PASTRY AND ITS EGG INGREDIENTS.

Taranaki Daily News, Volume LV, Issue 307, 20 May 1913, Page 7

PASTRY AND ITS EGG INGREDIENTS.

FOODS AND DRUGS ACT. MATTER BEING LOOKED INTO. Christchurch, May lfi. On his attention being drawn to a press message from Dunedin about one of the regulations (No. 30) made under the Sale of Food and Drugs Act, which, it is alleged practically prohibited confectioners from using yolks and albumen, the Hon. R. Heaton Rhodes (Minister for Public Health) said that his Department was carefully considering the question of the use of dried albumen in pastry. He mentioned, as a matter of fact, that the Dominion Analyst was now engaged upon an analysis of a Bample submitted to the Department so that he might be informed if the article was (as it had been alleged to be) dried egg albumen, or merely a mixture with gelatine or other adulterant added. There was, the Minister stated, absolutely no reason to anticipate a dislocation of the pastry trade on account of the regulations, for these did not refer to stock-in-trade on April 1 last, nor. to any orders from Home or the Continent given before that date, nor (in regard to such stocks) for twelve months yet. Consequently any reference to an inability to get fresh eggs this winter was beside the point. The regulations in regard to pastry were identical with those of New South Wales. The use of dried albti-.' men, or the yolk,of egg preserved with any preservative substance,'was prohibited in both. j The Minister added that his information was not yet complete, but, so far, it went to show that an increasing use was being made by pastrycooks of imported dried egg albumen and imported preserved yolks of eggs. The eggs from which they were derived might, for instance, have been grown in Russia or Siberia. It would therefore be seen that the whole question involved much policy. He had to consider to what extent the uses of these importations were now affecting (and, in the future might affect) the egg-producing industry of the Dominion. Obviously pastrycooks, instead of buying eggs when the price was low, and securing thereby winter stocks, might be content to avoid this trouble, and resort to these importations, thus undoubtedly tending to hamper one important industry of a producing country such as New Zealand was. There would therefore (Mr. Rhodes continued) alwaysjie a scarcity of fresh eggs if our producers found themselves unable to compete with lower-waged foreign importations. The Government would therefore consider the whole question very carefully before giving a decision. |