KITCHEN MANAGEMENT.

Taranaki Daily News, 16 December 1921, Page 4 (Supplement)

KITCHEN MANAGEMENT.

REALLY NO SECRET. (•Mrs. G. Grant, New Plymouth.) The secret of kitchen hygiene is really no secret. Every good housewife who follows one or two cardinal principles will not only find that labor lessened, but her results are better, with resultant cheerfulness wit rich sm/oothly running functions imbue.

The mainspring of kitchen cult is, first and foremost, sanitation. Everything and every article should be kept spotlessly clean. Clean every article, as far as possible, immediately after use. Do not allow a pile of things to remain for the after-meal wash-up. It is really surprising how small your wash-up will be if you replace things which no longer required. They are very easily cleaned, and the time sg spent is rarely missed. If you have a gas stove or cooker keep your jets dean. You will be pleased with the result. Don't place gas rings on hot stoves. It shortens the life of both tube and ring, and occupies precious space.

Have, your kindling ready, or, if possible, the fire set the night before. Keep the flues clean., and the damper in good order. Burn your refuse.

Have your chimney swept regularly. Do not allow refuse to get into sink, waste-pipes or drains. Do not allow grease to accumulate round sink.

It is a mistake to have more utensils in the kitchen than required. Avoid lumber. Remember to have simplicity as your keynote. Keep your spices, etc., all together and plainly marked; sugar and salt in dry places, also flour and such like. Keep onions, potatoes and vegetables in boxes, the lids or sides of which are perforated. Place a few sheets of newspaper on bottom of boxes, so that refuse may be easily removed. Disinfect drains. Use disinfectant in your scrub-out water, and wash walls at intervals with disinfected water. When in use, cover tables with newspaper. Keep bread, cake, etc., in locker. Keep everything such as cornflour, arrowroot, barley, sago, etc., in plainlylabelled glass jars of uniform size. As far as possible leave your window open, and in summer time place wire mesh fly-proof screen across, also doors. In buying your kitchen and diningroom gear, avoid narrow necks. See that you are able to have free access to any portion where food, etc., is likely to be. This is most important.

Place China marble in kettle; this prevents furring. Don’t allow knives. forks, etc., to stand in vinegar; it rusts them. Wash dish-cloths daily. Keep bottoms of pots clean. Don’t wipe glassware with dishcloths. Always have a supply of newspaper on hand, it is useful for a variety of purposes. Be systematic in your work; it will aid you. Pay cash for everything. Don’t allow butter, lard, etc., to stand more than twenty-four hours in one dish. Waste nothing, but don’t stint things. Be clean. Be tidy. Of course, to read all this it may appear to be a lot to ask, but it is really surprising how nice things work if done in a proper manner. Above all, take a pride in your work, and always be cheerful! BUILDERS WOMEN HATERS. WHAT WOMEN HAVE TO PUT UP WITH. (Mrs. A. Haley, Princes Street, Hawera.) Every builder is a woman hater. As I look around my kitchen and think of all the other kitchens I have lived in, I repeat again firmly and with emphasis, that every builder is a woman hater! I should like to ask any one of them: Would he put a joiner, doing the most particular work, in the darkest part of the factory,, and at a bench the height of which would make him look like a standing, or rather a bending, advertisement for somebody’s kidney backache pills? Can’t you see him smile at the idea of anyone thinking him such a feeble-minded idiot as to make a workman uncomfortable at his work! He knows the work would suffer. Whv, then, does he so often build the kitchen range in the darkest part of the room, on the outer wall, with the wondow's at each side, and place it at about the correct height for a little child about five years of age to play houses with? Because he is a woman hater. He glories in the knowledge that he is preparing for smarting eyes and an aching back. Every woman loves cupboards. You can never give her too many. That is why this misogynist never allows her any . or if he is compelled to do so, before starting he carefully studies the weather, so as to be sure and put it in on an outer wall, and the one where the rain beats heaviest, so that, after making her eyes smart , and her back almost break in two by bending over the dark low stove, preparing her jams and pickles. it shouldn’t surprise her very much when she finds in a week or two that they have all gone mouldy. And then the walls. Now, any ordinary sane, unprejudiced person would say if there is anywhere in a house from which dust traps should be absent it is in a room where food ns prepared. In my kitchen the walls are composed of pieces of wood five inches wide; in between each piece is a dent. Then, next, a rounded piece of wood. Then another dent. There are twenty pieces of wood from floor to ceiling, the boards running across. The door of the damp 1 cupboard has the pieces running verticalThe ceiling is composed of the same dust catchers. The kitchen is the only Jhe house without smooth walls.

And the doors! In each door is two glass panels. Each panel has no less than 140 ridges, each one of which is full of dust. At the lower part of the door there are two wooden panels. Around them,, and around the glass panels, there are two roly-poly bits of wood, with deep hollows to catch the dear little" dusty microbes. The two small windows are also surrounded by many meaningless little ridges, neither beautiful nor necessary, but merely designed to give a woman as much work as possible in her vain effort to keep them clean. THE IDEAL KITCHEN. Now for the ideal kitchen. First, plenty of light, great big windows, on at least two sides. Then that big laborsaver. a gas stove, with the top quite 3J feel above the floor, placed against an inner wall with the light shining on it. A gas stove does away with a lot of work, cleaning out dirty soot and ashes, chopping wood, carrying coal, lighting the fire, etc. It allows a woman ha If-an-hour extra in bed and at least threequarters of an hour more to spend in the fresh air before coming home to start the dinner in the afternoon. At each side of the gas stove we will have a cupboard reaching to the ceiling. On the damp side we will place the sink, reaching from wall to wall except a small space at each end for a tea-towel roller. Underneath will be enclosed shelves for pots and pans, brushes, buckets. etc. Against a third wall we will put a dresser, the top shelves of which will have doors of glass. The crockery makes a bright spot in the kitehen. If not of glass, then sliding doors of wood. Underneath and above the cupboard, a large paste-board, to slide out, can be placed, being a much more convenient height to work at than the ordinary kit ehen table, which should be. but never is, at least 37 : nches high, instead of 30. The walV» and ceilings should be as smooth as „hv floor, and covered with white oilcloth.

On the floor we will have a plai.q linoleum. one without any pattern, which could be rubbed over every day with a wet mop in five minutes. The walls and ceiling should be done once % vzeek with a wet and dry mop. Witn such covering a kitchen could be kept really clean, quickly and easily. Now, any woman who couldn’t work comfortably and contentedly in my dream kitchen deserves to be the wife of the malignant unknown misanthrope who designed the one I am sitting in now! THE VALUE OF ELECTRICITY. COUNTRY HOUSES HANDICAPPED. (By “Zita,” Opunake.) A book could be 'written on this subject, and in a short paper very few points can be considered. Electricity is, of course, the greatest modern laborsaver. Even when used only for cooking and lighting the saving of labor is considerable, and if used, as it is in America, for washing and ironing clothes, cleaning floors, walls, furniture : etc., and washing dishes,, it would seem to weary Taranaki housewives that life would be one long holiday. Apart from electricity there are many conveniences which should be in every house but which. I am afraid, are missing from the majority , at least of country homes. Even when new houses are ! being built, many women have become so used to “doing without” that they think any convenience is an improvement on what they have had, and never think of having plans altered to suit their ideas. Under the circumstances., architects can only do their best, according to their lights. If their best means that a woman who has to stand on tip-toes to reach a height of six feet has, for the rest of her life or as long as she remains in that house, to lift articles off shelves seventy inches from the floor, we can hardly blame the architect. And a sink, a table, or washtub that would be the exact Working height for a woman who measures five feet will certainly mean chronic backache for a woman.

Journals and magazines often have illustrations of model kitchens and kitchen appliance.’, but it is impossible to plan a kitchen which will suit everyone, or even the majority of women. Tne point, then, is to allow everyone to plan her own kitchen.

One woman likes to have the sun shining into her kitchen as much as possible. Another objects strongly to anything but a cool room to work in. One may object to a small kitchen as “poky.” Another prefers a small kitchen, with everything near at hand. A family may like to have meals in the kitchen. It is easier to keep the food hot, and saves the cook many steps, they say, while others enjoy their meals much better away from the sight of • the stove and cooking utensils. Though the greater part of a housekeeper’s work may be in the kitchen,, the rest of the house must also be considered, and should be planned with a view to saving labor. The opinion of the “lady of the house” should be considered in every particular. She may not understand technical details, but no one knows as well as she what a difference it makes to a woman’s work to have a door, or a window, or a fireplace,, in the wrong position. It is well to remember that, in considering utility, it is not necessary to sacrifice beauty. It is only by combining the two, both indoors and out. that Taranaki homes will be worthy’ of this fair corner of “God’s Own Country.”