HOME ECONOMICS ASSOCIATION.

Star (Christchurch), Issue 16366, 3 March 1921, Page 6

HOME ECONOMICS ASSOCIATION.

IMPRESSIONS OF THE UNITED STATES. (Contributed.) A New Zealander, who is interested in the work of our association, has just returned from the United .States and, interviewed by tho editors of this column kindly answered the following questions:— Did you notice anything in the serving or cooking of food in the American restaurants markedly different from the methods employed in New Zealand? The use of trade operations, as advertisements, is very marked in the cities, e.g., barbers’ chairs are separated from the side walks merely by plate-glass windows, and the whole operation is in full view of the passersby. To some extent, restaurants also are utilising this mode of advertising, and the operations of making doughnuts and waffles are often in full view 1 of the customers, and are occasionally made a prominent feature in the show window. In the cafeterias, the making of toast, omelettes, and all egg dishes is carried out in full view of clients- Naturally, all such cooking is done with the neatest and most up-to-date appliances, generally with gas, with the minimum of handling, and the utmost attention to cleanliness. There are many good points in the bringing of the restaurant cooking processes into open daylight for inspection. A feature of American cities is the enormous number of meals to be served in a given time. Works employing thousands of operatives are very common, and all these get their midday meal within an hour or so. The j Y.M.C.A. hotel of Chicago, with its 1800 rooms mostly filled with workers, has to supply the bulk of these with breakfast within about two hours. The waitress system does not fit in well with such conditions, and hence lias arisen, the cafeteria. Here a long counter carries piles of sliced bread, rolls, doughnuts, tiny saucers with more tiny squares of butter, and all the very numerous dishes of the bill-of-far© that do not require to made just before use. The meat dishes, porridge, and others requiring to be kept hot in pans have a special counter, where they are kept over gas burners or hot plates, with a waitress to every four or five feet of counter. The toast and egg dishes, buckwheat cakes, etc., are supplied from a counter fitted with the neatest of ovens and hot plates for their manufacture, with experts in charge. A client coming in picks up a tray from one pile, a knife, fork, and spoons rolled up in a serviette from another, and then passes down the food counter and helps himself, or is helped, to whatever he fancies, leaving an order for toast, or omelette, or prepared dish, as he goes; such order js represented on his tray by a little metal stand carrying a card with the number and price of the dish ordered. Next, he pauses at the gate entrance to the lunch room to have his tray-full valued by a lady clerk, and to get from her a card with the cost of his meal marked thereon. It will be seen that this system largely obviates the necessity for waiters, and, what is even more important from the customers’ point of view r , “tipping.’’ The method of distributing milk, so far as I saw it throughout the United States, is admirably hygienic and convenient. It is sold in sealed bottles so that each consumer can get his own absolutely uncontaminated supply. A New' Zealander cannot fail to be impressed by the immense amount of coffee consumed in the States. Coffee is always brought as a matter of course, unless tea is specially ordered, and in many of the restaurants good tea cannot be obtained at all. Judging from the magazines published in the vStates, we should gather that a good deal of attention is paid in America to the nutritive values of foods, and to serving them in appropriate combinations. Did you find this to b© the case? No attention was paid to nutritive values in the restaurants, so far as my experience went, and the combination is usually left entirely to the customer. The bill-of-fare is often very long, covering two or three foolscap sheets. But although there was this indifference to nutritive values and scientific combinations in the eating houses, bakers’ shops were noted in two cities which specialised in whole-meal, bran, and rye bread, and each issued a leaflet drawing attention to the richness of these breads in vitamines, and emphasing the fact that modern degerminated white flour is woefully lacking in these essentials. < >ne of these bakers stocked whole-

meal, Boston brown, un ferine nted (a nea .!y black bread), and rye breads. In this’ shop no white bread was obtainable. How do prices for food in America compare with those in New Zealand? The prices are very high, probably from 25 to 40 per cent higher than in New Zealand. l>id you notice many efforts to solve the problem of domestic service by labour-saving devices in cooking, sewing, etc.? Fleet rically-driven sewing and washing machines were on exhibition in the shop windows, and also fireless cookers- Paper drinking cups were universal in trains, and, of a better class, were occasionally seen in cafes. Paper plates were common in the shops, and, like the cups, are, of course, discarded after having been used once. In the trains, towels were sometimes replaced by a soft-, spongy paper, torn off a roll as required. In the bathroom at the Y.M-C.A. hotel in Chicago, an eletrieally produced current of hot, dry air was supplied in lieu of towels. I was i not in a private bouse in America, so can tell you nothing of the domestic service problem there. Can you tell us anything about distinctive dishes often referred to in American literature, such as waffles, buckwheat cakes. crackers, crabs’ claws, maple syrup, cranberry jelly, etc. ? A feature in. American eating houses is the variety and popularity of the pies. These are cut into triangular sections an inch or so thick, with crust at the bottom. ft is not uncommon to see from eight to ten varieties on. one counter. Custard in varieties, squash, apricot, apple, cranberry, blueberry, huckleberry, etc. The cranberry is a small, light-red, firm, smooth-skinned berry, smaller than a small cherry. Bushels of this fruit are on view in the fruit shops in early December. It is slightly astringent, and is used more, perhaps, in sauce than in pies—it is good in either. Blueberry pie tastes rather like our blackberry pie. Freshly-made batter cakes of buckwheat or ordinary wheat, are also popular, and are something like our pancakes, though they are occasionally made 'on a special, socalled waffle iron, studded with rectangular depressions, and covered with a similar plate, so that it can be turned over on its gas ring and cooked on each side. Some small cafes make a specialty of waffles, even to calling themselves “waffle inns. : ’ A little jug of syrup is always supplied with such batter cakes, occasionally this is claimed to be maple syrup, but it all tasted the same to me. It is much more usual to servo cream with cereal dishes than is the case in New Zealand. You were in America at Thanksgiving time: could you give us the menu of a Thanksgiving dinner, such as is referred to in nearly every American, book one reads? A little suburban restaurant in Chicago supplied on Thanksgiving Day the following bill of fare: — 1. Shredded crabs* claws, with slice of lemon. 2. Tomato soup with bread and butter. 3. Roast turkey, baked kumara, mashed potato, beet and tomato salad, and cranberry jelly. 4. Very rich plum pudding o. Coffee and cream, bread and butter. 6. Biscuits and cheese. "Was there anything in the heating, lighting or general arrangement of the American bouses you saw very different, from our own system? A point which strikes a traveller very much is the universality with which all inhabited places are heated. Railway carriages and stations, waiting room of all kinds, offices, works, hotels—all are heated. usually by steam, up to about 70deg F. The amount of coal that this absorbs is simply appalling, but the sysUam v&ktainly a comfortable wa*.