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Vintage Recipe: Peach Blueberry Breadcrumb Crumble

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This recipe was inspired by a 1940s newspaper recipe entitled “Peach Cup Pudding.” Doesn't that alone make you want to bake it? I love historical and vintage recipes and stories, in fact, let's just call it what it is, a full on infatuation. They don't use processed ingredients and are much more frugal and healthier than a lot of modern recipes. Are you with me?

Read on for Andrea's great-grandmother's recipe.

Want a frugal recipe that doesn't use any refined sugar, but is good enough to replace all your other recipes? This recipe is from her great-grandmother's recipe collection in 1940. Love the tips for using any fruit you have on hand and it had me at vintage!

The vintage recipe relied on two frugal items – tinned peaches, and homemade breadcrumbs (a great way to use up slightly-stale bread.)  It was accompanied by a sauce made from the peach syrup.

My version uses fresh or frozen fruit, is sweetened with honey or maple syrup, and features a beautifully fresh-tasting sauce made from peach puree. I knew the recipe was a winner when my husband told me to “go and throw out all of your other peach crisp recipes and just use this one from now on.”

Although Peach and Blueberries are a wonderful combination, feel free to substitute any berry for the blueberries, or to make the whole thing with just peaches. ~Melissa here, blackberries and peach are quite wonderful together.

Vintage Peach and Blueberry Crumble Recipe

  • 2 cups fresh or frozen peeled and sliced peaches
  • 1 cup fresh or frozen blueberries
  • 1 tbsp arrowroot or corn starch
  • 2 eggs
  • 1/3 cup honey or maple syrup
  • ½ tsp cinnamon
  • ¼ tsp ginger
  • 2 Tbsp melted butter
  • 3 cups fresh breadcrumbs (This is not dry bread crumbs, take fresh bread and put it through a food processor or blender to make lovely soft breadcrumbs for this delicious topping)

Peach Sauce

  • 1 fresh peach, peeled and sliced, or about 1 cup frozen peach slices, thawed.
  • 2 Tbsp maple syrup or honey
  • 1 Tbsp Lemon Juice
  • 1 Tbsp water

Grease an 8 x 8 pan. Toss the fruit with the arrowroot or corn starch and place in the bottom of the pan.

Whisk the eggs until golden in color. Whisk in the honey or maple syrup. Fold in cinnamon, ginger, butter and breadcrumbs.

Spoon the egg mixture over the fruit, spreading it out to cover the fruit.

Bake at 400 degrees for 25 minutes.

While the crumble is baking, make the sauce.

Place all ingredients into a blender and blend until smooth.

Vintage Recipe: Peach Blueberry Breadcrumb Crumble

Andrea
No ratings yet
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Prep Time 10 mins
Cook Time 25 mins
Total Time 35 mins
Servings 8

Ingredients
  

  • 2 cups fresh or frozen peeled and sliced peaches
  • 1 cup fresh or frozen blueberries
  • 1 tbsp arrowroot or corn starch
  • 2 eggs
  • 1/3 cup honey or maple syrup
  • ½ tsp cinnamon
  • ¼ tsp ginger
  • 2 Tbsp melted butter
  • 3 cups fresh breadcrumbs
  • Peach Sauce
  • 1 fresh peach peeled and sliced, or about 1 cup frozen peach slices, thawed.
  • 2 Tbsp maple syrup or honey
  • 1 Tbsp Lemon Juice
  • 1 Tbsp water

Instructions
 

  • Grease an 8 x 8 pan. Toss the fruit with the arrowroot or corn starch and place in the bottom of the pan.
  • Whisk the eggs until golden in color. Whisk in the honey or maple syrup. Fold in cinnamon, ginger, butter and breadcrumbs.
  • Spoon the egg mixture over the fruit, spreading it out to cover the fruit.
  • Bake at 400 degrees for 25 minutes.
  • While the crumble is baking, make the sauce.
  • Place all ingredients into a blender and blend until smooth.
Tried this recipe?Let us know how it was!
Want a frugal recipe that doesn't use any refined sugar, but is good enough to replace all your other recipes? This recipe is from her great-grandmother's recipe collection in 1940. Love the tips for using any fruit you have on hand and it had me at vintage!

Serve the warm crumble with the sauce.

 

Don't miss out on the rest of Andrea's Great-Grandmother's treats, visit Frugal Tips from 1913, Historical Honey Date Squares,  Vintage Carrot Cookies, and Dried Fruit and Nut Candy.

Historical Recipes: Honey Date Squares

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Honey Date Square Recipe, straight from the 1940's and Andrea's great-grandmother's recipes collection. Are you swooning with me? There is nothing I love more than sharing recipes with a history, except when someone is sharing a new one with me. Confession: I am a recipe addict.

1940's Honey Date Squares Recipe

Show me a reliable, tastes amazing, and uses only whole food ingredient recipe and I'm hooked! That's why we're about to become best friends, right? Too soon, okay, how about good friends with room for growth. ~Melissa

I love historical recipes.  Not only are they a window into the daily lives of people in other times and places, but they are often a treasure-trove of whole-foods meals!

When I inherited my great-grandmother's recipe collection, I was particularly interested in a collection of baking recipes from the early 1940's.  Due to war-time sugar-rationing, all of the recipes were made with natural sweeteners such as honey or maple syrup.

Although sugar is more plentiful than ever these days, many of us have switched to using less processed sweeteners in our baking because we know it is better for us, and our families.  This makes these recipes from the 40's just as relevant for today as they were more than 70 years ago.

These Honey Date Squares are a lovely sweet treat.  If you are a low-sugar household I think you could cut the honey in the recipe and still have something delicious.  My husband, who loves his sweets, prefers them with the full amount.  I have made these with walnuts, pecans, almonds, and a mix of nuts, and all have been good, so go ahead and use your favorites.  I have also made these with whole wheat pastry flour, spelt flour, and a gluten-free flour blend, so again, use what your family likes best.

1940s Honey Date Squares Recipe

  • 2 eggs
  • 1 cup nuts, chopped
  • 1 cup dates, chopped (raisins would also be good!)
  • ⅔ cup honey
  • ¾ cup flour (whole wheat, spelt, or gluten-free blend)
  • ½ tsp baking powder
  • ¼ tsp salt

Flavor variations: although I haven't tried them this way, you could swap out the dates for any dried fruit or even chocolate chips.  You could also add in a tsp of flavoring such as vanilla (make your own vanilla extract), or orange zest.  Chocolate chips and cherries would be a yummy combo, as would cranberry and orange.

Method

Beat together eggs, nuts, dates, and honey.  Stir in flour, baking powder, and salt.

Spread in a greased 9×9 pan.  Bake at 350 degrees for 25 – 30 minutes.

1940's Honey Date Square Recipe

When cool, cut into squares.

Historical Recipes: Honey Date Squares

Andrea Sabbeen
4.89 from 9 votes
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Prep Time 5 mins
Cook Time 25 mins
Total Time 30 mins
Servings 9

Ingredients
  

  • 2 eggs
  • 1 cup nuts chopped
  • 1 cup dates chopped (raisins would also be good!)
  • ⅔ cup honey
  • ¾ cup flour whole wheat, spelt, or gluten-free blend
  • ½ tsp baking powder
  • ¼ tsp salt

Instructions
 

  • Beat together eggs, nuts, dates, and honey. Stir in flour, baking powder, and salt.
  • Spread in a greased 9×9 pan. Bake at 350 degrees for 25 – 30 minutes.
  • When cool, cut into squares.
Tried this recipe?Let us know how it was!

Have you had any experience cooking from historical recipes?  What are your favorites?

Bio Photo Andrea Sabean
Andrea is an artisan and teacher trying to live a handmade and homemade lifestyle with her husband in
Eastern Canada. She is passionate about growing her own food, cooking healthy meals, using herbs for healing, nurturing creativity, and finding joy and blessings in the every-day moments of life. She writes about all of this, plus her adventures in sewing, crafting, and pattern design, at www.artisaninthewoods.com.

16 Ways from 1913 to Save Money and Live Frugally

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Anyone else notice the price of groceries just keep creeping up? I swear they go up by the time I make it through an aisle in the store sometimes…..

Are you looking for ways to save money? Trying to live frugally? Wondering how to make meals for less?

Picture of a very old notebook and some pennies falling out of a purse. Text overlay says, "16 Ways to Save Money & Live Frugally: My great-grandmother's wisdom from 1913".

Amen! You are not alone! In fact, even in 1913 people were looking for ways to live more frugally (and thankfully, taking notes)

My great-grandmother grew up in England at a time before television, telephone, internet, credit cards, and shopping malls. She owned few clothes by today’s standards and it was not a fashion faux pas to wear the same thing more than one day in a row. When her family purchased food, a whole family meal could be made for 8 pennies.

Her lifestyle more than 100 years ago seems quite far removed from our modern lives in 2016.

And yet, it seems some wisdom never goes out of fashion.

Tucked among her recipe books, letters, and scraps of notes, I discovered one of her school exercise books.

I know what you're thinking, these tips might have worked in 1913, but we live in a different age. I don't have time to make everything from scratch and spend hours running here and there to save a buck.

There's something to be said about those who went before us. They lived through tough times most of us haven't seen and learned how to more with less, lessons you and I both need in order to save money. This much-needed wisdom lives on for all of us in these pages from 1913.

I totally understand that which is why I've rounded up 4 of our favorite EASY and FRUGAL recipes from the 1900s to get you started.

If you try to make everything from scratch when you're not used to it, you're going to pull your hair out. I'm going to show you:

  • how to make 5 pantry staples at home in less than 15 minutes!
  • quick recipes that cost HALF the price of store-bought (awesome sauce, right?)
  • allergy-friendly, cuz let's face it, we need that these days

  • Saving money honey! Click here 

It was in this book, written in 1913, I found some economic wisdom that still applies to us today.

16 Ways to Save Money and Live Frugally

 In 1913 learning to manage money and be a good steward of what you had was something passed on and taught to children.

In those days, frugality was important enough that it was taught in school. And although there are no great revelations in these words, most of this advice has stood the test of time, and will probably continue to be stated as components of good money management for another century to come.

Need to save money and live frugally? These are 16 tips from my great-grandmother in 1913 that still apply today. Read now for time tested tips to stretch your dollar


Here it is, in her own hand:

8 ways to save money and stick to a budget

Hello, is it just me or does anyone else struggle to stick to a budget…

(My own comments are written in parentheses)

Management of the Income

  1. Savings and insurance are most important  (Make it a priority to build your emergency fund. Most experts suggest 3 months of savings tucked away.) Need help? Here's 7 Tips to Spending Less
  2. Remember which things are necessary and which are only luxuries. 
  1. If possible, buy things in large quantities. (But make sure what you buy will store well.)
  2. Buy things from shops with a quick sale.  (Don’t spend good money on stale food!)
  3. Never throw away anything that is of any use. (In 1913 not as many items came into the home, which made this a practical way to live. In our modern world, the better advice is to save if it’s useful and you have the space to store it.)
  4. Save as much as possible in the summer. (Even if you don’t have a garden, in most places food is cheaper in the summer when it is grown in abundance locally. Freeze, dry, and can everything you can!) Learn how to can with my free video series here
  5. Do not buy in a hurry (This one is just as important today as it was 100 years ago. Don’t give in to impulse buying. Step away. Think about it, especially in light of #2)
  6. As much as possible, buy things of good quality, and take care of them. (Frugality does not have to mean purchasing the cheapest item. Cheap items are often made of cheap materials that fall apart quickly. Buying a higher quality item and taking care of it can stretch your dollars further in the long run.)

A few pages later, she has also written advice specific to saving money on food. Many of these made me smile due to the references to foods from a very different country and era! (Although British readers might be more familiar with them.)

I don't know about you, but the one place I know I can save money (and often times blow it) is on our food bill. It's so important to remember:

  • ultimately, we are responsible for how much we spend at the store
  • we can save money
  • good food doesn't have to be fancy
  • sometimes the simple tips are the ones most often overlooked

8 Ways to Practice Kitchen Economy

Economy means “no waste.”

Need to save money and live frugally? These are 16 tips from my great-grandmother in 1913 that still apply today. Read now for time tested tips to stretch your dollar

  1. Stale Bread: use for pudding, crumbs, fried bread, bread fritters, toast, bread & milk. (This is an excellent homemade bread recipe)
  2. Pieces of Fat: use for dripping (often added to recipes for flavor), clarified fat (which can be used for cooking later.)
  3. Milk: scald at night, batters, sour milk can be used for cakes and scones
  4. Puddings: leftovers can be cut in slices and fried (although few of us make old-fashioned English puddings, leftover quick-breads can be given the same treatment – soaked in milk and egg first they make great French Toast!)
  5. Cold Greens and Potatoes: bubble and squeak (Add a little fat to a pan and fry them up!  Add leftover meat for a full meal or serve as a side dish.)
  6. Meat: toad in the hole, pie, pudding, meat pie, shepherds pie, mince
  7. Cold fish: fish cakes, fish pie (Make this Fish Chowder Recipe- Great-Grandma’s from 1931 )
  8. Bones and pieces of meat: stock (I save vegetable ends for this too!) Here's how to make and preserve your own bone broth/stock

What it all boils down to is making sure you use every bit of what you have. 

More Old-Timey Wisdom Resources:

17 Self-Sufficiency Tips from the 1940’s & Great Depression Live Interview

Easy 2 Ingredient Sourdough Starter

6 Things Our Great-Grandparents Did Better Than Us

Grab these easy recipes from the 1900s to get you on your way to living frugally with our great-grandmother's and grandmother's frugal recipes!

What are your favorite ways to save money and eat economically? Do you have any financial wisdom from other generations?

 
 

 

7 Frugal Fall Recipes for Real Food Kitchens

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7 Fall frugal recipes every real food kitchen should be making. Seriously, I can't believe I never thought of some of these. If you grew winter squash, you can make the roasted butternut bisque soup for a $1.00, for the whole pot! Read this now for new recipes and stretching the grocery budget during the holidays.

With the chilly fall weather I'm pushing even more to stretch our dollar and save money for the coming Christmas season. Our garden is basically done, so I'm also mourning the loss of free fresh vegetable shopping from the back yard. I've put up a lot of our produce on the pantry shelves or freezer which does help.

We're still harvesting some of our fall crops. Butternut squash, apples, carrots, beets, and pumpkin to name a few. Due to our off-grid greenhouse, I've also got tomatoes still ripening. I love our green house, like totally swoon every time I come home and see it snuggled up in the back yard. Sigh. Okay, enough gushing.

Back to the frugal foodie goodies. Beings I had butternut squash sitting on our back deck, I decided to try out a new soup recipe. This is my first fall with a Blendtec and I was flat out itching to try some hot blended soups. I used it a ton this summer with fresh smoothies, salsa prepping, guacamole, and fermented hummus. But fall means soup time, can I get a high five?

These are 7 fall frugal recipes every real food kitchen should be making!

1. Roasted Butternut Bisque Soup

First off, I decided the easiest way to cook the butternut squash for this recipe was to roast it. I chopped it in half length ways, scooped out the seeds with a spoon, and put it face down in about an inch of water. I baked it at 375 degrees for about forty minutes.

Making roasted butternut bisque soup with garlic and onions. Best fall soup ever!

No peeling or chopping. For this busy mamma who had a full canner load of salsa going, that was a plus. A girl can only do so many kitchen things at once, am I right?

7 Frugal fall recipes for real food kitchens.

While the butternut squash is cooling, saute the garlic and onions in olive oil until transparent.

Scoop half of the roasted butternut squash into the blender. Add a 1/4 cup cream and using the hot soup setting, turned it on. For all the awesome power of the Blendtec blender it is not a quiet machine. I love that the blade is not sharp, ie. I won't cut myself while washing it out as I've been known to be a bit clumsy a time or two.. or three.


Save $100 on Blendtec Factory Recertified Blenders + Free Shipping *affiliate link

7 Fall frugal recipes every real food kitchen should be making. Seriously, I can't believe I never thought of some of these. If you grew winter squash, you can make the roasted butternut bisque soup for a $1.00, for the whole pot! Read this now for new recipes and stretching the grocery budget during the holidays.

Roasted Butternut Bisque Soup

MelissaKNorris
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Prep Time 30 mins
Cook Time 40 mins
Total Time 1 hr 10 mins
Servings 8 cups

Ingredients
  

  • 1 large butternut squash
  • 2 tablespoons olive oil
  • 1/2 cup diced onion
  • 5 to 6 cloves garlic
  • 1/2 cup heavy cream
  • salt and pepper to taste

Instructions
 

  • Chop butternut squash in half lengthwise and dig out the seeds. Place in a roasting pan face down with an inch of water and bake at 375 degrees until soft enough to scoop out, ab out 30 minutes. While squash is cooling, heat olive oil in cast iron skillet. Saute garlic and onions. In two batches, scoop cooked squash into Blendtec blender and add half of the cream. Puree. In second batch, add garlic and onion. Salt and pepper to taste.
Tried this recipe?Let us know how it was!

On the second go round, add the sauteed garlic and onions. You can add a bit of sage if you have any. I remembered I had a bunch growing in our herb garden after the final blend… Need a dairy free option? Use chicken stock or broth in place of the cream. 

Now, we grew our own onions, garlic, and butternut squash, so this soup cost me about $1.00 for the organic cream I used in it. It made about 8 cups of soup making this extremely frugal and stretching a squash into two meals for my husband and I. This roasted butternut bisque soup has an incredible rich and creamy texture with the savory notes of the garlic and onion balancing divinely with the sweet notes of the butternut squash. Plain talk, you just plain have to make this soup, okay?

Soups are one of the best ways to stretch your grocery budget. They're extremely frugal and easy to slip in other vegetables. Plus, on those cold days, nothing warms a body up like a hot bowl of homemade soup love.

Here's some other fave fall frugal recipes and soups every real food kitchen should be whipping out in the weeks and months to come.

2. Caramelized Apple Onion Soup from SkinnyTaste.com Seriously, caramelized onions with apples with a tantalizing bit of garlic and cream to bring it together. Yeah, you're drooling to aren't ya? Click here for the recipe. 

3. Orange Mashed Cauliflower from RestoredRoots.com This uses carrots and cauliflower for a gorgeous and healthy mashed puree. Think move on over mashed potatoes because this duo has you beat. Click here for the recipe.  

4. Pumpkin Pie Smoothie and Hot Chocolate from Homesteadlady.com Yes, chocolate and pumpkin, together, 'nuff said. Click here for the recipe.

5. Superfood Pumpkin Pie Smoothie from This House of Joy.com I'm kind of lovin that this one has pecans and maca powder all blended into a healthy drink it up pumpkin pie. Click here for the recipe. 

6. Roasted Acorn Squash and Sweet Potato Soup from BloggingOverThyme.com I adore acorn squash and roasting it sweet potatoes and adding in some ginger. This just went into my meal plan for this weekend and maybe even on the holiday menu. Click here for the recipe.

7. Winter White Velvet Soup by TheCafesucrefarine.com Seriously, this soup has parsnips (I love parsnips), cauliflower, leeks, and shallots, and it's blended into one of the prettiest and stylish soups I've ever seen. Yes, I used the word stylish to describe a soup. Click here for the recipe.

Bean and Ham Soup Recipe-Frugal Suppers

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The only thing I like more than frugal cooking is having it taste like it cost a fortune and took hours. This bean and ham soup was declared by my husband (and readers who emailed me) as the best soup ever, and it took very little hands on time. Can you see me doing the moon walk in the kitchen? Me, neither, but it's a little funky and jazzy, though I won't win any dance awards.

Cooking healthy wholesome food for my family, while maintaining a frugal budget, is one of my favorite things to do. I know many of you are in the same spot as I am. My aim over the next few months is to share my tips and tricks for keeping a food budget of $350 a month, with our favorite recipes, to help you and hopefully learn some new recipes.

Ham and Bean Soup-Frugal Suppers Recipe at MelissaKNorris.com

Now, along with using common, healthy, and cheap inexpensive ingredients, it has to taste amazing, too. Because, hello, it doesn't matter the cost or the health benefits if it doesn't taste good. At least, that's the way it rolls at my house with my family.

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