What would an American, British, Japanese, and German

civilian expect to have as their major food staples during the war?

My grandfather and father's primary food staple before and after the war (China) was steamed bread, noodles, and other things made out of corn flour. White rice was a luxury. Meat was even more rare- it was consumed only two or three times a year for a single meal.

My daily food staples right now are bread, eggs, chicken, and cans of tuna fish.

 

These are my impressions and not based on any special knowledge.

US pretty much unchanged through the course of the war. I believe vegetable oils were rationed but people used a lot of bacon grease in cooking back then anyway.

Japan - rice was still the staple but the quantity of it dropped throughout the war near the end it was whatever could be harvested locally as the transportation infrastructure broke down.

England was on rationing until 1950 I believe. Fresh fruits and vegetables were harder to come by.

Not reallly sure about Germany although by the end of the war they were also pretty much thrown back on scarce local resources.

 

My parents both said they hardly noticed food rationing during the war because they both served in the US Navy and ate whatever was available in the various messes to which they were assigned. My mother said her family mentioned rationing from time to time, as certain items disappeared from stores, but it was never considered a serious hardship.

My wife's parents and siblings are Chinese, however, and had a much different story to relate. They were stuck for much of the war on Japanese-occupied Borneo, where food was very difficult to come by. My mother-in-law said that she managed to grow much of their food in a small vegetable garden. She had to be careful of growing too much, or it would attract the attention of Japanese supply officers who were always "requisitioning" civilian food supplies to feed their troops. She said that they lived on the edge of the jungle at that time, and she could hide many of her crops among the jungle growth. Rice, which had been a major staple pre-war, was a problem and they never got enough. They were able to occasionally buy or trade for some wild-game and fish from the Borneo natives, and knew where wild fruit could be collected in season. They also tried to raise pigs and chickens, but often had them stolen by passing Japanese soldiers. Toward the end of the war, the Japanese became more aggressive in stealing food because their own supply lines had been cut, and things got a "bit tight", as she put it. They were usually hungry, but never really close to serious starvation. They never had "rationing" in the sense that we know it because there were no stores where food was consistently bought and sold, but food was definitely scarce.

 

My parents were barely in their teens when the Japanese invaded the Philippines.
My dad fled with his family from the shores of Lingayen and were forced to make the trek up Baguio City, then down to the plains of Luzon. I haven't yet thought of asking him what they had to eat during their evacuation. But I did ask him what they ate when they finally resettled in a town in Pangasinan where relatives had a farm. He said they were lucky because they were living in a farm. The Japanese there regularly took a share of their harvests and crops but the family were able to learn how to set aside to tide them by.
As for my mother, they lived in the town of Lucban on the foot of Mt. Banahaw in the southern part of Luzon.
She recalled that they were also forced to grow whatever they can, often root crops. They didn't have enough rice but she did recall that they had meat. She said they made a living selling local sausages (known as longaniza) at that time. She told me they used either dog or cat meat to do so.

 

i thought the stapled food from china was steamed rice?

 

In my grandfather's region, the weather and soil conditions weren't good for rice. I should have added that his other staple was some sort of maize. What was very missing from his diet (and my father's, post war when he was growing up) was oils, fats, fruits, and severe lack of meat in general. Most of their entire diet was corn, vegetable, and grain.

 

One thing that should probably be remembered about food rationing in both the UK and the US, that would be the over reaching use of SPAM. It and fish were never rationed, consequently was, many times, the only non-fish meat product the housewife could find. By mid-war the Hormel company was pumping out 15 million tins of SPAM per WEEK!

In the west, Montana specifically my grandparents (both sets) had farms so they had access to their own beef, chicken, hogs, and grains. My paternal set raised a great many chickens and they sold eggs locally and to the government while keeping many for themselves I'm sure. Both my Mom and Dad were employed in government work, Dad in the USAAF and Mom with the Kaiser Plant in Portland as a "Wanda the Welder", she always mentioned the great meals she would get at the Kaiser cafeteria twice a day.

In America, as in Great Britain the citizens raised little gardens of veggies to supplement what they could purchase. And in Britain, carrots and cabbage were never rationed so a great many meals included those ingredients I would suppose. Fish, SPAM, carrots, and or cabbage.

In Great Britain, bread wasn’t rationed until post-war. This was in response to Britain shipping much of its own wheat and flour to the European nations (Germany most of all) to help alleviate their own shortages.

 

(double post, don't know why!)