1901 Workhouse Diet Survival Strategy

I had a really bad time on the gruel-and-bread 1834 diet. To be brutally honest, the gruel was as bad on the way out as it was on the way in. And now, starting tomorrow, I have to do it all again for the 1901 diet.

So, during this 'break' week, I’ve eaten loads (and I sincerely mean LOADS) of fruit and vegetables while I’ve been planning what to do about the oncoming gruel-tanker that is the 1901 diet. I really don’t fancy another experience like last time. 

I asked myself if food in the workhouse could really still be as bad as all that in 1901? I mean, that’s only just over 100 years ago, and most of my life has so far been lived in that same century. Surely we had moved on from gruel by 1901? 

Happily, my research has revealed that workhouse food did improve in the 1900s -but there was still gruel on the menu.

And so to the history bit: Records show there were increasing complaints and concerns about the quality and quantity of workhouse food during the last few decades of the 1800s. Finally in 1901 the Local Government Board decreed that standards must be raised, and produced a manual and a training program for workhouse cooks.

I have a copy of the manual. We know that cheap, but now thicker, gruel still featured, and it was probably eaten for breakfast. Other than that, the newly trained Edwardian cooks could choose whichever meal combinations they thought best. Norfolk workhouse cooks didn’t seem to write any of their choices down (or if they did, they’re now long lost), so I have no option but to make up my own meal plans. 

I’ve done gruel, and it was disgusting. In 1901 they doubled the amount of oatmeal back to two ounces per pint of water, exactly like the older 1797 diet. So I have tasted it (YouTube video here) and I’ve run out of expletives, so I’ve decided to give gruel a miss this time.

I've opted to eat normally for the week, with one daily exception: my main evening meal. That’s when I’ll be trying out the 1901 workhouse meal recipes. My family will be joining me on this venture (they don’t know about it yet, but I’m the one who cooks tea in our house, so they really have no choice)!

George tucks into Hog Roast at GFW

Luckily they won't have too bad a time, because the 1901 diet includes pasties, shepherd's pie, roly poly pudding and all sorts of other relatively normal sounding meals. 

From a cookery perspective, it will be interesting for me to put away all my shop-prepared 'essentials' like frozen pastry and to make meals entirely from scratch. I'm no Delia, but I'm not a terrible cook -and lets be clear, no ready-meals ever darken my doorstep- but I do like the convenience of bottled sauces with pasta, and I admit I am no stranger to the pre-washed potato. 

The first day of the 1901 diet coincides with a super event at Gressenhall, 'The Workhouse Experience'. Do come!

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The Beer Necessities

With three weeks to go before I embark on this insane dietary odyssey I have had a thorough look at the first diet. This is the one from 1797. Here's a reminder:

Some surprises. Of twenty one meals, 12 are bread, with either cheese, butter or treacle, but only four are Oliver Twist's favourite, gruel. And here's the real jaw-dropper: BEER FOR BREAKFAST? I had a count-up, and twelve of the twenty one meals I'll be eating include beer. Mostly at breakfast time. Now, I am no stranger to the tankard, but beer for breakfast is definitely not what I expected.

I realised I had a few other questions, too. For instance, I haven't a clue what the following meals are:

Milk-broth. Frumenty. Pease-pottage. Milk-pottage.  

I like the sound of Frumenty. It feels as though it should be a bit naughty, and perhaps taking place behind a haystack.

Pease-pottage? I recognise that from nursery rhyme days and can hazard a guess it's made of- well, peas. Let's hope it's not hot, cold or in the pot nine days old.

Milk-pottage sounds disgusting, and I'd like to direct that dairy-based bowl of wickedness to take a long walk off a short cliff. It can take its shameless little sister Milk-broth with it, for that matter.

Other questions popped up: what sort of boiled meat- and how much of it? What type and quantity of bread? And what sort of cheese (please let it be bacon sarnies and Dairylea triangles)?

I've scanned my copies of Delia and Jamie but funnily enough, they don't seem to give cooking instructions for any of these carbohydrate-rich curiosities, or suet pudding, or gruel. But I bet Nigella's got a good recipe for dumplins.

Luckily, I have a team of experts on hand: Megan Dennis, curator at Gressenhall, Steve Pope, researcher and workhouse expert extraordinaire, and Lucy Child, dietician and general all-round Good Egg (Lucy is, incidentally, probably the only egg of any type to feature in this diet).

Steve says the cheese would be made backwards*, and the bread would be more or less the sweepings off the mill floor. He says the main beverage would be beer due to necessity, the low alcohol content being enough to kill the bugs dwelling in the 18th century water supply.

Megan says that the vegetables 'served in great plenty' would be just that, but none of us really know what sort of size the portions were. Our educated guesses tell us that if there were less people in the workhouse, there would be more food per person.

Lucy reckons the bread would be similar to rye bread, and the diet won't kill me.

Steve has recommended a book of recipes and suggested I get on with it.


Living The Workhouse Diet:1797 begins on April 26th 2014. Follow Rachel on Twitter @workhousediet or on her Facebook page 

*Edam. It's the cheesiest joke in the world.