Public canteens were set up to feed
people during World War One - and they proved hugely popular. Could
today's food banks learn from them, asks Adam Forrest.
A bowl of
soup, a joint of meat and a portion of side vegetables cost 6d - just
over £1 in today's money. Puddings, scones and cakes could be bought for
as little as 1d (about 18p).
These self-service restaurants, run
by local workers and partly funded by government grants, offered simple
meals at subsidised prices.
In 1917, ministers in Lloyd George's
government had agonised over the best way of combating hunger while
Germany's U-boats disrupted Britain's food supply.
The government
was keen to avoid the stigma of poverty associated with soup kitchen
hand-outs, but also wanted to utilise the volunteer-run community
kitchens springing up in working class communities to help deal with
food shortages.
A popular fix was found - a network of public cafeteria known as "national kitchens".
The
Ministry of Food instructed that the kitchens "must not resemble a soup
kitchen for poorest section of society". They should feel like places
"ordinary people in ordinary circumstances" could sit down together at
long canteen tables for a cheap meal.
Now there are efforts to
bring them back. Bryce Evans, a senior lecturer at Liverpool Hope
University, has researched the WW1 kitchens and believes there are
parallels with today's food banks.
"Some of the bigger kitchens
were feeding up to 2,000 people a day, and the efficiency really helped
cut down on waste," he says. "Great
efforts were made to make sure they were attractive places run along
business lines and avoided the taint of charity. It encouraged
middle-class professionals like clerks and office workers to come in and
sit alongside working class families."
Evans's new research, funded by the Wellcome Trust,
shows how the government's national kitchen programme grew out of
grassroots community kitchens run by charities and trade unionists.
The
Ministry of Food seized on their potential for efficiency. Wholesale
purchasing and the collective preparation of food, they reasoned, would
help cut out waste.
So local authorities were urged to open up
public cafeterias wherever possible. If an outlet followed Ministry of
Food guidelines, the local authority received a Whitehall grant covering
half the costs.
In May 1917, Queen Mary opened the first
government-backed national kitchen on Westminster Bridge Road in London.
By the end of 1917, national kitchens were popping up in almost every
British town and city.
Queen Mary (second left) opens the first government-backed national kitchen, May 1917
A 1918 Scarborough Post story
about a national kitchen in Hull emphasised the ambition of the typical
urban outlet: "The place has the appearance of being a prosperous
confectionery and cafe business. The business done is enormous."
The
Ministry of Food handbook criticised the "appalling ignorance" of
British people when it came to preparing food, advising that more
vegetables should be introduced to the diet through national kitchen
menus.
The handbook also advised that each kitchen "bow to
prejudice" by offering meat dishes. Gravy was to be made the "British
way", by using juices and fat from the meat. The ministry also
recommended any kitchens in rural settings like village halls should
have food which could be "taken into the field", like Cornish pasties.
At
the height of their popularity in 1918, 363 national kitchens were
doing business across the country. Wartime civil servants at the
Ministry of Food eagerly discussed whether national kitchens might
become a "permanent national institution".
Yet the bold experiment was not to last. The
restaurant trade was not happy at the threat to private enterprise. The
introduction of full rationing toward the end of the war apportioned
food to each individual, damping demand for communal eating. And after
the war ended, local authorities were reluctant to help fund kitchens
any longer.
Within six months of Armistice Day, 120 of the kitchens had closed.
Evans
believes the national kitchen movement has been too easily dismissed as
merely an emergency expansion of dingy soup kitchens.
"The
national kitchens were a great example of government supporting and
building upon good work going on at the grassroots," he reflects.
"They
were also an admirable attempt to bring people together. It wasn't a
service only for the very poorest - it was an egalitarian approach to
meeting people's needs, which I think we can learn from today."
Inspired
by the past, the historian has now set up his own project in Liverpool
called Manna Community Kitchen. Manna volunteers visit housing
associations and other community spaces in the city to create a pop-up
lunchtime cafe.
Meals at Manna are made using surplus food. Soups
and "scouses" (a local lamb or beef stew) are sold for 50p, and people
from all walks of life are encouraged to take recipes home, or even help
with the cooking.
Evans thinks community kitchens like Manna might act as
an alternative to food bank hand-outs, which are used by a rising
number of people.
The Trussell Trust network has grown to 445 food
banks, and the charity's most recent annual figures also show a 19%
year-on-year increase in food bank use. Around 500,000 different people
are thought to have received help over a 12-month period.
According
to the charity, the most common reason for food bank use has been
benefit payment delays and sanctions. But more than a fifth of food bank
users - 22% - were referred because of low incomes, including people in
low-paid, zero-hours or part-time work.
Most of the food banks
run by the Trussell Trust charity only have the storage facilities to
hand out non-perishable items like pasta, cereal and cans, though a
small number do offer fresh fruit and vegetables too.
The numbers of food banks have been growing
Evans hopes community cafes might inspire food banks to rethink how they currently operate.
"There
are some wonderful people who give up their time to volunteer at food
banks," he says. "But I think simply handing over plastic bags of tinned
and dried goods is a very limited approach. It's a wasted opportunity
to do more with the huge amount of fresh food being wasted."
"I
think food banks need to evolve into places with kitchens for people to
cook fresh food and social spaces for people to eat together. We can do
better."
Yet not everyone agrees the seeds of a new communal dining movement lie in the home front hardship of the WW1.
"Turning
back to communal kitchens, it would be extremely difficult to avoid the
stigma of it feeling like a service for the poor," says Martin Caraher
is professor of food and health policy at Centre for Food Policy at City
University.
"If they build up quite organically from a community
choosing to set it up, perhaps the stigma can be overcome. But if it
feels anything remotely like charity or state provision, people will
feel like they're going cap in hand."
Evans argues community
kitchens could also help address the nation's poor diet. At a time of
rising obesity rates, he thinks it would be useful to have local
authorities helping subsidise cheap cafes which only have healthy food
on the menu.
"I'd like to see supermarkets get involved too by
donating fresh produce," he explains. "Community kitchens, by providing
cheap and healthy meals, could really help improve nutrition."
"I
would love to see community kitchens blossom," adds the historian. "We
have a history of egalitarian eating. Why couldn't we do it again?" Subscribe to the BBC News Magazine's email newsletter to get articles sent to your inbox.
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