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Your Kitchen Through Time

(40 Posts)
NanKate Wed 28-Aug-24 21:31:30

Just watching the tv series starting with the 1950s. It has brought back many memories.

They mentioned how millions visited The Ideal Home Exhibitions. I went a few times to the one in Birmingham. I think mum bought something like an omelette maker that folded in two.

Whilst in the open cafe we watched a water/fountain display in different colours to music.

Percy Thrower the Gardener was there one year.

I bought a potato peeler in the 1970s. You put the potatoes in a round plastic container with some water and rotated the handle which rubbed the potatoes together and supposedly peeled them. It didn’t work ☹️

What are your kitchen memories?

Allira Fri 30-Aug-24 08:52:25

kittylester

We still have an electric carving knife which DH wields periodically.

We have a hostess trolley which I always feel slightly embarrassed to admit to. But, it comes into it's own when we have big family gatherings.

We have a hostess trolley too kittylester.

I offered it to DS who seems to be the main chef/host for family gatherings now be he declined.
It stores some of our larger 'best' serving dishes.

Reminiscent of Barry and Freda 😁

kittylester Fri 30-Aug-24 11:42:54

Ours makes me think of Abigail's Party.

Nit even sure there was one in it but there definitely should have been grin

Allira Fri 30-Aug-24 15:01:14

They must be collectors' items now kittylester.
Soon to be seen on the Antiques Road Show.

Greyduster Fri 30-Aug-24 16:18:25

I have a hostess trolley too. DS won it in a raffle in the senior NCOs mess at his RAF station. As he had neither house nor wife at the time, he gave it to me and it was very useful as we used, then, to entertain. However, it’s only used at Christmas time now. The rest of the time, it houses my laptop and a load of paperwork I haven’t the energy to look at!
DH had a mania for kitchen gadgets. We used to go to the Great Yorkshire Show every year and he would come back with some wonderful gizmo that had worked beautifully in the demonstrator’s hands, but refused to work for him (or me)!

Greyduster Fri 30-Aug-24 16:20:48

I would add, as an aside, that I have never been “bent over backwards” on it😁!

Witzend Fri 30-Aug-24 16:26:23

I had a hostess trolley for years, but it was rarely used and ended up as a dumping ground in the dining room. Needed the space for a piano after I took it up again, sold the trolley in no time on eBay for £80.

I forget who mentioned Kenwood mixers - my Chef was a wedding present in 1974! We had to send it off maybe 10 years ago for a repair and service, but it’s still going strong.

Franbern Fri 30-Aug-24 18:03:12

I used to love my annual trip to Earls Court for The Ideal Home Show, A few times I went with a friend, but actually preferred to go by myself, so I could go exactly where I wanted as I wanted.

Most year I would come home ith a 'gadget', often they proved reasonably useful for a short time. The worst one was a sausage maker. My youngest son never let me live that one down!!!

The Kenwood mixer was one of my ambitions as soon as I married in 1964. I think I finally got one in 1969. (It is still working with one of my daughters (with .a replacement bowl).

My parents passed on to us one of those twin washing tubs when first married. Tried it twice, gave up and used launderette from them onwards. Continued with this even after birth of first baby (his things hand washed each day), when second child arrived eleven months later we purchased a washing machine. This had to live in our bathroom so that for use, we would put the inward hose onto the taps and draper the exit hose over the bath. All too often as the water exited machine would go for walkies, pulling that exit hose off the bath and flooding the bathroom.

One of the best IHE I attended had a wonderful rain forest feature built there, which we could wander around and take shelter as it rained, each time.

Only once bothered to do the large queues for the houses, but spent one wonderful time at an exhibition there of caravans.

When I retired from work I used some of my retirement money to treat myself to a Vitamix. Used it for a few years before passing it on to one of my daughter who also got a good few years use out of.

At another one I was introduced to 'washing sheets' at one of the market place stalls. I was attending with a friend and they had a special offer of several packages of these for tenner, so we did that between us. Many years back, never used anything other than these sort of sheets since.

Always took a packed lunch with me, found the food sold there very expensive.

In the last few years I went there was always offers of free entry tickets.

Granmarderby10 Fri 30-Aug-24 18:19:23

Hostess trolley ✔️ mum wheeled it out at Christmas when we dined in the dining room but the rest of the time it served it’s true purpose as a general dumping ground for everything when doing a panicked tidy up😺

AreWeThereYet Fri 30-Aug-24 18:27:24

It used to be my job to stick the Green Shield stamps in the book after a shopping trip 😄

Gin Fri 30-Aug-24 18:54:49

I think the show at Earls Court was sponsored by The Daily Mail and my uncle was an employee so got free tickets. We would go every year and I would run around collecting every freebie I could find. I remember tiny Hovis loaves. What they were promoting I have no idea - brown bread? My parents bought a twin tub there, can’t remember the make but it had a red trim with a paddle you rotated with a handle on the lid. A mangle was attached to the top that folded down for storage. A vast improvement on the big gas heated boiler and dolly stick.

I went with a girlfriend, we were 19 or 20 and after a few hours It got so hot and stuffy that I fainted. A kindly foreign lady found me a chair on her stand and gave me a drink and as I left gave me a stainless steal tea strainer on a little drip stand that I still use to this day! It is a beautifully Swedish design and made of really thick steal.

Granmarderby10 Fri 30-Aug-24 20:17:40

That was a lovely memory Gin these exhibitions/shows get so packed you can barely move. The Gardeners World one at NEC was like that when I went too.

kittylester Fri 30-Aug-24 21:56:04

I went to an Ideal Home Exhibition just before got married and bought an 'everlasting' bread knife which I still use.

Allira Fri 30-Aug-24 23:09:41

I remember tiny Hovis loaves. What they were promoting I have no idea - brown bread?

You could buy those tiny Hovis loaves in the shops, Gin. I haven't seen any for years.

NotAGran55 Sat 31-Aug-24 08:31:21

I went to the 1966 Ideal Home Exhibition and we came back with free tins of soup.
A famous soup maker had a stand there and if you could prove that your name was the same they gave freebies! I don’t know what proof my mum and dad had with them though.