Grandma’s recipes

Edited by Wendy Pang

Grandma’s recipes

Edited by Wendy Pang

Thanks
Special thanks to Sandra Routley for passing on Lizzie Moody’s recipes and sparking the idea that recipes are something
that link us to the women in our history. Thanks also to:
Irma Gold, University of Canberra, for her guidance through the project
Adrienne, Deb, Kate, and Rhonda — fellow editors in the Advanced Editing course, for thoughtful suggestions
Michael Pang, for the graphic design
Copyright holders for recipe text and photos: Kenneth Draney, Roy and Spencer Featherstone, Rose Komduur, Gay
Middleton, Robert and Wendy Pang, and Sandra Routley.

Grandma's Recipes
ISBN: 978-0-9806119-0-8 (online)
ISBN: 978-0-9806119-1-5 (paperback)
Publication date: January 2009
Recommended retail price: $0.00

Published and edited by

Wendy Pang
17 Cloncurry St
Kaleen 2617
ACT
Australia
wpang@netspace.net.au
61 2 6241 4487

Some rights reserved.

Read http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc-sa/3.0/Catalog-in-publishing data for more information.

Computer typeset in Calibri, Cambria and Scriptina

Printed in Canberra, Australia and also distributed electronically

10 9 8 7 6 5 4 3 2 1
Contents

Page

Introduction 10

Lizzie Moody From Yorkshire to Toowoomba in 1910 11

Dot Featherstone Making do in the Depression – the thirties 16

Sarah Jane Bailey A widow raising nine children alone – the thirties 23

Elsie McAllan Holding dreams of better times – the forties 25

Ruth Draney Raising a family through the church – the fifties 27

Rea Featherstone The fifties housewife 29

Emmie Featherstone Country hospitality in town – the sixties 40

Notes From the editor 42

Cooking terms and ingredients
Oven temperatures

Photos Permissions 43

Index 44
Introduction

In June 2007, I cooked a nostalgic dinner using favourite recipes from my mother Rea Featherstone.
The meal was to celebrate my sister Judy’s visit from the United States. It included my brother
Spencer’s and my families.

Afterwards, I started to write out my mother’s recipes to share with everyone. Then I realised that
the recipe book should include recipes from grandmothers, my mother and aunts. My cousin Rose
Komduur sent me my grandmother Dot Featherstone’s Depression-era recipe book. My relative
Sandra Routley sent me her grandmother’s recipes, reminding me that keeping their recipes alive is
a way to remember our grandmothers.

In the days when communities were small, most men were remembered for their contribution to the
community in an obituary. The contribution our mothers and grandmothers made is rarely
recognised this way. Some of them left England never to return, like Dot Featherstone and Lizzie
Moody. Others were second-generation Australians like Rea and her sisters Elsie McAllen and Ruth
Draney. They were the wives of working men – average Anglo-Celtic Australians. They pass down to
us their way of speech, their linen and jewellery, their sewing machines and recipes.

I hope you will cook some of these recipes and smile at others, remembering our grandmothers.

Wendy Pang
Canberra
December 2008

10
Lizzie Moody

From Yorkshire to Toowoomba in 1910

Elizabeth Basterfield married John William (Jack) Moody in England, probably in the 1890s. They had
four children before they decided to migrate to Toowoomba, Queensland, on SS Orvieto in
September 1911. Their last child, also called John William (Bill) was born in Toowoomba. The family
never returned to Britain.

They left Britain at a turbulent time. After Edward VII died in 1910, there were extensive strikes of
seamen and miners, dockers and railwaymen. Suffragettes were protesting vigorously. By coming to
Australia, Lizzie gained the right to vote earlier than women in Britain.

Lizzie settled into life in Toowoomba. Jack had a mixed business in Middlesborough, opposite the
Hippodrome, and sold it before they left. In Toowoomba, as a first-class coach painter, he set up a
coach-painting business. That business later employed young Bill and his cousin Don Featherstone.

Although it isn’t difficult to find out about Jack’s life, it is more difficult to find out about Lizzie. She
was a home-maker, and raised five children. She has left us some recipes, and through this tenuous
link, we have a picture of Lizzie’s connection to the land of her birth.

Lizzie’s granddaughter Sandra Routley, daughter of Lizzie’s son Les, sent me Lizzie’s Yorkshire
recipes, with a reminder that we should not lose the recipes, as they are our heritage.

11
Lizzie Moody

Lizzie Moody’s
Moody’s recipes

From Yorkshire to Toowoomba in 1910

Peanut parkins

Popovers

Yorkshire bran loaf

Yorkshire cheese cake

Yorkshire fruit cake

Yorkshire pudding

12
 Lizzie Moody

Peanut parkins
These biscuits are delicious. They cool quickly and need to be lifted off the tray before they cool, because they
shatter.

Ingredients Directions

1 ¼ cups sugar Mix dry ingredients.

1 cup plain flour Melt butter and syrup.
1 tablespoon butter Dissolve bicarbonate of soda in ¼ cup boiling
1 tablespoon golden syrup water.
grated rind of orange or lemon Mix well.
½ teaspoon each of ginger, mixed spice, Add peanuts.
bicarbonate of soda Place small pieces on a greased oven slide.
¼ cup boiling water Bake in a moderate oven (180° C).
a few peanuts Leave plenty of room as they spread – 5 or 6 to
the tray at a time is plenty.

Popovers
When they are done on one side they pop over by themselves. Granddaughter Sandra used to eat them with
syrup or jam.

Ingredients Directions

1 egg Beat egg and milk.

¾ cup milk Add nutmeg, salt and bicarbonate of soda.
pinch nutmeg Sift cream of tartar into flour.
pinch salt Beat well.
¼ teaspoon bicarbonate of soda Fry walnut-sized balls in deep boiling fat.
¼ teaspoon cream of tartar
1 cup flour

Yorkshire bran loaf (sticky bread)

Use any cup size.

Ingredients Directions

1 cup of each of the following: Stir first 4 ingredients and leave overnight.
All Bran Stir in flour.
moist brown sugar Put into loaf tin and cook for 1–1½ hours at
seedless raisins 325° F (160° C).
milk
self-raising flour

13
Lizzie Moody

Yorkshire cheese cake

Lizzie’s granddaughter Sandra suggests cottage cheese or ricotta instead of curds. Junket tablet is a source of
rennet.

Ingredients – curds Directions – curds

(no quantities given) Add rennet to milk and strain, or use sour milk
rennet and strain off whey.
milk

Ingredients – cheese cake Directions – cheese cake

2 eggs Beat eggs and sugar and add melted butter, if

2 ounces sugar (60 g) desired.
2 teaspoons melted butter, if desired Stir in currants.
2 ounces currants (60 g) Add curds.
½ pound curds (250 g) Put into an uncooked plain pastry case. Sprinkle
rind of a lemon with nutmeg.
uncooked plain pastry case Cook until firm in a fairly slow oven (170° C).
nutmeg to sprinkle on top

Yorkshire fruit cake

To be eaten with cheese. Traditionally all the fruit and nuts are ground. I’ve suggested some directions, as none
were provided.

Ingredients Directions

1½ tablespoons plain flour Cream butter and sugar. Add eggs.

1½ tablespoons caster sugar Add flour and spices to ground fruits.
1½ tablespoons butter Combine all ingredients.
12 eggs Cook pastry case filled with weights such as dried
2 pound currants (1 kg) peas, in oven for about 15 mins. Remove peas
¼ pound sultanas (125 g) when cooked.
¼ pound lemon peel (finely ground) (125 g) Put mixture into cooled pastry case.
¼ pound ground almonds (125 g) Cook in a slow oven (150° C) for a long time –
¼ pound cherries (125 g) test after 1½ hrs.
1 nutmeg, grated
1 glass rum
1 teaspoon ground mace or black treacle
1 uncooked plain pastry case

14
 Lizzie Moody

Yorkshire pudding
A savoury pudding, this traditional British dish is to be served with roast meat and gravy. The Yorkshire pudding
should rise into hills and valleys. The critical thing is to get the right sized tin for the recipe, and for the fat to be
really hot.

Ingredients Directions

1 egg Mix well together and leave in refrigerator for at

salt and pepper least an hour.
½ cup milk Pour batter into hot fat in a baking tray.
1 tablespoon cold water Cook in hot oven (230° C).
2 rounded tablespoons flour

15
Dot Featherstone

Making do in the Depression – the thirties

Dot and Joe Featherstone followed her brother Jack Moody and his wife Lizzie a few months later
from Middlesborough to Toowoomba. Dot, Joe and their five boys arrived in Australia on
SS Themistocles in January 1912. It was the same summer as Roald Amundsen reached the South
Pole and Sir Robert Scott perished on the way back from it. This period of Antarctic exploration has
been called the Heroic Age. I think that a woman who takes her family of five boys to the other side
of the world, never again to see her eight other brothers and sisters, is heroic. Her sixth son, Ian
(pronounced iron but known as Jack), was born in Toowoomba.

Dot, born Eliza Dorothy Moody, was thirty-six when she arrived. She had long hair, and wore long
dresses and corsets, in the style of the time. She must have been glad when the twenties arrived.
Hems went up, corsets were abandoned, and hair was cropped.

She started writing her recipe book in 1931, when she was in her fifties. 1932 was the worst year of
the Depression in Australia. By then her boys were young men. Bill and youngest brother Jack, with a
few mates, an old truck and an Alsatian dog, made their way from Maryborough in Queensland to
Cairns, buying apples in bulk and selling them door-to-door to make a living.

The recipes in Dot’s recipe book reflect a time when neighbours called each other ‘Mrs Langsdorff’
or ‘Mrs Featherstone’. In spite of the difficult times, they made eye masks for their beauty routine,
and lotions for their hard-working hands. The life of a railwayman’s wife was not easy during the
Depression. If people wanted beer or coffee, they made it at home. Visiting the doctor was rare, so
housewives had many home remedies for their large families.

Dot’s small black recipe book was given to me in 2007 by my cousin Rose. It is a glimpse of a difficult
period in Dot’s life.

16
 Dot Featherstone

Dot Featherstone’s
Featherstone’s recipes

Making do in the Depression – the thirties

Recipes Home remedies

Gem scones with anchovy butter
Cure for chilblains

Mock brains
Cure for indigestion

Tomato salad
Cure for rheumatism

Malt biscuits
Egg mask

Beer
Fruit salts

Coffee
To soften hands

Tonic for nervous and digestive systems

17
Dot Featherstone

Gem scones with anchovy butter

A gem scone iron is a small metal baking tray with semi-circular depressions for the gem scones, which rise to
create ball shapes. This is Dot’s recipe with Rea’s anchovy butter. Serve some gem scones with butter and some
with anchovy butter. I have suggested directions.

Ingredients – gem scones Directions – gem scones

1 tablespoon butter Preheat gem scone irons in hot oven.

2 tablespoons sugar Cream butter and sugar.
1 egg Add egg and milk alternately with sifted dry
1 cup milk ingredients.
1½ cups flour Take the gem irons out of the oven. Put a
1½ teaspoons cream of tartar tablespoon of mixture in each of the gem iron
¾ teaspoon soda holes.
pinch salt Bake in hot oven (230° C) for 10 minutes or less.
Serve hot.

Ingredients – anchovy butter Directions – anchovy butter

1 tablespoon butter Mix all ingredients together well.

¼ teaspoon dry mustard
2 teaspoons Anchovette or ½ teaspoon anchovy
paste
pinch cayenne
1 teaspoon vinegar

Mock brains
Sounds better than the real thing. From the days when mothers cooked breakfast.

Ingredients Directions

1 cup rolled oats Cook oats in water with parsley and onion.
½ cup boiling water When well cooked and thick, put in basin to set.
parsley, chopped Then cut in slices and fry to a nice golden brown
onion, chopped in egg and breadcrumbs, salt and pepper.
1 egg
breadcrumbs
salt and pepper

18
 Dot Featherstone

Tomato salad
When she was first married, Aussie Rea Featherstone was somewhat shocked by English Dot Featherstone’s
Yorkshire approach to tomato salad.

Ingredients Directions

tomatoes, sliced Spread sliced tomatoes out on a serving dish.

vinegar Pour a generous amount of vinegar over.
Serve.

Malt biscuits
Rea’s copy of this recipe shows she was still calling her mother-in-law ‘Mrs Featherstone’ four years after she
was married.

Ingredients Directions

4 ounces butter (125 g) Put first 4 ingredients into a saucepan and bring
½ cup brown sugar to boil.
1 tablespoon malt extract Add bicarbonate of soda dissolved in a little
1 tablespoon golden syrup warm water.
½ teaspoon bicarbonate of soda Have dry ingredients ready in a bowl.
1½ cups flour Pour hot syrup over dry ingredients and mix into
1½ cups rolled oats a dough.
1 cup coconut Make walnut sized balls of dough and flatten on
pinch salt oven tray.
Bake in moderate oven (180° C) about
10 minutes or until golden brown.

19
Dot Featherstone

Beer
Yes, beer. You’ll have to guess how big a packet of hops is, if you make this recipe.

Ingredients Directions

tin golden syrup Boil hops in 4 gallons (16 litres) water for
large tin malt 20 minutes. Add salt.
3 pounds sugar (1.5 kg) Put in syrup and malt when moderately cool.
1 teaspoon salt When at blood heat, add yeast and allow to work
½ packet hops about 60 hours skimming each day twice.
about 2 cups yeast Bottle and cap securely.

Coffee
Two ways to make ‘coffee’. In the Depression, there was no money for luxuries like coffee. Dot didn’t specify
how much treacle is needed.

Ingredients – version 1 Directions – version 1

1 pound wheat (500 g) Mix all ingredients.

1 teaspoon salt Brown in oven.
2 tablespoons sugar Put through mincer.

Ingredients – version 2 Directions – version 2

2 cups bran Damp dry ingredients with treacle and brown

1 cup oatmeal well in oven.
pinch salt Put through mincer.
black treacle

Cure for chilblains

For those frosty Toowoomba winters.

Ingredients Directions

one fair-sized potato Peel potato then cut into pieces about ¼ inch
water to cover (7 mm) thick.
salt Place in basin and cover with salt.
Stand for 8 to 12 hours.
Strain juice, and keep in a bottle.
Sponge affected parts with juice.

20
 Dot Featherstone

Cure for indigestion

A sixpenny coin is like a five cent coin. A shilling is like a ten cent coin.

Ingredients Directions

½ pound sultanas (250 g) Chop all ingredients and mix with brandy.
½ pound dried figs (250 g) Dose: 2 teaspoonsful every morning.
sixpence worth syrup of senna
sixpence worth Peruvian bark (powdered)
two shillings worth brandy

Cure for rheumatism

I suggest using cooked rhubarb. The amount of honey is up to you.

Ingredients Directions

1 ounce sulphur (30 g) Warm honey. Mix thoroughly.

1 ounce cream of tartar (30 g) Dose: 2 teaspoonsful dissolved in tumbler of
1 ounce rhubarb (30 g) water at night and early morning.
honey Can be flavoured with lemon juice or white wine.

Egg mask
Dot’s beauty treatment is not much different from the ones in women’s magazines today.

Ingredients Directions

1 egg Separate white from yolk of egg.

few drops glycerine Beat white to stiff froth.
honey Add glycerine and apply mixture to face.
Steam face for a minute then smooth honey all
over the face and leave on for a few minutes.

Fruit salts
Presumably for using in the bath

Ingredients Directions

¼ pound cream of tartar (125 g) Mix thoroughly.

¼ pound tartaric acid (125 g) Keep in a securely corked bottle in a dry place.
¼ pound bicarbonate of soda (125 g)
½ pound icing sugar (250 g)
4 packets Epsom salts
1 ounce magnesia (30 g)

21
Dot Featherstone

To soften hands
For hands rough from too much housework. A one shilling coin is like a ten cent coin.

Ingredients Directions

1 teaspoon powdered starch Mix starch and lemon juice.

juice of a lemon Add glycerine and boil till clear.
half bottle glycerine (1 shilling size) Rub into hands at night.

Tonic for nervous and digestive systems

It makes me nervous to think what this would do to your digestive system.

Ingredients Directions

1 pound eating prunes (500 g) Put all fruit through mincer.

1 pound dates (500 g) Add senna and honey.
½ pound raisins (250 g) Dose: 2 teaspoonsful before breakfast and on
½ pound currants (250 g) retiring.
½ pound sultanas (250 g)
1 pound figs (500 g)
1 ounce senna powder (30 g)
4 tablespoons honey

22
Sarah Jane Bailey

A widow raising nine children alone – the thirties

Sarah Jane Risson was born in Australia, of English immigrant parents who settled at Ma Ma Creek,
at the foot of the Great Dividing Range. She grew up on a dairy farm carved out of the bush by her
father, and went to school at the school that her father and others petitioned the government to
build. Her husband Thomas Bailey’s story is similar. He was also a first-generation Australian, born of
Scottish parents, who lived in the next valley at Flagstone Creek.

When Thomas died after an accident at work as a carter in 1929, Sarah was left to raise those of her
nine children still left at home. Through the thirties and forties, Sarah worked as a cleaner and
laundress, and her younger children helped by picking up and delivering the laundry. My cousins
remember a woman who could never stand seeing an idle child, so she would always give them
something to do. She never had a holiday until her youngest daughter Rea took her to the Blue
Mountains, after Rea started work about 1940.

Sarah was a staunch member of the church, and made sure that all the children attended church and
Sunday School regularly. Youngest daughter Rea was awarded an engraved gold brooch, for not
missing a day at Sunday School for five years. Rea would walk to church, attend youth group, and
walk back to sister Ruth’s home to look after her young cousins while their parents attended church,
then she would take the children Sunday School. She would then walk them home, collect washing
from a family and take it to her home. She would then return in the evening for another service. She
would take the freshly ironed washing back on Monday.

It is hard to imagine when Sarah had time for fancy cooking, but my cousins clearly remember her
beautifully-presented rows of preserved fruit and vegetables on display in the kitchen.

23
Sarah Jane Bailey

Sarah Jane Bailey’s

Bailey’s recipe

A widow raising nine children alone – the thirties

Bread and butter cucumbers

Economical and easy to make.

Ingredients Directions

3 medium cucumbers
1 pound onions (optional)(500 g)
1 large green pepper (capsicum)
¼ cup salt
1 cup brown sugar, firmly packed
½ teaspoon turmeric
½ teaspoon ground cloves
1 tablespoon mustard seed or 2 teaspoons
mustard powder if seed unavailable
½ teaspoon celery seed
2 cups white vinegar
Wash cucumbers and cut into very thin slices.
Peel onions and cut into thin slices.
Put cucumber and onion into a bowl with
coarsely grated capsicum.
Sprinkle with salt and stand 3 hours.
Drain and rinse under cold water.
Put brown sugar, turmeric, cloves, mustard seed,
celery seed and vinegar in a large saucepan.
Stir over medium heat until sugar dissolves and
liquid comes to the boil. Reduce heat and
simmer 5 minutes.
Add vegetables. Bring just to the boil. Remove
from heat.
Pack into sterilised jars. Pour liquid over and
seal.
Makes about 6 cups (1½ litres)

24
Elsie McAllan

Holding dreams of better times – the forties

Elsie Bailey was Rea’s eldest sister. There were twenty years between them. Elsie would have been
twenty-five when their father Thomas died unexpectedly. Because she was older, Elsie would have
been one less for her widowed mother to look after. Rea, the youngest, was only five, and there
were seven other brothers and sisters between the two of them.

Perhaps because of family responsibilities, or the Depression, Elsie didn’t marry until she was thirty-
four. She married Andy McAllan, a widower with a young son and daughter. Their happiness was
short-lived, as Elsie died seven years later.

Rea copied this recipe into her recipe book about nine years after her eldest sister had died in 1943.
Her recipe for a rich Christmas cake must date from before the war, because the ingredients would
not have been available during that time, with wartime rationing. There was no question of making a
cake with ten eggs. However, holding on to the dream of better times was important.

This recipe and these photos are all I have from my Auntie Elsie.

25
Elsie McAllan

Elsie McAllan’s
McAllan’s recipe

Holding dreams of better times – the forties

Christmas cake
I have suggested some instructions as none were given. This cake should keep well.

Ingredients Directions

3 pounds dried mixed fruit (1.4 kg ) Mix dried fruits and soak in orange juice and
orange juice rum, preferably overnight.
1 wineglass rum Beat butter and brown sugar. Add eggs.
1 pound butter (500 g) Add sifted dry ingredients and lemon rind. Mix
1 pound brown sugar (500 g) well, while adding milk.
10 eggs Stir in fruit mixture.
½ packet spice Put in a cake tin, lined with brown paper so that
1 nutmeg, grated it is taller than the cake tin.
cinnamon Cook in a moderately slow oven (170° C) for
salt and pepper 1– 1½ hrs.
1 pound flour (500 g)
2 ounces self-raising flour (60 g)
grated rind of a lemon
2 tablespoons milk

26
Ruth Draney

Raising a family through the church – the fifties

Ruth and her older sister Elsie were born at Flagstone Creek, at the foot of the Great Dividing Range
where Toowoomba is situated. The girls went to school there before the family moved to
Toowoomba. Ruth was twenty-three years old when their father Thomas Bailey died. Ruth married
Ray Draney, a fellow church member, the year after Thomas’s death. They had four children, and
Ruth raised them all by herself while Ray was away for four years during World War II.

Like her mother Sarah, Ruth was very active in the Toowoomba Church of Christ. This church was
formed in Australia, and Ruth’s husband Ray became president of the church in Queensland. Ray
often used to preach. His dedication included pushing two of his young children in a pram for miles
across Toowoomba to preach at Harlaxton church on Sunday afternoons. Ruth assisted with Ladies
Groups and the Women’s Ministry. She helped establish Mylo Home for the aged, where she
eventually spent her last years.

Her son Ken became a minister, and her daughter Aileen was a missionary in Papua New Guinea for
many years. Ruth supported her daughter’s missionary work by writing to her every single week.
Ruth raised four children in her home in Rome Street. Her recipe will feed a large family.

27
Ruth Draney

Ruth Draney’s
Draney’s recipe

Raising a family through the church – the fifties

Mexicana mince
Mince was a staple food of Australian households. It was often fatty, so it was normal practice to boil the mince
in a pan of water first, to remove the fat. This recipe is the first one in all these hand-written recipe books that
refers to a world beyond English cookery. A sustaining meal to feed the whole family.

Ingredients Directions

1 cup rice Soak rice for 30 minutes.

1 tablespoon margarine Melt margarine in frypan.
1 large onion Brown sliced onion.
1½ teaspoons curry powder Drain rice, add and coat well in margarine.
salt and pepper Add curry powder and salt and pepper. Cook for
4 tomatoes, peeled and sliced a few minutes.
1½ pounds mince (750 g) Add tomatoes, sprinkled with sugar if desired.
1– 1½ pints water (700 mls) Cook a few minutes.
Add mince and water.
Cook 30 minutes at 260° F (160° C). Stir
frequently and add more water if required.

28
Rea Featherstone

The fifties housewife

Rea married Bill Featherstone in 1948. He was nineteen years older than her. Perhaps he did not
marry earlier because he was a young man during the Depression, and then he was away serving in
World War II. As a child at primary school, Rea’s contribution to the war was to knit socks for
servicemen, as she walked around the playground.

Rea was a stay-at-home mum, sewing clothes for her four children on her Singer sewing machine
housed in a silky oak cabinet made by her brother Stan. She loved to knit, and won a prize at a CWA
competition for speed knitting against stiff opposition. She knitted seven complete dresses between
the ages of 17 and 19, including a ballgown. Sadly, these dresses are lost to us.

Postwar shortages affected the home cook during the fifties, but the shortages gradually eased. Rea
has a number of recipes such as ‘mock chicken’, as she ‘made do’ with what she had. She
optimistically started this recipe book on the day I was born. In the sixties, we children would come
home to homemade slices and biscuits. She involved us all in bottling fruit in the Fowler’s Vacola.

These were simple times for the children, if not for the housewife. Rea graduated from boiling the
washing in a copper in the backyard to using a wringer machine about 1960. It took all Monday to
wash and iron for a family of six. So to have a simple recipe for Washday Pudding was handy,
because evening meals always included dessert . If it was ‘cook’s night off’, we would eat canned
tomato soup with jaffles – sandwiches toasted in an iron jaffle maker heated in the firebox of the
wood fire.

29
Rea Featherstone

Rea Featherstone’s recipes

The fifties housewife

Nibbles and snacks Preserves

Mock chicken
Imitation apricot filling

Main course
Tomato and passionfruit jam

Crunchy Norwegian casserole Hints

French cabbage rolls
To polish cutlery and silver

Savoury chops
Ivory knife handles

Shepherd’s pie
For flies

Biscuits cakes and sweets
Curly wool

123 piecrust with stewed fruit

Delicious lemon cheese for tarts

Eggless chocolate cake

Melting moments

Neenish tarts

Pumpkin fruit cake

Pusher biscuits

Rocky road

Washday pudding

Lamingtons

30
 Rea Featherstone

Mock chicken
We frequently ate this spread on our white bread sandwiches for school lunches.

Ingredients Directions

1 small onion Cook onion slowly with butter, for about

1 rounded teaspoon butter 10 minutes. Do not brown.
1 tomato, skinned and chopped Add the tomato and herbs, and simmer for a few
1 teaspoon dried mixed herbs minutes.
1 beaten egg Remove from heat. Add the beaten egg, salt and
1 tablespoon grated cheese pepper, and cheese, and beat well. If the egg
salt and pepper to taste isn’t quite cooked, put back on the stove for a
minute or two.
Add 2 crushed shredded wheatmeal biscuits if
required to be thicker.

Crunchy Norwegian casserole

This was a Featherstone family favourite, often served in winter. Substitute chilli sauce if Tabasco is
unavailable.

Ingredients – white sauce Directions – white sauce

1 tablespoon flour Melt butter and mix in flour.

1 tablespoon butter Heat remaining milk separately.
1 cup milk Add a little warmed milk to the butter–flour
mixture and stir to prevent lumps. Add more
milk, stirring, and then add this mixture to the
rest of the warmed milk.
Cook until the sauce coats the back of a wooden
spoon.

Ingredients – casserole Directions – casserole

¾ cup green pepper Combine and sauté vegetables.

¾ cup onion Mix in other ingredients and top with the melted
1 cup diced celery butter and crumbs.
7 ounces tuna (220 g) Cook in moderate oven (180° C) for 30 minutes.
3 ¾ ounce tin sardines (110 g)
1 teaspoon Worcestershire sauce
2 drops Tabasco sauce
1 cup thick white sauce

Topping

2 tablespoons melted butter

1 cup cornflake crumbs

31
Rea Featherstone

French cabbage rolls

Another way to serve mince – a cheap family meal. I think the garlic is the reason for the ‘French’ name, as it
was an unusual ingredient in the fifties.

Ingredients – filling Directions – cabbage rolls

½ pound mince (250 g) Mix together all ingredients except cabbage

½ cup uncooked rice leaves.
½ cup soft breadcrumbs Simmer cabbage leaves in boiling water
4 tablespoons finely chopped onions 3–5 minutes.
1 garlic clove Remove leaves. Drain and cut out rib, then
¼ teaspoon pepper spread with mixture. Roll firmly.
1½ teaspoon salt Stack closely in oven dish. Put on lid and cook
2 large tablespoons margarine 40 minutes in a moderate oven (180° C).
12 tender cabbage leaves Pour sauce over cabbage rolls. Replace lid and
cook another 20 minutes.

Ingredients – sauce Directions – sauce

2 ounces margarine Cook onions and garlic in melted margarine for

2 teaspoons onion 2 minutes.
1 garlic clove Add plain flour and enough stock to make
2 tablespoon flour creamy sauce.
stock Add lemon juice, salt and pepper.
juice of a lemon
salt and pepper

Savoury chops
Mutton chops are no longer common, but it was everyday family food then.

Ingredients Directions

1 pound stewing chops Trim chops and cut rind off bacon.
4 slices bacon Scrape and slice carrot.
1 carrot Peel and slice onion.
1 onion Roll chops in seasoned flour.
2 tablespoons flour plus salt and pepper, to Into a pie dish place layers of chops, bacon,
make seasoned flour carrot and onion. Add water.
2 cups water Cover pie dish and bake in moderate oven
(180° C) for 1–1½ hours.

32
 Rea Featherstone

Shepherd’s pie
This traditional dish warmed the family on cold winter nights.

Ingredients – stewed mince Directions – stewed mince

1 pound mince (500 g) Place meat, chopped onion, parsley and grated
1 onion carrot in a saucepan.
parsley Add water, salt and pepper.
1 small carrot, grated Cook over gentle heat until well cooked.
½ cup water Add water if necessary.
1½ teaspoons salt Sprinkle flour over meat and mix well. Allow to
pepper thicken.
2 tablespoons flour Pour into pie dish and cover with slices of
1–2 tomatoes, sliced tomato, if desired.

Ingredients – mashed potato Directions – mashed potato

4 large potatoes Peel potatoes and cut into chunks.

1 rounded teaspoon butter Add to boiling water and boil until very soft.
2–3 tablespoon milk Drain.
Return to saucepan. Add butter and a good dash
of milk.
Beat well until very smooth.

To assemble

extra butter, melted Put the mince into a greased rectangular baking
dish, and top with mashed potato.
Use a fork to decorate the top, and brush with
melted butter.
Cook in a hot oven (230° C) for 15 minutes until
the top is golden brown.
Serve hot.

33
Rea Featherstone

123 piecrust with stewed fruit

As easy to make as it is to remember: 1–2–3. I suggest baking in a moderate oven for 20 minutes.

Ingredients Directions

1 tablespoon butter Mix ingredients together with fingers until

2 tablespoons sugar crumbly and sprinkle it thickly over cooked fruit.
3 tablespoons self-raising flour Bake in usual way, but not too quickly.
Stewed fruit such as peach or quince

Delicious lemon cheese for tarts

Rea used to say that the lemons must be fully ripe, and that the recipe will not set with Meyer lemons. This is
typical picnic food, served in a crumbed biscuit tart shell and eaten with a cup of hot tea while Bill and Uncle
Don painted watercolours of gum trees down by the creek.

Ingredients Directions

1 tin condensed milk Mix all ingredients well.

rind and juice of 4 lemons Spread mixture in tart shell.
egg yolks Store in ice chest.
tart shell made of biscuit crumbs and melted
butter, chilled

Eggless chocolate cake

There are many eggless recipes in Rea’s recipe book. This may be because of post-war shortages.

Ingredients Directions

1 cup hot water Place ingredients in basin in order listed, up to

4 teaspoons golden syrup the flour.
½ teaspoon bicarbonate of soda When margarine has melted, add self-raising
3 tablespoons margarine flour and cocoa.
½ cup brown sugar Mix thoroughly.
2 cups self-raising flour Bake in a moderate oven (180° C) about
2 tablespoons cocoa 25 minutes.
pinch salt

34
 Rea Featherstone

Melting moments
A classic biscuit recipe. We often found these in the bikkie tin when we came home from school.

Ingredients Directions

¼ to ½ pound butter (125–250 g) Beat butter and sugar to a cream then sift
2 ounces sugar (60 g) cornflour in slowly.
4 ounces cornflour (125 g) Roll into walnut sized balls in the palms of the
hands.
Put on a greased paper on biscuit tray. Use a
fork to flatten onto the tray.
Bake in a moderate oven (180° C) about
10 minutes.
Sandwich pairs together with white icing.

Neenish tarts
Rea recommends these special-occasions tarts for afternoon tea, or to serve with coffee after dinner. Almond
meal should be used for the pastry, she says, but champagne pastry is good too.

Ingredients – champagne pastry Directions – champagne pastry

3 ounces butter (90 g) Cream butter and sugar.

¼ cup caster sugar Add egg yolk then sifted flour alternately with
1 egg yolk milk.
¾ cup flour Knead. Rest 15 minutes.
½ cup self-raising flour Roll out thinly.
pinch salt Cut circles for tartlets. Prick with fork after
1 tablespoon milk placing on tray to bake.
Bake 10 minutes at 375° F (190° C).
Makes about 20 small tart shells. Cool before
filling.

Ingredients – almond cream Directions – almond cream

3 ounces butter (90 g) Cream butter and icing sugar, then add the rest
6 level tablespoons icing sugar of the ingredients.
1½ tablespoons condensed milk Mix well.
3 tablespoons honey Fill the small tart shells with almond cream,
few drops almond essence smoothing it over so it is even with the tart
edges.
Chill in fridge.
Ingredients – icing Directions – icing

1 cup icing mixture Make the white icing.

1 tablespoon butter Halve, and add cocoa to one half to make brown
1½ tablespoons milk icing.

Brown icing
1 tablespoon cocoa
To assemble
Ice each filled tart half with white icing and half
with chocolate icing.

35
Rea Featherstone

Pumpkin fruit cake

This was Rea’s most famous recipe. A beautiful moist golden fruit cake.

Ingredients Directions

½ pound butter (250 g) Cream butter and sugar.

1 cup sugar Add eggs and beat well.
2 eggs Add pumpkin and sifted dry ingredients, and
1 cup cold mashed pumpkin lastly mixed fruit.
2 cups flour Bake in a slow oven (150° C) 1½–2 hours.
1 teaspoon cream of tartar
½ teaspoon baking soda
1 packet mixed fruit (375 g)

Pusher biscuits
This buttery mix can be pushed through a metal biscuit maker tube using different inserts to make a variety of
decorative biscuits that look good for Christmas. Kids enjoy helping to make these.

Ingredients Directions

2 ounces butter or dripping (60 g) Beat butter or dripping and sugar to a cream.
2 ounces sugar (60 g) Add egg and sifted dry ingredients.
1 egg Mix and put mixture through pusher.
6 ounces self-raising flour (180 g) If mixture is too stiff for pusher, add a little
¼ teaspoon salt boiling water after adding flour.
Cook in moderate oven (180° C) about
10 minutes.

Variations

Vanilla fingers: add vanilla essence.

Strawberry cream: add strawberry essence and
join biscuits with strawberry icing.
Monte Carlos: Add 1 tablespoon honey. Join with
raspberry jam and vanilla icing.

36
 Rea Featherstone

Rocky road
Rea has many recipes for sweets. The kids helped her make them for school fetes. Instead of Jellettes, make
different colours of packet jelly with half quantity of water. When the jellies are set, dice. You can also add
sultanas.

Ingredients Directions

6 ounces marshmallows Cut marshmallows into small pieces.

4 ounces white shortening (Copha) Grease 7 inch square tin.
¾ cup sifted icing sugar Melt shortening over gentle heat – it must
2 tablespoons cocoa only be lukewarm.
vanilla Add to icing sugar, cocoa and vanilla.
½ cup walnuts or peanuts Mix till smooth.
3 coloured Jellettes (chopped) Fold through marshmallows, nuts and Jellette
pieces.
Press into prepared tin, chill.
Cut into squares. Wrap if desired.

Washday pudding
Even after a day boiling the copper and folding the family washing, the family expected dessert. It needs no
sauce as it has enough.

Ingredients Directions

1½ cups self-raising flour Rub flour and butter together.

1 tablespoon butter Add boiling water and milk. Mix well.
2 tablespoons boiling water Cover with sugar, syrup, butter and 1 cup boiling
½ cup milk water.
½ cup sugar Stand basin in boiling water and steam ½ hour.
1 tablespoon syrup Do not cover basin with lid.
1 tablespoon butter
1 cup boiling water, extra

Tomato and passionfruit jam

Women used what they had on hand, and adapted recipes to use available ingredients. Rea also made jam
from rosellas, a native fruit.

Ingredients Directions

2 pounds ripe tomatoes (1 kg) Peel and slice tomatoes and add chopped apples
1 pound peeled and cored apples (500 g) and boil together until soft.
6 passionfruit Add sugar. Stir until dissolved then boil the
3 pounds sugar (1.5 kg) mixture hard for about 30 minutes.
Add the passionfruit pulp. Boil again for
5 minutes.
Test the jam and continue to boil till setting
point is reached.
Bottle in sterilised jars.

37
Rea Featherstone

Imitation apricot filling

This surprising recipe is nice in tarts or biscuits. Don't mention it has choko and no-one will know what it really
is, Rea tells us. It’s important to mash the chokos well.

Ingredients Directions

1 pound sugar (500 g) Slice the tree tomatoes and cover with sugar.
1 pound tree tomatoes (tamarillos) (500 g) Allow to stand overnight.
4 or 5 chokos Peel and cook the chokos while sugar and tree
tomatoes are cooking.
Drain and mash chokos well or puree them.
Add to fruit–sugar mixture.
Cook until it jells.

Lamingtons
Lamingtons were invented in Toowoomba in 1896. Lord Lamington, the Governor of Queensland, used to spend
each summer at Harlaxton House. His cook, unable to bake the snowball cakes he liked, invented what we now
know as lamingtons.

Ingredients Directions

½ cup butter Cream butter and sugar, beating until very light.
1 cup sugar Add beaten eggs and vanilla.
2 eggs Sift flour with baking powder and salt.
1 teaspoon vanilla Add some sifted dry ingredients to the mixture,
2/3 cup milk then some milk.
2 cups flour Continue adding flour then milk until it is all
3 teaspoons baking powder used.
¼ teaspoon salt Bake in greased and floured tin for about
20 minutes at 180° C.
Cut cooled cake into squares.
Roll each lamington in brown icing and dip in
coconut.

38
 Rea Featherstone

To polish cutlery and silver

This imparts a brilliant polish, and cutlery will not require any special treatment if treated in this way every
fortnight. The mixture is also good for household silver.

Ingredients Directions

1 cup yellow soap Dissolve all ingredients in a saucepan over a slow

1 cup washing soda fire.
1 cup whiting Pour into a tin.
Place the cutlery in a dish with 2 teaspoons of
the mixture, pour in hot water, and wash in the
usual way.
Dry the cutlery while hot.

For ivory knife handles

Rea received ivory-handled knives for her wedding. You might find some at vintage markets.

Ingredients Directions

lemon rind Ivory knife handles will turn yellowish if they are
salt allowed to go without a periodical treatment of
being rubbed over with a piece of lemon rind
dipped in salt.

For flies
Rea’s answer for a constant problem.

Ingredients Directions

½ teaspoon black pepper Mix well and place on plate in room.

1 teaspoon brown sugar
1 teaspoon cream

For curly wool

Rea loved to knit. If one of the kids grew out of a jumper, this was how to recycle the wool.

Requirements Directions

unravelled wool from an old garment Wind wool round saucepan.

aluminium saucepan Fill saucepan with almost boiling water and allow
it to stand with wool round it, while there is any
heat in the water.
When removed wool is ready to reknit.

39
Emmie Featherstone

Country hospitality in town – the sixties

Emmie Gillam was descended from the family of Charles Gillam, gentleman, of Allora. She loved
horses, and rode well. Her daughter Rose inherited her love of animals, and they both share the
wonderfully warm sense of hospitality that is typical of country people.

Emmie, small and round, married Don Featherstone, tall and thin. They shared a warm relationship,
always teasing each other. There was usually a very chatty budgie in the kitchen, who could call the
dogs to come for dinner, sounding just like Emmie. There was usually at least one dog underfoot,
and our favourite cousin Rose’s cats, cockies and curlews roamed the back yard.

When television came to Toowoomba about 1960, Bill and Rea didn’t buy one. Often on a Sunday
night, the Ford Prefect with four children in the back would drive over to Don and Emmie’s to watch
TV. We were supposed to go home before the movie, but we children would try to get the adults
chatting so that they would not notice that the movie had started. Then we would need to stay for
supper, wouldn’t we? Saos with cheese and tomato, and a warm tea cake were Emmie’s favourites –
and ours.

40
 Emmie Featherstone

Emmie Featherstone’s recipes

Country hospitality in town – the sixties

Saos with cheese and tomato

Sometimes the simplest things are the best.

Ingredients Directions

Sao biscuits Butter Sao biscuits.

butter (not margarine) Top with sliced tasty cheese and a slice of
tasty cheese home-grown tomato.
home-grown tomato Sprinkle with salt and pepper.
salt and pepper Serve immediately.

Tea cake
Served warm, with cinnamon sugar that sticks to fingers.

Ingredients Directions

1 large tablespoon butter Cream butter and sugar.

½ cup sugar Add well-beaten egg, milk and vanilla, then flour.
1 egg Bake in a buttered tin, in a moderate oven
½ cup milk (180° C) for about 20 minutes.
vanilla
1 cup self-raising flour

Ingredients – topping Directions – topping

1 teaspoon sugar When the cake is nearly ready, mix topping

1 teaspoon cinnamon ingredients.
1 teaspoon coconut Smooth over hot cake. Put back in oven for a few
1 rounded teaspoon butter minutes.
Serve hot or cold.

41
Notes

From the editor

All these recipes came from hand-written recipe books. I have not cooked them all, so I can give no
assurance that the recipes work. However, I am sure you can trust these grandmothers, as they used
the recipes themselves. I would not suggest you try the home remedies, nor would I suggest that
making your own beer or coffee from these recipes is a good idea. As grandma would say, “Just use
your common sense!”

Where possible, I have provided Australian Standard metric conversions for imperial measurements,
based on the Macquarie Dictionary of Cooking, McMahon’s Point, N.S.W. , edited by Judy Jones in
1983. I have not attempted to provide equivalents for things like ‘2 shillings worth brandy’, or ‘large
tin malt’.

Cooking terms and ingredients

Cup – use a standard Australian measuring cup, whether you are using imperial measurements or
metric. There is little difference.

Hops, malt, Peruvian bark, syrup of senna – If you wish to prepare recipes using these ingredients, I
suggest you do your own research.

Oven temperatures

Moderately slow oven 330° F/170° C

Slow oven 250° F/150° C
Moderate oven 350° F/180° C
Hot oven 450° F/230° C

42
Photos

Front Lizzie Moody © Sandra Routley, Dot Featherstone © Roy Featherstone, Sarah Jane Bailey © Kenneth Draney, Elsie
cover McAllan, and Ruth Draney © Gay Middleton, Rea Featherstone © Spencer Featherstone, Emmie Featherstone ©
Spencer Featherstone

7 Rose’s wishes © Wendy Pang

11 Jack and Lizzie Moody © Sandra Routley

12 Lizzie Moody’s Yorkshire fruit cake recipe recorded by Sandra Routley © Wendy Pang

15 Lizzie Moody’s popovers recipe recorded by Sandra Routley © Wendy Pang

16 Dot Featherstone — Darlington, UK, about 1910 © Roy Featherstone

17 Dot Featherstone’s kisses and mock brains recipes © Wendy Pang

19 Joseph and Dot Featherstone, William and Elizabeth Hunt, and boys (L to R): Sydney, William, Joseph Charles, Eric
and Maurice © Roy Featherstone

22 Dot Featherstone’s recipe book dated 1931 © Wendy Pang

23 Sarah Jane Bailey © Gay Middleton

24 Sarah Bailey’s home at 168A Bridge St Toowoomba — 1960s © Gay Middleton

25 Elsie McAllan © Gay Middleton

26 Elsie McAllan, step-children Hughie and Eunice, and possibly husband Andy — about 1940 © Gay Middleton

27 Ruth Draney — about 1950 © Kenneth Draney

28 Church of Christ Toowoomba © Gay Middleton

29 Rea Featherstone © Spencer Featherstone

30 Featherstones — Bill, Rea, Spencer (obscured), Wendy, Judy, Roy and dog Andy — Toowoomba, about 1962 ©
Rose Komduur

33 Rea Featherstone’s recipe book dated 1952 © Wendy Pang

36 Rea Featherstone’s recipe for sardine scones © Wendy Pang

38 Christmas at home — Toowoomba 1960s © Roy Featherstone

40 Emmie Featherstone — Toowoomba 1970s © Spencer Featherstone

41 Featherstones — Emmie, Don, Dot with Lal and Rose in front — possibly 1950s © Rose Komduur

45 Wendy Pang © Robert Pang

Back Dot Featherstone, William and Elizabeth Hunt — Toowoomba about 1913 © Roy Featherstone
cover

43
Index
Index

Entree or snacks Preserves and beverages

Gem scones with anchovy butter 18
Beer 19
Mock chicken 31 Coffee 20
Popovers 15 Tomato and passionfruit jam 37
Saos with cheese and tomato 41
Home remedies and hints
Main course Cure for chilblains 20
Crunchy Norwegian casserole 31 Cure for indigestion 20
French cabbage rolls 32 Cure for rheumatism 21
Mexicana mince 28 Egg mask 21
Savoury chops 32 For curly wool 39
Shepherd’s pie 33 For flies 39
For ivory knife handles 39
Side dishes Fruit salts 21
To soften hands 21
Bread and butter cucumbers 24
To polish cutlery and silver 38
Mock brains 18
Tonic for nervous and digestive systems 22
Tomato salad 19
Yorkshire pudding 15

Desserts and sweets

123 piecrust with stewed fruit 33
Delicious lemon cheese for tarts 34
Imitation apricot filling 38
Neenish tarts 35
Rocky road 37
Washday pudding 37

Biscuits and cakes

Christmas cake 26
Eggless chocolate cake 34
Lamingtons 38
Malt biscuits 19
Melting moments 34
Peanut parkins 13
Pumpkin fruit cake 36
Pusher biscuits 36
Sticky bread 13
Tea cake 41
Yorkshire bran loaf 13
Yorkshire cheese cake 26
Yorkshire fruit cake 14

44
Wendy Pang

The editor

Wendy Pang is a baby-boomer, now taking time to reflect on where she came from. She went to
school at Toowoomba High School, like her mother, and then to the University of Queensland.

Wendy spent a year in France before marrying her Malaysian Chinese husband, Robert Pang, and
raising three children – Andrew, Kim and Michael. Wendy and Robert met in Brisbane and spent
seven years in Perth, where she taught in high schools, before moving to Canberra in 1984. She
joined the Public Service and worked in computing and departmental libraries before becoming a
website manager. She enjoys quilting and founded Australia’s first online quilt group, who later
created a Bicentennial figure in her honour. She has won gold medals at the Australian Masters
Rowing Championships. She inherited a sweet tooth from her mother, and enjoys cooking cakes and
biscuits. Most of the household cooking is done by her husband, and they both agree that this is a
good thing.

45
Grandma’s recipes brings together recipes from a group of women related to the editor. They lived
in Toowoomba, Queensland, from 1910 onwards. The recipes represent home-cooking through the
twentieth century, when the Depression and World War II affected daily lives dramatically. Reading
the recipes offers a glimpse of the lives of mothers and home-makers – a role that is hidden from
society at large, but represents a big influence on family, friends and neighbours.

Wendy Pang presents recipes with metric measurements where possible, so that they can be
enjoyed today. There are also recipes that readers will wonder at, but probably not want to recreate
– like recipes for making coffee from wheat.

Enjoy the recipes. Cook them, and remember the hard-working women who went before us.