The Idaho Springs siftings-news., 1919-07-11

munty cooking. Notwithstanding the high
prices of food and the scarcity of cooks.
the American people like good things to eat just
well ever. The question is where can these
good things be had? large proportion of twen-
teth century married women cannot cook accept
ably and would not cook If they could. A modern
city woman who cook can hardly be blamed
for unwilliDgness to spend all her time in home
work 1t is age of ineffciency in restaurant
cooking in most other things and prices
are even higher N proportion than material
prices.
Iva Lowther Peters. Phi. D., of .he woman's dvi-
sion Of the council of national defense. made in
1918 complete survey of the various cooperative
and community food enterprises of this country.
1t was then believed that If the continued COM
munity kitchens would have to be established in
our larger cities to save food and fuel.
England was already running great many Of
them. with encouraging results and Doctor Peters
not only studied these. but undertook thorough
Investigation of the cooperative movement from
the time it was born in the eighteenth century.
AS 1t happened, the signing of the armistice came
Just in time to make the survey useless to the
United States food administration, but it is going
TO be of great assistance to those individual Amer
leans who thinking of cooperating with other
individual Americans in bringing down the price of
eating.
An object lesson is a community kitchen that
opened in 1907 in Carthage, Mo. 1t was To-
Gated in private residence and the various fami-
lies of the neghbtrhood to 1t for their meals
linen, silver thus maintaining its own tastes and
standards. To provide the original equipment for
the kitchen assessment of SO per adult and S150
per child was made. In the beginning there were
60 members. including 10 or II children. For the
first three months the price of meals SO for an
adult and S150 for a child per week. After the
third month several families stopped coming
When the number decreased to so the price OF
board was advanced to $3.50 per week. AS the
Kitchens patronage decreased and the cost of food
Sp1th rirCo of hnard kpr,t
finally, in 1911 four years after its opening the
kitchen went quietly out of existence.
Most of the community cooking enterprises sur
veyed by Doctor Peters for the council of national
defense tell practically the same story-a brief
popularity, brief decline, then extinction
But the community cooking enterprises tell one
other story and it is this
The only community cooking enterprises showing
unmistakable signs of success are those where the
central kitchen delivers the cooked meals to the
homes. These kitchens being established
In several cities.
Chicago and many of its suburban cities have
their attention Evanston. ILL.,, just now. Evans
ton is few miles north of Chicago on Lake Mich
igan. 1t has about 10000 people. 1t is a city of
homes Many of the men do business In Chicago
Evanston Is called the City of Churches" is the
seat of Northwestern university and is what may
be called high-class American small city
Yes Evanston is city of homes. There are
streets of dwellings and comparatively few flats
are in evidence There trees and lawns The
houses look as If they had kitchens-good, big
roomy, od-fashioned kitchens, where things were
cooked-'pies like mother used to make" and
doughnuts te compare with those of the Sal
walton Army.
But the Imagination that sets you to shifting In
the hope of catching delectabe odors from these
old-fashioned kitchens in these old-fashoned
homes is deusion and a snare. The kitchens are
there, but they Idle as a painted ship on a
painted ocean. Cause why-there are no cooks.
There time, not long ago, when an occa-
sonal cook could be enticed out to Evanston and
pampered into cooking. But that time is
past.
SO Evanston is going to have community kitch-
and has made a beginning. That's why Chicago
and Illinois are watching her with Interest.