using from ¼ to ½ as much syrup as fruit juice; and in the cooking of the fruit using less water than when sugar is to be used in the jelly-making.

At least once Extension Farm-News (17 August 1918) suggested honey as a sugar alternative, in a grape jelly recipe:

Wash grapes, pick from stems, and crush.  Heat slowly and boil until juice is extracted.  Strain through cheesecloth and strain again through a flannel jelly-bag.  Measure juice, put back to boil and add, gradually, three-fourths as much honey as juice.  Boil rapidly until a sheet is formed on side of spoon.  This will be about 223 degrees F.  Pour immediately in hot sterilized jelly glasses and skim carefully with a teaspoon.  When cold pour on melted paraffin.

It concluded the recipe by stating that “corn sirup may be used in place of honey—three-fourths of a cup to one cup of juice.”

Sugarless Food Preservation

Sometimes Extension Farm-News ran articles about canning foods that did not require sweeteners during the processing.  The 14 September 1918 issue had Jane McKimmon’s recipe for canning sweet potatoes, reprinted from her pamphlet The Canning of Fruits and Vegetables by 4-H Recipes (Extension Circular No. 76).  On 21 September 1918 Extension Farm-News contained extensive instructions on canning muscadine grape juice without sugar. 

A food preservation alternative to canning that didn't require sugar was dehydration, but the publications of the time devoted little attention to it.  The 15 June 1918 Extension Farm-News and the 7 September 1918 Progressive Farmer (p. 14) did run articles on drying fruit and vegetables, but they seem to have missed the value of this technique during the sugar shortages.  Instead, the Progressive Farmer claimed that “to discourage canning is not our purpose at all for we still advise and urge our Progressive Farmer family to keep every fruit jar full.  But there are not jars to go around sometimes nor is it always desirable to use them.”  Extension Farm-News stated "when canning is not feasible, or tin and glass containers are too expensive or are not obtainable, drying affords a practical means of saving the surplus products that otherwise would be wasted."  Perhaps the reason Progressive Farmer downplayed dehydration was because it believed “ . . . that some of the vitamins so essential to growth and complete nutrition are destroyed by drying.”  On the otherhand, Extension Farm-News repeated U.S. government claims " . . . that dried products are equal to the canned."

"Methods of Saving Sugar" by Minnie L. Jamison (From Methods of Saving Sugar, Fats, Wheat, and Meat, Extension Circular No. 59, North Carolina Agricultural Extension Service, October 1917, p. 3)

1. Use honey and syrups of all kinds.

2. Syrup made of peach parings and seeds.

3. Syrup made of left over fruit juices.

4. Syrup made of canned fruit juices.

5. Use fruit jams or marmalades as spreads.

6. Make jam of hard pears (one gallon pears, one lemon, two oranges). Use as spreads between meals.

7. Bake fruit long and slowly to develop fruit sugar.

8. Dried fruit cooked slowly in little water develops fruit sugar.

9. Sweet potato biscuit or puffs—saves sugar and flour.

10. Omit all frostings for cakes.

11. Make war cakes.

12. Use raisins, dates, figs and prunes to save sugar.

13. 3 oz. (6 tablespoons) per day per person is sufficient.

Granulated sugar may be replaced by:  brown sugar, cane syrup, and honey.