HOUSEKEEPING NOT SIMPLE MATTER, HUSBANDS FIND

Greymouth Evening Star, 2 December 1950, Page 10

HOUSEKEEPING NOT SIMPLE MATTER, HUSBANDS FIND

During the last few months many husbands have gained a new respect for the housekeeping abilities of their wives. When the current epidemic of glandular fever has struck down the mother of a family, the father has had an unwelcome promotion from first mate to captain, from amiable auxiliary to organising executive. The men have found that running a house is not the siinple matter it appears, writes the women’s editor in the Otago Daily Times.

The technique of shopping, too, has been another problem. Buying the food has proved relatively simple, but stowing it away in a suitable carrier and bringing it home relatively unscathed has brought difficulties. Men do not care much for the roomy shopping bag with which most women go equipped. One man chose a suitcase as more dignified. It answered quite well except for a sponge cake and some extra eggs—thoughtfully put in because bacon and eggs constituted the one dish he could really cook — but by the time he had reached his home, the eggs were already semrscrambled, and the sponge cake was already disintegrating.

The Bread Problem

Buying the bread is another difficulty to most husbands. “There are so many kinds of loaves” they protest. Usually they know a Vienna loaf but all the other descriptive names are beyond theii’ coinprehension—raised pan, half square pan, and the varieties of brown bread offered them throw them into confusion, and they hastily take anything to escape from the pitying ,eye of the shop assistant. Tackling the dishes is a job at which most men have already had plenty of practice—but most wives try to get the saucepans washed while dishing the meal. It is here that the stopped-up-sink calamities occur. Tired by a praiseworthy desire

to clear the kitchen, bits of vegetables, tea-leaves and even the fat from the joint go down the kitchen sink. The guiding hand is missing, and its owner is probably lying m bed wondering exactly what is going on in the kitchen where loud bangs announce that the saucepans are being hurled into the cupboard.

Difference In Cooking

Then the cooking' itself. Camp cookery is one art, home cookery another. Frying pan dishes with a cup of tea seem to present the least pitfalls; once put on, they have to be watched. There is no time for a “glance” at the newspaper, which is What happens when the over-burden-ed husband has put the joint in the oven and set the vegetables to cook. The “glance” becomes absorption until a shout from the invalid reminds him that something is burning. Even if everything is under control, the last 10 minutes spent in dishing up are a trial for the unaccustomed cook. Everything is ready at once; he needs at least two sets of hands —and then he discovers he doesn’t know how to make gravy! In preparation for next winter’s ills it might be a good idea to give some preliminary lessons to husbands in the art of housekeeping. The course might be called, “Maintaining Essential Services,” and should avoid anything ambitious. Nobody really cares whether the man of the family can whip up a cake or make a batch of scones; those can always be bought, but it is heartbreaking for the mother to return to a disordered kitchen, a raffish living room, and a grimy bathroom. In default of lessons a few cards of instruction and prohibition might be fastened on the kitchen walls. But the best insurance against domestic upheaval is to have a growing daughter. She will gladly take on feminine authority and keep father in his place.