Weekend Cooking #17: Happy St. Patrick’s Day

Today is the day everyone is Irish.  Here, in NYC, this is celebrated in a big way with a huge parade up Fifth Avenue.  This year marks the 251st St. Patrick’s Day Parade.   It began back on March 17, 1762, when a group of Irish immigrants decided to get together on lower Broadway and celebrate being Irish.  Being Irish in Ireland was forbidden at the time, but here they could speak Irish, dance Irish play the Irish pipes and just revel in their Irish pride and ‘the wearing of the green.’  

Unlike the Thanksgiving Day Parade, which was cancelled during World War II, the St. Patrick’s Day Parade was held every year, with varying numbers of marchers and viewers, but always honoring the members of the armed forces.  

Now, I have always like a nice Corned Beef and Cabbage meal, with boiled potatoes and some home baked Irish Soda Bread on St. Patrick’s Day.  But I was curious about what people could eat given wartime rationing to celebrate this holiday, so I looked up some of the recommended recipes from the New York Times.

Nothing was very St. Patrick’s Dayish:

In 1942, Mock Goose 

In 1943, Ox Joints with Vegetables

In 1944, Scalloped Eggplant

In 1945, Bologna Stuffed with Cabbage

But I thought for sure there would be come kind of Irish treat once the war was over, so I looked up 1946 and found Vegetable Loaf.

I am learning to appreciate the hardships of wartime rationing more and more as I write Weekend Cooking posts, but since I am a traditionalist at heart, I am including a recipe for Irish Soda Bread that was given to me by a neighbor who had brought it with her from the Emerald Isle.  I have made it lots of times and it is delicious.

Irish Soda Bread

4 1/4 cups of flour

1/4 lb butter

1 egg 

2 cups of milk

1 tsp vanilla

4 tsp baking soda

1/2 cup sugar

pinch of salt

3 tbsp caraway seeds

2 cups raisins

1- Beat the egg, milk and vanilla together

2- By hand, blend the butter and flour together

3- By hand, mix together with remaining ingredients except the raisins

4- Now mix in the raisins, also by hand

Put into a well greased dutch oven 

Bake at 400℉ for 20 minutes

After 20 minutes, add a pan of boiling water to the bottom of the oven

10 minutes later lower oven to 350℉

Continue baking for 40 minutes or until knife come out dry when inserted in the middle of the bread.

For something really grand, serve this hot with a lovely cup of tea.

Weekend Cooking is a weekly meme hosted by Beth Fish Reads

Defiance (Resistance Book 2) by Carla Jablonski and Leland Purvis

Defiance is the second book in the Resistance trilogy by writer Carla Jablonski and artist Leland Purvis.  It begins in 1943, a year after Book 1 ends.   Tensions are now higher and supplies are lower.  To make matter worse, the Germans have formed a paramilitary group of Frenchmen called the Milice to do their dirty work, as well as instituting a policy of sending young French men and women to labor camps in Germany to help in their war effort. Paul Tessier, his older sister Sylvie and younger sister Marie are still working underground with the French Resistance.

Paul is still posting his anti-Nazi pictures around the village, but now he is also directing his skills towards the Milice.  And he is getting impatient with the resistance movement using propaganda instead of weapons, on orders from Charles DeGaulle in London.  

One day, after making a propaganda delivery, Paul finds the house empty, and his mother in their winery cellar demanding more wine to convert into fuel.and pouring heating oil into the ancient casks used to age the wine, and ruining them, infuriating Paul even more.

Paul’s older sister Sylvie is asked by her boyfriend Jacques to cozy up to the Germans to try to get information for the resistance.  But Sylvie storms off because she feels she is being used.  Jacques tells Paul about the Marquis, resistance workers who are hiding out in the woods, and that he wanted Sylvie to find out how much the Germans know about Marquis.  

Jacques is sent to Germany for labor service, but when she finds out he escaped and is hiding out with the Marquis, Sylvie changes her mind about helping the resistance by gathering intelligence through flirting.  

Paul finally is seen hanging up one of his anti-Nazi posters and realizes he, too, must go into hiding.  But will he be able to find the Marquis and even if he does, will they allow his to become one of them?

Once again the combination of Jablonski, Leland and Sycamore have produced an excellent graphic novel about events effecting the French in World War II.  I have read some criticism of this second book in the Resistance trilogy that it does not stand alone.   Yet, if you read the brief description at the beginning of the story and the Author’s Note at the end, Defiance can easily be read as a stand alone novel, though, of course, it is better if read after reading Book 1, Resistance.

Another criticism is that the artwork depicting the female characters is confusing.  I also thought this when I read Resistance, however, after a few pages I realized there is an each way to tell everyone apart.  Each character wears the same color throughout.  So - Paul wears a blue shirt, little sister Marie wears pink and though Sylvie and Aunt Celia both wear green, they are easy to tell apart.

The only thing that mars this otherwise excellent graphic novel is a lack of explanation about who Marshall Petain and General DeGaulle are and the role they played for France in World War II.  On the other hand, if you are using this as a text in a class, it is definitely a teachable opportunity.  Otherwise, Defiance is a exciting, informative novel based on real events in France while it was under Nazi occupation.  

Book 3, Victory, will be available on July 17, 2012 and I am really looking forward to reading it.

This book is recommended for readers age 12 and up

This book was borrowed from the Webster Branch of the NYPL

Defiance

Carla Jablonksi, author

Leland Purvis, illustrator

Hilary Sycamore, colorist

First-Second

2011

Sunday Funnies #6: Comics for Defense

One of the ways that the government financed World War II was by selling war bonds.  Beginning in December 1942, a series of eight war bond drives began, the last one held in December 1945.  Advertising for the sale of war bonds was donated and, when it was all over, more than $156 billion was raised in the 8 bonds drives held, despite the fact that money was so tight for the average citizen.  

To encourage already strapped people to buy war bonds, the government employed all kinds of publicity.  Movie stars, radio stars, singing stars and sports stars were all enlisted to help, often appearing at massive rallies or sporting events during bond drives.

Left: a bond drive on Wall Street
Center: 1943 three day Cavalcade of Stars bond drive
(how many stars do you recognize?)
Right: 1943 Brooklyn Dogers war bond honor card

Kids were also encouraged to do their bit for the war and to buy bonds at school.  But how do you get kids to part with their hard won nickels and dimes?  One way was by having some of their favorite comic book/scomic strip characters sound the appeal.  And these characters all got into the swing of it, as you can see here:

Batman, Superman and a host of other superheroes, as well as
Willie and Joe by Bill Mauldin, a particular favorite comic strip
during the war

Jane Arden was a reporter like Lois Lane and Brenda Star
who was involved in the war from the very beginning

Even Santa was enlisted to sell war bonds to children:

Coming Attractions: Walt Disney and friends.

The Girl is Murder by Kathryn Miller Haines

Veteran mystery writer Kathryn Miller Haines has penned her first YA mystery and like her adult mysteries, it is set in New York City during World War II.  And though it is war time, the war seems to play the part of another character.  The story isn’t war related, but the action couldn’t happen if there wasn’t a war happening. 

It is the first day at her new school for 15 year old Iris Anderson and she is understandably nervous.  A former student at the post Upper East Side private girls’ school, Chapin, she is about to begin public school on the Lower East Side. 

Just before her Pop came home from the war, having lost a leg at Pearl Harbor, her mother had inexplicably committed suicide.  Now, out of money, Iris and her dad have moved into a cheaper place downtown, where he has resumed the detective business. 

At school, the first person Iris meets is Suze, a tough girl smoking in the girls‘ room with her friends.  But Iris and Suze actually manage to bond - Suze has a boyfriend in the army and Iris lies about her dad being home.  She also meet Tom Barney, good looking guy who helps her find her class.  

At home, Iris overhears a client telling her father he is dissatisfied with proving his wife’s unfaithfulness.  Iris decides to help out, manages to get photos of the cheating wife, but her father gets angry instead of appreciating her efforts.  He wants her to stay out of his business because she doesn’t know or understand how to properly detect.

But when Tom Barney goes missing, and Iris has capitalizes of her bond with Suze to get in good with Tom’s friends, she find she can’t stay out of her father’s business, especially when she learns there is a connection between Tom and her best friend from Chapin, the very well to do Grace Dunwitty.

Kathryn Miller Haines has created a realistic historical fiction novel and a good mystery, though in this first book od a series the mystery falls a little flat.  But that is ok, because the real purpose of this novel is to introduce and familiarize the reader with Iris, her family, her friends, and her environment and Haines has done an excellent job at recreating 1942 New York.

And Iris is an interesting character.  Once a happy, carefree girl who had whatever she wanted, she is now forced to become more ‘street smart‘ with her change of circumstances and, yes, she has taken up lieing to her father.  Haines does a good job of making this change seem plausible.  It doesn’t just happen, Iris makes all kinds of mistakes right from the start because she is impulsive and doesn’t always think things through very well.  But she learns from her mistakes.  Originally, I didn't care much for Iris, but she grew on me and I ended up finding her a very likable character.  

Zoot Suit Dancer

I even liked the Rainbows, even though they were supposed to be the school badies - teens who cut classes, went dancing at the Savoy Ballroom in Harlem, and even smoke a lot and drink not so much. The girls dress suggestively. the boys go dancing in Zoot Suits.  Haines includes a disturbing but realistic episode about the Zoot Suits, which were considered very unpatriotic because the large amount of material used to make them should have gone to the war effort.  And there are other realistic touches throughout the book, adding to its appeal.  When I was in high school in NYC, there were groups just like the Rainbows, even that many years later.

The story is fast paced, full of 1940s slang and so New Yorkish, I kept wanting an egg cream while I read it.  Haines brings up and deals with issues around race, class and touches on religion, all very much a part of the time.  

This book is recommended for readers age 12 and up.

This book was purchased for my personal library.


This trailer is great:

My Family for the War by Anne C. Voorhoeve

For a short time between December 2,1938 and September 1, 1939, trainloads of Jewish children under the age of 17 were sent from Germany to Great Britain for safety.  Altogether, almost 10,000 children and teens made the trip.  My Family for the War is a novel about how the Kindertransport changed the life of one child.

Frnaziska Mangold,10, thought of herself as a Protestant girl living a comfortable life in Berlin. Her family, originally Jewish, had converted generations ago, and though she considered herself to be Christian, now the Nazis don’t.  Marked as a Jew, life has become precarious for her and her best friend Bekka Liebich.  They have even mapped out as many hiding places as they could find in their Berlin neighborhood, just in case they needed to escape from some Nazi bullies.  

When a sponsorship to come to America fell through for the Liebich family, Bekka is registered for the Kindertransport, and at the last minute, so is Ziska.  But only Ziska is chosen.  Just before she leaves for Britain, her mother gives her the cross she had received years ago at her confirmation to remember her by.  Ziska promises never to take it off until they are together again.

It takes a while in Britain before Ziska finally finds a place in a family.  The Shepards, Matthew, Amanda and the teenage son Gary are orthodox Jews, so when Amanda sees Ziska’s cross, she doesn’t really want her to stay with them.  But it is Gary who decides he wants her as a sister, and Anglicizes her name to Frances.  

Life eventually settles down for Frances, and becomes even better as she begins to learn English.  But it is not without its troubles, too.  First, Frances has to contend with the guilt she feels about being chosen to go to Britain and leaving Bekka behind.  

Later, remembering her promise to try to find a way to get her family sponsored to come to England, Frances starts sneaking off to the Cafe Vienna, a expat hangout for Germans and Austrians.  She never finds help there, but she does meet Professor Schueler, who becomes a good friend to her.  Frances had been told about the Cafe Vienna while crossing the English Channel to Britain by a boy named Walter Glücklich, who, with his father, also becomes good friends.  

As the war begins in earnest, and things go from bad to worse, Ziska must struggle to grow up and survive the war at the same time. An the surrogate family she has surrounded herself with as the war intensifies help her do this?   

For the most part, I found My Family for the War to be a very interesting novel, though I had a few problems with it.  There is a long bit about Ziska mistaking the Mezuzah hanging on the door frames in the Shepard house for the mailbox, which seemed somewhat forced to me, given that a Mezuzah is only about 2 inches long as a rule.  I was also disturbed by a feeling that Ziska’s real family receded into the background too quickly, and too easily replaced by the Shepards.

On the other hand, this novel is a real coming of age story, showing Ziska/Frances‘ transition from childhood to young adulthood, but it is more than that.  Condemned for being a Jew in Germany, she discovers this part of herself living with the Shepards, proudly learning what being a Jew really is about.

    

To her credit, however, Voorhoeve has provided the reader with a perspective of the Kindertransport program that is rarely written about for young readers.  Though not everything is easy for Ziska/Frances from the beginning, the point is made that she has a better life with her foster family than many of the other Kindertransport children have, case in point is her friend Walter Glücklich.

This book is recommended for readers age 12 and up.

This book is an ARC received from the publisher

Read an excerpt of My Family for the War here.

More information on the Kindertransport program can be found at the United States Holocaust Memorial Museum

and at The Kindertransport Association

    

My Family for the War (originally Liverpool Street)

Anne C. Voorhoeve

Trans. Tammi Reichel

Dial Books for Young Readers

2012

412 Pages