They led the Government to introduce food rationing, which lasted from 1940 until well into the 1950s.

Bacon, butter and sugar were rationed as early as January 1940, followed by meat, tea, jam, biscuits, breakfast cereals, cheese, eggs, milk and canned fruit. Among the few foods not rationed – to keep up morale – were fish and chips.

Rationing continued after the war. Bread was rationed from 1946 and rationing of sweets and sugar ended only in 1953 and bananas in 1954.

The shortages inspired a series of campaigns by the Ministry of Food to help housewives create supposedly palatable dishes with limited means, such as the infamous powdered eggs, the wholemeal "national loaf" and Woolton pie, a pie of vegetables in oatmeal, with a pastry or potato crust, named after the Minister of Food, Lord Woolton.

Then there was snoek, a fish from South Africa which arrived in Britain canned and has been described as "spectacularly unsuccessful", despite having an intense flavour, and the much derided Spam pork and ham luncheon meat, which is still around today.

All Lord Woolton's advice was augmented by locally produced recipes such as those published in two booklets by Sowerby Bridge Urban District Council, which contained around 300 recipes, from oat cakes to rhubarb wine and potato savoury to onion souffle and apricot fancies.

The booklets have been sent to me by Kathleen Lees (pictured), of Catherine Crescent, Elland, who was brought up in Sowerby Bridge.

They belonged to her mother, Doris Hebblethwaite, who died in 1971.

One of the booklets was produced to mark Salute the Soldier Week in May, 1944. It cost a shilling (5p) and started by reminding readers on its cover of Napoleon's famous dictum: "The Army marches on its stomach".

All the recipes – most of them sweet, rather than savoury, it must be said – were contributed by individuals.

There is a savoury loaf by Mrs S F Hollas, of Sowerby, and Durham cutlets (made from a quarter pound of cold meat ("well trimmed") by Mrs J A Boothroyd, of Rochdale Road, Halifax.

Mrs P Carter, of Gad's Hill, Trimmingham, Halifax, prescribed an unappetising sounding "cheese and tomato paste" while Mrs D Chadwick, of Laurel Mount, Sowerby Bridge even offered haggis.

There is Russian pudding, chocolate carrot tart, buns, small buns and plain buns, coconut tarts, treacle tart and Chelsea tart, vinegar loaf, something called brunchies and something else called, simply, munch.

Mrs J Sutcliffe, of Rochdale Road, Halifax, even offered something called "furniture cream" though, given that it contained soap, turpentine, white wax and beeswax, there's a fair chance that it wasn't intended to be eaten – although you probably couldn't be absolutely sure, could you?

• Share your memories with other Courier readers. Write to Nostalgia, Evening Courier, PO Box 19, King Cross Street, Halifax, HX1 2SF, phone 01422 260208 or e-mail david.hanson@halifaxcourier.co.uk