Evening star., 1896-02-22

ing enterprise Of the ambitious New Wo-
man reformer embedies only conceit and
Mrs. Abers coaneetion 1e,s with the New
England kitchen Mas as apparently acci-
dental as relations growing out Of any
thing but short7s3ghted selfish interest
Through the American Public Health
Association in 1883, Mr.. Heary Lamb Of
Rochester, n, YA offered prize for the
best essay on Practical Sanitary and
Economic Cooking,"' adapted to persons of
moderate and small means.
Seventy essays competed for this prize,
Which was awarded to one entitled "The
Five Food Principles Illustrated by Practi-
cal Recipes" written by Mrs. Mary Hin
man Abel.
Nutrient Value of Foods.
In making the award, the judges empha-
sized the fact that of all the essays sub
m!tted, the one selected was not only pre-
eminently tine best, but was also intrinsi-
cally valuable treatise on the subject"
The particular. merit and original fea-
ture of this treatise is in that Mrs. Abel,
for the first time in the history of the de-
Veiopment of the science of nutrition,
made standard dietares cookable. Pre-
Vious to this the nutrients necessary to
sustain life had been figured opt and rep}J
resented in food materials without any ref
S'cHSc HdlepeT 10 Inc ccHNe1Sioi VI Iuoi
material into eatables, and with Mrs. Abel
originated the now generally adopted
method of cor sidering nutrients in the
forms in which they are cooked and eaten.
Ihat is, instead of prescribing SO many
pounds OF beef and SO many pounds OF flour
as the amount Of proteids, carbohydrates,
rats and salts man should consume in a
Day, Mrs. Abel presented bills OF fare for
three meals day. so combining the sew
eral dishes Of menu as to make the sum
total of the nutrients contained in the food
materials entering into each correspond
with the standard average dietary, and
also come within an average cost per day.
Another original and remarkable feature
of Mrs. Abels essay is, it was the first
American cookery book giving exact III
structions for working with measured
heat. 10 this end, Mrs. Abel Invented her
own thermometer. This is thermometer
tube registering 300 degrees Celsius, simply
fastened into cork, the bulb projecting
below and protected by a short cylinder of
wood. This floats on the water and makes
it easy to cook at any given temperature.
For testing the heat of an oven the same
thermometer is used, hung in light wire
frame.
Mrs. Abel was living abroad. where she
mad been for several years, when she wrote
her Lamb prize essay. During this Tor
eisn residence she had made an exhaustive
study of the science of nutrition, which at
that time was in its merest infancy in this
country. She also made a thorough in
SSol4Sdlipii VI tHe puDilC hitCiiChS u Su-
rope at Berlin, Vienna, Strasburg, Leipsig,
Munich. Paris and any other cities. She
considered them from all sides, in the in
terest of health and economy. from the
standpoint of science and of pecuniary
profit, and to obtain her facts did not hest
tate day after day to take her place and
her iron knife and fork among. the laborng
people, whose experience she Tor the time
being shared.
Starting the Public Kitchen.
Returning to this country the Summer
following her successful competition for the
Lamb prize, Mrs. Abel met in Boston Mrs.
Ellen Fl. Richards to whom she was in-
troduced by the circun. .starce that Mrs.
Richards was ore of the committee of the
public health association that awarded her
essay the prize. Persuaded by Mrs. Rich
ards and others, Mrs. Abel abandoned all
her plans for the six months she was to
spend on this side ar remained in Boston
to make the experiment there of public
kitchen. Mrs. Richards Cooperating with
her. Funds necessary Tor the beginning,
5000, were donated by wealthy woman,
Mrs. Quincy a. Shaw, whose interest in
the movement WAS founded in her belief
that nutritious and inexpensive food made
available to the poor is a certain means of
the drink evil.
At the end of six months Mrs. Abel had
proved the demand for a public kitchen in
this country, and had satisfied it. AT the
end of two years, during which time the
institution was sustained by phian thropy,
the kitchen began to he seif-supporting, and
1 ow it is wholly Independent of charity, an
assured financial success.
l told Mrs. Abel what / had learned of
the opportunity the public schools offer the
establishment of public kitchen in Wash
ington, and 1 asked her to give me the
benefit OF her experience to that end 30
The Food Needed by Wage Earners
tc MIA in
Mrs. Abel, where a public kitchen would
tell as much for the social development OF
the whole people as 1t would in Washing
our large cities when the food eaten IN
the families of the poor and of the wage
earning classes will not be cooked at home.
rms has long been the case in foreign
cities. and the iced has been supplied by
private enterprise ard by great institutions
IKE the Eolkskuche OF Germany and the
torneau Economique of Paris, having a
charitable basis the best of them becom-
ing, in time, self-supporting. There seem
to be some reasons why Institutions OF this
Kind are even more needed mere than in
Europe, notWithS anding the higher rates
OF wages here What / had believed of this
from general observation my experience in
the New England kitchen confirmed The
agent of the census or the labor bureau
has small opportunity for getting into COM
compared with one who has a public kitch-
en- for vantage ground.
Three-fourths of our customers in Bos-
ton are from what we call the working
classes, and many are sewing women, who
live in lodgings and eat the food furnished
by the cheaper restaurants, supplemented
by what they call bakers stuff Most
frequently it is the latter, with tea. which
they make In their own rooms. What /
had heard of the over-use of tea the expe-
rience of the kitchen proved. The children
of the neighborhocd. l found, drank tea,
and for the rest lived largely on bakers
bread and cake and pickles. The consump-
ton of vinegar pickles among them is
enormous. One grocer said he sold hun
dredS Of them day, the same child often
eating four or five.
Even among persons who keep house
there Is little cooking done, and the de-
pendence is more and more on bakers
bread and cheap cake. It is surprising in
how many families no plans are made for
the approaching meal until it is too late
to cook anything that requires time. Then.
when meal time arrives, a child is dis
patched to the nearest shop, the great
American frying pan is whipped out and
an ill-cooked, insufficient meal is provided
that neither pleases the palate nor nour-
ishes the body.
Moreover, the women of our people DO
not seem to have the inherited OF acquired
skill il cooking that is seen among the
women Of European countries nor do We
seem to know as well when we are properlv
nourished. We tend too much toward sweet
and condensed foods, and anything that