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This story is taken from an interview with John Luke, and has been added to the site with his permission. The author fully understands the site's terms and conditions. The interviewer was Mark Jeffers, and the transcription was by Bruce Logan.
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Rationing came into operation. I have already mentioned petrol rationing. Food and clothing were also rationed. A weekly ration of food per person was as follows:

1 egg, 2 ozs butter, 4 ozs margarine, 2 ozs lard (for frying), 3 ozs tea, 4 ozs sugar
4 ozs meat, 2 ozs cheese, 4 ozs bacon

Ballymena, being a rural community wasn’t so badly off. Someone in the country maybe gave the family a present of ½ dozen eggs or ½ lb of butter around Christmas time. But by and large rationing was very strict and inspectors visited the shops to see that it was carried out properly.

Dried eggs came on the market. These were in powdered form and were mixed with water and fried. What it really was I don’t know but it tasted not too bad. My mother baked her own soda bread but even flour was scarce. It was a grey colour rather then white and it showed in the colour of the soda bread and the loaves as well. Most folk around Ballymena, and I’m sure elsewhere, had a vegetable patch and grew their own vegetables.

Other items rationed included clothes and sweets. You had so many E coupons and so many D coupons to buy sweets every month. When you used them that was it until the next month. I am told that it took 6 months clothing coupons to buy a man’s suit, which in those days could be bought at the 50 shilling tailors (possibly more than a week’s wages). Many people who were born around 1938/39 never saw a banana until after the war.

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