Keeping food cool. When the table was cleared after dinner, the most important point was putting away the foods that would most easily spoil, — the meat, the butter, the milk. The meat had been hot when it was put on the table, and it was still warm. Mrs. Allen did not put it into the ice box warm, but, as there were no flies in the kitchen, she stood the meat in the breeze by the window to cool it off. If there had been no breeze, she would have returned the meat to the pot and set the pot in a pan of water. Ice for keeping food. Ice is one of the great comforts in summer, and is a safeguard of our health. Remember in the lesson on Courtesy of New York State College of Agriculture at ComeU University. Fig. 114. — Mrs. Groves has an inexpensive home-made ice box. 26o FOOD AND HEALTH preserving fruit that we learned how the bacteria that spoil our food do not flourish in the cold. More and more are farmers planning to cut ice and store it. Mr. Groves of Pleasant Valley dammed up a brook, making a small pond, cleaned out the vegetable matter, and found that he could take enough clean ice from the pond to last all summer. Mr. Groves fenced in his ice pond to keep out the farm animals, and he put in the dam at a spot in the brook above the place Courtesy of Grand Rapids R^Tigerator Co. wViprp thc COWS and Fig. 115. — Mrs. Allen's refrigerator is built with 1 ^ A ' \r double walls made of nonconducting materials. nOrSCS gO lO UrmK. He made a double wall and roof to one small building on the place, and packed the ice down in sawdust. Sometimes two or three landowners can combine in ice cutting. One man in Pleasant Valley adds to his income by selling ice to his neighbors. THE HOME DINNER 261 The farmers who sell milk, cream:, and butter find that the better condition of their products makes it pay to have ice. A well-built refrigerator. Mrs. Allen was very happy with her new refrigerator, and told Mollie that the difference between a summer with ice and without ice, was astounding. The picture (Fig. 115) shows Mrs. Allen's refrigerator, which stands in the coolest part of the pantry. It is important to have air circulating in United States Department of Commerce, Circular of the Bureau of Standards, No. 6S* Fig. 116. — Diagram showing the circulation in two used types of refrigerator. the refrigerator. The drawings (Fig. 116) show the movement of the air in two refrigerators and the cool- est place in each. 262 FOOD AND HEALTH Mrs. Allen's refrigerator is built with double walls made of nonconducting materials, and has ten layers of such in the walls, one of them a closed-in air space. The closets for the food are enamel lined. This is nonabsorptive, and may be kept perfectly clean. A large refrigerator is more economical of ice than a small one, and in the end more than balances the few dollars extra that must be paid for the larger size. Select the coolest spot that you have for the refrigerator. Care of a refrigerator. Always wash off the block of ice before putting it into the ice chamber. Wash out the ice chamber once a week, and pour a solu- tion of washing soda down the waste pipe. The food chambers should be washed out once a week and dried, and no spilled food allowed to remain a moment. Do not leave the doors open. Have a strong ice pick for breaking ice. And when we cannot have ice ? Perhaps there is a well. Then you can hang very clean pails or glass fruit jars in the well that will hold some food at least. This is a simple old-fashioned way ; but be sure that the ropes are strong, and the pails tightly closed. It is always a sad event when milk spills into the waten If the water comes from a spring in pipes, you have an overflow that can be used for cooling food.

AI-modernized reading of the original text

Keeping food cool. When the table was cleared after dinner, the most important point was putting away the foods that would most easily spoil, — the meat, the butter, the milk. The meat had been hot when it was put on the table, and it was still warm. Mrs. Allen did not put it into the ice box warm, but, as there were no flies in the kitchen, she stood the meat in the breeze by the window to cool it off. If there had been no breeze, she would have returned the meat to the pot and set the pot in a pan of water. Ice for keeping food. Ice is one of the great comforts in summer, and is a safeguard of our health. Remember in the lesson on Courtesy of New York State College of Agriculture at ComeU University. Fig. 114. — Mrs. Groves has an inexpensive home-made ice box. 26o preserving fruit that we learned how the bacteria that spoil our food do not flourish in the cold. More and more are farmers planning to cut ice and store it. Mr. Groves of Pleasant Valley dammed up a brook, making a small pond, cleaned out the vegetable matter, and found that he could take enough clean ice from the pond to last all summer. Mr. Groves fenced in his ice pond to keep out the farm animals, and he put in the dam at a spot in the brook above the place where the cows and horses go to drink.. He made a double wall and roof to one small building on the place, and packed the ice down in sawdust. Sometimes two or three landowners can combine in ice cutting. One man in Pleasant Valley adds to his income by selling ice to his neighbors. The farmers who sell milk, cream:, and butter find that the better condition of their products makes it pay to have ice. A well-built refrigerator. Mrs. Allen was very happy with her new refrigerator, and told Mollie that the difference between a summer with ice and without ice, was astounding. The picture (Fig. 115) shows Mrs. Allen's refrigerator, which stands in the coolest part of the pantry. It is important to have air circulating in United States Department of Commerce, Circular of the Bureau of Standards, No. 6S* Fig. 116. — Diagram showing the circulation in two used types of refrigerator. the refrigerator. The drawings (Fig. 116) show the movement of the air in two refrigerators and the coolest place in each. Mrs. Allen's refrigerator is built with double walls made of nonconducting materials, and has ten layers of such in the walls, one of them a closed-in air space. The closets for the food are enamel lined. This is nonabsorptive, and may be kept perfectly clean. A large refrigerator is more economical of ice than a small one, and in the end more than balances the few dollars extra that must be paid for the larger size. Select the coolest spot that you have for the refrigerator. Care of a refrigerator. Always wash off the block of ice before putting it into the ice chamber. Wash out the ice chamber once a week, and pour a solution of washing soda down the waste pipe. The food chambers should be washed out once a week and dried, and no spilled food allowed to remain a moment. Do not leave the doors open. Have a strong ice pick for breaking ice. And when we cannot have ice ? Perhaps there is a well. Then you can hang very clean pails or glass fruit jars in the well that will hold some food at least. This is a simplAn old-fashioned way; but be sure that the ropes are strong, and the pails tightly closed. It is always a sad event when milk spills into the water. If the water comes from a spring in pipes, you have an overflow that can be used for cooling food.

Food and health