FoodNet

Foods and household management

1914

Page 19

Presented as published in 1914. Historical recipes may not meet modern food-safety standards. Cook from the modern interpretation, not the original instructions.
7. Make an estimate of the cost of utensils for the home kitchen from a price list obtained from some standard furnishing shop. 8. Examine the utensils in the school kitchen and at home. Consider the material and shape with reference to durability and convenience. 9. What are the important points in cleaning the kitchen? 10. What are the important points in good dish-washing? 11. What is a good order of work in dish-washing? ^Laboratory management. — In the school kitchen the dish-washing may be done at the sink by housekeepers appointed for the day, or if equipment allows, the work may be done in twos with some definite plan for dividing the work. CHAPTER III FUEL AND STOVES The fuels most widely used in this country are coal, gas, and kerosene. Wood is still used for cooking by those who own wood lots, or who live in a district where wood is abun- dant, but in a sense it is the fuel of the past. Electricity is generated from coal except in the few communities where the electric current is derived through machinery from the energy of falling water but electricity is not in conmion household use, and is still the method of the future for the average family. Other substances are btuned for fuel occasionally or in restricted localities. Corn cobs are used sometimes in the corn belt. Peat is an old-world fuel. It is a vegetable substance taken in blocks from marshes, in reality the first stage of coal formation. It is a slow-burning fuel which is cheap in its own locahty. Economy of fuel is a world problem, for it is evident that the coal supply will be exhausted in course of time, and this is true also of coal oil or petroleum. Scientists are experi- menting to discover Rractical methods, not dependent upon the burning of coal, for generating electricity. Water power is the only practicable method so far, and to make it per- manently available we must conserve the forests still remain- ing to us, jind thus safeguard the sources of our rivers. Another effort toward economy is seen in the use for fuel of waste products treated in some way to make them readily combustible. The briquet is used in Europe where the fuel supply is limited. It is made of sawdust or waste coal, with D 33 34 ¥OOJ>S AND HOUSEHOLD MANAGEMENT some petroleum, tar, resin, or other substance, heated together and molded. Good briquets yield a large amount of heat in proportion to bulk and weight. The problem here, as with all waste, is to find a manufacturing process that will make the product cheap enough to be practical for conmion use. It is a natural impulse to use lavishly whatever is at hand in abundance, and it is only a highly civilized conmumity that takes thought for the economy of the future. Con- sidered only from a selfish point pf view, however, with coal and petroleum at the high prices that are likely to prevail, the saving of fuel is one of our most important economies.