School and Home Cooking Part 8

(2) To plan the entire number of dishes, knives, forks, spoons, and other things needed during the meal, and then place these on the dining table or other suitable place where they may be conveniently obtained when the meal is being served.

In order to accomplish these things, you must work with a _determination_ to succeed at what you are doing and to keep your mind steadfastly on the work at hand. With such an att.i.tude toward your work you will doubtless have accomplished several things by the end of a week. You will have set the table in an orderly manner, and thus have given real a.s.sistance and satisfaction to the members of your family; you will have become more skilful in spreading the table, and you will have made it possible to spend less time in setting the table in the future.

You could not have accomplished all this if you had not earnestly thought as you worked.

You will find it interesting and beneficial to make each a.s.signment of home work as complete as possible. If, for example, you are to make cakes, it will be most desirable if you not only mix and bake cakes, but, if possible, select and purchase the materials for them and compute their cost.

Suggestions for Home Projects:

Make the beverages for one or more meals each day. Wash the dishes of the evening meal. Prepare a scalloped dish or any of the foods given in Lessons I to V once a week.

Suggested Aims:

(1) To prepare tea or coffee so as to draw out as little tannin as possible.

(2) To wash dishes well but to make as few movements as possible. To note the time required to do the dishes each day and by means of efficiency methods strive to lessen the time.

(3) To utilize left-over pieces or crumbs of bread in preparing scalloped dishes. To prepare seasonable fruits and vegetables so well that the members of your home will find them most palatable.

LESSON X

AFTERNOON TEA

PLANNING THE TEA.--To entertain friends is a pleasure. Meeting friends or having them become acquainted with a pleasure. This lesson is arranged that you may entertain your mother at afternoon tea and that she may visit with your teacher and cla.s.smates.

In planning for any special occasion, it is necessary to decide upon the day and hour for the party. If the occasion is at all formal, or if a number of persons are to be present, it is also necessary to plan how to entertain your guests,--what you will have them do to have a pleasant time. If it is desired to serve refreshments, you must decide what to serve, how much to prepare, and when to prepare the foods. The method of serving them must also be considered.

The Refreshments for an afternoon tea should be dainty and served in small portions. Tea served with thin slices of lemon or cream and sugar and accompanied by wafers, sandwiches, or small cakes is the usual menu.

Sweets or candies are often served with these foods.

The following menu may be prepared for your first tea: Tea with Lemon (or Cream) and Sugar Toasted Wafers with Cheese or Oatmeal Cookies Coconut Sweetmeats

From previous work, estimate the quant.i.ty of tea, lemons (or cream), sugar, wafers, or cakes you will need. A recipe for Coconut Sweetmeats follows. It makes 20 sweetmeats about one inch in diameter.

COCONUT SWEETMEATS

1/4 cupful powdered sugar l 1/4 cupfuls shredded coconut 2 tablespoonfuls flour 1/8 teaspoonful salt 1 teaspoonful vanilla 1 egg white

Mix the dry ingredients, then add the vanilla. Beat the egg white stiff.

Add the other ingredients and mix thoroughly.

Grease a baking sheet and dredge it with flour. Drop the coconut mixture by the teaspoonfuls on the baking sheet. Bake in a moderate oven (375 degrees F.) for 20 minutes or until slightly browned. Remove from the pan, place on a cake cooler. When cold store in a tin box.

SERVING THE TEA.--For an afternoon tea, the beverage may be poured in the kitchen and carried into the dining room or the other room where the guests are a.s.sembled, or it may be poured in the dining room in the presence of the guests.

When the latter plan is followed, the teapot, cups, plates, spoons, and napkins are placed on the dining table. Seated at the table, one of the pupils [Footnote 17: If afternoon tea is served in a home to a number of guests, an intimate friend of the hostess or a member of the household usually pours tea. In this way the hostess is free to greet every guest and to see that every one is having an enjoyable time.] pours the tea, and places a filled cup and a teaspoon on a plate. The tea (with a napkin) is then pa.s.sed to the guests; the lemon or cream and sugar, wafers or cakes and sweets are also pa.s.sed. The slices of lemon should be placed on a small plate or other suitable dish and served with a lemon fork. Wafers, sandwiches, or small cakes should be placed on plates or in dainty baskets. No article of silver is provided in serving them; the guests take them from the plates with their fingers.

Those who are serving the tea should be watchful and note when the guests have drunk their tea and relieve them of cup and plate. They should also replenish the teapot, and see that the one pouring the tea has all the materials and dishes needed.

DIVISION THREE

BODY-BUILDING AND BODY-REGULATING FOODS, RICH IN ASH (MINERAL MATTER)

LESSON XI

FRESH VEGETABLES (A)

ASH.--In a previous lesson, it was mentioned that most foods do not consist of one material, but of several substances. _Ash_ or mineral matter is a common const.i.tuent of food. It is a _foodstuff_. The term "ash" does not apply to one substance; it is used to indicate a group of substances. Milk, eggs, vegetables, both fresh and dried fruits, and cereals are valuable sources of ash. They do not all, however, contain the same kind of ash.

The presence of ash in food is not apparent until the food is burned. The substance that remains after burning, _i.e._ the "ashes," is mineral matter or ash.

Although ash exists in combination with other substances in most foods, a few materials consist almost entirely of ash. Common salt is a mineral substance; another example is the white scaly substance which sometimes forms on the inside of a teakettle or on any pan in which water has been heated. Soda is still another familiar mineral substance. The condiment salt--ordinary table salt--(see _Condiments_) must not be confused with the term "salts"; the latter applies to many mineral substances besides common salt.

USE OF ASH IN THE BODY.--Ash as well as water does not burn in the body.

It is therefore considered an incombustible foodstuff. Bones, teeth, and many other parts of the body contain certain mineral materials. Ash helps to build the body.

Ash exists in the fluids of the body. For example, there is salt in perspiration and in all excretions of the body. The digestive juices also contain mineral materials, and ash aids in the digestive processes of the body. Scientists have shown that ash partic.i.p.ates in many ways in the regulation of body processes.

Thus ash has two main uses in the body: (_a_) _it aids in building the body_; and (_b_) _it aids in regulating body processes_.

Ash, therefore, is an absolute necessity in diet.

FRESH VEGETABLES.--It was mentioned above that fresh vegetables are one of the most valuable food sources of ash. The leaves, stems, pods, and roots of certain plants, and also those fruits which are used as vegetables, may be cla.s.sed as fresh vegetables. Some of these are: cabbage, brussels sprouts, lettuce, water cress, spinach, celery, onions, tomatoes, cuc.u.mbers, beets, carrots, and turnips.

Fresh vegetables contain not only the foodstuff ash, but water. Indeed most fresh vegetables contain from 75 to 90 per cent of water.

In addition to these two foodstuffs, vegetables contain _cellulose_.

The latter is a fibrous substance which forms for the most part the skins and interior framework of vegetables and fruits. The strings of beans and celery and the "pith" of turnips and radishes, for example, contain much cellulose.

Foods containing both ash and cellulose have a laxative effect. Hence the value of fresh vegetables in diet. The use of fresh vegetables cannot be too strongly urged. Certain vegetables, especially the green leaved vegetables, also contain substances which are necessary to make the body grow and keep it in good health (see Division Seven).

Most persons should use fresh vegetables more freely than they do.

SUGGESTIONS FOR COOKING GREEN VEGETABLES.--If ash is such a valuable const.i.tuent of vegetables, the latter should be cooked so as to retain all the ash. Unfortunately vegetables are not always cooked in such a way that the minerals are saved. Just as salt dissolves readily in water, so many of the mineral materials found in green vegetables dissolve in the water in which vegetables are cooked. Hence if it is necessary to drain off water from vegetables after cooking, it is evident there may be much loss of nutriment.

Ash is also one of the substances which gives flavor to vegetables.

Insipid flavors of certain vegetables may be due to improper cooking.

A most important point to consider in the cooking of vegetables is the saving of the minerals. This can be accomplished in several ways:

1. Cooking in water with their skins.

2. Cooking in water and using the water which must be drained away after cooking for sauces and soups.