NEW ZEALANDERS ADVISED TO EAT LESS MEAT

Press, Volume CXV, Issue 33753, 28 January 1975, Page 6

NEW ZEALANDERS ADVISED TO EAT LESS MEAT

Support for Professor D. W. Beaven’s recent statement that New Zealanders eat too much may seem strange coming from a trained cordon bleu cook.

But Miss Stephanie Veitch is convinced New Zealanders should eat less meat and more fruit and vegetables. Just returned home from two years overseas, she is “horrified at the amount of food that’s consumed here." Miss Veitch will be starting an evening course in' cordon bleu cookery’ in Feb- : ruary. Contrary to its reputation. French cooking, she: says, need no be rich in calories or cost She is planning an extensive section on salads, and is including a vegetarian sec-, tion. The course makes much use of vegetables, which, she ■ says, should suit Christchurch. gardeners. j

! Liberal use of dairy pro- ■ ducts is a basic element in ; cordon bleu cookery and I that, she says, makes it an I expensive method in many • countries. > Miss Veitch believes • that the relative cheapness i of dairy products in New • Zealand should take cordon i[ blue cookery out of the ■lluxury class he e. • But with a healthier diet : in mind, she will be advising i'her cooks vhen they can safely use top of the milk •: instead of cream in the many ; sauces that are the signature •lof the cordon bleu cook. FROZEN VEGETABLES She will also instruct I I them on the use of their . • deep freeze in c.onjuction [with this type of cooking. I “Many vegetables that are , in season now can be frozen and used for dishes later on [in the-winter,” she said. Although she admits that many of the dishes require i more time and work to achieve high standards, cordon bleu cookery can be applied to every-day dishes.

“I wouldn’t run down plain cooking,” she said, “but New Zealand housewives do often ruin vegetables by over-cooking. And there are many things in the course that can be applied to standard cuts of meat and vegetables that provide variety without being expensive.” In these times of television dinners are women still interested n intricate cooking? “I like it because I get a thrill out of cooking something that takes a bit more effort,” said

Miss Veitch. "The New Zealand housewife, thank goodness, still enjoys cooking her own food for dinner guests. And 1 think she would rather prepare food than open a can all the lime.” Miss Veitch warns that the two-hour, 33-week course will be hard work. She is not about to allow any short cuts, and there will be plenty of washing up after the many steps in preparing a French dish are followed. But, she says, it will not be a course just' for adventurous cooks. Anyone with an interest in food should enjoy it. Men are, she adds, very welcome to join, and she hopes some will enrol. The course will be held on Tuesday evenings at Hagley High School, where Mis’s Veitch will be teaching home economics. A Waimate girl, she is a trained home economics teacher, and taught for three years at Avonside Girls’ High School before going overseas. In London she took the 12-1 week course at the Cordon: Bleu Cookery School. For a year she taught cordon bleu cookery at a girls’ finishing school, Winkfield Place, near Windsor. One of the principals of the school edits the Cordon Bleu Cookery magazine, now published monthly. “Many of the girls who took the cookery course couldn’t boil an egg when they started because they had been used to having servants in their homes,” said Miss Veitch. As well as French .cooking they became accomplished at floral art and handicraft.