CAPABLE HOUSEKEEPING

New Zealand Times, Volume XLIX, Issue 11252, 3 July 1922, Page 5

CAPABLE HOUSEKEEPING

—C.S.M. (in "Sydney Telegraph"). Housekeeping has to be organised as methodically and thoroiiglily as an army manoeuvre. There must be a competent head in charge, and an efficient staff to carry out the detail work, even if the staff and head are tire one woman. No woman who is not her own housekeeper can ever hope to instruct another to efficiently carry out orders and produce satisfactory results. She must obey, before she can command. Housekeeping becomes simple when a system is adopted and stuck to. Schedule work sometimes seems irritating in its dull monotony; but the plan is a producer of tidiness, habit, formation, ea-se, regularity, and successful campaigning. Consequently, it is in a housekeeper,with tli£S.e ideas that one expects to find the necessary qualifications to justify the title “capable". ifii VV S PAPERS. Few house-women realise the great value of newspaper. I have seen establishments where cooks and maids fell over one another usinv this and that; utensil, soiling tea-towels and table-nap-kins and plates, when a little common sense and a few sheets of newspaper would have accomplished the whole thing, and there ■would have been no unnecessary washing up, One of the tragedies of housekeeping is the washing up. The young bride, often her own cook, maid, and kitchen-girl, bitterly surges and seethes with misery as she watches her pretty hands becoming mined with continual plunging into hot water, and vents her wrath upon her young husband, who Is, perhaps, striving to make both ends meet at the office. The result is the first of a series of quarrels and petty miseries for both. ■Whatever table you are employing to work upon, whether it be covered with American cloth or marble or glass, first of all, before you place anvthing upon it, lav down a newspaper. It acts a double purpose. It save* you from having to wipe the table down and leave an objectionable kitchen odour on your hands, and it collects the scraps or crumbs from whatever you are making without having to s-et a tray or brush. Newspapers should bo the ereato°-t friends to all women' who wrestle with sauces and scones and those pleasantries which are to the heart of man gladdening after the toil of the day. WASHING-UP. Now this washing-up business. “Let's leave the dishes till the morning" is a common cry when the movies are calling, or a theatre party lias been arranged. A day’s work should be finished, and the next day should never be encroached upon. To face a pile of greasy dishes to bo treated either before or after breakfast—well, it does take the gilt off the previous evening’s gingerbread. Supposing there is no way of washing up, and you must leave the dishes, even until yon get back. Well, collect them in a-bowl, and after you have thrown the scraps in the refuse bin cover them with water and place a paper over them till you return. Rubber gloves should hang on a peg in every kitchen. There is a simple solution to chapped hands and red unpleasantness and that awful kitchen odour. Wiho minds peeling anything in a pair of rubber gloves which are smooth and comfortable? HOUSEKEEPING JARS. We can’t all be Mrs Rockefellers in a minute, and the poor men of the household imist be given a reasonable chance to make us such; but until we can, we can, indeed, believe me, make things more comfortable for ourselves and not nearly so irksome and irritating as they qro frequently. Petty jars come so often from a housekeeping annoyance on one side, and from a man who was five minutes late on the other; but when they meet at 6 o'clock they have developed into—“'Wliy did I ever marry you? If never did anything like this 'at mother’s; I’m tired; Eve been in this beastly kitchen cooking all day, and I’m sick of it." And “Good heavens, my mother made the best apple pies I ever tasted, ■ and brought up ten children without making all this fuse. Suppose you-had to -stay in the office all day and argue your head off with a parcel of fools whom you could wipe off the map if you had a chance. Nothing to do all day but piind this little fiat and cook my dinner at night. Women! they make*, me—yes, go on and cry now." It’s true, and a. little system might alter the whole thing. These women, instance, who turn out rooms, and retire exhausted at the end of the day. There should never be any occasion In ordinary homes which are treated normally to ever “turn a room out." Each room each day should receive its share of cleanly attention. If this is done perfect order should prevail, and so make any extra fi4ld-day fatigue quite unnecessary. WHAT’S GREEN IN THE GARDEN? Then there is the modern tendency of tlm modem housekeeper, especially one in charge of a small flat, and a small family, to neglect the green vegetable market. It is surprising how few people partake of green vegetables every night. The housekeepers in charge of some of the restaurants in this town have three ideas only; Canned peas, halfcooked tomatoes, and stringy beans. Are there no marrows, pumpkins, peas, Brussels eprouts, corn, sweet potatoes, egg plant, cauliflowers, cabbages, artichokes, or celery p No; we never see them, or, if we do, it is in an advertisement in an American magazine. The home housekeeper should insist upon green vegetables for the family. The bams of good health lies in this direction. Fruit and cereals should play a prominent part in a household menage, and not be thought extravagances or ’'treats.’’ THE SOLUTION OF SUCCESSFUL HOUSEKEEPING.

Capability simply lies in knowing what has to be done, and going resolutely about it in a cheerful spirit. Spirit carries .people through anything. How did our great-grandmothers, and often otir grandmothers, manage in the early days of pioaeership when they had to make all tlie clothes, knit the* stockings, cook and clean for large families, and still hnvo time to rend their Bibles and entertain a few friends on Sunday? They were contented with their lot. Tne world nowadays is rushing and tearing alon,'j at fever heat, and the home duties are neglected for the glamour and joy of jazz parties and hotel lounges. Then the bongo begins to look shabby, tho silver grows tarnished, and the evening meals are hurriedly prepared without thought or trouble. The young husband dffrelops a liver through the cooking, and the young housekeeping wife begins to resent having to leave her friends to come homo and go into the kitchen. A little common6en.se in arrangement and forethought, would smooth away all troublo and turn that troubled and irritated menage into a healthy and happy home such as all the young housekeeping brides and matrons in this country should possess.