The stomach for the fight

In the Third Reich, food was not a personal matter but a way for Germans to show their patriotism and sacrifice. Lisa Pine investigates how the Nazis micromanaged what was being served on the nation's tables

-  Lisa Pine

“Hardworking and efficient housewives know what they have to do in the service of this great German family – the German people – if it has to overcome temporary small shortages. They simply do their shopping in accordance with the interest of the great German family!” So said Rudolf Hess, deputy Führer of the Nazi Party, in a speech in 1936. He went on to elaborate on what was expected of “good” German women: “They do not attempt to buy expressly that which is in short supply at the time, but instead buy those things which are available in abundance and prepare them in such a way that they look really good and taste really good to their husbands and children. No good German housewife particularly mourns the quarter-pound of pork which, from time to time, she now fails to get.”

Food was a key concern in the Third Reich: from their rise to power in the early 1930s through to the Second World War, the Nazis always sought to control what was grown in the fields and eaten by the nation. This was one way in which they would meet the policy objective of autarky, or economic self-sufficiency.

To never repeat the shortages and hardship during and after the First World War – when potato harvests failed and enemy naval blockades cut access to imports, which accounted for around a third of the nation’s food – the Nazis aimed to make Germany self-sufficient. They would improve and control food production, and change people’s eating habits. Imported goods like oranges would need to become a thing of the past. In addition, any foods requiring imported fodder (feed for livestock) to produce, such as meat and butter, would be less abundant, as the regime looked to reduce the reliance on such imports.