"? 
 
THRIFT 
 IN THE HOUSEHOLD 
 
THRIFT 
 IN THE HOUSEHOLD 
 
 BY 
 
 DORA MORRELL HUGHES 
 
 BOSTON 
 LOTHROP, LEE & SHEPARD CO. 
 
Published, March, 1918 
 
 COPYRIGHT, 1918, 
 BY LOTHROP, LEE & SHEPARD Co. 
 
 All Rights Reserved 
 THRIFT IN THE HOUSEHOLD 
 
 press 
 co. 
 
 U.S. A. 
 
"Annual income twenty pounds, an- 
 nual expenditure nineteen nineteen six, 
 result happiness. Annual income twenty 
 pounds, annual expenditure twenty 
 pounds ought and six, result misery" 
 
 Mr. Uicawber in "David Copperfeld." 
 
CONTENTS 
 
 CHAPTER PAGE 
 
 I. WHAT THRIFT Is AND Is NOT . 9 
 
 II. BUYING. . .' . . ' . 19 
 
 III. MANAGING, AND LITTLE LEAKS . 37 
 
 IV. LITTLE ECONOMIES . . . 49 
 V. VINEGARS. EGGS . 75 
 
 VI. THE GREATEST ECONOMY : YOUR- 
 SELF 89 
 
 VII. LABOR-SAVING . . . .107 
 
 VIII. BREAD AND CAKE . . .115 
 
 IX. SOUPS . . . . . .133 
 
 X. OILS AND FATS .... 149 
 
 XI. COAL AND ICE .... 167 
 
 XII. POSSIBILITIES OF CORN MEAL . 185 
 
 XIII. MEAT AND MEAT SUBSTITUTES . 195 
 
 XIV. DESSERTS . . . . .225 
 XV. THRIFT AND TEXTILES . . . 243 
 
 XVI. CARE OF CLOTHING . . . 257 
 
 XVII. THE FAMILY GARDEN . 277 
 
CHAPTER I 
 WHAT THRIFT IS AND IS NOT 
 
THRIFT 
 IN THE HOUSEHOLD 
 
 CHAPTER I 
 WHAT THRIFT IS AND IS NOT 
 
 THRIFT is the making the best of what 
 one has in strength, time, or money ; get- 
 ting one hundred per cent, in one's re- 
 lations with life. Thrift is an apprecia- 
 tion and application of the accumulative 
 force of little things. Thrift is a con- 
 structive force ; waste is its destructive 
 opposite. Sometimes thrift is saving, 
 going without ; sometimes thrift is spend- 
 ing " there is a scattering that increas- 
 eth " but always it is something for 
 
 something. Thrift is the base on which 
 11 
 
12 THRIFT IN THE HOUSEHOLD 
 
 success of every kind is built, for either 
 thrift or waste is used in everything. 
 The business man applies thrift when he 
 finds the measure by which he can re- 
 duce his " overhead " by the fraction of 
 a cent, for he realizes that these fractions 
 soon grow into dollars. 
 
 Philosophers, since first there were 
 philosophers, have been telling their 
 hearers that there were no trifles, but 
 the American households as a whole 
 have been managed as if to use no more 
 than was needed, to save the bit here 
 and there, were beneath their dignity. 
 Women know less of thrift and more of 
 an uneven, haphazard effort at saving 
 than is consistent with their duty as 
 partners in home-making ; unfortunately, 
 too often they have no respect for nor 
 appreciation of the power that lies in 
 their hands, and therefore fail to realize 
 the possibilities of the material with 
 which they work, and their servants 
 
WHAT THRIFT IS AND IS NOT 13 
 
 have imitated them, and have despised 
 economy as stinginess, which is quite 
 another matter. Stinginess is selfish- 
 ness. If you notice, you will find the 
 givers among the thrifty. What they 
 have not wasted they share with others. 
 Every article, however small it may be, 
 that is wasted must be replaced and it is 
 11 the little foxes that spoil the vines." 
 Few persons waste dollars at a time, but 
 they waste many in cents. The Wool- 
 worth Building, and the Fifth Avenue 
 house, built, as the megaphone man tells 
 his hearers, from five-cent and ten-cent 
 pieces, are object lessons in the financial 
 advantage of saving trifles. 
 
 There is no thrift in saving when the 
 value of the article saved is less than the 
 expense of saving it. Sometimes there is 
 more thrift in throwing away than in 
 saving. Does that seem a paradox? 
 Not long since, when eggs were sixty 
 cents a dozen and bread six cents a loaf, 
 
14 THRIFT IN THE HOUSEHOLD 
 
 there was an article in a home publica- 
 tion on the importance of saving bread 
 crumbs, and as an illustration how to do 
 this a recipe for a bread-pudding was 
 given. This called for a cup of bread 
 crumbs, value less than a cent, and five 
 eggs, cost twenty-five cents, and milk, 
 sugar, and heat. To spend twenty-five 
 cents to save five is waste ; to spend 
 twenty-five cents to save thirty is gain. 
 It is not economy to spend time, ma- 
 terials, and strength in making something 
 that the family will not like when it is 
 done. 
 
 The average cook, and housekeeper, 
 too, if she has three oranges and is mak- 
 ing an orange-pudding which requires 
 two oranges, will use the three. If the 
 housewife objects to using three when two 
 are enough she very likely will hear her 
 cook ask, " What's the use of being so 
 stingy with them ? What is one orange 
 good for ? " If the housekeeper can tell 
 
WHAT THRIFT IS AND IS NOT 15 
 
 her, the cook will appreciate the thrift, 
 otherwise she will continue to waste. 
 
 There is an old proverb of our grand- 
 mother's day that is equally true to-day 
 though not as often heard : " a woman 
 can throw out with a spoon in the kitchen 
 more than a man can bring in with a 
 shovel." That is because a woman gen- 
 erally does not realize that what she 
 throws out has any money value. There 
 is no more exacting business than house- 
 keeping and home-making. Those wives 
 who think it beneath them and unworthy 
 of their attention simply show their ig- 
 norance of what it is. That there are so 
 many who feel time spent in work at 
 home to be time wasted explains in a large 
 part why the cost of living has steadily 
 increased. All waste raises the cost of 
 living. What is wasted must be supplied 
 in some other way. Had women handled 
 the money in past years they would have 
 had a better understanding of the value 
 
16 THRIFT IN THE HOUSEHOLD 
 
 of things with which they worked. So 
 many women do not have the spending 
 of cash that they do not know what one 
 hundred cents are good for. 
 
 If the garbage pail is always full, if the 
 housewife says, " My cake isn't as good 
 as usual. I didn't have good luck with 
 it this time," there is much waste in that 
 household. There is no luck about cook- 
 ing. Cooking is the combination of care 
 and brains expressed in the arrangement 
 of certain materials. Cooking is a branch 
 of chemistry, and should be followed with 
 equal painstaking. Then, it will be 
 equally effective. 
 
 It is very thriftless to cook without 
 recipes unless one has cooked so much 
 that with her experience she has learned 
 to measure by eye and feel. Also, it is 
 thriftless for one who has much cooking 
 to do not to master the principles of cook- 
 ing that she may become independent of 
 recipes. A good cook knows as soon as 
 
WHAT THRIFT IS AND IS NOT 17 
 
 she reads a recipe whether or not it is 
 worth cooking ; there is a law of propor- 
 tion and affinity governing the combina- 
 tion of food materials, and the less money 
 you have to spend on food, the more it is 
 to your advantage to know the laws of 
 cooking and how to apply them. 
 
 An empty garbage pail is the certain 
 indication of two things : how to buy and 
 how to use what one has bought. Thrift 
 does not put slices of bread, halves of stale 
 loaves, bits of vegetables, cheese, bones, 
 and scraps of meat into the garbage pail. 
 Thrift appreciates that a cold potato rep- 
 resents the amount that potato cost plus 
 the expense for heat to cook it ; it knows 
 that a loaf of cake spoiled or bread 
 burned, anything that carelessness has 
 left to become sour or worthless, repre- 
 sents an expenditure of money equivalent 
 to what it will cost to replace and cook 
 it. The woman who leaves dough stick- 
 ing to her mixing-pan will lose consider- 
 
18 THRIFT IN THE HOUSEHOLD 
 
 able bread before the year is done, and 
 she will lose it not merely in that one 
 channel but in others, for one is careless 
 in many things if she is in one. 
 
 A very small leak in a ship if left un- 
 heeded will sink a good-sized vessel ; so 
 the happiness of many a household is 
 wrecked on small things. There can be 
 no real happiness in a home where the 
 outgo is the same as the income or greater, 
 and wherever that is the case there are 
 leakages in the kitchen. It is absolutely 
 impossible for a man to get ahead finan- 
 cially if there is not good management 
 in the kitchen, and good management 
 means taking heed of trifles. The di- 
 rection that Christ gave His people, 
 " Gather up the fragments that remain, 
 that nothing be lost/' has a practical 
 merit to-day. 
 
CHAPTER II 
 BUYING 
 
CHAPTER II 
 BUYING 
 
 THERE are two avenues through which 
 thrift is cultivated : buying and manag- 
 ing. Usually one is advised to buy in 
 quantity, and if one has storage room, 
 that reduces the cost of articles consider- 
 ably. Large families serve thrift by buy- 
 ing in quantity, but small families living 
 in flats may find quantity-buying very 
 wasteful. For a large family to buy flour 
 by the bag is as foolish as for a small 
 family to buy it by the barrel. There is 
 more loss proportionately to flour in the 
 bag because it sifts through the holder, 
 but for the small family the loss is 
 smaller than it would be to have a barrel 
 of flour which before it could be eaten 
 
 would become musty, possibly wormy, 
 21 
 
22 THRIFT IN THE HOUSEHOLD 
 
 unless there were unusual facilities for 
 keeping it. 
 
 Cereals and meals, which are only 
 other forms of a cereal, do not keep long 
 unless in a thoroughly dry atmosphere 
 and therefore should be bought in such 
 quantity that they will be eaten before 
 must or insects corrupt. Even rice and 
 the so-called sterilized grains will become 
 wormy if kept by the month before using. 
 Canned goods are wisely purchased by 
 the dozen or the case. Of most, the case 
 contains four dozen jars. There is a re- 
 duction by the dozen usually, though 
 since prices have become so high many 
 dealers will not sell by the dozen or case. 
 They prefer to retail the cans getting the 
 larger price for them. If you get a re- 
 duction of only a cent on a can there is a 
 considerable saving when you think of 
 all the canned fruits and vegetables that 
 go to satisfy the appetite of the ordinary 
 family. Remember the words of Poor 
 
BUYING 23 
 
 Richard, "Take care of the pennies, 
 and the dollars will take care of them- 
 selves. " 
 
 I believe it is wiser to buy regularly at 
 the same stores than to wander about 
 looking for bargains. Very often so- 
 called bargains have short weight or 
 other weaknesses. Every store has oc- 
 casional bargains, not always advertised, 
 sales of special values ; in the better 
 stores it is to the regular customers that 
 knowledge 01 these is given, because there 
 never is enough of the stock on sale to be 
 offered for general buying. 
 
 Prices are lower in the stores that in- 
 sist on cash sales and do not deliver 
 goods. It is proper they should be lower, 
 for the expenses of such stores are greatly 
 reduced below those where deliveries are 
 made of every little order any time of day, 
 and cash in hand enables a merchant to 
 buy more cheaply and so to sell at better 
 advantage to the buyer. These cash 
 
24 THRIFT IN THE HOUSEHOLD 
 
 stores save the salaries of bookkeepers 
 made necessary by charge accounts, and 
 they are also free from losses from uncol- 
 lectible bills. 
 
 When men are buyers they watch the 
 printed list of prices and conditions of 
 what they will buy ; when women are 
 buyers they often go to their buying with- 
 out knowing anything about the standard 
 price and variations from that. They do 
 not know whether articles are plenty and 
 cheap or scarce and high. Men know 
 what they should be charged for what 
 they buy; women often buy without 
 asking the price of what they are get- 
 ting. 
 
 In every city of any size a market price 
 list is printed once or twice a week giving 
 prices and market conditions of foods. 
 The home member of the matrimonial 
 partnership should study these lists. 
 Even if she pays as much she will know 
 more what she gets. The buyer should 
 
BUYING 25 
 
 know if she is getting sixteen ounces to 
 the pound. 
 
 A scale for the kitchen running as high 
 as twenty-five pounds is almost as great 
 a necessity as a dishpan. If you pay 
 nine and a half cents a pound for sugar 
 and get fifteen ounces only instead of a 
 full pound you will pay for many pounds 
 of sugar that you never get. Perhaps 
 you lack the moral courage to exact of 
 your dealer what belongs to you. Re- 
 member that any one who is willing to 
 be robbed will always find the thief to 
 rob her. 
 
 It is possible to avoid any unpleasant- 
 ness in securing your dues by saying to a 
 grocer with whom you begin trading, 
 " I see that your measures are full and 
 generous to your customers. I always 
 weigh my packages and it is a satisfaction 
 to know that you are as just to me as to 
 yourself." Thus you accomplish three 
 things : you show that you are " on your 
 
26 THRIFT IN THE HOUSEHOLD 
 
 job/' that you are watching how things 
 go, and you tell him this by praise, which 
 is better than finding fault. 
 
 If a package is short-weight and you 
 wish to continue to trade there you can 
 say, " I would like to have you see to this 
 yourself as last time your clerk was care- 
 less with his weighing." If you have no 
 grounds for praise you should take your 
 business elsewhere, and not help a man 
 to success in thievery, for he is as truly a 
 thief who takes an ounce from your 
 pound as he is who takes the money for 
 it from your pocket. 
 
 Another great waste for the consumer 
 has developed from what is said to be a 
 commendable measure, that is, the fancy 
 box and carton business. This is claimed 
 to be more sanitary, and so it is in a few 
 instances, but as a whole it is a claim un- 
 justified by facts, and a decided item in 
 increasing the cost of living. In some 
 instances it more than doubles the cost 
 
BUYING 27 
 
 of the article contained. It is sanitary to 
 wrap bread, cakes, pies, crackers, and ar- 
 ticles to be eaten without further cook- 
 ing, but what good is served by placing 
 in close cartons such foods as rice, and 
 those things which must be cooked before 
 serving? All cereals are thoroughly 
 cooked after being taken from cartons 
 and are thus sterilized. Why pay double 
 for them? Corn meal sold in cartons 
 costs nearly three times as much as 
 that bought in bulk. It keeps no better, 
 tastes no better, and must go through the 
 same processes for cooking as that bought 
 by the pound. The same is true of other 
 things. 
 
 The first package I ate of seeded raisins 
 stated on the wrapper that they were 
 cleaned, and being of a naturally trusting 
 nature I used the raisins in a cake with- 
 out washing. The cake was spoiled. 
 From a cupful of raisins, sold in cartons 
 because of cleanliness, I have found a 
 
28 THKIFT IN THE HOUSEHOLD 
 
 saltspoonful of sand, beside stalks. The 
 cook who does not wash her raisins will 
 have regrets and a few other things. 
 Then, why not buy raisins by the pound 
 rate open? The same is true of dried 
 fruits and many other articles. They all 
 have to be as carefully looked over, 
 washed, and treated as if they had not 
 been placed in cartons as a sanitary meas- 
 ure for cleanliness. There is a good deal 
 of humbug about the extra cleanliness of 
 things packed in special containers, but 
 there is no doubt that some things are 
 better thus treated and that more are not. 
 Employ containers for cooked foods, omit 
 them for foods to be cooked, and thus 
 encourage thrift. 
 
 Whether it is thrift to make all dealings 
 on a cash basis or to run accounts is a 
 mooted question with something to be 
 said on both sides and the weight in 
 favor of cash payments. Running bills 
 usually leads to spending more ; it is so 
 
BUYING 29 
 
 easy to say, " Charge it," when you see 
 something tempting that you would not 
 buy if you were paying cash for every- 
 thing. Persons who spend recklessly by 
 instinct should never run bills they will 
 find the entire income mortgaged before 
 it is due. Those who calculate all ex- 
 penses of the household and have will 
 enough to hold by their calculations have 
 the use of their money thirty days longer, 
 and of credit in an emergency, for it is 
 one of the peculiarities of the business 
 world that it is easier for a man to get 
 credit who is slack about paying for what 
 he buys than for a man who has always 
 followed the Biblical injunction to "owe 
 no man anything." If such a one asks 
 time it is at once taken for granted that 
 conditions are unfavorable with him and 
 that he will be a risk to the merchant. 
 
 The average consumer will save ten 
 per cent, by living on a cash basis and 
 have the satisfaction of knowing what 
 
30 THRIFT IN THE HOUSEHOLD 
 
 money she has is hers. The apostle of 
 thrift will favor living on a cash basis 
 and making the most of what one has. 
 If the housewife is allowed only five dol- 
 lars weekly for her table she must plan 
 so carefully that she has at least a dime 
 left with which to build a reserve fund. 
 Thrift lies in small savings. Unless she 
 saves her little she can never become a 
 thrifty buyer. It is always possible to 
 save something if one does not despise 
 the day of small things. It may not be 
 possible to save a quarter though it will 
 be to save a nickel or dime. Thrift 
 makes the housewife plan according to 
 her income, not according to her desires. 
 No one claims that a table can be as well 
 furnished or as much can be done with 
 five dollars as with three times that 
 amount, but the skill of the housewife 
 and the mistress of thrift is never better 
 employed than in making her wits do the 
 most that can be done with what she has. 
 
BUYING 31 
 
 Until one tries to do it she has no idea 
 how interesting she can find the accom- 
 plishing of this aim. To the doer the 
 promise holds true : " Thou hast been 
 faithful over a few things, I will make 
 thee a ruler over many things." 
 
 There is a mistaken idea of thrift which 
 sometimes influences the would-be econ- 
 omist to buy articles by their cost price 
 alone, without reflecting whether the 
 lower price gives proper value for what 
 is bought, whether it has as much propor- 
 tionately of material as the higher priced. 
 It is not what you pay that makes the 
 important factor in living but what you 
 get for what you pay. For instance : 
 here are two baskets of apples ; the fruit 
 in one is large and speckless, that of the 
 other is windfalls, bruised, gnarly, and the 
 second is one-third less in price than the 
 first. The second will prove the dearer 
 because it has so large an amount of 
 waste ; the first has almost no waste, for 
 
32 THRIFT IN THE HOUSEHOLD 
 
 the skins are so smooth and fine that 
 from them and the cores may be made 
 several glasses of jelly. From the second 
 basket will be no such profit. In con- 
 sumption of time for preparation twice 
 as much will be necessary. 
 
 A good housewife who never bought 
 poor supplies once said to a critic of her 
 methods, " Only rich people can afford to 
 buy poor stuff, since they do not suffer if 
 a few dollars are thrown away in waste." 
 
 The boarding-house keeper who bought 
 two seven-pound turkeys instead of one 
 large bird was not thrifty. The larger 
 birds are a trifle less in cost per pound, 
 the intestinal waste of the larger bird and 
 the skeleton is less than of two smaller 
 birds and the meat is richer. How do I 
 know about the waste of the two? I 
 weighed the waste when I was buying to 
 know how much was thrown away. The 
 larger birds have more meat in propor- 
 tion to skeleton. It costs more in time 
 
BUYING 33 
 
 to prepare two birds than one. In every 
 respect the large bird is the more thrifty 
 purchase for a large family than the same 
 weight of birds in two bodies. 
 
 The foundation of true thrift is getting 
 the proportion of most for the expen- 
 diture, not the price. One does not learn 
 this relation all at once or by accident, 
 but by computation. Once learned you 
 may build on it your home of thrift. 
 "There is that scattereth, and yet in- 
 creaseth, and there is that withholdeth 
 more than is meet, but it tendeth to pov- 
 erty." The knowledge of this and the 
 ability to use the knowledge are thrift. 
 
 This principle explains why of two cuts 
 of meat at the same price one is extrava- 
 gant and the other is not. It is not alone 
 the cost of porterhouse that makes it in- 
 advisable for one of small means, but the 
 proportion of waste in bone and fat for 
 which one pays. You must always re- 
 member you are paying for all this waste 
 
34: THRIFT IN THE HOUSEHOLD 
 
 at the same price you are paying for the 
 delicious meat. 
 
 Never buy second-class canned goods 
 but those you have tested and know to 
 be reliable. At times there are sales of 
 these to make way for the new and then 
 it is good buying to get what you need. 
 Good cans have ends slightly concaved 
 and if dented will remain so. Twice- 
 soldered cans are not to be recommended. 
 
 Keep all articles in tin, earthenware, 
 or glass, although no acids nor liquids 
 should be kept in tin. Have containers 
 lettered so that you do not handle more 
 than the one wanted when you go for 
 anything, and keep the covers on them 
 when not being used. 
 
 Nearly all kitchen supplies may well 
 be bought in quantity, as most of them 
 improve with keeping. Polishes, starch, 
 blueing, all kinds of soap, cleansing-pow- 
 der, clothes-pins, and such things, are 
 cheaper a year's supply at a time. 
 
BUYING 35 
 
 Sugar keeps indefinitely and should 
 the price ever lower it will be decidedly 
 thrifty to lay in a supply. Never keep 
 sugar or anything else in a damp store- 
 room. It is also far from thrifty for any 
 family to live in a damp house, too damp 
 to store supplies, since it induces disease, 
 and disease is a very heavy expense. 
 Sickness soon reduces any surplus, so 
 that anything which induces depleted 
 strength, whether it be feeding, dressing, 
 thinking, is extravagant. One of the 
 thriftiest habits is that of making the 
 sun welcome in home and self. The best 
 germ-killer is God's own, the sunshine. 
 
 Let us sum up the matter of buying 
 thus : Pay cash for everything, or settle 
 all bills at end of a definite time, by week 
 or month. 
 
 Examine all supplies as they come in, 
 having a sales order slip by which to 
 check them, and to insure their being of 
 quality and amount ordered. Put them 
 
36 THRIFT IN THE HOUSEHOLD 
 
 away in their containers as soon as 
 checked. 
 
 See that your maid is as careful in use 
 of goods bought in quantity as if they 
 were bought by the pound, and train 
 yourself to the same care if you do your 
 own work. Sugar and flour require 
 special care to save waste as you take 
 from the bins. 
 
 Buy when things are in season, not 
 when they are dearest, which is when 
 they are out of season. Buy fruits and 
 vegetables for canning when and where 
 they are most abundant. That is when 
 they are cheapest, and also the best. 
 Things out of season are seldom as good 
 as when their proper time for being eaten 
 has come. 
 
CHAPTER III 
 
 MANAGING, AND LITTLE 
 LEAKS 
 
CHAPTER III 
 MANAGING, AND LITTLE LEAKS 
 
 MANAGING is the art and science of 
 using to the best advantage what has been 
 brought into the house. There is no part 
 of the household economy where it is not 
 called upon, no part which is not the bet- 
 ter for what New England means when it 
 says of a housekeeper : " She has faculty." 
 Solomon knew her in his time and she 
 to-day is the woman who " looketh well 
 to the ways of her household." It is in- 
 teresting to notice how like the twentieth- 
 century manager is to this old-time woman 
 in essentials, though conditions have 
 changed so greatly. Read the last chap- 
 ter of Proverbs and learn what she was 
 
 and 4s. 
 
 39 
 
40 THRIFT IN THE HOUSEHOLD 
 
 Managing means the charge of waste as 
 well as the first use of everything. It is 
 in the department of management that 
 the wreck of the home happiness comes 
 and financial anxiety with an incompetent 
 manager. A good manager keeps things 
 comfortable. Her mind is easy and there- 
 fore she produces ease. She needs no 
 advice but gives it to those who cannot 
 manage time, duties, or money success- 
 fully. 
 
 System is the secret of good manage- 
 ment, and it extends to the smallest de- 
 tail of home affairs. It softens greatly 
 the jolts of difficult experiences. 
 
 She who has learned to prevent little 
 leaks in the home has learned how to 
 make the dollars count for one hundred 
 cents. So many of them are there that 
 one might fill a large book with a list of 
 them. One great mistake for the would- 
 be devotee of thrift is to cook too much 
 at once. Monotony in diet spoils the ap- 
 
MANAGING, AND LITTLE LEAKS 41 
 
 petite, the digestion, and wastes the food 
 cooked, for it is refused. Sometimes it is 
 well to cook in large quantities, for many 
 things need hours for their cooking, and 
 it is as cheap to cook much as only what 
 will be used at a single time. The extra 
 quantity may be canned and saved until 
 wanted. For instance, it takes no more 
 fuel to cook three pounds of prunes than 
 to cook half a pound, so I always cook the 
 three pounds and can all but enough for 
 two meals. As my family is small it is 
 more convenient to can often. I fill ajar 
 or more as I have material, set it in the 
 bottom part of the steamer when I am 
 cooking dinner and the same heat steril- 
 izes it that cooks something else. Excess 
 meats, soups, vegetables, and even oat- 
 meal may be saved in this way until one 
 wants it. It is thrift to preserve food 
 thus and the amount quickly accumulates. 
 In our family we dislike to see the same 
 dish served twice in succession, and as we 
 
42 THRIFT IN THE HOUSEHOLD 
 
 consider waste wicked we avoid it by 
 canning. 
 
 The folly of cooking too much for one 
 or two servings lies with those who have 
 not learned what to do with the extra 
 amount. I once saw ten cold potatoes in 
 the garbage pail of a friend whose whole 
 married life had been a struggle with 
 debt. " Why don't you use your potatoes 
 in some other way, in salad, croquettes, 
 baked with cheese or onions, or fried ? " 
 " My family don't like them fixed up in 
 any of those ways." Would not the 
 economic consideration of that fact have 
 led to cooking just enough for the one 
 meal? It is poor planning that leaves 
 ten good potatoes to be wasted. Do you 
 know there are over three hundred ways 
 in which potatoes may be prepared ? 
 
 A skillful manager will overbalance 
 the weakness of a poor buyer, but no 
 buyer can cover the defects of a poor 
 manager. It is the little wastes that des- 
 
MANAGING, AND LITTLE LEAKS 43 
 
 troy the family's peace of mind, though 
 they may not average a farthing's worth 
 each but they are so many they amount 
 to pounds when a year is done. They 
 are to the house what nail-holes would 
 be to a ship if thousands were in the 
 hull. In no department of the unthrifty 
 is there freedom from small wastes. They 
 increase the gas and coal bills, help the 
 plumber to get rich by stopping up the 
 pipes, fill the garbage pail, and so on 
 ad infinitum. Let us consider some of 
 the little wastes. 
 
 Soap lies soaking in dish or laundry 
 water. Green soap is used instead of old. 
 Bits of soap are thrown away. Dish- 
 towels are taken for holders and burned. 
 Gas ranges are left lighted when no 
 cooking is going on, or gas is left going 
 full head when a dim light would serve as 
 well. In homes that use stoves instead 
 of gas ranges cords of wood in the shape 
 of boxes are thrown out, yet it all has 
 
44 THRIFT IN THE HOUSEHOLD 
 
 heating possibilities. Rags and papers 
 are thrown out and so scarce has such 
 material become that the price of paper 
 has risen high enough to bring failure to 
 many publications. I have a friend who 
 saved his newspapers and started his 
 son's college fund by a sale of those 
 saved in a short time. They brought 
 eight dollars, and the price was lower 
 than it has since been. When the three- 
 year-old has become of college age the 
 practice of that kind of thrift will have 
 amounted to considerable. 
 
 In the kitchen waste runs riot, often 
 when the housekeeper is her own maid. 
 Cheese is kept in a damp place and be- 
 comes covered with a white mould ; bits 
 of it that are dried are thrown out ; ends, 
 crumbs, and bits of bread accumulate in 
 the garbage pail ; a cup of peas or beans, 
 a spoonful of this or that vegetable, bones 
 and scraps from roasts and chops, left- 
 over gravies, all go with the bread. All 
 
MANAGING, AND LITTLE LEAKS 45 
 
 of these have possibilities of usefulness 
 and are just that much money wasted. 
 
 Milk and cream sour for lack of atten- 
 tion and as soon as sour are turned out. 
 Fruit juices are turned down the sink. 
 Potatoes are pared so generously that 
 more goes with the peeling than into the 
 pot. Bacon fat is turned down the sink, 
 thus disposing of one of the best and 
 most useful fats by stopping up the drain- 
 pipe. 
 
 Cold potatoes and other vegetables are 
 left to sour ; dried fruits and cereals be- 
 come wormy for want of attention ; food 
 is left in tin, which induces unwhole- 
 some changes in it ; all kinds of winter 
 vegetables and apples are left to sprout 
 and decay for want of picking over. 
 
 Boxes of tea, coffee, and spices are left 
 open and the flavor of each is gone; some- 
 times these things are kept in paper bags, 
 which is worse yet ; sugar, tea, coffee, 
 rice, and flour are spilled and wasted in 
 
4:6 THRIFT IN THE HOUSEHOLD 
 
 handling; brooms and mops are worn 
 out by being set on the floor. They 
 should be hung. 
 
 Tin dishes are not properly dried or 
 are melted by being set on the stove to 
 dry. Tin is less thriftful to buy than 
 enamel, agate, or aluminum. The dif- 
 ference in cost is more than saved in the 
 wear of the dishes. More coal is burned 
 than needed by not closing dampers when 
 fire is not used. 
 
 New brooms are used for scrubbing and 
 sweeping paths. Silver spoons are taken 
 for scraping kettles. Sometimes they dis- 
 appear in the garbage. Steel knives lose 
 their handles from being soaked in hot 
 water. Mustard is left to dry in the pot ; 
 pork spoils for want of salt, and beef brine 
 needs scalding. Pickles and olives spoil 
 for want of vinegar or fresh brine. 
 Woodenware is left unscalded and warps, 
 or it splits from being dried in a hot 
 place. Ammonia, gasoline, and other 
 
MANAGING, AND LITTLE LEAKS 4T 
 
 volatile substances are left loosely corked 
 and evaporate. 
 
 Clothes are washed with strong wash- 
 ing-powder or chloride of lime, lye, or 
 soda and come out rotted and faded. 
 Clothes in one washing have been per- 
 forated with tiny holes from chloride-of- 
 lime washing-powder. 
 
 There are little wastes at the table as, 
 for instance, putting so much sugar in 
 your cup that it does not dissolve. That 
 means sugar enough for another cup. 
 Another decided waste is too large help- 
 ings, which is not to be changed into not 
 giving enough to eat, but it is wiser, if 
 one would save, to help twice than to put 
 too much on one's plate at first. 
 
 The butter cut in small blocks or made 
 in shapes and served on the bread and 
 butter plate is to be advised for thrift. 
 Of course you do not throw away butter. 
 On the plate it is perfectly clean even if 
 left, because the knife used for it is used 
 
48 THRIFT IN THE HOUSEHOLD 
 
 only for that. Let the serving be small 
 but repeated. 
 
 Avoid the waste that comes from neg- 
 lect of your tools. Never let the egg- 
 beater soak, which draws oil from the 
 gears, but wash it at once and set to dry. 
 Care of one's tools doubles their useful- 
 ness. 
 
CHAPTER IV 
 LITTLE ECONOMIES 
 
CHAPTER IV 
 
 LITTLE ECONOMIES 
 
 THERE need be no waste in the home, 
 for much that seems necessary now may 
 be eliminated and what you have you 
 can turn to some use. In the matter of 
 garbage, which is the largest evident 
 waste, there may be something helpful, 
 particularly for one who has hens or a 
 garden. When garbage is nothing but 
 the leavings made in preparing food for 
 cooking it is proper food for poultry, and 
 if one has a garden it makes good fertil- 
 izer. For this it is planted in quite a 
 deep hole. The earth is thrown over it, 
 then more garbage added with perhaps a 
 little lime if the land needs it. Garbage 
 
 may be placed over the oven of the coal 
 51 
 
52 THRIFT IN THE HOUSEHOLD 
 
 range, and contrary to what you may be- 
 lieve, the heat of the fire will burn it 
 without any odor if the damper is left a 
 little open. It will not injure the stove 
 nor cool the oven. These ashes are a fine 
 dressing for garden or for house-plants. 
 
 Potato peelings are strong in carbon 
 and if dried may be used as kindlings, 
 but the truly thrifty housewife cooks her 
 potatoes in their jackets, at least until they 
 can be peeled, which keeps her fingers 
 from being discolored and saves a quarter 
 of an hour or more in the oven. After 
 the peelings can be removed only skin 
 thick the potato may be finished in oven 
 or pot. Potatoes thus peeled, then 
 greased very lightly all over and baked 
 in a hot oven are as nice as baked pota- 
 toes can be, and what is better ? 
 
 Baking potatoes takes considerable gas 
 and every moment of the firing means 
 money spent. You can lessen the time 
 by boiling the potatoes for fifteen or 
 
LITTLE ECONOMIES 53 
 
 twenty minutes and finishing them in a 
 hot oven. They will be equally good. 
 
 If you dislike to peel potatoes you can 
 boil them until nearly done, then peel 
 and continue the cooking. Thus you 
 save the wastage that peeling brings. 
 The best of the potato lies near the skin. 
 
 Old potatoes are much improved by 
 being soaked for an hour or more in cold 
 water, then plunged into boiling salted 
 water. Instead of peeling them, remove 
 an inch of the skin all around. All 
 vegetables not directly from the garden 
 are better for being freshened by stand- 
 ing a while in cold water. 
 
 When you bake potatoes have the 
 skins dry. Wet potatoes lower the heat 
 of the oven, and as potatoes are largely 
 starch they need the stronger heat to 
 make them light. The heat should do 
 to the starch grains of the potato what 
 it does to the corn that is set to pop over 
 the coals. 
 
54: THRIFT IN THE HOUSEHOLD 
 
 Use the little bits of potatoes that are 
 too small for the table by boiling, mash- 
 ing, and adding to the dough for bread 
 or doughnuts. The proportion is two- 
 fifths as much potato as flour. Many 
 cooks will tell you that bread with the 
 addition of potato is the best bread that 
 can be made. These small potatoes are 
 as good as any for frying, croquettes, or 
 mashing, and though it is tiresome to 
 prepare them it is as good a way of saving 
 money or earning it as any other. " A 
 penny saved is a penny earned." There 
 are a hundred calls for each cent that you 
 save, and the need of them dignifies your 
 saving of the pennies by using little 
 things and wasting nothing. 
 
 When you prepare asparagus, instead 
 of throwing away the bottom part that 
 you break off, peel it until you come to 
 the juicy center. Cut it in inch pieces, 
 and put it to cook half an hour earlier 
 than you do the better part of the stalks. 
 
LITTLE ECONOMIES 55 
 
 Do not salt until nearly done. You will 
 find what was once waste will be edible 
 and tender. Save the water in which 
 you cook these bits as well as the aspara- 
 gus proper ; the next day add milk, 
 thicken if you prefer, season, and have 
 asparagus soup. Use it as the first course 
 of a dinner. 
 
 Instead of buying parsley week after 
 week, why not buy a pot of it? It is 
 ornamental and grows nicely in any 
 sunny window and may be grown in 
 winter in a box in the cellar by a win- 
 dow if it has the sunlight. Parsley is 
 hard to start, but after it has been potted 
 it grows well. One may also grow a pot 
 of thyme, which is pretty enough to 
 grow for its own sake did it lack the 
 merit of being one of the best of season- 
 ings. Crush a leaf between finger and 
 thumb and the room will be fresh with 
 its fragrance. Chives also may be added 
 to the family garden, and with them 
 
56 THRIFT IN THE HOUSEHOLD 
 
 basil and marjoram. A window-box will 
 provide such a garden for all the year, 
 and these living plants will at most 
 trifling cost furnish seasonings for many 
 kinds of food and additions to salads, to 
 make them different and delightful. 
 The leaves may be gathered occasionally, 
 slowly dried and ground for seasoning. 
 For the out-of-door garden tarragon 
 should be planted. Added to cider vine- 
 gar it becomes the delicious tarragon 
 vinegar so much liked for salads. 
 
 Tomatoes originally were grown as 
 house-plants. Our grandmothers raised 
 them in pots for their beauty, without 
 so much as a dream that one day they 
 would be eaten more than any other 
 vegetable except potatoes. Then they 
 were " love apples," and held to be deadly 
 to the eater. Is there any reason why 
 she who would have delicacies in winter 
 may not grow her tomatoes in a sunny 
 window as they were grown for years? 
 
LITTLE ECONOMIES 57 
 
 The dwarf varieties can be grown in pots 
 nicely. Such plants have thriven in the 
 window of a fireless attic where the sun 
 came for the greater part of the day, but 
 tomatoes or any of these plants will do 
 badly if subjected to coal or illuminating 
 gas. They can endure considerable cold 
 if helped by the sun, but no gas. 
 
 One of the greatest economies for the 
 cook who uses a gas range is the set of 
 steamers in which she may cook several 
 things at once. If you would be a thrifty 
 housewife, provide yourself with one of 
 these. In six months you will have 
 about saved its cost in your gas bill. 
 With a set of steamers you can prepare 
 an entire dinner without having the odor 
 of one thing at all affect the foods above 
 it. Do not buy one of tin, however 
 cheaply it is offered. This is a lesson of 
 experience. I bought " a bargain." It 
 cost forty-nine cents and lasted three 
 weeks. A good one will last for years. 
 
58 THRIFT IN THE HOUSEHOLD 
 
 Another great economy that means 
 great saving in fuel and in time, perhaps 
 in unspoiled food, is a fireless cooker. 
 You can have one ; if you cannot afford 
 to buy a really good commercial cooker 
 you can make one yourself. I made 
 mine and did well with it. Any recep- 
 tacle made so air-tight that the cold can- 
 not get in will keep the heat from getting 
 out. Take a box, line it with several 
 layers of newspapers either pasted or 
 tacked on. Nearly fill it with hay or 
 sawdust or crumpled paper. Leave 
 spaces where you will set your kettles. 
 Pack the filling as tight as you can 
 around them, so tight that the hole is 
 left when you take the kettle out. I 
 used mine by starting the food cooking 
 in a tin that would fit into one a little 
 larger. In the second I placed the food 
 receptacle with the boiling food, and 
 filled the second with boiling water. 
 Then this was set into a kettle big 
 
LITTLE ECONOMIES 59 
 
 enough to hold it and more boiling 
 water. When all were boiling hot they 
 went into the box, each being covered 
 closely, and were covered thickly with 
 the same stuff as the remainder of the 
 box packing. Thus prepared, the food 
 could be left to care for itself. This is 
 an excellent way of cooking tough fowl 
 or meat. Cereals or fruits set to cooking 
 like this when you go to bed will be 
 ready for breakfast the next morning. 
 Nothing ever spoils by over-cooking, and 
 much more time must be allowed for 
 preparing a meal with any fireless cook- 
 ing. The home-made will do less than 
 the best sold but it will do much more 
 than none at all. 
 
 The results obtained in flavor with a 
 fireless are much the same as those ob- 
 tained by casserole cooking in a hot oven ; 
 in each case the juices and flavors are re- 
 tained instead of dissipated as by ordi- 
 nary methods. A tightly covered earthen 
 
60 THRIFT IN THE HOUSEHOLD 
 
 bean-pot is a true casserole, and may be 
 used for the same dishes with much satis- 
 faction, though not as fitting to set upon 
 the table. 
 
 Corn cooked on the cob should not be 
 wasted. The grains may be taken from 
 the cob by running the edge of a sharp 
 knife between the rows, not cutting, and 
 these grains are to be spread in a thin 
 layer on a bake sheet and dried thor- 
 oughly in a warm oven. When dry, 
 place in close receptacle and keep in 
 cool, dark, dry place. The dark can be 
 secured by wrapping thick brown paper 
 around the receptacle. To use this corn, 
 soak it overnight previously. Many 
 persons like this better than the canned. 
 It may be used for soups, corn pudding, 
 fritters, or any other purpose for which 
 the fresh or canned corn serves. The 
 corn on one cob will make corn custard 
 or fritters for two. 
 
 Bits of soap which accumulate, either 
 
LITTLE ECONOMIES 61 
 
 in kitchen or in chambers, may serve 
 another term by being set to boil with a 
 little hot water and allowed to cool in a 
 flat dish after all have become soft and 
 united into one mass. Then from the 
 piece may be cut small cakes to be 
 wrapped in pretty paper and appear in 
 the bathroom. For the kitchen, let the 
 soap be left in a jelly, which is a very 
 convenient shape for it to be in when one 
 has scrubbing or laundry to be done. 
 
 Use your sour milk with soda for 
 gingerbread, biscuits, griddle-cakes, and 
 such things and you will have lighter 
 results than when you used only sweet 
 milk. If you are afraid of getting too 
 much soda, use with it a like measure 
 of cream of tartar. Some cooks use a 
 spoonful of baking-powder to the spoon- 
 ful of soda and then the bread or cake 
 never tastes of soda or has a golden glow 
 that is not wanted. Sour cream is very 
 good in salad-dressing. If there is con- 
 
62 THRIFT IN THE HOUSEHOLD 
 
 siderable sour milk it can be converted 
 into cottage-cheese by pouring over it 
 boiling water until it is cooked, draining, 
 and dressing with a little butter or cream 
 and salt. 
 
 In cooking rhubarb or cranberry sauce, 
 boil until nearly done, add a pinch of 
 soda, and sweeten to taste. The soda 
 neutralizes the acid and about half as 
 much sugar will be enough. Too much 
 soda will make the rhubarb tasteless. 
 Combine rhubarb with strawberries if you 
 have some that seem not quite good 
 enough to be served raw. The flavors 
 combined are delicious. 
 
 Oiled surfaces, whether floor or lino- 
 leum, should not be wiped with soap and 
 water. Wipe with a cloth wet with kero- 
 sene. Do not use ammonia on polished 
 or oiled surfaces or on any surface that 
 you do not want cleaned from its finish. 
 
 Cook fruits slowly to bring out their 
 sweetness. This makes prunes much 
 
LITTLE ECONOMIES 63 
 
 sweeter, and makes it unnecessary to 
 sweeten prunes. 
 
 Fabrics soaked in borax water will 
 come out clean with neither cloth nor 
 color injured. Borax water does not 
 harm the hands as harsher cleansers do. 
 
 Use everything left over. Bits of meat 
 and even a spoonful of gravy will help to 
 make something or to flavor it, and a 
 spoonful of jelly or jam adds to the 
 pudding-sauce just the touch it needed. 
 
 Has your hot-water bottle a leak ? If 
 it is from a broken spot in the rubber 
 mend it with layers of mending-tissue 
 larger than the hole. Place a piece of 
 tissue, hold it on with a warm iron, and 
 continue until four or five have been 
 set. Let it cool and harden for a day or 
 more before using. If it leaks around 
 the stopper it needs a new washer. One 
 can be put in place and the bag will last 
 a long time. Do not be in haste to cast 
 anything aside. 
 
64 THRIFT IN THE HOUSEHOLD 
 
 As a hint in regard to what you can 
 do with two or three left-overs try this. 
 Perhaps you have two or three potatoes, 
 a tablespoonful of onion. Do you think 
 there is nothing to be done with them ? 
 Brown the onion in whatever fat you 
 have, the cheapest being a slice of fat 
 pork cut in small pieces and tried out. 
 Leave these crisp pieces in the pan. 
 After the onion has browned a little, 
 add the potatoes cut in dice. Just before 
 serving stir in a cupful of milk in which 
 you have beaten two eggs. It is a good 
 supper dish. 
 
 You can vary this by adding to it 
 minced green pepper, or a little corn, or 
 lima beans. You can use beans, onions, 
 tomatoes, and peppers with or without 
 potatoes in almost any proportion, taking 
 what you have and omitting what you 
 have not. You can be reasonably cer- 
 tain of having something to taste good 
 by such combinations either for hot 
 
LITTLE ECONOMIES 65 
 
 dishes or for salads. The one rule in 
 making a left-over into something is to 
 be sure it tastes good. No chef can do 
 more. 
 
 Lettuce will keep a week fresh and 
 crisp if placed in a cloth or paper bag 
 and then in a tight pail. Keep it in a 
 cool place. 
 
 Orange, lemon, and grapefruit peel can 
 be saved, cut in strips, left standing in 
 salted water overnight. In the morning 
 parboil in one or more waters to draw out 
 the bitterness, of which with grapefruit 
 there is considerable, though with orange 
 and lemon only little. Then boil in a 
 thick syrup. Place hot in jars and seal. 
 With boiled rice, it is excellent for des- 
 sert ; it furnishes another dessert with 
 syrup and toasted crackers ; and it may 
 be used like citron. It is also good to 
 eat like candy. Baskets of candied peel 
 make an attractive Christmas or birthday 
 gift. 
 
66 THRIFT IN THE HOUSEHOLD 
 
 If you have a chop or steak left that 
 has been cooked, do not think you must 
 discard it because it dries when one 
 tries to warm it. Put it in a covered 
 dish in a steamer and let it heat by 
 steam. The steam does not dry it as 
 oven or pan heat does, and the meat will 
 show little difference from newly cooked 
 meat unless the cover was not tight and 
 the steam ran into the plate as water. 
 Steaming is a much better method of re- 
 heating than the one more commonly 
 used. 
 
 Do you throw away the green stalks 
 of celery and the leaves and then do you 
 buy celery seed or ground celery for sea- 
 soning? That is contrary to thrift. All 
 the leaves and stalks not good for the 
 table may be washed and those which are 
 fit for it cut in dice for salad, and some- 
 times the outer stalks are excellent when 
 boiled and then dressed with a white 
 sauce. All leaves and stalks not other- 
 
LITTLE ECONOMIES 67 
 
 wise good should be dried in a slow oven 
 or in the sunshine and then run through 
 the finest of the meat-grinders. It is the 
 best celery seasoning and costs nothing. 
 Keep in tightly closed jars. Keep every 
 kind of seasoning in a close receptacle. 
 All the smell that creeps out is that 
 much of the strength of the seasoning 
 being lost. 
 
 Tea and coffee left uncovered soon lose 
 their strength. The best way to buy 
 coffee is in the green berry and in large 
 quantities, as in the green berry it im- 
 proves by keeping. To get the full 
 aroma and deliciousness of coffee roast 
 and grind it just before making. Use 
 left-over coffee for mixing gingerbread 
 or for gelatine desserts. Never warm it 
 up for a beverage, as the flavor of coffee 
 lies in a volatile oil which soon goes after 
 the coffee is made. 
 
 Keep a little bag of mustard and horse- 
 radish in the mouth of a pickle jar and 
 
68 THRIFT IN THE HOUSEHOLD 
 
 the contents will not mould. If pre- 
 serves or pickles show signs of mould, 
 remove the mould and cook up again. 
 Mould is not a sign of fermentation, and 
 unless it is shaken through the jar will 
 not harm preserves. Old ladies some- 
 times say of preserves, " They are sure to 
 be good for there is mould on the top." 
 Unsealed pickles made without mustard 
 and horseradish often are improved by 
 reheating. 
 
 If you have made a cake and it fell, 
 keep it and next day steam to serve as 
 pudding, with a good sauce. Usually it 
 comes out very good because it fell from 
 not having baked enough. If cake falls 
 from having had too little flour mixed 
 with it, break it up and soften it with 
 milk or water, as little as possible, then 
 add flour to make a stiff dough with 
 baking-powder in the usual proportion 
 to the amount of flour you add. One 
 mixing-cup of flour is half a pint. Steam 
 
LITTLE ECONOMIES 69 
 
 or bake, allowing twice as long for steam- 
 ing as for baking. Never lift the lid of 
 the steamer while cooking cake, dump- 
 lings, or puddings. They will fall. If 
 water boils away, add boiling water at 
 one side of the water receptacle. 
 
 It is true thrift to make and bake 
 without chance of imperfect result, and 
 this is simply a matter of care and at- 
 tention to details of mixing and baking. 
 If one has been careless she does well to 
 make amends as directed above. It is 
 also far more profitable to cook only 
 what one needs and to cook that well 
 than to have left-overs and food to be 
 worked up for a second appearance. 
 Practice the thrift that plans according 
 to this principle, but become as expert 
 as possible on using left-over articles of 
 food because there will always be some 
 of them. If you want to know what 
 your thrift amounts to in dollars and 
 cents, try putting in a penny bank what- 
 
70 THRIFT IN THE HOUSEHOLD 
 
 ever is represented by the food you do 
 not waste. You will thus get a realizing 
 sense what thrift means. You will not 
 have gone without any of the foods you 
 wanted, but you will have made them 
 of greater value to the family treasury. 
 Your kitchen scale will tell you how 
 many ounces of meat or other substance 
 goes to your soup, salad, pie, or whatever 
 you make for your economy. It becomes 
 very interesting to learn the practical 
 cash saving by such economy, and this 
 method brings realization. It will sur- 
 prise you. Your loaf of bread cuts a 
 certain number of slices, the whole being 
 priced at six or twelve cents at present 
 time. How much do you waste when 
 you throw into the garbage one of the 
 slices, or how many fragments does it 
 need to make a third of a loaf? 
 
 The next time there is melted ice-cream 
 left don't say, " You may as well throw 
 that out ; it isn't any good now." Set it 
 
LITTLE ECONOMIES 71 
 
 with gelatine for blanc-mange, or thicken 
 it with corn-starch or tapioca for pud- 
 ding. Two eggs to a pint of liquid 
 stirred in and cooked, makes it a good 
 custard. You can use the left-over cocoa 
 or chocolate in the same way, or you 
 may use it for the liquid in place of milk 
 or water. 
 
 You can often use water in mixing a 
 cake instead of milk and the cake will be 
 lighter and less liable to scorch. Dishes 
 containing milk or molasses will scorch 
 readily. Grease well the dishes in which 
 such cakes and pudding are baked, as 
 they stick more than sugar-made articles, 
 and when you lose in that way your 
 profit is less. 
 
 Save gas in the range by turning off 
 when not in use if only for two minutes. 
 Matches are cheaper than gas. Do not 
 light until wanted, and turn off five min- 
 utes before removing kettle from range. 
 The water will continue to boil for some 
 
72 THRIFT IN THE HOUSEHOLD 
 
 minutes after the gas is out. In using 
 the gas oven, get the full heat and then 
 turn out the gas for baking articles need- 
 ing a slight heat. Watch the oven, and 
 when more heat becomes necessary light 
 it again. Most housewives use twice as 
 much gas for the oven as is necessary. 
 An outside lining of sheet asbestos makes 
 the oven hold heat considerably longer. 
 
 Lemons, cranberries, and rhubarb may 
 be kept a long time if covered with cold 
 water and sealed. Cut rhubarb in inch 
 pieces, pack in jars, let the cold water 
 from the faucet run on it until it has no 
 bubbles, then seal. Keep in the dark, 
 and it will remain good indefinitely and 
 can be used like the fresh plant. The 
 same method holds good with cranberries. 
 Lemons need the water renewed, and will 
 not keep as well as the others. When they 
 are cheap, squeeze out the juice and mix 
 it half and half with sugar until ajar is 
 filled. Seal. It is ready for use in any 
 
LITTLE ECONOMIES 73 
 
 way that one wants lemon-juice. A 
 spoonful to a glass makes an excellent 
 lemonade, and for lemon pie it is as good 
 as the fresh lemon. This mixture keeps 
 better than the lemons. 
 
 Grate the yellow rind into pure grain 
 alcohol and let it stand. Add a crystal 
 of citric acid. You will have an excellent 
 extract for flavoring. Use only enough 
 alcohol to absorb the oil of the lemon. 
 Dilute for using. I make orange, ginger, 
 and vanilla in the same way. Ginger- 
 root is the slowest to make a strong ex- 
 tract but it makes a better extract than 
 one buys, because it is stronger and costs 
 less. This principle is that on which 
 most extracts are made. You must not 
 use wood alcohol, or denatured alcohol. 
 They are unsafe. 
 
CHAPTER V 
 VINEGARS. EGGS 
 
CHAPTER V 
 VINEGAKS. EGGS 
 
 MAKE your own vinegar. Keep your 
 cider until it turns to vinegar or add to 
 the cider vinegar which you have the old 
 cider, and fruit juices you will not put 
 into pudding sauces or other things. 
 The vinegar into which you turn your 
 liquids must have plenty of " mother " 
 for the starter. Add the water in which 
 you boiled apple peelings not to be made 
 into jelly. Clean potato water may be 
 added. Nothing should be hot when 
 turned into the vinegar, as heat destroys 
 the active principle in the mother. If 
 warm it will the sooner begin to work. 
 Keep in a warm place until fermentation 
 has ceased, clarify if necessary, and strain 
 
 the vinegar if it does not seem clear. If 
 
 77 
 
78 THRIFT IN THE HOUSEHOLD 
 
 the made vinegar does not clear readily 
 add to it a half-pint of sweet milk to 
 a gallon of vinegar. It will curdle and 
 settle, taking with it the impurities, after 
 which it may be bottled. The sediment 
 will be the working part of a new vinegar. 
 To destroy the mother, boil it. 
 
 Starting with this vinegar you can 
 make fancy vinegars for your use or to 
 give your friends. The general rule for 
 making flavored vinegars is to pour the 
 hot acid on the leaves or whatever is the 
 base of the new vinegar, and leave the 
 two to stand undisturbed from two weeks 
 to a month. Fresh leaves are better than 
 dried but not as easy to get. Any drug- 
 gist has the dried tarragon, mint, or other 
 herb, but the growing plants are not often 
 seen. Onions, horseradish, mustard, and 
 celery, as well as herbs may be treated 
 with the hot vinegar. Mustard and 
 celery seed will be better if boiled with 
 the vinegar. Fancy vinegars sell at 
 
VINEGARS. EGGS 79 
 
 fancy prices and cannot often be bought 
 at that. 
 
 Last fall I made a very unusual and 
 good vinegar from the red part of water- 
 melon. The modus operandi was mash- 
 ing the melon, the pulp and juice turned 
 into closed receptacles where it could 
 ferment. All vinegars when making 
 must have heat and be kept warm with 
 the sun if not otherwise. The water- 
 melon juice cleared itself, and when fer- 
 mentation was complete the acid was as 
 clear and colorless as water. It would 
 " make " if added to the cider vinegar, 
 and next time will be used with it. The 
 two acids combine well in flavor. I 
 used the watermelon vinegar in making 
 pickles and found it as successful as cider 
 vinegar. 
 
 Fermentation may be started with yeast 
 if one wants to make a vinegar without 
 the flavor of the cider vinegar, and more 
 quickly than by waiting for it to come as 
 
80 THRIFT IN THE HOUSEHOLD 
 
 a natural result of conditions. Almost 
 any liquid will turn to vinegar if left to 
 sour and work itself clear. Molasses will 
 become so acid that it must be diluted 
 very much to use at all. I once made 
 some pickles by pouring molasses over 
 sliced green tomatoes it was a recipe in 
 a cook-book and the resulting pickles 
 were so sour that the acid made ordinary 
 vinegar seem sweet. They could not be 
 eaten, but might have been with diluted 
 acid, perhaps. 
 
 Vinegars may be made from the juices 
 of oranges, peaches, and other fruits. The 
 recipes for these call for yeast-cake ac- 
 cording to amount of liquid. Half a 
 cake will ferment a gallon, or nature 
 will do the same. There is no more real 
 need for a fermentative agent than with 
 watermelon. I have never made any of 
 these fruit vinegars but have made many 
 of the herb vinegars, and plan to keep 
 mint and tarragon vinegar always on 
 
VINEGARS. EGGS 81 
 
 hand. With onions at the present price 
 onion vinegar will be added to my supply 
 of fancy vinegars. They may be made in 
 quart quantities. 
 
 EGGS 
 
 There is an economy in putting down 
 eggs for winter provided you can get ab- 
 solutely fresh and infertile eggs. It will 
 not pay to lay the eggs down unless you 
 can be sure they are fresh. One of the 
 leading authorities on farm matters has 
 advised every one who can do so to put 
 down eggs whenever they can be bought 
 at less than forty cents a dozen, as the 
 probability is that the price will rise in 
 the future to much more than that. The 
 price is lowest in spring when eggs are 
 most abundant, but they are more liable 
 then to be fertile and thus will not keep 
 well. 
 
 There are several methods of preserv- 
 ing eggs, but the two tested by the 
 
82 THRIFT IN THE HOUSEHOLD 
 
 Department of Agriculture and recom- 
 mended by the authorities of the Depart- 
 ment are in water-glass and by lime. 
 The country way for years was to put 
 the eggs in a half-barrel or big lard- 
 firkin. The great disadvantage of this is 
 that the last eggs put down are the first 
 to be eaten, unless one does as an old 
 friend of mine did. When her firkin 
 was full she put a tight lid on it and re- 
 versed it, opened it at the bottom and 
 thus used the first laid down before the 
 late. Better than that is to have smaller 
 receptacles, which may be opened in 
 order of age, beginning with the oldest. 
 Working from the oldest to the last put 
 down you will never get any that are 
 very old. 
 
 Water-glass is a sodium silicate and is 
 dissolved in water. The proper propor- 
 tions are given with the material. The 
 water has a somewhat slippery feeling. 
 When the eggs are to be used, they are 
 
VINEGARS. EGGS 83 
 
 removed from the liquid and rinsed in 
 clean, cold water, but must not wait 
 long before being used. The informa- 
 tion given by the Department of Agri- 
 culture says eggs thus preserved may be 
 used for soft-boiling or poaching up to 
 November. To cook an egg in the shell 
 first prick a tiny hole in the large end 
 of the shell with a needle to keep it 
 from cracking. They are satisfactory for 
 frying until December and after that 
 time until March they may be used for 
 omelets, custards, and cake cooking. 
 
 As the eggs become older, the whites be- 
 come thinner and it is harder to separate 
 yellow from white. It becomes difficult 
 to beat the eggs. As the eggs age, they 
 do not look as inviting and sometimes, 
 even when not bad, there is a tinge of 
 pink in the white, which is said to be 
 due to a small supply of iron in the 
 sodium silicate and does not harm the 
 egg for cooking. Some of these changes 
 
84: THRIFT IN THE HOUSEHOLD 
 
 in the eggs will be avoided by so placing 
 them in separate receptacles that they do 
 not get so old before using. Sixteen 
 average-sized eggs may be packed with 
 the water-glass in a half-gallon crock. 
 Seal the jar or crock when full. The 
 water-glass may be used again. 
 
 The most enthusiastic advocate of pre- 
 serving eggs I ever met was a personal 
 friend who had put eggs down in lime- 
 water for forty years when she told me 
 about that method. She did not like 
 the water -glass method, and perhaps was 
 slightly prejudiced against it, as she got 
 better results with the lime-water. She 
 said she had never had a bad egg with 
 the lime process, but she was fortunate in 
 having hens and thus being assured of 
 perfectly fresh material to preserve. Forty 
 years' experience and no poor eggs is a 
 good recommendation. The lime-water 
 is a strong solution, three pounds of un- 
 slaked lime to five gallons of water which 
 
VINEGARS. EGGS 85 
 
 has been boiled and allowed to stand 
 until cool. The mixture must stand 
 until the lime settles and the liquid is 
 clear. The eggs are to be packed as with 
 water-glass, having at least two inches of 
 water above the eggs. Rinse as with the 
 other preparation. These eggs retain 
 their original appearance on breaking 
 somewhat longer than the eggs from 
 water-glass. The lime-water is somewhat 
 the cheaper solution, but the Department 
 of Agriculture endorses the water-glass 
 process the more highly. 
 
 Eggs are so important a part of the 
 family diet that it is well worth your 
 time and care to have as many as you 
 can. My grocer said, " The price of eggs 
 in winter does not trouble me. In the 
 spring I buy thirty dozen where I know 
 they are good, put them down, and they 
 last us until they come again." That is 
 from a man who can always get his foods 
 at cost price, and what is a good plan for 
 
86 THRIFT IN THE HOUSEHOLD 
 
 him is equally good for others. Eggs 
 must always be put down in earthenware 
 or glass. I know I spoke of the firkin 
 and have seen it used a great deal in the 
 country, but it is like other exceptions to 
 rules, and when you begin you do better 
 to follow the rule exactly. 
 
 Buy no eggs for preserving which are 
 over four days old. The fresher they 
 are, the better for keeping. 
 
 Even when using fresh eggs, break 
 each egg separately, and then only one 
 will be lost. I once spoiled eight by 
 breaking the ninth into them when it 
 was much too old to be pleasant. Yolks 
 separated from whites may be kept fresh 
 if covered, without blending, with cold 
 water. Cover the whites with a lid to 
 keep from drying. If beaten eggs be- 
 come hard, soften them with milk. 
 
 If eggs are scarce and you want to 
 make a cake that calls for more than one 
 egg, add the butter last and have it 
 
VINEGARS. EGGS. 87 
 
 melted when added. Then one egg will 
 serve for two cakes. Beat yolk and white 
 separately and add last of all but the 
 butter. Eggs may be made to do double 
 duty by beating up with a tablespoonful 
 of water to an egg. If more than three 
 eggs are called for, omit one and add a 
 spoonful of corn-starch. Beat it in with 
 the eggs or the mixture may fall. It 
 may be substituted in scrambled eggs or 
 an omelet. 
 
CHAPTER VI 
 
 THE GREATEST ECONOMY 
 YOURSELF 
 
CHAPTER VI 
 THE GEEATEST ECONOMY : YOUKSELF 
 
 THERE is one possession which the 
 woman who makes the greatest effort to 
 be thrifty often wastes with reckless 
 prodigality, in spite of the fact that it is 
 so valuable it cannot be replaced by any- 
 thing else ; money cannot buy it, and 
 once lost one seldom can get it again. 
 Of all the wastes about the household 
 this is the one irreparable, and as the 
 housewife is wasting it she seems to 
 think she is doing something very com- 
 mendable. She will save her pennies and 
 waste her life by overwork and lack of 
 sleep, and in the end she spends all she 
 has tried to accumulate, in the vain effort 
 to be well again. 
 
 Of all the good gifts the fairies bestow 
 91 
 
92 THRIFT IN THE HOUSEHOLD 
 
 upon a child at birth, the first and best is 
 good health ; if that does not come by 
 birth, the next best for the child is a 
 mother wise enough to nurture him so 
 needfully that health grows within him 
 as he sleeps, eats, and, later, works. 
 Blessed is the household where the mother 
 puts good health above all things except 
 moral strength. In that household the 
 mother does not throw away her strength 
 and time doing work that can be elimi- 
 nated, but she serves cleanliness with 
 reason. 
 
 However hard one works and however 
 steadily, she never can have an absolutely 
 clean house. Nature forbids it. All out- 
 of-doors is dirt, yet we take to out-of-doors 
 and we thrive. Instead of working so 
 hard to drive out the dust why not take 
 more of out-of-doors into the house? 
 That is thrift. It may fade the carpet, 
 and the life-giving sunshine generally 
 does fade it and the paper and other 
 
GREATEST ECONOMY: YOURSELF 93 
 
 things, but these can be renewed if the 
 members of the family are well, for they 
 will work with so much more enthusiasm 
 that their incomes will increase; more- 
 over, there is no home that is so inviting 
 and homelike as one that is not too new 
 and speckless. Better is a home where 
 faded walls and floor are, with a well, 
 happy mother, than an immaculate, dark- 
 ened home with an irritable, nervous 
 mother presiding over it. In homes 
 where the income is small, only one per- 
 son to see to everything, there is always 
 occasion to choose which you shall have, 
 more show, more work, less happiness, or 
 health and content with plain living. 
 As a matter of dollars and cents, regard- 
 less of the spirit of the home and the 
 happiest homes are not the most scrubbed 
 it pays better to work less. 
 
 A woman will tell you, " I cleaned all 
 my up-stairs to-day, took up the carpet, 
 washed the floor, etc.," as if she had done 
 
94: THRIFT IN THE HOUSEHOLD 
 
 a truly virtuous deed, when what she 
 really did was to strain her back, neglect 
 her food, work all day keyed at the high- 
 est tension, and go to bed at night with 
 every nerve strained to the utmost, an 
 aching head and back, and the conscious- 
 ness that her weariness and aches have 
 made her so snappy that the children 
 have stayed as far from her as they could, 
 and her husband has " decided to do 
 some extra work at the office." Wearing 
 one's self out like that and being cross 
 is a sin, and if a woman herself must 
 clean her house at such a cost she will be 
 much wiser to let the extra work be un- 
 done. Probably no one else ever would 
 know whether or not she had done all 
 the cleaning, or care. Just why houses 
 should become so remarkably dirty twice 
 a year when they apparently have been 
 kept clean all through the months be- 
 tween is one of the puzzles of a thought- 
 ful mind. 
 
GREATEST ECONOMY : YOURSELF 95 
 
 When this country was first settled and 
 only one fire was kept in most houses, 
 and that in the kitchen, and all winter 
 the family hibernated and dirt accumu- 
 lated because it was too cold to clean the 
 rooms unlived in, there was reason for a 
 yearly digging-out ; but now it is the cus- 
 tom to occupy all the house, and all is 
 kept swept and garnished from January 
 first to the following December thirty- 
 first at midnight it should be possible to 
 keep it livable without any yearly up- 
 heaval. There is enough to be done each 
 day not to add any needless labor to the 
 amount. 
 
 If you, my dear sister-worker, find 
 yourself getting so tired each day that 
 you " cannot think," try this way of cul- 
 tivating thrift. Take time to consider 
 with yourself how not to waste your life. 
 It is the best thing you have. Did you 
 ever notice how many husbands have 
 young wives spending the money saved 
 
96 THRIFT IN THE HOUSEHOLD 
 
 by the work of the first wives, who die and 
 leave it for their successors to spend? 
 Why not spend it yourself? Reflect on 
 that topic deeply and heartfully, and then 
 decide first that you will not join the 
 number of those thus making a place for 
 some superfluous woman. That decision 
 being made so that it cannot be shaken, 
 reflect thoughtfully on what you can do 
 to save yourself, which is to make yourself 
 well and keep yourself well. 
 
 You know just about what you can do 
 before you become conscious of weariness. 
 You should stop a little the other side 
 of that. If you can work but an hour 
 and feel right, work that at your best and 
 stop. 
 
 If you cannot afford to hire a helper 
 really cannot afford it by going without 
 something else then there remains for 
 you only to cut down the work and have 
 the members of your family help you. 
 Probably you are the kind who hangs up 
 
GREATEST ECONOMY : YOURSELF 97 
 
 everything the other members of the fam- 
 ily drop, who puts away or packs every- 
 thing for them, and who makes of herself 
 an unthanked servant for the household. 
 Having resolved to be just to yourself, you 
 must change this condition, so talk over 
 the situation with your family and re- 
 quest their cooperation in making life 
 easier for you. Very likely they will be 
 greatly surprised to know that you have 
 any lacks in that respect. If you have 
 brought them up so selfishly that they 
 will not help for the asking, then make 
 a demand that they do at least what be- 
 longs to them to do, the work they make, 
 and if they do not heed your words, leave 
 all their proper work undone. 
 
 Let their clothes lie where they were 
 dropped, also their tennis-rackets, books, 
 etc. Don't give way to the weakness of 
 saying, " I can't stand seeing them 
 around." If you can't, just go somewhere 
 else and forget about them. You may as 
 
98 THRIFT IN THE HOUSEHOLD 
 
 well go while you are able to do it as to 
 wait until you are carried feet first. If 
 you were sick abed you would have to 
 let them lie, so play that you are too ill 
 to attend to them. It should come easy 
 to you to do that. 
 
 The woman who is always tired is a 
 woman who is not well, and she belongs 
 in bed quite as much as the woman who 
 is there. Rest will do her more good 
 than any medicine and help more to keep 
 her well, and the housemother should 
 rest some part of every day as soon as she 
 is conscious of weariness ; even fifteen 
 minutes' relaxation will do her good, and 
 after it she will go on with renewed en- 
 ergy. She can get this rest if she will. 
 It is always possible to do the thing one 
 should do, and to be pleasant is the first 
 duty of a woman with husband and 
 child. 
 
 As soon as you feel that you have more 
 to do than you can ever get done, and 
 
GREATEST ECONOMY : YOURSELF 99 
 
 wherever you turn you see nothing but 
 dust and dirt, it is time for you to drop 
 everything for half an hour. Go out- 
 doors and breathe fresh air and see how 
 the sky looks. There is no more dirt 
 than when you did not notice it at all. 
 You see it because your nerves are mag- 
 nifying everything. Remember, " As 
 thy days, so shall thy strength be," and 
 you can do all that belongs to you 
 to do without the wear that makes you 
 cross. You have no more before you that 
 absolutely must be done than you can do 
 well. Separate the things you know 
 must be done from those that can be left, 
 and be guided in your decision by the 
 state of your mind and body, and pay no 
 heed to the things you would do because 
 your neighbors do and think you should 
 do. Your neighbors do not have your 
 life to live ; live it yourself as seems good 
 to you. Tasks are the things you do to 
 satisfy your neighbors' notions. Do no 
 
100 THRIFT IN THE HOUSEHOLD 
 
 more of them. They bring nervous pros- 
 tration. 
 
 " Do the duty that lies nearest," but be 
 sure it is a duty. You can recognize a 
 duty because it is something that makes 
 you and your family physically well, that 
 develops them spiritually and morally, 
 and does not take from you more than 
 you are able to give. Your first duty is 
 to make yourself so lovely that your fam- 
 ily want to be with you. Nothing is 
 worth while to you or them that does 
 not help you to be dear to them. Test 
 what you lay out for your work by its re- 
 lation to this great demand, and reject it 
 if it does not meet the test. 
 
 Very many seem-to- be-important tasks 
 will fade into nothingness if judged by 
 this test. You think of pies, doughnuts, 
 cakes, or what else to be made, but are 
 those really necessary to body or soul ? 
 They take much time and they are de- 
 licious, but if you are not strong, cannot 
 
GREATEST ECONOMY: YOURSELF iOl 
 
 9 
 
 your family be well nourished and whole- 
 somely fed without them? You know 
 they can. The actual requirements of 
 the body to keep it in perfect physical 
 trim are very few. A simple dietary does 
 more to make and keep it perfect than all 
 the products of the cook in sweets and 
 desserts. All forms of thrift are against 
 much cookery of that kind, thrift of time, 
 money, strength, health, and good spirits. 
 Eggs, shortening, flour, milk, all are so 
 expensive that it is not thrift to put much 
 of them into the non-essentials of diet. 
 While you deny your appetite these 
 pleasing gratifications you can content 
 yourself and family by reminding them 
 of the gains in health, and in money. 
 Very few women ever stop to reckon the 
 cost of cakes or any such foods. They 
 know what eggs and meat cost because 
 they pay for them in a lump sum, but they 
 cannot tell you what a cake costs until 
 they count it up. With lard at twenty- 
 
ib2 TSfttFT IN THE HOUSEHOLD 
 
 five cents a pound, eggs at fifty cents or 
 more a dozen, sugar nine cents or more a 
 pound, and milk and flour equally high, 
 it is not hard to see that cake is as ex- 
 pensive as needless. Women can lessen 
 the indirect expenses of the family in 
 many ways, beginning with what they 
 need not spend on doctors and medicine. 
 If the housewife will cut out from her 
 housework the non-essentials, she will go 
 through her days much more healthfully 
 and comfortably. Weariness creates poi- 
 sons in the blood that after a while create 
 the so-called diseases. Why not avoid 
 the illness by leaving undone the acts 
 that produce it? You will have to leave 
 them undone after the illness ; it is as 
 easy to foresee the evil and escape it. 
 One severe sickness will use up in a 
 month the savings of a year and indirectly 
 much more in what one's time is worth, 
 and while the wages of the housewife's 
 substitute are being paid as well as her 
 
GREATEST ECONOMY: YOURSELF 103 
 
 board and breakages the appreciation of 
 the regular worker's duties and value 
 will be increasing. 
 
 "How shall I save health?" do you 
 ask? "How shall I plan my days to 
 eliminate the needless? " That is some- 
 thing no one can tell another, for the 
 needs of families are different, but a gen- 
 eral rule may be given. Simplify every 
 department of life. With foods, cook 
 those which are most easily prepared and 
 use the fireless, since that is the easiest 
 and least time-devouring of all cooking. 
 That saves labor, time and money beside 
 strength, all of which you need to con- 
 serve. Eat many uncooked articles for 
 desserts ; figs, raisins, dates, prunes, and 
 other fruits cost less than cakes and pod- 
 dings and keep the body in good tone. 
 These are all good with the morning 
 cereal. They supply also the sugar that 
 is necessary for perfect nutrition. 
 
 Plan to have a meat or its substitute, a 
 
104 THRIFT IN THE HOUSEHOLD 
 
 starch, and a fat at each dinner. The 
 body has to be fed with these to meet its 
 needs. As most meals are provided for 
 individuals of different ages and physical 
 conditions, a compromise has to be ar- 
 ranged, varied as the mother knows to be 
 best. 
 
 Meat substitutes are fish, fowl, cheese, 
 nuts, legumes, milk and eggs. Potatoes 
 and cereals furnish starches. Fats are 
 found to some extent in most foods but 
 the fats for the table are butter and cream, 
 with salad oils, and children should be 
 encouraged to eat much of them. Every 
 family would be the healthier for a green 
 salad daily which should be served with- 
 out mayonnaise. There is no thrift in 
 providing that dressing, which is as un- 
 wholesome as expensive. Many persons 
 find peanut and cottonseed oil as pleasant 
 as olive for salads and the cost is a third 
 less. It is said that no case of appen- 
 dicitis has ever developed among persons 
 
GREATEST ECONOMY: YOURSELF 105 
 
 who eat oil freely. Children, unless they 
 have heard their elders say they never 
 could take oil, will eat vegetables dressed 
 with oil and lemon juice and ask for 
 more. There are so few fats palatable to 
 children that the salad habit should be 
 encouraged. Also, a salad is a dish easy 
 to prepare for the table. 
 
 Economize on the daily duties by hav- 
 ing those common to every day follow a 
 regular routine. The more nearly auto- 
 matic they become, the less they take out 
 of you, while saving the wear of thinking, 
 "What shall I do next?" Insist that 
 each member of the family turn back his 
 bed before leaving his room, and leave 
 the window open. Also, have him take 
 care of all his belongings. To pick up a 
 paper or a match is not much effort, but 
 it is as much for you as for him, and the 
 aggregation of picking up for every one 
 is an appreciable tax upon one. Perhaps 
 the weaker sex would not be the weaker 
 
106 THRIFT IN THE HOUSEHOLD 
 
 if she did not bend her back so much 
 picking up what the stronger leaves on 
 the floor. There will be more life for 
 you to put into better things when you 
 have taught your family to look after 
 their own belongings. You should have 
 begun the lessons when they were little. 
 Each year of practice makes the good 
 habit become more like instinct. 
 
CHAPTER VII 
 LABOR-SAVING 
 
CHAPTER VII 
 LABOK-SAYING 
 
 BEGIN on Sunday to prepare for the 
 week's work so that you shall finish each 
 day of it with the joy of doing, not with 
 the weariness that grows greater and 
 heavier day by day. Take your day of 
 rest as does the man who insists on an 
 eight-hour day. You need it as much as 
 your men do. Plan your day's work and 
 meals to be as light as you can possibly 
 make them. Have your dinner nearly 
 ready on Saturday. It won't hurt your 
 men to eat cold meat once a week. Study 
 how to get the hours of rest that will do 
 you good ; let it be your day and let 
 your family make it good for you. Prob- 
 ably they will enjoy the change as much 
 as you will, and you will feel and look 
 
 so much the younger. 
 109 
 
110 THRIFT IN THE HOUSEHOLD 
 
 Take Monday to put the house in order 
 after Sunday, to get food ready for wash- 
 day ; Tuesday, for putting clothes in soak 
 and getting them ready thus to be treated. 
 Monday is the day to take out the stains, 
 to mend rents that will be enlarged by 
 going through the wash, and to get the 
 week well under way. It saves labor to 
 soak the clothes with a good powder that 
 you can make yourself, or to use a spoon- 
 ful of kerosene to the gallon of water. 
 The odor of kerosene will be lost when 
 the clothes go through the wash. A 
 washing-machine is an economy in the 
 average household because it makes very 
 hard labor become easy and does the 
 same work in half the time. Add a good 
 wringer, and wash-day is no more to be 
 dreaded than any other day. Laundry 
 work is the hardest and most exacting 
 of the household, and a woman should 
 have every appliance that will make 
 it easier, if to have them she leaves 
 
LABOR-SAVING 111 
 
 her bedroom with only a bed, table, and 
 chair. 
 
 When you put the clothes on the line 
 hang all things of the same kind to- 
 gether, all sheets, slips, etc., side by side. 
 Hang them to swing smoothly, and fold 
 as taken from the line. Do not iron. 
 Sun-dried sheets folded while the sun is 
 on them are so sweet that ironing is no 
 improvement. Moreover, there is health 
 in such clothing. Fold ordinary towels 
 and do not iron them. For underwear, 
 woven garments, or those made of crpe 
 or seersucker if you want heavier ma- 
 terial, will need no ironing, just pulling 
 into smoothness and shape. They are 
 very pretty with a little needlework for 
 trimming, which may be done in odd 
 minutes. By a little thought you can 
 make your ironing only a small amount 
 of work, less than the washing. 
 
 If you do your own work, all that you 
 can leave undone without lessening the 
 
112 THRIFT IN THE HOUSEHOLD 
 
 comfort or in any degree injuring the 
 health of your family will keep you 
 fresher and happier. If you hire your 
 laundry done, the less ironing, the less 
 the cost for the washing, and the more 
 you will have for the finer things of the 
 mind or for charity. To-day from all 
 over the world comes the cry for help, 
 and to answer it one must practise thrift 
 as never before. 
 
 Try to "have as few handlings of the 
 clothes as you can. You can sort the 
 not-to-be-ironed as you take from the 
 line. As you iron the others, place 
 systematically on the drier. Have those 
 to be mended separated from the others 
 on the drier and so on. Mend when 
 taken from the drier, and do not put 
 anything away without buttons on and 
 rents repaired. Let the sewing-machine 
 help with the mending. Do not waste 
 time sewing by hand when it can be 
 more effectively done by machine. 
 
LABOR-SAVING 113 
 
 If you have a small family, you may 
 save time and strength by doing your 
 dishes all at one time. Scrape them, 
 pile in an orderly manner, pour hot 
 water over them, and let them stand in 
 the pan until the most convenient hour 
 of your day for doing them. This may 
 be in the pauses of getting dinner at 
 night. There is a considerable saving 
 of time, and the dishes by their soaking 
 are about half-washed when one begins 
 on them. 
 
 It will be a great help in keeping 
 rooms clean to have on each floor a duster, 
 broom, and brush. By removing dust 
 and dirt as it comes the weekly cleaning 
 may be turned into a fortnightly work, 
 and made easier by taking half of the 
 rooms each week. With your work, as 
 with your money, it is the small savings 
 and expenditures that count for profit or 
 loss. Use your head to devise methods 
 of saving motions and labor. Keeping 
 
114 THRIFT IN THE HOUSEHOLD 
 
 things convenient is a great gain in 
 health. 
 
 In your kitchen and pantry have your 
 cooking articles and dishes so arranged 
 that you can get what you want without 
 moving anything else, and all within easy 
 reach. That is a decided advantage in 
 working rapidly, and is free from the 
 irritating influence that accompanies 
 keeping dishes, covers, and so on, piled 
 one on another. 
 
CHAPTER VIII 
 BREAD AND CAKE 
 
CHAPTER VIII 
 
 BREAD AND CAKE 
 
 BREAD, being the commonest and most 
 important article of food, must form a 
 large part of the cost of the table. In no 
 other thing has the standard of the 
 housewife changed so greatly as in rela- 
 tion to bread-making. One of the 
 memories from my childhood in New 
 England is hearing the discussion of a 
 woman new to the neighborhood, and 
 what I remember is this, spoken in 
 pitying accents : " Yes, poor thing, she 
 does the best she can, but she hasn't any 
 faculty. Why, she buys her bread!" 
 That to the generation earlier was a sure 
 indication of a poor or lazy housewife. 
 Now it is the exceptional housekeeper 
 
 who makes her own bread, and perhaps 
 117 
 
118 THRIFT IN THE HOUSEHOLD 
 
 that fact has had its share in raising the 
 cost of living. 
 
 Whether it were more profitable to 
 make my bread, cake, and other flour 
 products or to buy them, no one was able 
 to tell me when I began to keep house, 
 so I determined to find out for myself, 
 and I kept account of all that was baked 
 from a bag of flour, added to that the 
 cost of other material and of fuel. As 
 gas has always been my fuel and I can 
 read my meter I could tell how much 
 gas was burned for each baking or steam- 
 ing. I found a gain of fifty per cent., 
 and if there were no gain where would 
 the baker get his profit? Though he 
 buys for less and has increased produc- 
 tion, he must pay other expenses lacking 
 to the housewife, so it is fair to credit 
 him with a cost no heavier than that of 
 the home-maker, and his profit she saves 
 when she does the work. No housewife 
 at the head of a large family can afford 
 
BREAD AND CAKE 119 
 
 to buy her bread if she desires to be 
 thrifty in the least. The higher the price 
 of flour and other material, the more need 
 of her being the bread-maker. 
 
 The following statement may help you 
 to see that making your bread is cheaper 
 than buying it, outside of the fact that 
 home-made bread has more body to it 
 than baker's bread, and " goes farther." 
 In a barrel of flour there will be flour 
 enough for 330 loaves of bread. Suppose 
 you pay $15 for the flour. Your loaves 
 at ten cents each, and they are quite as 
 likely to be more, will cost $33, and you 
 will see at once that the shortening and 
 baking will not cost you any such sum as 
 the difference between cost of the barrel 
 of flour and cost of loaves of bread bought 
 from the baker. A light, delicious loaf 
 of home-made bread will serve more than 
 baker's bread because it has more sub- 
 stance to it. No woman with a family 
 of four persons is thrifty if she buys 
 
120 THEIFT IN THE HOUSEHOLD 
 
 bread unless she is frail and overbur- 
 dened with work. 
 
 In my family of three persons I have 
 found it profitable to make my cakes, 
 pies, breads, and puddings, planning to 
 bake when there is something else to 
 cook at the same time. With gas for 
 fuel, it is wasteful to run the oven for 
 only one article. It takes as much gas 
 to bake a roast as to bake a roast, a loaf, 
 potatoes, and one other thing, which are 
 all a gas oven will hold. 
 
 Good bread, even the much-vilified 
 fine white bread, has considerable food 
 value. An expert on nutrition (Brews- 
 ter) says a slice of it toasted and buttered 
 has as much nutriment as an egg. 
 
 " As for the vexed question of Graham 
 and entire-wheat bread vs. white, the 
 difference is really not nearly so great 
 as some persons would have us believe. 
 In fuel value, the white has a slight ad- 
 vantage, since the darker forms are com- 
 
BREAD AND CAKE 121 
 
 monly made up with somewhat more 
 water. The protein of the darker sorts 
 amounts, on the average, to only about 
 two per cent, more, fifty bites of the one 
 matching forty-nine of the other. The 
 white sorts are for most persons dis- 
 tinctly more digestible. In the bone- 
 building minerals the difference is some- 
 what greater. Even here it amounts, in 
 general, to only about two parts in ten. 
 Moreover, some white flour contains more 
 protein and more phosphates than some 
 dark, the low-grade flours having com- 
 monly the most. The striking difference 
 between white and dark flours lies in 
 their content of woody fibre, which may 
 be twenty times as great in certain brands 
 of Graham as is the super-refined white. 
 This fibre tends to make the bread indi- 
 gestible. On the other hand, there is 
 probably nothing else so good for keep- 
 ing the bowels properly at work." 
 
 Thus does Brewster dispose of a favor- 
 
122 THKIFT IN THE HOUSEHOLD 
 
 ite popular notion. Recent investiga- 
 tions among English workingmen show 
 that among well-nourished men of that 
 class, bread provides nearly two-thirds of 
 the total energy value of the ration. This 
 proves that bread is worthy of its high 
 place in the dietary, and the more active 
 the individual, the better for him is bread. 
 " The mainstay of a child's diet should 
 be bread." He is always working, and 
 the bread and butter give him what he 
 needs in the best form. There is good 
 basis for the Continental breakfast of 
 bread and coffee or chocolate, and work- 
 ers of the offices and stores who have tried 
 for breakfast two slices of buttered toast, 
 with fruit cooked or raw, will rarely re- 
 turn to the heavier meal, which makes 
 the mind heavier as well. 
 
 Do not have always the same kind of 
 bread. Variety in this is as welcome as 
 in other things and as readily found. 
 You may have bran, rice, whole wheat, 
 
BREAD AND CAKE 123 
 
 brown bread, as part of your bread ration 
 and it will pay you to make it yourself. 
 Then for breads that are almost a meal 
 in themselves offer nut, date, and raisin 
 bread. These need no meat accompani- 
 ment and will satisfy hunger perfectly. 
 Where lunches have to be put up daily, 
 these breads should be made often. Nut 
 bread with butter or jam is the delight 
 of all who have been given it. 
 
 Bread become stale is bread in its most 
 wholesome state. It is amazing how 
 slight a realization most women have of 
 the uses of stale bread. Not a crumb 
 should be thrown away. In this one 
 article the housewife will find herself 
 gaining greatly in thrift as she learns 
 how to avail herself of crumbs and broken 
 bread. Even the crumbs that remain on 
 the bread-board after cutting should be 
 turned into a glass jar. Dried slowly 
 without browning, they will keep indefi- 
 nitely and are ready for any number of 
 
THRIFT IN THE HOUSEHOLD 
 
 purposes, saving cracker crumbs. All 
 crumbs, all bits of bread, and heels 
 of loaves should be dried thoroughly, 
 ground fine with a bread-roller or through 
 a meat-grinder, and they are even better 
 than the cracker crumbs one buys for 
 breading cutlets, etc. The lightest grid- 
 dle-cakes have bread crumbs as their 
 foundation ; brown bread is all the better 
 for having part of the wheat flour added 
 as crumbs. 
 
 The delicious bread sauce so favored 
 in England with roast chicken cannot 
 be made without bread crumbs; they 
 may be combined with potatoes for fry- 
 ing if there is a scant supply of the lat- 
 ter ; a hash is improved if crumbs take 
 the place of part potato ; bread crumbs 
 are needed in all households for breading 
 cutlets, croquettes, chops and such things. 
 Bread crumbs help well to fill out a 
 meal when combined with mashed po- 
 tato, blended with an egg, all seasoned, 
 
BKEAD AND CAKE 125 
 
 shaped in small balls and dropped in 
 deep hot fat. 
 
 A dish of considerable substance may be 
 prepared from crumbs by soaking them 
 in a cup of milk, adding an egg, season- 
 ing well, then adding a spoonful of baking- 
 powder and enough flour to make a thin 
 batter. Into this stir any bits of meat 
 you have if it is only a spoonful it will 
 give flavor. 
 
 Shavings of fat pork, nice and brown, 
 are very good. You can turn the batter 
 over the fat pork-crisps and bake them 
 like pancakes. If you cook on top of 
 the stove, when one side is brown, turn 
 it and brown the other. It can be baked 
 in the oven also. You can have a hearty, 
 appetizing dish by having some bacon in 
 the skillet with the fat and turning the 
 batter over it. Have plenty of fat but 
 not too much, which is when it comes 
 above the dough. To have crumbs pre- 
 pared is a saving of time and a great 
 
126 THRIFT IN THE HOUSEHOLD 
 
 convenience. Crumbs for scallops should 
 be bigger than for breading. Always 
 make the dough for anything of which 
 crumbs are a part somewhat thicker than 
 with flour alone. Crumbs may be mixed 
 with a custard and " make it go farther " 
 without making it less palatable. 
 
 Probably there is more unthrift con- 
 nected with the treatment of stale bread 
 than in any one other branch of family 
 service. Garbage men can tell how sel- 
 dom does one find a garbage pail that does 
 not hold enough of bread alone to feed a 
 hungry man for a day, and that is a low 
 limit, as any one knows who has shared 
 the garbage receptacle of an apartment 
 house. Stale bread toasted, dressed with 
 a white sauce to which grated cheese has 
 been added, makes a dish with nutrition 
 enough for the breakfast of a man who 
 works out-of-doors. In Europe, cheese 
 and bread are an important part of the 
 diet and may well help those who wish 
 
BREAD AND CAKE 127 
 
 to make thrift take the place of dollars. 
 Slices of cheese are served for breakfast 
 in some parts of Europe just as slices of 
 cold meat sometimes are served in the 
 United States. 
 
 Crumbs of brown bread and corn-meal 
 bread may be converted into baked 
 Indian pudding by substituting them 
 for part of the meal the recipe calls for. 
 Then follow the rule. If you have any 
 dry gingerbread add that to the other. 
 Bread puddings are very good when well 
 made; when not they are a waste of 
 material. There are many kinds of ex- 
 cellent puddings which will use the 
 crumbs, but a bread pudding which calls 
 for several eggs should be made very 
 seldom. Puddings are served after the 
 appetite is satisfied or nearly so, and the 
 nutrition of the meal does not require 
 eggs ; when the main part of the meal 
 has been light, a two-egg pudding is 
 more thrifty than at other times because 
 
128 THRIFT IN THE HOUSEHOLD 
 
 there is need of more food value in the 
 dessert. Eggs are not extravagant when 
 they are a substitute for meat, but except 
 when of low cost, are wasteful in pud- 
 dings and cakes because they are added 
 to a meal which does not need them. 
 
 Cake cannot be called a necessity of 
 life but it is a food that is pleasant and 
 has considerable nutrition, therefore it 
 may have an occasional place on the 
 table of the thrifty, though as it is al- 
 ways eaten after a fulness of other food, 
 it should be a simple combination of one 
 egg, or two at most, with such ingredients 
 as one needs. As good a cake as any 
 family need to eat may be made with 
 two eggs ; if you make simple cakes for 
 daily fare you will not mind the expense 
 of something richer on festal occasions. 
 
 Most experienced housewives have a 
 recipe which has proved worth making 
 up, and this they vary as they need other 
 cakes. For instance, gingerbread by the 
 
BREAD AND CAKE 129 
 
 following rule has been made in our 
 family for years and is thoroughly de- 
 pendable. You will note that it is egg- 
 less. One-half cup of molasses, one- 
 fourth cup sugar, one-fourth cup melted 
 shortening; turn on these one-half cup 
 of boiling not just hot water. I use 
 coffee left from breakfast in place of the 
 water if there is any. Allow enough 
 flour to make a slightly thick batter 
 (about two cups, more or less), with 
 which sift one-half teaspoonful each of 
 soda, salt, and ginger. Bake slowly, as 
 any molasses mixture burns readily. 
 This is turned into a bake-sheet and 
 baked about two inches thick. That is 
 the first result. 
 
 From this come other cakes. Some- 
 times I bake in muffin tins and have 
 little cakes ; sometimes to the original 
 recipe I add raisins, or chopped dates, or 
 citron, or any two of these ; sometimes I 
 turn a cup of black walnut meats broken 
 
130 THRIFT IN THE HOUSEHOLD 
 
 rather fine into the dough, and find it 
 delicious. Then I season with spices as 
 fruit cake, and add nuts, raisins, and a 
 little minced orange peel that I candied. 
 I made my Christmas plum pudding as 
 a variation of this recipe and it was as 
 good as any Christmas pudding needs 
 to be. 
 
 Beside being plain gingerbread or little 
 cakes it is made in layers ; as a layer cake 
 it does not need as much flour. If for 
 supper dessert, I have it hot and spread 
 between the layers jelly or whipped 
 cream when I have something left from 
 my week's allowance. Sometimes I make 
 a nut or other filling. Sometimes I make 
 it as a loaf. As my oven is likely to 
 burn on the bottom, I bake my cake in 
 my iron skillet and it makes a pretty 
 loaf of extra size. You see what I mean 
 by an inexpensive base producing many 
 cakes. You can turn this into a dark 
 chocolate cake by omitting the ginger 
 
BREAD AND CAKE 131 
 
 and using an ounce of cake chocolate, or 
 two spoonfuls of powdered cocoa or 
 chocolate with it, and seasoning with 
 vanilla. By frosting with chocolate or 
 other icing you will have a cake that 
 seems much more expensive than it is. 
 It is the same cake in all forms but it 
 does not taste the same and in all it 
 is inexpensive. Of course, as nuts and 
 fruits go into it the cost rises. Ginger- 
 bread is the most desirable form of cake 
 for home consumption speaking from 
 the health point and served hot will de- 
 light nearly every one. There are recipes 
 for its making requiring from no eggs 
 to four, and for keeping it is well to add 
 an egg, but gingerbread never keeps with 
 us. It is so good that it quickly disap- 
 pears. 
 
 It is very well to use several eggs in a 
 cake or pudding if one serves it when 
 there is very little preceding it as food, 
 but not otherwise. When one has satis- 
 
132 THEIFT IN THE HOUSEHOLD 
 
 fied his appetite with heavier food the 
 system does not need the protein of the 
 eggs and it is mainly wasted. There are 
 many good eggless recipes, much to the 
 purpose with eggs at fifty to sixty cents a 
 dozen, or even more. Eggs as the main 
 dish of a meal are not extravagant, even 
 at the higher price, but as part of cakes 
 and puddings they are not used in our 
 house when they go above forty-five cents 
 a dozen, and very seldom at that price. 
 The members of my family do not know 
 whether my cake is made with eggs or 
 not, but they say " it tastes like more." 
 
CHAPTER IX 
 SOUPS 
 
CHAPTER IX 
 SOUPS 
 
 HOUSEWIVES in this country do not 
 know as they should the thrift of soups. 
 They understand the merits of chowders 
 and stews which are dishes containing 
 everything for a meal in one composition, 
 but they have never really grasped the 
 economy of a thin soup daily at the be- 
 ginning of a dinner. It is truly econom- 
 ical. It warms the stomach and starts 
 the digestive apparatus as surely as does 
 drinking warm water before eating. Its 
 work is very much the same. If one is 
 very hungry, it takes the edge off the ap- 
 petite, and that is more healthful than 
 eating as we do when we are very 
 hungry. 
 
 Less meat is eaten when soup is served, 
 
 and the body thrives as well. As a rule, 
 135 
 
136 THRIFT IN THE HOUSEHOLD 
 
 the ordinary household does not serve 
 soups as a first course of a dinner, seem- 
 ing to regard it as a luxury for the table 
 of the rich, whereas it is one of the 
 greatest economies. It is rarely neces- 
 sary to buy material for the daily soup. 
 In my household nothing except an oc- 
 casional bunch of soup herbs was bought 
 for soup in a year. The bones from dif- 
 ferent meats and fowl supplied the stock, 
 and left-overs of vegetables gave variety. 
 Cream soups are too heavy for a first 
 course unless the second be of vegetables 
 or the less nourishing fish. With salmon 
 or oily fish it is a bad arrangement. As 
 an economy, one should not make cream 
 soups often. Water in which vegetables 
 are boiled should be the base of soups. 
 French housewives do not add meat 
 juices to this. The water with a little of 
 the vegetable in it is seasoned and served 
 with sippets of bread as the first course. 
 To American palates it seems flat at first, 
 
SOUPS 137 
 
 but not after a while, and the water con- 
 tains mineral salts which are beneficial 
 to the taker of them. You can make 
 your soup look better to you by thicken- 
 ing it with corn-starch or flour to what 
 you like as soup consistency, and you 
 can add milk if you like it better that 
 way. Season it well, serve with it crou- 
 tons, which are dice of stale bread browned 
 in butter or bacon fat. Then you will 
 have a good soup. 
 
 Did you know you could make nice 
 soup from left-overs of fish ? One of the 
 nicest I ever had or ate was the result of 
 an experiment of mine. I boiled the 
 backbone and skin of a cooked finnan- 
 haddie for half or three-quarters of an 
 hour in water ; strained it, seasoned with 
 butter and salt, added milk to make soup 
 enough for serving, and passed toasted 
 crackers with it. That was made from 
 what seemed to be wholly waste, and 
 the family declared it as good as oyster 
 
138 THRIFT IN THE HOUSEHOLD 
 
 soup. Milk may be added to any soup 
 except meat stock, and it makes the soup 
 richer in food value. 
 
 Unless one has the art of making soups 
 from the little leavings that cannot other- 
 wise serve the family there is no econ- 
 omy in having them, but it will pay any 
 housekeeper to acquire the knack of 
 making good soup from the bits. Fish- 
 soups, well seasoned, are very good and 
 should be more frequently served. They 
 require milk for the body of the soup 
 and are heartier than vegetable-soups for 
 which water is the stock. 
 
 The cook who wishes to surpass her 
 fellows must become past mistress in 
 the art of seasoning. She will use dif- 
 ferent spices for different soups and not 
 have everything taste alike. Continental 
 cooks, even to the humblest mother of a 
 home, know how to season, and the re- 
 sult is a flavor compounded of many in- 
 gredients, not one of which is stronger 
 
SOUPS 139 
 
 than another. One will use a single 
 clove or peppercorn, a leaf of celery, and 
 so on, the whole being so delicious to the 
 smell that one is made eager to eat it. 
 
 Soups are always thin, about as thin 
 as milk ; the next member of the soup 
 family is a pure*e, which is a thick soup, 
 but not thick enough nor compounded 
 to be a stew; then come chowders and 
 stews, which are really meals of them- 
 selves, not, like purges and soups, aids to 
 a meal. Purges of the legumes, that is, 
 peas, beans of all varieties, and lentils, are 
 heavy enough, though made only of one 
 ingredient beside water and seasoning, to 
 form a meal with bread and butter that 
 is as hearty as an ordinary woman should 
 eat at luncheon. These need long cook- 
 ing, and should be started with soaking 
 overnight. The more they are cooked, 
 the more wholesome they are, though 
 they need not measure up to the time set 
 by Mother Goose for her bean porridge. 
 
140 THRIFT IN THE HOUSEHOLD 
 
 The national dish of France and also 
 of Belgium is a kind of chowder, though 
 called soup, because it never would be a 
 course at a dinner. As you would ex- 
 pect, the pot au-feu, and huitze pot are 
 masterpieces of thrift, and as the need in 
 this country for cheap living increases 
 there can be no better aid to meeting 
 that need than to learn to make either 
 of these soups. They are alike in their 
 general making, for which there is no 
 rule. No one buys new material for 
 these soups ; they are a combination of 
 what cannot go on the table, because 
 there may not be enough of it. The 
 stock pot in a French or Belgian family 
 is never empty, unless for an occasional 
 washing. Into it go the left-overs, a 
 bean-pod, a leaf of cabbage or lettuce, the 
 bones from the meat these are rather few 
 a sausage, and so on. In our country 
 the garbage pail gets all of these, for it is 
 the little bit that makes the pot au-feu 
 
SOUPS 141 
 
 and the huitze pot, and all the bits feed 
 those who without them would go hungry. 
 Then the pot receives the water it needs, 
 and everything simmers away for hours, 
 so slowly that nothing is spoiled by hard 
 boiling ; another agency for the appetiz- 
 ing result is the flavoring. That cannot 
 be imparted by directions, but any one 
 can learn it by experimenting. 
 
 Before the War, one would see in the 
 markets the children of the very poor 
 gleaning from the floor of the market- 
 place the scraps that would furnish the 
 huitze pot and save them from hunger. 
 It would not seem that these bits of 
 refuse could be made of any service, but 
 a bean-pod is not the less something to 
 eat because it has fallen to the ground, 
 and so the poor are fed, for the children 
 would collect a basketful of odds and 
 ends that no one begrudged them, and 
 no one else wanted. It is a thrifty people 
 that teaches its poor to make something 
 
142 THRIFT IN THE HOUSEHOLD 
 
 worth eating from what it finds to its 
 hand. Our people should learn the same 
 lesson of thrift, though perhaps not the 
 same application of it. 
 
 Chowders and thick soups should be 
 eaten as the hearty dish of a meal, and 
 should not be preceded by a soup. They 
 supply all the nutrition and bulk that 
 the system needs at a meal. After the 
 legumes have been strained, do not throw 
 away the pulp which has a great deal of 
 the peas, beans, or lentils still with it. 
 Shape it into a mold around a platter 
 and fill the space with sauerkraut or with 
 left-over meat minced and thickened with 
 white or brown sauce, or tomato made 
 solid with gelatine, or chopped cabbage 
 and beets, or sliced onions and cucum- 
 bers, or cabbage with diced celery and 
 apples, or whatever occurs to you. If 
 you have seasoned everything well, so 
 that it tastes right without being spiced 
 much, your family will not miss meat 
 
SOUPS 143 
 
 when this is served. First you will have 
 your soup, then the dish which is so 
 pretty with the mold and contrasting 
 center, and if you add to this some 
 corn-meal muffins or johnny-cake, so 
 much the better, with a light dessert for 
 finish. This is a very satisfactory dinner 
 for active workers, but a little heavy for 
 sedentary workers if taken in the middle 
 of the day. 
 
 Either chowders or stews may be baked 
 if preferred. When they are baked in 
 a casserole or bean-pot there is less of 
 the waste that goes into the air. The 
 economy of any food requiring much 
 cooking depends somewhat upon the na- 
 ture of the fuel. If you keep a coal fire 
 for its heating value, any cooking you 
 may do on it is so much gained, while 
 if gas or electricity is your fuel, cooking 
 is an extra cost and the amount may be 
 estimated by watching the meter. It 
 might be much cheaper to provide a food 
 
144 THRIFT IN THE HOUSEHOLD 
 
 of which the first cost was considerably 
 more than that of peas or beans, but 
 the cooking expense very much less. 
 When you have made your fireless cooker 
 you will find stews, chowders, and such 
 foods very nutritious and as inexpensive, 
 as the cost of cooking by fireless is so 
 trifling. If you want to keep a greater 
 heat in the cooker, place at the bottom 
 under your kettle a brick or two heated 
 as hot as is safe. If you have an old 
 blanket or carpet you can throw over the 
 entire outside, so much the better. 
 
 All gravies are a good starting-point 
 for a soup. Let it make the soup for 
 your first course. Dilute it to proper 
 consistency, season with whatever you 
 have, add any left-over vegetable of 
 which there is only a spoonful or two, or 
 even a spoonful of the cereal from break- 
 fast which will thicken it somewhat. 
 Simmer it for a couple of hours, strain, 
 add croutons, or noodles, and serve. 
 
SOUPS 145 
 
 Make only enough for one meal at a 
 time. When there is gravy, it may be 
 added to tne water in which a yester- 
 day's vegetable was boiled. If there is 
 no gravy, milk may be the base of the 
 soup flavored with the water for the vege- 
 tables. 
 
 If you think a soup so compounded 
 will not be worth serving, try this which 
 I served yesterday. The spinach for din- 
 ner was cooked only in the water that 
 clung to its leaves, but as it cooks, the 
 steam brings out more, and when the 
 spinach is done there will be a pint of 
 liquid. This contains the mineral salts 
 which are so valuable for the body. 
 Spinach furnishes iron, and unless one 
 gets some part of the liquid, all of this is 
 lost. To my mind, it is better economy 
 to administer iron in this way than as a 
 drug. This liquor was hot, salted, half a 
 pint of milk added, the bits of the vegeta- 
 ble left in the soup, and a nicer light soup 
 
146 THRIFT IN THE HOUSEHOLD 
 
 you will not often find. One of the best 
 arguments for saving the water in which 
 vegetables are cooked is the eating of the 
 wholesome part of the vegetable, other- 
 wise lost. 
 
 A simple soup may be made from the 
 liquor that surrounds canned peas. Add 
 to it two tablespoonfuls of peas mashed 
 through a sieve. Put the liquid and the 
 mashed peas into a pan with a scant pint 
 of milk and a thickening of corn-starch. 
 Cook only long enough to remove the 
 rawness of the corn-starch. Season, and 
 serve with croutons. This soup is rich in 
 nutrition. 
 
 If you want to increase the nutriment 
 of a soup, serve it with grated cheese, for 
 which you can use the hard cheese not 
 fit for serving at table as cheese with des- 
 sert. You can even make a cheese soup 
 if you wish which will be too nourishing 
 to be served with much else for a meal. 
 The foundation is milk and water, in 
 
SOUPS 147 
 
 equal parts, brought to the boiling-point, 
 thickened with flour or corn-starch in the 
 proportion of a tablespoonful to a quart. 
 When this is cooked and seasoned with 
 paprika, mustard, and salt to suit taste, 
 add two tablespoonfuls of grated cheese 
 to a quart. Serve with cubes of hot toast, 
 or toasted crackers, and you have a good 
 supper for a cold night. 
 
CHAPTER X 
 OILS AND FATS 
 
CHAPTER X 
 OILS AND FATS 
 
 OILS and fats are important articles in 
 the family diet and at the present time 
 are mounting in price so rapidly that to 
 supply them becomes a real problem. To 
 the woman who regards lard as the only 
 material to be considered for shortening 
 and frying, there is nothing to be said, 
 but there are other fats equally good or 
 better, and the systematic saving and 
 clarifying of fats brought out in cooking 
 will lessen very considerably the amount 
 that must be bought. 
 
 Save water in which meat has been 
 boiled, and let it cool with the fat in it. 
 It will rise to the top, become a firm cake 
 which may be removed, freed from any 
 
 scum at the under side, and will be as 
 151 
 
152 THRIFT IN THE HOUSEHOLD 
 
 good for most cooking as the fat you pay 
 well for. Before cooking sausage scald it 
 with boiling water. Let it stand. Grease 
 will cover the top of the water. Remove 
 the sausage, turn the water into an open 
 jar with large top, and treat the fat that 
 forms into cake in the same manner as 
 the other. This will be flavored with 
 spices, but it is very excellent shortening 
 for dark cakes and gingerbread. It is 
 good for frying potatoes, but cannot be 
 as generally used for shortening as the fat 
 from beef and pork. 
 
 All fat from cooking should be saved 
 and clarified ; to clear it, put over the fire 
 and heat until the water evaporates, being 
 careful that the fat neither discolors nor 
 burns. An easier method is to boil all 
 fats in water, s-alt when taking from the 
 heat, and let it cool on the water. Fat so 
 cleared is always white. If bits of skin, 
 etc., are caught in it when cooling, strain 
 through a clean cloth or very fine sieve. 
 
OILS AND FATS 153 
 
 You can strain water and all, and the fat 
 will separate so that it needs no further 
 care except to take it from the water. 
 This fat may be used acceptably in place 
 of butter and lard. 
 
 Fat from lamb and mutton will lose its 
 objectionable features if mixed in the pro- 
 portion of one-third lamb or mutton fat 
 and two-thirds beef or pork fat. Chicken 
 fat is one of the very best of fats, and 
 when mixed with beef and pork fat it 
 looks like butter. It does not injure fats 
 for cooking to be combined. Chicken 
 fat should be tried out like others, and if 
 a fowl is very fat the excess should not be 
 cooked with the bird but reserved for 
 cooking. It may be used for cakes, pud- 
 dings, and biscuits, and gives no hint of 
 any unpleasant flavor. As the fat of suet 
 is rather hard when cool, that of poultry 
 is well mixed with it to lighten it. 
 
 Suet is a wholesome fat and should form 
 part of the family's material much oftener 
 
154 THRIFT IN THE HOUSEHOLD 
 
 than it does. To use it is true thrift. 
 When it is chopped very fine it makes 
 good shortening for puddings and the 
 crust of meat pies. It is not good short- 
 ening for things to be eaten cold because 
 it coagulates as it cools. Suet tried out 
 is white and inviting. It can be used ex- 
 actly as lard is and for the same purposes. 
 It may take the place of butter in sauces 
 and gravies. Its value in the household 
 economy should be better known. Its 
 first cost is the lowest of all cooking fats 
 except mutton, which owing to its tend- 
 ency to form a coating on whatever it 
 touches, can be used only in combination 
 with other fats. 
 
 One housekeeper, with some local re- 
 nown as a cook, uses suet entirely in her 
 cooking. She buys at the rate of two 
 pounds for fifteen cents, tries it out with 
 water, and has something over a pound 
 and a half of very nice shortening. The 
 fat tried out from the suet known as 
 
OILS AND FATS 155 
 
 cord-fat is no stiffer than good lard. 
 Cord-fat is the fat about the intestines 
 and costs less than some other, and 
 harder suet. Suet works very well mixed 
 with lard or vegetable oil in any pro- 
 portion. 
 
 Bacon fat has so much merit that not 
 a drop of it should be wasted. The 
 French use it in salad dressing, and like 
 it 'better than any other oil for that pur- 
 pose. It may serve very well in many 
 ways not commonly known. It may be 
 the shortening for gingerbread, or it may 
 even be used to enrich biscuit, and you 
 will be surprised to find that there will 
 be no bacon iaste to the biscuit unless 
 you have let the fat become browned. It 
 rather improves corn-bread to have the 
 seasoning of bacon, and it seems to be a 
 richer shortening than lard in the same 
 quantity. I have seen a housekeeper 
 who always talks about the high cost of 
 living and who earnestly strives to lessen 
 
156 THRIFT IN THE HOUSEHOLD 
 
 her part of it empty into her sink all the 
 grease from the breakfast bacon. She 
 did not know she could use it for any- 
 thing but frying potatoes, and she did 
 not know that she could keep it sweet as 
 long as lard if she kept it cool and clean. 
 When you empty the skillet in which 
 you have been frying bacon, do not wash 
 it. Have some griddle-cakes for breakfast, 
 or something else to use up the fat that 
 does not run from the skillet. You will 
 have more left in it than you realize, so 
 why throw away a fat and then be obliged 
 to replace by some more that which you 
 wasted ? Do not leave the skillet stand- 
 ing day after day with left-over grease in 
 it, as that will attract bugs and hold dirt, 
 but plan to use it the next meal, for an 
 omelet or any one of the many things you 
 cook in a greased skillet. 
 
 Vegetable oils steadily make their way 
 in popular favor, and though the first 
 cost seems rather more it really is not, 
 
OILS AND FATS 15Y 
 
 for only half as much of the oils for 
 cooking are used in any recipe as the 
 amount of butter or lard given in the 
 recipe as necessary. Dietists claim a 
 wholesomeness for the vegetable oils that 
 is lacking to the animal oils. They give 
 a very pleasant flavor and a delightful 
 brownness to whatever is fried in them. 
 
 In frying, it really is cheaper to use a 
 deep fat this is the true frying enough 
 to cover the article to be cooked by it, 
 than to use only surface fat, renewing as 
 it disappears. At best it is a wasteful 
 manner of cooking with the arguments 
 many and strong against it for health's 
 sake. Anything that soaks fat and leaves 
 grease on the plate is unfit for food. For 
 the thrifty, frying will never be a favor- 
 ite method of cooking, but for croquettes 
 and some other articles one must use it 
 now and then. When frying, do not let 
 the fat get smoking hot and stand wait- 
 ing for the cook to use it. Be ready be- 
 
158 THRIFT IN THE HOUSEHOLD 
 
 fore the fat is, and drop into it only a 
 little at a time, since its temperature falls 
 with each cold spoonful put into it. This 
 is not only an economy of fat, but is the 
 only way of keeping an even temperature 
 for the articles plunged into it. 
 
 One fat preparation against which prej- 
 udice has done much deserves better 
 treatment than it has had, and if once 
 tested in a family remains there. Thou- 
 sands of families who have to buy poor 
 butter, really unfit for eating, refuse to 
 try oleomargarine because they have read 
 so much against it written by those in- 
 terested in selling butter, and with them 
 it is like, 
 
 " No man e'er felt the halter draw, 
 With good opinion of the law." 
 
 The butter interest is rich, and it has 
 printed much against oleomargarine that 
 is not just, and it has succeeded in mak- 
 ing a heavy penalty fall on the merchant 
 who sells it colored like butter. There 
 
OILS AND FATS 159 
 
 is now a heavy tax on each pound of col- 
 ored oleomargarine. I have a friend who 
 ate oleomargarine for two years, paying 
 thirty-five cents a pound as she supposed 
 for butter. That is the argument of the 
 butter-sellers against it. It cuts out the 
 sale of butter, but to the man whose 
 salary is twenty dollars a week or less, 
 that does not seem an argument against it 
 when a good sweet butter costs him from 
 forty-five cents a pound upwards, and 
 then does not keep as sweet as oleo does. 
 Oleo is a more cleanly fat than cheap, 
 worked-over butters, and has been im- 
 proved so greatly that if Congress had 
 not hurt its sale by establishing for it a 
 standard of whiteness strongly prejudicial 
 to it in the customer's eyes, thousands 
 now would be eating it to their decided 
 advantage who now go without eating 
 any butter fat or else buy what they can- 
 not afford to buy. One would object to 
 eating the uncolored oleo just as he ob- 
 
160 THRIFT IN THE HOUSEHOLD 
 
 jects to eating white butter. There is 
 no law against coloring that. Makers 
 are allowed to color butter without stat- 
 ing on the wrapper that it has been so 
 treated. Why this is permitted and such 
 restriction placed on coloring oleomarga- 
 rine with the same ingredient is one 
 of the peculiarities of legislation which 
 affect the buyer uncomfortably and make 
 him somewhat cynical when he reads of 
 " equal rights for all." To him it seems 
 to indicate that really there is quite a 
 difference between tweedledum and 
 tweedledee. 
 
 June butter gives naturally the color 
 that the eye craves, but only June butter 
 has it, from the quality of new grass. It 
 would be impossible to make enough 
 butter in one month to supply the de- 
 mand during the year, and some milk 
 would not give it at all, but as the 
 public will not buy white butter, all 
 butter-makers are allowed to color it at 
 
OILS AND FATS 161 
 
 their desire in order to increase the sell- 
 ing properties of their product, which is 
 the same reason that the makers of 
 oleomargarine want to use it, and would 
 if it were not for the weight of the in- 
 fluence of the butter-makers. The color- 
 ing is vegetable and may be used with 
 perfect safety. In fact, a bottle of color- 
 ing may be sold with the uncolored 
 oleomargarine which the buyer may mix 
 with it, and that is lawful. Isn't that 
 interesting, consistent, and amusing ? 
 
 If one does not want oleomargarine he 
 will not buy it even if it is colored, but 
 next to butter, it is the best preparation, 
 and it is so good a butter substitute that 
 you cannot tell the difference sometimes, 
 therefore I advise the use of it for those 
 who seek thrift. Recently I had some 
 butter at fifty-four cents a pound and 
 some oleomargarine at twenty-seven, and 
 those at the table could not tell by taste 
 or eye which was the butter. In cook- 
 
162 THRIFT IN THE HOUSEHOLD 
 
 ing anything, there is a separation in the 
 hot fat that proves it to be oleomargarine, 
 but does not affect the flavor at all. 
 
 In England, the meat drippings are 
 sold in small groceries and the poor buy 
 that instead of butter. Others beside the 
 poor buy it. " Spread bread with drip- 
 pings and toast it in the oven and you 
 will find it a very good dish," said an 
 Englishwoman to me. Equally good 
 will you find it to take your stale bread, 
 spread over it the crisp scraps that are left 
 after frying out the fat of suet, and toast- 
 ing these and bread together in a good 
 oven. There is no need for butter sub- 
 stitute beyond these. Try it some cold 
 night for supper with some vegetable 
 accompaniment. It will be very nice 
 with the bean soup or other legumes. 
 
 These crisp scraps are also very pleasant 
 to the taste stirred into corn-meal breads 
 before baking. No other shortening will 
 be necessary. 
 
OILS AND FATS 163 
 
 There is something else to be considered 
 from fats, and that is the economy of 
 turning the waste fats into soap. Fats 
 that are not clean enough for eating may 
 be converted into soap with as little labor 
 as to make bread. You can, if you wish, 
 make several dollars' worth of good soap 
 for no greater expense than the potash 
 used with the fat. If you think you will 
 try it, have a receptacle for scraps of 
 cooked fats, trimming of meats that can- 
 not be tried out for table use, what is left 
 after trying out all suet, extra amounts 
 of mutton fat, which is very agreeable to 
 the skin, and when you have six pounds 
 you will be ready to make your soap. 
 
 Have at hand a tin of reliable potash. 
 Dissolve the lye in three quarts of cold 
 water in a large kettle on the back of the 
 stove, then put in the scraps and boil 
 until they seem to be dissolved. You 
 will be surprised to see how they will be 
 converted by the lye. Strain the liquid 
 
164 THRIFT IN THE HOUSEHOLD 
 
 through a sieve. Boil the scraps about 
 ten minutes with a little water to draw 
 from them what they retain, and add to 
 the first water. Throw the scraps away. 
 Put the other part on the stove to boil 
 until it is converted into soap and looks 
 like a very thick cream. When it 
 reaches this stage add one-third cup pure 
 borax dissolved in a little water, and 
 one-half cup of ammonia. Be very care- 
 ful it does not boil over, which it does 
 quickly, and stir with a wooden spoon. 
 When you take it from the stove, stir 
 into it one-half cup of sugar to make it 
 like froth, stir well for five minutes, then 
 turn into dish to cool. You can put it 
 into a wide-mouthed stone crock and cut 
 a slice as you want it. This soap is not 
 as hard as bar soap and harder than soft 
 soap. It is for kitchen use wholly. If 
 any liquid settles, you can use it for 
 floors or for putting clothes to soak. 
 On all tins of good lye there will be 
 
OILS AND FATS 165 
 
 found a recipe for making soap, not all 
 having the same recipe, but the one I 
 have given is one which has been used for 
 years in one family, and has been found 
 serviceable without being hard on the 
 hands. Excess of lye will make any 
 soap bad for the skin, but the proportion 
 given is not severe. 
 
 If you da not care to serve thrift by 
 making your year's supply of soap for 
 about fifty cents, take the waste scraps 
 you would have used in this way and 
 keep them wrapped in paper in a thick 
 paper bag; when you want a quick fire or 
 to kindle your fire use these scraps. Of 
 course you must not keep many on hand 
 as they will corrupt, but for rapid heat 
 they are excellent. 
 
CHAPTER XI 
 COAL AND ICE 
 
CHAPTER XI 
 COAL AND ICE 
 
 THE cost of fuel is a very heavy ex- 
 pense in all families, and the less one 
 knows about how to run a fire, the 
 heavier the expense. Knowledge is 
 economy in warming a house and getting 
 the heat for which one has paid. The 
 greatest economy in fuel is that which is 
 given by proper running of the fire. Few 
 know how ; those who do know can heat 
 their houses on a much smaller amount 
 of coal. Those who do not want heavy 
 coal bills will show thrift by living in a 
 sunny house and letting every bit of sun- 
 shine get into the rooms. That makes a 
 perceptible difference in the amount of 
 coal one burns. 
 
 The fire-pot of the stove or furnace 
 
 should never be heaped to the top, but 
 169 
 
170 THRIFT IN THE HOUSEHOLD 
 
 the coal always kept on the line of the 
 fire-brick. All coal above that is wasted, 
 and by obstructing the draft lessens the 
 heat obtained. Those who do not know 
 how to get heat out of coal always pile 
 the stove full and learn nothing by ex- 
 perience. The coal should be started so 
 that the gas shall be burned off gradu- 
 ally, then the furnace or range regulated 
 so that the coal burns steadily without 
 burning fast. It is the rapid, almost 
 white-hot fire burning out at once that 
 forms clinkers, which are always the 
 indication of uneven firing. 
 
 In warming a house it is not necessary 
 to be throwing coal on almost as often 
 as one would throw wood, and when a 
 furnace is fired in that way it is a waste 
 of fuel, heat, and money. It is an econ- 
 omy to sift ashes if one burns coal in 
 such a fashion that a large part of it is 
 left unburned, but it is a much greater 
 economy to burn it in such a manner 
 
COAL AND ICE 171 
 
 that no cinders and no un burned or half- 
 burned coal remain to be burned again. 
 The art of running a coal fire has to be 
 learned by practice, and you have it when 
 you do not find stove or furnace filled 
 with cinders or half-burned coal. 
 
 When we began our housekeeping 
 neither of us knew anything about a 
 furnace or what coal to buy, and what 
 we did get vanished with a saddening 
 rapidity. More than that, the furnace 
 fire went out regularly each day, but 
 " knowledge is power " with furnaces as 
 with other things and both members of 
 the family proceeded to get knowledge 
 experimentally and by asking others. 
 Now we know how to run a furnace 
 and keep warm on as small amount of 
 coal as any one we know. If we found 
 those who could do it for less we should 
 at once learn from them. Why burn 
 ten tons of coal if nine can be made to 
 furnish the necessary heat ? 
 
172 THRIFT IN THE HOUSEHOLD 
 
 We started our career as firemen with 
 kitchen and furnace coal, big pieces 
 which filled the fire-box and burned 
 with discouraging quickness. One of our 
 consulted said, " Why don't you try pea 
 coal?" That is a very small coal, and 
 when we tried it it fell through the grate 
 almost as fast as it went in at the top. 
 Further consultation-led to starting the 
 fire with a good bed of furnace coal over 
 which the small coal is laid. The small 
 coal forms a bed on which more is laid, 
 and once we learned how, it was thor- 
 oughly satisfactory for heat, for lasting, 
 and for cost, as pea coal is much less dear 
 than the larger coal, and though you get 
 no more pounds for the money, what you 
 do get seems to go farther. The fire has 
 kept eighteen hours without attention 
 and then burned up. 
 
 In our endeavors to find warmth at a 
 reasonable rate we tried coke which had 
 been recommended to us, but we did not 
 
COAL AND ICE 173 
 
 like it as well as the pea coal. Coke as 
 recommended to us would be mixed, one 
 part of coke to two parts of coal. It 
 worked fairly well, making a hot fire 
 which was soon exhausted. Burned in 
 any larger proportion, it soon burns out 
 the fire-box because it gives such an in- 
 tense heat. There is the further disad- 
 vantage of having to renew fuel much 
 more frequently than with coal alone, 
 and this extra amount burned serves to 
 offset considerably any apparent saving 
 in first cost. Our experience in burning 
 coke was that coke was an expensive and 
 unsatisfactory fuel, increasing labor and 
 dirt. 
 
 Any woman who wants merely to keep 
 a fire going in her kitchen should be able 
 to hold the fire on a large hodful of coal 
 a day. The average kitchen maid will 
 burn four hodfuls to produce the same 
 effect. When not intending to use the 
 fire for cooking, just keep it alive and 
 
174 THKIFT IN THE HOUSEHOLD 
 
 increase the heat gradually as needed, 
 and your part in the cost of coal will 
 lessen with no decrease in the efficiency 
 of what is burned. It is less expensive 
 to keep a furnace fire going than to build 
 it, but if one is going to cook much when 
 a great heat is desired in the oven it is 
 better to start a new fire in the range, 
 Much less coal will keep a fire than will 
 start it, therefore let your effort for thrift 
 influence you to get well acquainted with 
 the idiosyncrasies of your furnace and 
 range. If you are at all imaginative, 
 long before you have mastered it you 
 will believe firmly in " the total de- 
 pravity of inanimate things," and that 
 your furnace is the worst, but as you 
 learn what it can do you will forget all 
 that and be ready to tell your neighbors 
 how you can produce wonderful results 
 instead of discomfort. 
 
 If you have poor coal you may find it 
 better to sift your ashes. Some coal is 
 
COAL AND ICE 175 
 
 more wasteful than others. It is cheaper 
 also to buy of some dealers than of others 
 whose prices are less. Slate is cheaper 
 than coal in cash but not for long. Get 
 a good dealer and stick to him. Buy 
 your coal if you possibly can during the 
 summer months when prices are lowest, 
 and buy your year's supply then. Some- 
 times you can buy it without having it 
 all delivered at once, but sent to you as 
 you need it, in two-ton loads. If you 
 own your house and live where cold 
 winters are, you will find it a decided 
 economy to put double windows on the 
 cold side of the house. A Maine man 
 once told me that in one winter he saved 
 the cost of the double windows by the 
 difference in the coal burned before and 
 after he had them. 
 
 During the coal strike some years ago, 
 the following method of getting heat 
 from cinders was evolved ; it was given 
 to me by one who had followed it for five 
 
176 THRIFT IN THE HOUSEHOLD 
 
 years, but personally I know nothing of 
 its efficacy. " Get ten-cents' worth of 
 oxalic acid crystals and dissolve in two 
 gallons of water with one bag of coarse 
 salt. I got two bags for ten cents. (The 
 price will be higher now.) Use one bag 
 with a hod of fine ashes or cinders. Roll 
 in balls and put in middle of fire-pot. 
 It makes an exceedingly hot fire and is a 
 great saving. I used three barrels of 
 furnace cinders in one winter. If clink- 
 ers form, put into the fire the peeling of 
 yellow turnips (rutabaga) and the clink- 
 ers drop off." The expense of trying this 
 is not much and it may be found avail- 
 able for you. 
 
 For fuel save corn-cobs and dry them. 
 Also the skins of vegetables if there is no 
 other method of turning them to use. 
 The writer once lived in a city where 
 there was no coal to be had for three 
 weeks, and the inhabitants used corn- 
 cobs for fuel. They make an intense 
 
COAL AND ICE iTT 
 
 heat, soon over, and are not practical 
 when one has other material but the cobs 
 from corn eaten in summer time may be 
 dried for kindling or for open fire in fall 
 or winter. 
 
 ICE 
 
 It may seem impossible to go through a 
 summer without ice and preserve butter, 
 meats, and other foods, but thousands of 
 persons in parts of the earth where artifi- 
 cial ice is not made and natural ice never 
 forms do live comfortably without it. 
 They have learned how to produce cool- 
 ness by other means. Whatever method 
 will keep heat in food can be modified to 
 keep it cool ; for instance, the fireless 
 cooker, and the thermos bottle. Rapid 
 evaporation is the explanation of some 
 methods, keeping hot air from the foods 
 to be cooled. The Department of Agri- 
 culture has prepared a bulletin giving 
 directions for making an iceless refrig- 
 erator, and it is as useful in one State as 
 
178 THRIFT IN THE HOUSEHOLD 
 
 in another, though it was written more 
 particularly for those States with most 
 heat and least convenience for getting 
 ice. The Department of Publications will 
 send the bulletin for ten cents. Mean- 
 time, try the suggestions to be given 
 herein. 
 
 Never buy ice when it is cool enough 
 to keep butter firm by putting it outside. 
 If you want ice in really cold weather, 
 all that you need do to get it is to set a 
 pail or pan of water out-of-doors and let 
 it remain there overnight. What need 
 of paying the iceman for it ? 
 
 Keep your provisions in the coolest 
 place about the house. Keep butter and 
 milk sweet without ice by placing in a 
 pan, and this pan in another consider- 
 ably larger. In the bigger one have 
 enough water to come to the top of the 
 smaller, and to the water add two table- 
 spoonfuls of salt. Soak a large flower- 
 pot until it is saturated with water. It 
 
COAL AND ICE 179 
 
 must be large enough to go to the bottom 
 of the larger pan, and to cover the smaller 
 entirely when it is turned over it. Being 
 porous, rapid evaporation is constantly 
 going on, and will keep everything 
 within firm and cool. A fancy flower- 
 pot will not do for this. It must be the 
 unvarnished terra-cotta pot. Once a 
 week it should have another soaking. 
 This is much the same as the method 
 practised in some tropical countries to 
 keep water cool, and is equally efficacious 
 with foods. 
 
 Another adaptation of the same prin- 
 ciple is to cover the inner dish with a 
 towel which has been wet in cold water, 
 folded in such a manner that the corners 
 will hang down into the water of the large 
 dish. Keep the pan in a cool place and 
 butter will be as firm as in winter. By 
 capillary attraction there will be a steady 
 current of water from the dish through 
 the cloth. Renew the water in the dish 
 
180 THRIFT IN THE HOUSEHOLD 
 
 and change it daily. Campers often use 
 this method of preserving perishable 
 goods. 
 
 If you have occasion to save bits of ice 
 in a room through the night, protect them 
 by lining a dish with wet white flannel ; 
 fill it with ice, cover outside and in with 
 more flannel, and set in a cool place. In 
 a bowl the ice will last overnight. This 
 is advantageous for an invalid. 
 
 If you take ice you can keep it in 
 many ways from melting. The iceman 
 says the best preservative is several thick- 
 nesses of newspaper over the ice. But 
 if you feel a prejudice against having 
 your ice thus protected you can try the 
 pad described herewith. It is excellent 
 in its effect. It must be kept as clean as 
 the refrigerator should be. To make it, 
 get a piece of heavy felting at least half 
 an inch in thickness. Lay this between 
 two sheets of woven wire, preferably the 
 galvanized, as it will not rust and will 
 
COAL AND ICE 181 
 
 last five times as long as the non-gal- 
 vanized. Cut the three pieces an inch 
 smaller on all sides than the cold cham- 
 ber to permit free circulation of air. Dip 
 the pad in cold water before placing it 
 on the ice. As soon as the pad becomes 
 damp from contact with the ice it throws 
 out a blast of cold air which completely 
 envelops the ice and makes it last much 
 longer. The felt can be bought at a har- 
 ness-maker's and the wire at any hard- 
 ware store. The expense is trifling, and 
 with good care the pad will last for years. 
 It should be washed twice a week and 
 sunned so that it does not become slimy 
 from being wet. 
 
 Ice may be preserved also by fasten- 
 ing two sheets of cotton-batting between 
 brown paper covers. Place under and 
 over and around the sides. This keeps 
 the ice, but encloses it so thoroughly 
 that it does not cool the food chamber as 
 well as the felting pad. A cover for a 
 
182 THRIFT IN THE HOUSEHOLD 
 
 pitcher, like a tea cozy, that will com- 
 pletely enclose it, may be made of the 
 cotton and brown paper, and the water 
 or other fluid will remain cool a long 
 time and the ice unmelted for hours. It 
 is better as the cozy over a dish than as a 
 pad for the ice chamber, but it is men- 
 tioned because it has merit and the first 
 cost is less than that of the pad of felt 
 and wire. In the long run it is more 
 expensive, as the cotton pad is good only 
 for the short time until it is flattened by 
 the water and the paper is in bits, while 
 the felt pad will last more than one 
 season. 
 
 No one with any idea of thrift will 
 leave ice standing by the door steadily 
 melting in the hot air, thereby melting 
 the money you have to pay for it. Rinse 
 it at once and place in the chamber, cov- 
 ering it to keep it cool. If you take ice 
 and yet wish to economize on it, never let 
 your ice chamber get empty. Keep it 
 
COAL AND ICE 183 
 
 full. It wastes less beside supplying more 
 coolness. You do not get as much for 
 your money with a ten-cent piece two 
 days in succession as you do with twenty 
 cents' worth every other day, though the 
 actual outlay is the same. If you take 
 larger pieces you will not need as many 
 of them nor as much ice. Little pieces 
 are wasteful because they so soon melt 
 and leave the ice chamber getting warm 
 again to melt the ice as soon as it touches 
 the sides. Once filled, and the refrigera- 
 tor well chilled, it can be kept thoroughly 
 cool by small renewals and the box never 
 allowed to become empty. Open the box 
 once in a while to renew the air which 
 becomes stale if unchanged. 
 
 If you find a hole in the ice-pan or the 
 bottom of the refrigerator you can make 
 it water-proof by a temporary mending 
 with little labor and expense, but it will 
 not be any protection against hot things. 
 You do not put hot dishes in your refrig- 
 
184 THRIFT IN THE HOUSEHOLD 
 
 erator probably, at least you should not, 
 so you can try this plan of mending it. 
 Hold a paper under the hole. Melt par- 
 affine, and while it is hot pour a coating 
 over the hole, letting the paraffine run 
 some inches beyond the hole. Some of 
 the paraffine will run through the holes, 
 which explains why the paper is held 
 under. Make the coating of paraffine 
 quite thick. Scrape off the part that ran 
 through, as it is as good to use again. 
 This repair work will serve as well for 
 the purpose named as a piece of zinc 
 soldered on, but will not last as long. 
 
CHAPTER XII 
 POSSIBILITIES OF CORN MEAL 
 
CHAPTER XII 
 
 POSSIBILITIES OF CORN MEAL 
 
 NEW ENGLAND owes its life to corn, for 
 had its daily bread depended upon wheat 
 in the early days when Puritans and Pil- 
 grims were fighting their grim fight for 
 existence there would have been no New 
 England. Why may not these days of 
 scarcity of wheat flour find profit from 
 those when corn was the basis of bread 
 food ? No system of thrift goes far that 
 does not recognize the benefits and econ- 
 omy of corn in the diet. Financially and 
 hygienically corn deserves the old Indian 
 name, " the friend of man." 
 
 Man might live many years on no 
 other foods than corn and its products, 
 which include oil, sugar, and molasses as 
 well as meal. The yearly production of 
 
 corn in this country is three times that 
 187 
 
188 THKIFT IN THE HOUSEHOLD 
 
 of wheat, and the food value is greater 
 than that. 
 
 Let your thrift begin with the greater 
 use of corn meal to help out the contents 
 of the flour barrel. Based on food value, 
 corn is the leader in food, and at five 
 cents a pound it is one of the cheapest in 
 money. Whether served as hulled corn, 
 hominy, grits, or some arrangement of 
 meal, it is very nutritious and pleasant to 
 the taste. When properly cooked it is 
 easily digested, and its food value is ren- 
 dered better for food by having bulk, as 
 foods that do not have bulk are injurious 
 to the system, which is so made that it 
 must have something beside concentrated 
 nourishment. 
 
 Corn meal at the time of writing this 
 is five cents a pound ; this amount of 
 meal contains as much of food as ninety- 
 one cents' worth of eggs at fifty cents a 
 dozen, and fifty-six cents' worth of round 
 steak at thirty cents a pound. Consider- 
 
POSSIBILITIES OF CORN MEAL 189 
 
 ing these prices you will conclude that 
 the high cost of living can be dealt an 
 effective blow by taking corn meal for a 
 weapon. It is an energy-making food. 
 
 Variety may be given to dishes of corn 
 meal by adding dried or fresh fruits. 
 The old time baked Indian pudding 
 served by our grandmothers was one of 
 the best of the corn-meal dishes. When 
 there was not much else it was a dinner 
 dish, and often it was the main dish at 
 supper. It cannot be baked as it should 
 be in a gas range because it needs slow 
 cooking, and if baked in a gas-range oven 
 it would not be an example of thrift, but it 
 may be baked well in the fireless cooker. 
 Here is a recipe for Indian pudding which 
 is three generations old, and perhaps more. 
 Heat a quart of milk and with it scald 
 five tablespoonfuls of corn meal, stirring 
 all the time. To these add one cup of 
 molasses and a good-sized piece of butter, 
 and bake in a deep dish for three hours 
 
190 THRIFT IN THE HOUSEHOLD 
 
 or more with moderate heat. Stir several 
 times when first set to baking to keep 
 meal from settling. This was varied by 
 the addition of peeled and quartered 
 apples, was baked in au earthenware deep 
 dish until it was a beautiful reddish brown 
 that when turned out would stand quiv- 
 ering like a mold of jelly. It is the slow 
 baking that produces such a result as 
 that. 
 
 Such a pudding is all that any ordinary 
 individual would need for a luncheon or 
 supper, and is entirely too heavy for a des- 
 sert. As a one-dish meal it is delicious. 
 It is to be eaten with cream. 
 
 Corn meal should have for cook one 
 who likes it and is mistress over it, then 
 from it such food will be made as will 
 delight the appetite and preserve the 
 health of the pocket-book. 
 
 Corn provides either alone or in com- 
 bination with meat, milk, fish, or eggs, a 
 one-dish meal which gives all the mate- 
 
POSSIBILITIES OF CORN MEAL 191 
 
 rial the system requires at a meal of tissue- 
 builders, starch, sugar, and fat. The fuel 
 value or energy of corn meal to a pound 
 is 1,795 calories, and in this respect corn 
 stands above the other known cereals. 
 The percentage of fat is greater than in 
 other grains. 
 
 The simplest preparation of corn is 
 hasty pudding, or mush, which is merely 
 the meal dropped into boiling and salted 
 water. With milk it forms a balanced 
 dish, that is, it gives in proper proportion 
 those chemical essentials which feed all 
 parts of the body equally. It was the 
 standard breakfast or supper dish of 
 workers of two generations ago, and 
 should be served occasionally by all those 
 who want to make their money go to its 
 full limit without taking proper suste- 
 nance from the family. The mush of old 
 days was cooked all day, and was almost 
 jellied when dished. All cereals are 
 wholesomer for long-time cooking. 
 
192 THRIFT IN THE HOUSEHOLD 
 
 After the meal was stirred with a 
 wooden, long-handled spoon until there 
 were no lumps, it was set back on the 
 stove to simmer all day, and it tasted like 
 a different dish from the quickly made 
 mush. After one meal as mush it was 
 turned into a deep pan to cool. In the 
 morning this was sliced and fried, and 
 eaten with maple sirup, it was, and is, a 
 food to be served in every family. The 
 old way of frying was in shallow fat, but 
 the modern way is to drop it in deep fat 
 which is the less wasteful method. The 
 Italians use mush with cheese and have 
 a very nourishing food ; as a meal it is 
 better for having the addition of a green 
 salad. The natives of Jamaica combine 
 fish, lard, and corn meal. Note how these 
 give the essentials of nutrition. 
 
 There is in Pennsylvania an organiza- 
 tion of individuals, who once a year 
 meet to eat scrapple and apple butter. 
 Scrapple is a combination of meat and 
 
POSSIBILITIES OF COKN MEAL 193 
 
 corn meal, usually spiced. Any kind of 
 meat may be served in this way, but it is 
 commonly pork. The mush is made in 
 the proportion of one cup of meal to 
 three and a half cups of water. It is al- 
 ways made and cooled in a pan like a 
 bread-pan, then fried for breakfast. No 
 extra fat is necessary. 
 
 Remains of fish from the day's dinner 
 may be converted into fish-cakes by mix- 
 ing with corn-meal mush in proportion 
 of two cups of meal to one of fish, all held 
 together by an egg. Season to taste. 
 Bits of green peppers may be added if 
 you like the flavor, or a few drops of 
 onion juice. 
 
 Corn mush is very good with cheese 
 for an addition, like the Italian polenta, 
 and becomes a very hearty food. The sole 
 accompaniment to these dishes of corn 
 meal and meat, fish, or cheese is a green 
 salad or tart fruits. Apples as sauce, salad, 
 or baked are an appropriate side dish. 
 
194 THRIFT IN THE HOUSEHOLD 
 
 Apples are sometimes added to brown 
 bread in small quantities. A cup of rai- 
 sins to a loaf, or a cup of dates, pitted 
 and quartered, are an improvement to 
 brown bread, which of itself is a very 
 satisfying meal, with butter. The fol- 
 lowing recipe for brown bread has passed 
 from mother to daughter for four gener- 
 ations, and may be depended upon. One 
 cup of corn meal, one of flour, one-half 
 cup molasses, one of sour milk or water, 
 teaspoonful of soda, one-half teaspoonful 
 of salt. Steam three hours, with water 
 boiling the first hour very fast, and do 
 not let the water stop boiling, as if it 
 does the bread will be heavy. 
 
 The Department of Agriculture supplies 
 a bulletin on Uses of Corn Meal, to be had 
 for the asking. It should be in every 
 household, and followed by the home 
 cook. 
 
CHAPTER XIII 
 
 MEAT AND MEAT SUBSTI- 
 TUTES 
 
CHAPTER XIII 
 MEAT AJSTD MEAT SUBSTITUTES 
 
 IF every family does without meat two 
 days a week there will be a perceptible 
 difference in the supply of meat in the 
 market, and if no regulation is made 
 obliging every one to go without on the 
 same days, there will be no crowding of 
 the markets some days and a correspond- 
 ing lack on others. To go without meat 
 is no hardship after one gets into the 
 habit, and thousands live healthfully and 
 contentedly without any meat day after 
 day. They feel better without it. Eat- 
 ing is largely a matter of habit, in 
 amount and in kind. 
 
 One of the largest sanitariums in the 
 country is conducted without meat, 
 neither officers nor patients ever eating 
 
 flesh food, and there is no loss of energy 
 197 
 
198 THRIFT IN THE HOUSEHOLD 
 
 from such abstinence. Meat is a stimu- 
 lant, and only outdoor workers should 
 eat it oftener than once a day. Auto- 
 intoxication is caused by excessive meat- 
 eating. 
 
 However, in spite of these facts most 
 of the world will continue to crave the 
 " flesh-pots of Egypt," and to desire to 
 know how to make a little serve as more. 
 Every housewife knows how hard it is in 
 her small family to buy roasts to advan- 
 tage and to use trimmings and bones. In- 
 stead of trying to use them before they 
 spoil, can them. They may be canned as 
 stock or as soup, and all the meat that 
 one does not wish to eat can be canned by 
 itself. 
 
 Simmer the bones for so long that every 
 bit of meat will come off with scraping. 
 Put them on with cold water and simmer 
 so slowly that no rim of hardened albu- 
 men is around the top. Remove all the 
 meat from bones, strain, and place the 
 
MEAT AND MEAT SUBSTITUTES 199 
 
 plain broth in jars, or to the stock add 
 diced vegetables as for making vegetable 
 soup, season, and sterilize as you do for 
 other things you preserve in this manner. 
 The principle of canning and the general 
 process of canning are precisely the same, 
 varying only in such minor details as 
 sugar or no sugar, and so on. 
 
 The beef that has boiled from the bones 
 may be seasoned and made into meat- 
 balls, to be cooked in bacon fat, which 
 will add to its flavor. It has lost through 
 simmering most of what flavor it had. 
 It may be made into a nice baked hash 
 with rice, potato, or such bread crumbs 
 as one has, and a bit of onion and good 
 seasoning. 
 
 The extra meat that has been cooked 
 only once you can pack into jars, cutting 
 the meat into bits so it will fit into the 
 glass closely and be more open to the 
 heat of sterilizing. Turn enough water 
 into the jars to fill the interstices, and 
 
200 THRIFT IN THE HOUSEHOLD 
 
 then boil with the top on, but not fastened 
 down, until the middle pieces are thor- 
 oughly heated. Meat must cook a con- 
 siderable time because the heat takes an 
 hour or so to penetrate the inner pieces. 
 Then, before removing from the boiling 
 water, snap down the cover, and let the 
 meat cool in the boiling water, as the 
 water cools. Probably there will be some 
 fat on the top. This is a preservative in 
 itself. Beef, mutton, lamb, and veal have 
 been canned in this way and I have never 
 lost ajar. I do chicken or turkey in the 
 same manner if there is any to do. There 
 is every probability that the price of meat 
 will go higher rather than lessen, and 
 housewives do well to get into the can- 
 ning habit, which is true thrift, making 
 the best and most of what they have. 
 
 If you have no ice and fear that meat 
 will not keep, place it out-of-doors in a 
 cool place so that the air can get at all 
 sides of it. On the continent before the 
 
MEAT AND MEAT SUBSTITUTES 201 
 
 War, many butchers had shops without 
 ice. Sides of beef and pork hung by 
 great hooks from the ceiling and all 
 around them the air circulated day and 
 night. At night it entered the shops 
 through wrought-iron doors so that no 
 stale air was retained in the shop, and 
 the meat was as fresh and sweet as in any 
 of the shops with which we are more fa- 
 miliar. 
 
 Here is a recipe for keeping meat that 
 has been recommended by campers as re- 
 liable. Cover each piece of meat, chops, 
 or roast with corn meal or oatmeal so 
 thickly that it cannot come in contact 
 with any other substance, and place in a 
 current of air as cool as can be found. 
 Do not wrap in paper, which will soon 
 spoil meat under the best of conditions. 
 I have been told that steak has been 
 kept a fortnight in moderate weather and 
 longer in cold, with no other protection 
 than the wrapping of meal. 
 
202 THRIFT IN THE HOUSEHOLD 
 
 Once a delicious and expensive porter- 
 house when removed from the refrigera- 
 tor indicated very unmistakably that it 
 should have been cooked a day earlier. 
 What was to be done? One does not 
 willingly throw away such costly meat, 
 and it seemed to be hopeless. This is 
 what was done. The meat was scraped 
 with a sharp knife until every sign of 
 badness was removed from top, bottom, 
 and fat. Then it smelled right, but to 
 make certain, the meat was washed with 
 saleratus water, and left in the water for 
 ten minutes, and then wiped dry with 
 cheese-cloth. Then it was wiped again 
 with a clean dry cloth, and broiled. It 
 was as sweet as ever it was, and very 
 tender. This process is to be advised in 
 every case when one has a doubt of the 
 freshness of meat. 
 
 To preserve a ham, put it into a flour- 
 sack, tie, and pack in a box of wood ashes. 
 The lye that probably is in them will 
 
MEAT AND MEAT SUBSTITUTES 203 
 
 keep it as sweet as you want it. For a 
 ham that is to be used right along, keep 
 in the flour-sack tied closely, and hang 
 from hook in ceiling. A current of air 
 is a preservative. 
 
 When you have not enough meat to 
 make a dish of itself, use it as a flavor- 
 ing. Take the odd ends of salt pork and 
 bacon that are left after slicing and add 
 them to peas or beans for soup. Or take 
 them and add to a batter and bake as 
 meat biscuits, or place a layer of rice, 
 crumbs, or mashed potatoes, whichever 
 you have, at the bottom of cups, and over 
 that a layer of the minced meat, another 
 layer like the first, wet it with water, 
 stock, gravy, or tomato, whatever you 
 have, and you will find the result when 
 the contents of the cups are baked a 
 very nice supper or breakfast dish. Use 
 the bits of meat with greens or grind them 
 and serve, dressed with a thick dressing, 
 as salad or as filling for sandwiches. 
 
204 THRIFT IN THE HOUSEHOLD 
 
 Bacon rind fried out often returns a 
 considerable amount of fat. Bits of 
 bacon cooked or uncooked combine 
 well with chicken, and a hash of bits 
 of chicken, bacon, and potato is good 
 enough for an epicure. Put all frag- 
 ments of meat through the meat-grinder. 
 Different meats may be used together. 
 Add a little to a macaroni and tomato 
 escallop. Even a tablespoonful will im- 
 prove it. So will one sausage that you 
 may have considered worthless. A 
 spoonful of meat will improve a dish 
 of hashed-brown potatoes or nearly any 
 starchy food. It is not necessary to have 
 enough meat for the combination to be- 
 come a hash. Stuff tomatoes or green 
 peppers with a bread-crumb dressing 
 to which you have added even a very 
 little bacon or ham, or any other meat. 
 Meats of high flavor such as bacon, 
 ham, and sausage add piquancy to more 
 tasteless meats. These meats may be 
 
MEAT AND MEAT SUBSTITUTES 205 
 
 added to a thick white or brown sauce, 
 seasoned with mustard, and served very 
 hot on toast. For sandwiches, add a 
 little chopped pickle and dress with 
 thick boiled dressing or mayonnaise. 
 The result is not much like the ordinary 
 sandwich with a slab of meat between 
 slices of bread. 
 
 Have you a cupful of minced meat you 
 do not know what to do with ? Beside 
 the ways to use it that have already been 
 mentioned try this. Mix it with three 
 good-sized mashed potatoes or the same 
 amount in cold boiled rice. Add three 
 well-beaten eggs, season and cook like an 
 omelet, or bake in oven. Omelets may 
 have a flavor from a spoonful of meat, 
 and a slice of left-over liver cut in small 
 pieces is very good. Any left-over meat 
 may be potted by being rubbed smooth 
 with butter or salad oil, seasoning well 
 with mustard, salt, and cayenne or 
 paprika. Ham thus treated is good 
 
206 THKIFT IN THE HOUSEHOLD 
 
 enough to be prepared without any 
 thought of saving. Meats potted will 
 keep for some time in a cool place. 
 
 If you try to practise thrift by buying 
 the cheaper cuts of meat there are two 
 difficulties you are quite likely to meet. 
 In the first place, you may not be able to 
 find them, or any store that has shank 
 of beef, flank, or such pieces. If the 
 seller can dispose of the higher-priced 
 cuts why should he take space for the 
 lower-priced ? That is the question once 
 asked me. Many dealers do not intend 
 to carry low-priced grades of meats. If 
 they do not have them, generally the 
 would-be buyer contents herself by get- 
 ting the cuts she did not intend to buy, 
 and the seller is that much ahead. 
 
 If you have been fortunate enough to 
 buy as your good intentions prompted, 
 perhaps you will feel that you were 
 really a loser because the meat was tough 
 and tasteless. That gives you your 
 
MEAT AND MEAT SUBSTITUTES 207 
 
 chance to show what good cooking will 
 do. Long, slow cooking will make the 
 toughest meat tender, and proper season- 
 ing will give it savor. If to tough meat 
 is added a spoonful of vinegar, or lemon 
 juice, or if it is cooked with tomato it 
 will become tender. The acid softens 
 the fibre. I often add a spoonful of vin- 
 egar to the water in which I cook a fowl 
 if it promises not to be tender. 
 
 To make meat savory let it lie over- 
 night in a dressing of oil, vinegar, pap- 
 rika, or onion juice, basting with the 
 dressing, and the most tasteless meat 
 will have a choice flavor and become 
 tender. Never add salt to uncooked 
 meat, as it toughens even tender meat. 
 If you do not care to give the meat the 
 bath of flavoring, season with herbs, or 
 curry, but do not use the same flavoring 
 every time. You can take the same cut 
 and by varying the seasonings produce 
 quite different results from it. A taste- 
 
208 THRIFT IN THE HOUSEHOLD 
 
 less meat is changed and made appetizing 
 by two or three strips of bacon added 
 as basting for a roast when cooking. 
 
 An inexpensive English dish is lamb's 
 heart stuffed with sage and onion. A 
 heart is allowed for a person. They cost 
 five cents apiece a short time ago. Each 
 heart is carefully washed and trimmed. 
 Then they are parboiled in hot water to 
 which is added a spoonful of vinegar. 
 After this they are stuffed with bread 
 crumbs, to which onions and sage are 
 added generously, with salt and pepper 
 as liked. They are baked, base of heart 
 down, and around the tiny pyramids 
 may be placed the potatoes to bake in 
 the pan. Baste often with water in 
 which is a little fat. Baste potatoes as 
 well as hearts, and they will become a 
 beautiful brown. When hearts and po- 
 tatoes are done, remove from the bake- 
 pan and thicken the water with browned 
 flour for gravy and you have the founda- 
 
MEAT AND MEAT SUBSTITUTES 209 
 
 tion of a nourishing and appetizing meal 
 at small cost. 
 
 From a shin-bone, which is another 
 inexpensive piece of meat, you may get 
 a good deal at comparatively small cost. 
 See that it has meat on it when you buy 
 it. You can use the edge or aitchbone 
 in the same way. Have the bone cracked, 
 then put it to soak as for soup. Use cold 
 water, let it come to the boiling point and 
 then simmer. No meat should boil. 
 Season with an onion, a clove, pepper 
 and salt, and the ground celery tips you 
 have dried. Use a tablespoonful to two 
 quarts of water. When the soup has 
 cooked down one-quarter, remove onion 
 arid meat and thicken the water with 
 flour wet with cold water and stirred 
 smooth. Be sure it is smooth or there 
 will be lumps in the soup. Serve the 
 soup with cubes of stale bread toasted. 
 This gives one dish from the bone. 
 
 Take every bit of meat from the bone 
 
210 THRIFT IN THE HOUSEHOLD 
 
 and chop fine. Add to it a tablespoonful 
 of crumbs, or as much more as the meat 
 needs to take up the moisture. Season 
 with onion, pepper and salt if needed, or 
 with powdered poultry dressing. It is a 
 combination of sage, thyme, marjoram 
 and other flavors, and is much better 
 than most cooks can prepare. Mix an 
 egg into this and shape into balls. 
 Brown in hot fat. Serve with tomato 
 sauce if you wish them to be somewhat 
 the nicer. The recipe for this is omitted 
 as it is in all cook-books. Serve with 
 this arrangement of meat any vegetable 
 you fancy, and with a simple dessert you 
 have a three-course dinner that has cost 
 you little and is good enough to eat. 
 You will be surprised to find how little 
 your dinner will have cost you. 
 
 Another meat dish from the shin is 
 spiced beef. Get quite a large weight, 
 and have considerable bone, as the gela- 
 tine in it helps to make this dish better, 
 
MEAT AND MEAT SUBSTITUTES 211 
 
 Have the bone well cracked. Put it to 
 cook as directed above. Simmer until 
 the meat can be pulled from the bone 
 with a fork. Take from the water and 
 remove all meat, chop it and the gristle 
 fine, return to the kettle with cloves, all- 
 spice, bay leaf, herbs, mustard seed, and 
 celery seed. Use a smaller proportion of 
 the pungent spices and remember that 
 cooking will intensify their strength. 
 The meat is to be preserved by the spices. 
 Cook the liquid down until very little 
 is left. Turn the meat into a dish, a 
 bread-tin is good, and let it stand until 
 very cold. Slice and serve cold for sup- 
 per or luncheon. Were this made of 
 pork it would be the hog's-head cheese 
 that our grandmothers kept regularly as 
 part of the preparation for winter. If 
 kept cool, it will keep a long time, thanks 
 to the spices, or it may be put into a 
 wide-mouthed crock, sterilized, covered 
 with melted lard, and be kept indefi- 
 
212 THRIFT IN THE HOUSEHOLD 
 
 nitely. Melted lard being somewhat ex- 
 pensive, you may substitute hot paraffine 
 if you prefer. If this cheese is made in 
 large quantity, it is better to prepare it 
 for winter, but five pounds of the bone 
 and meat will make a convenient dish 
 to keep on hand in summer or winter. 
 You can make up twenty pounds for 
 winter. 
 
 The many ways in which you can vary 
 your meat dishes number into the hun- 
 dreds, and would make a fair-sized cook- 
 book of themselves. If you wish to know 
 more of them, experiment for yourself. 
 The sole limitation on them is that the 
 result shall taste " like more." Use your 
 meat with rice, macaroni, potatoes, or 
 other starches, with onions, carrots, beans, 
 peas, turnips, tomatoes, and with combi- 
 nations of these. You can scarcely fail 
 to produce something good. Do not al- 
 ways work your ingredients into the 
 same old stew. A good stew is a very 
 
MEAT AND MEAT SUBSTITUTES 213 
 
 good thing, but nothing is good if one 
 has a chance to get tired of it. 
 
 Boil sometimes, steam, broil, fry, and 
 roast. Do not let anything come out 
 greasy. It spoils the article and wastes 
 a very important food product. A salad 
 may be compounded occasionally, alone 
 or with a vegetable, a very small amount 
 of meat may be used for a hot sandwich 
 if added to brown sauce, and by trying 
 you will find yourself becoming more 
 and more clever each month. It is very 
 interesting to use your mind this way. 
 It is also very profitable. Whatever you 
 compound, you will have it good if it is 
 not greasy and is well seasoned. " Well " 
 does not mean highly, but to the proper 
 taste. 
 
 The art of seasoning is that which 
 makes French and Belgian cooks excel. 
 The foundation materials are never bet- 
 ter than what you have. Taine, himself 
 a Frenchman who knew good cooking, 
 
THRIFT IN THE HOUSEHOLD 
 
 wrote, " The table d'hotes of Belgium are 
 the best in the world." They are made 
 so by the skill in seasoning. If you wish 
 to equal their cooks, provide yourself 
 with all the flavorings of which you hear 
 and use them to give variety, not all at 
 the same time. Do not scorn the effect 
 of a single clove, or think it is too little 
 to give a place. Try a bit of bay leaf 
 gather your bay while you are at the 
 seashore and dry it for flavoring and 
 use it a little at a time. A well-flavored 
 dish never has a strong taste of any one 
 thing but a pleasant blending of many 
 little things. 
 
 Thrift does not buy anything merely 
 because it is cheap. One may have to 
 buy that way or not buy at all, but thrift 
 buys low-priced cuts and then makes 
 them taste so good that one thinks them 
 to have been high cost. If one has to 
 throw away meat she has bought at 
 a low price because it is unappetizing 
 
MEAT AND MEAT SUBSTITUTES 215 
 
 there is no thrift in it. There is no need 
 for it. 
 
 The ragouts of the French are what we 
 prepare from left-overs but they are not 
 served as any makeshift but as something 
 really good, and they are. So may be 
 your dish from flank, or shin, or neck, 
 or any tough bit. You will have a pride 
 in developing your talent for making good 
 things at low cost that you never had in 
 any other accomplishment, and you will 
 have a happy home. The woman who 
 is a good and economical cook usually 
 has a home one likes to stay in. 
 
 You will find it a pleasant change from 
 meat to have fish twice a week, and some- 
 what more profitable in money. It is by 
 no means a poor exchange. From fish 
 you may have soup, chowder, stew, bake, 
 roast, fry, boil, broil, salad, escallop, fish- 
 cakes, fish-pie, fish-pudding, and hash. 
 Any article that offers such a range is 
 worth your consideration. Freshen salt 
 
216 THRIFT IN THE HOUSEHOLD 
 
 fish in sour milk, laying the fish back up 
 in the dish. Some fish are comparatively 
 tasteless, and to such you may give flavor 
 by leaving in the bath of lemon juice or 
 vinegar with onion or other seasoning, 
 with or without oil according to the na- 
 ture of the fish, if it is dry flesh or fat. 
 Or you can give flavor to your fish after 
 it is cooked by serving with sauce tartare, 
 a mayonnaise to which is added enough 
 mustard and paprika with a bit of minced 
 pickle to bite the tongue. Or you have 
 the choice of several other sauces. 
 
 It is a good plan to serve with fish such 
 vegetables as have a distinct flavor, as 
 peppers, cucumbers, cabbage salad, beets, 
 carrots, and onions. A boiled fish is dis- 
 tinctly a different dish if the water in 
 which it cooks has in it a little celery 
 seed or dried and ground celery tops, a 
 clove and a peppercorn or two. A dry 
 fish, one with little natural oil, should be 
 baked with slices of bacon to baste it, or 
 
MEAT AND MEAT SUBSTITUTES 217 
 
 slices of fat pork, which are equally good, 
 and cheaper. 
 
 Massachusetts would scarcely have 
 come to its present estate if in earlier 
 days it had not been held by the cod dig- 
 nified now in that State as " The sacred 
 codfish. " What it was to the earlier set- 
 tlers of Plymouth Bay Colony it can be 
 to-day to others, for it is one of the cheap- 
 est and best of fish, either fresh or salted. 
 Fresh cod may be baked, broiled, or fried, 
 and is made into a delicious fish chowder. 
 A fresh cod salted to stand overnight, in 
 the morning wiped free from salt, placed 
 on a bake-sheet, put into hot oven, baked 
 very quickly, and dressed with butter and 
 slices of lemon is very well worth eating. 
 It may be dressed with strips of bacon 
 before baking if one wants a change from 
 butter. 
 
 Small fish may be baked in a bean-pot 
 or casserole to be eaten hot or cold and 
 will be good for a long time if kept in a 
 
218 THRIFT IN THE HOUSEHOLD 
 
 cool place. To prepare them, place a 
 layer of cleaned fish on the bottom of the 
 pot, scatter whole cloves over the top, 
 mixed with peppercorns and mustard 
 seed, add another layer of fish, and then 
 spice, until the dish is filled. Have 
 spice on the top, and use discretion in 
 scattering over the top of the fishes. 
 Cover the fish with a mixture of vinegar 
 and water, twice as much vinegar as 
 water, and bake slowly until the liquid 
 is well absorbed. All bones will be so 
 softened by the acid that they will give 
 no trouble to the eater. This is a satis- 
 factory method of laying by any extra 
 fish. Larger fish may be cut in sections 
 and treated in the same manner. It is a 
 good thing to have in the house when 
 emergencies arise and one cannot go to 
 the market. Fish may be potted by the 
 rule given for potting meat, but bones 
 must be removed and great care taken 
 that no bits of bone remain in the paste. 
 
MEAT AND MEAT SUBSTITUTES 219 
 
 Left-over fish is a good foundation for 
 a salad, or it may be warmed up in an 
 egg sauce, which is drawn butter or white 
 sauce with egg added. Egg sauce is the 
 proper accompaniment for a boiled fish 
 and the left-over of sauce and fish may 
 be made into a scallop with potato or 
 crumbs, and baked until brown. The 
 sauce should be the top. If it is a little 
 less than the amount needed, you can fill 
 up with milk. The effect is pleasing if 
 over the last layer of sauce you spread a 
 few fine crumbs. Everything in this 
 being cooked, not more than fifteen min- 
 utes in a hot oven will be required for its 
 baking. 
 
 " I don't like fish " will not be heard 
 in your family if you know how to cook 
 it, and that knowledge is a part of thrift. 
 Those who go camping near the ocean or 
 inland lakes find that fish is a very good 
 thing to eat, and they will like it if the 
 cook learns how to prepare it so that it 
 
220 THRIFT IN THE HOUSEHOLD 
 
 has flavor. Bacon is an excellent fat to 
 use in nearly all ways of cooking fish 
 except the few oily kinds. It has so 
 distinct a flavor that it improves most. 
 Salt fat pork fried crisp was a favorite 
 part of a codfish dinner in New England 
 before its people became so prosperous 
 that they ceased to economize. The fish 
 was stripped into bits as small as they 
 could be pulled, freshened by having 
 boiling water poured over it several 
 times. If fish stands in water and boils 
 up much it toughens, but if soaked or 
 scalded in three or four waters it is 
 tender. The pork was cut in inch pieces 
 very thin, and fried out. It was per- 
 fectly crisp and the fat was a dressing for 
 the fish and the baked potatoes which 
 went with the dinner. In the land of 
 the codfish, beets and carrots always are 
 served with the fish and potatoes. 
 
 The Fish Commission of the United 
 States has done a wonderful but little- 
 
MEAT AND MEAT SUBSTITUTES 221 
 
 known work (so far as the public is con- 
 cerned) in introducing new fish to the 
 people. The fish supply of this country 
 is enough to feed the inhabitants for a 
 long time and negatives any probability 
 of starvation though there become a 
 greater shortage of meat than is at all 
 likely. Not only have new varieties of 
 food fish been discovered, but a wide 
 range of methods of cooking them have 
 been developed, and this information is 
 practically free to any housewife who 
 wishes it enough to send to the Fisheries 
 Department at Washington for it. At 
 the outside, the bulletins will not cost 
 over five or ten cents and they give care- 
 ful directions for cooking fish in many 
 inviting guises. Eat more fish and the 
 meat problem will cease to be a problem. 
 The health will be improved, and the 
 pocket-book will have something always 
 in it, if you want it to have. 
 
 Thrift influences you to make the 
 
222 THRIFT IN THE HOUSEHOLD 
 
 most of the possibilities that are at your 
 hand, and you want to make sure that 
 you are doing this before you groan too 
 much over the high cost of living. 
 Perhaps that bugbear is made stronger 
 by lack of knowledge how to use what 
 you have. In the days when the cost 
 of living was lower there were fewer 
 kinds of foods and the average family 
 ate dishes that only the poorest eat now, 
 codfish for instance with pork scraps, and 
 stews for supper. While you need not 
 do that to be thrifty, you will find you 
 can make your money buy to better ad- 
 vantage by knowing more about foods, 
 and what you can make with what you 
 can command of materials within your 
 financial reach. Learn that and you will 
 become past-mistress of thrift, and in- 
 dependent. 
 
 Try a Welsh rabbit some time for the 
 main dish of a luncheon. It is much more 
 than a light dish for a pleasure time. It 
 
MEAT AND MEAT SUBSTITUTES 223 
 
 is a hearty dish and a valuable meat sub- 
 stitute. You should not serve potatoes or 
 rice with it, but turn it on toast, and 
 have with it a salad of green vegetables. 
 If you have any of the rabbit left do not 
 discard it. Spread saltines or soda crack- 
 ers with the mixture, brown in the oven, 
 cool, and wrap in waxed paper and you 
 will have excellent cheese-crackers that 
 will keep as well as those bought in boxes, 
 provided they are hidden. They are 
 rich in food value and may be added to 
 a meatless meal. Do not serve any other 
 cheese preparation with them. 
 
 Peanuts deserve a larger place in the 
 household dietary. There is enough 
 nourishment in a pint of peanuts for a 
 meal for a hearty, out-of-doors worker, 
 and if eaten with some less concentrated 
 food might be chosen once in a while in 
 place of meat. 
 
 Peanuts may be cooked very much 
 like beans, and when baked are very good. 
 
224 THRIFT IN THE HOUSEHOLD 
 
 For a peanut roast, grind the nuts very 
 fine, mix with bread crumbs, and hold to- 
 gether with beaten egg. Season to taste, 
 and bake until brown. One may have 
 peanut soup, peanut roast, peanut salad, 
 peanut butter sandwiches, peanut cakes, 
 and thus have a peanut meal if one 
 chooses it. Brown bread is much the 
 best for the peanut-butter sandwiches. 
 
CHAPTER XIV 
 DESSERTS 
 
CHAPTER XIV 
 
 DESSERTS 
 
 I COUNT it wise to have desserts for 
 dinner even if one is trying to save to 
 the last penny. They add to the meal 
 certain elements that the system craves, 
 and which are well supplied as dessert, 
 and they make a pleasant finish to the 
 meaL Where children are they help 
 to form the manners of the well-bred 
 individual, and if the only dessert is a 
 bread and sugar sandwich, served on a 
 pretty plate, with the dishes of the pre- 
 vious course removed, it has helped the 
 child toward gracious manner to have it 
 given him. Having this conviction, I 
 should always have something for dessert, 
 however simple it might be. 
 
 As a rule, desserts should be very light, 
 
 227 
 
228 THRIFT IN THE HOUSEHOLD 
 
 but this may vary according to the food 
 of the earlier part of the meal. In the 
 usual household there are only two 
 courses at dinner, the heavy or meat 
 course and the dessert. Economy really 
 would be better served by having three, 
 soup, meat or its equivalent, and dessert, 
 for no more food would be eaten, and the 
 soup is better in most cases for the indi- 
 vidual than more heavy food. Three 
 courses would be a factor for helping out 
 with the meat problem in the ordinary 
 home. 
 
 If the first part of the meal is meatless 
 and rather light, the sustenance needed 
 may be gained by a heartier dessert such 
 as a pie or pudding. We know of course 
 that pies have had much said against 
 them by dietists, but if dangerous, they 
 are so slow a poison and so good if good 
 at all that most of us will continue to 
 take some chances on them. As a gen- 
 eral statement, it may be said that fruit 
 
DESSERTS 229 
 
 desserts are better than pies or puddings 
 except in cold weather, when the fuel 
 value of the latter makes them to be 
 liked more than the lighter food. 
 
 Any canned or fresh fruit makes a 
 tempting dessert if served with a spoon- 
 ful of whipped cream on it, and a little 
 cream is not as expensive or as thriftless 
 as you may think. It is one of the best 
 of foods. Fruit may have a meringue of 
 white of egg whipped to a froth with a 
 spoonful of sugar, or it may be served in 
 its original condition. 
 
 Any fruit whip may be made by mash- 
 ing the fruit, uncooked if soft enough to 
 whip, and cooked if hard like apple, 
 beating it with the egg-beater with the 
 addition of sugar as needed. Serve in 
 glasses. It is as pretty as it is good. 
 You may add a bit of whipped cream to 
 that for looks. Cream whipped will 
 " go " nearly three times as far with a 
 dessert as it will if served unwhipped. 
 
230 THRIFT IN THE HOUSEHOLD 
 
 You may make three desserts from your 
 fruit whip, first as it is just made, then 
 with the cream, and lastly, you may 
 place it upon rounds of buttered toast, or 
 slices of stale cake or cottage pudding. 
 
 Boiled rice shaped into forms, crowned 
 with fruit, and served with sugar and 
 milk, will please children and adults. 
 Teacups may be used if you have no 
 regular molds. Make a food attractive 
 to the eyes and children will enjoy what 
 otherwise they will refuse to eat. You 
 can hollow out the top of the rice and 
 drop a cherry in the hollow and that 
 pleases the child. A delicious and very 
 inexpensive pudding is made of rice in 
 the following way : Into the baking-dish 
 in which the pudding will be served 
 (butter well) turn a quart of milk ; add 
 three heaping tablespoonfuls of rice and 
 the same amount of sugar. Stir when 
 placed in the oven and continue to stir 
 until rice is swollen. Season as you like 
 
DESSERTS 231 
 
 it. Add raisins if you wish, but they 
 are not needed for excellence. Put into 
 a good oven, but as soon as the milk has 
 become thoroughly hot lessen the heat 
 of the oven as the deliciousness of this 
 pudding depends upon slow baking. It 
 should bake slowly for three hours and 
 the milk never bubble. This pudding is 
 to be eaten cold, and it will seem like a 
 jelly. 
 
 From biscuit dough you may have a 
 wide range of desserts ; cut in biscuit 
 rounds, bake, split, and fill with fruit : 
 there is the individual shortcake. You 
 may make a filling of raisins and dates 
 or raisins only, and you may cook the 
 fruit, one cup to one-half cup of water, 
 one-half cup of sugar, and when thick 
 turn over it the beaten white of an egg. 
 You can make this filling for the biscuit 
 shortcakes or for a layer cake in which 
 you will use the yoke of the egg. 
 
 Instead of cutting the dough, roll it 
 
232 THEIFT IN THE HOUSEHOLD 
 
 very thin and spread with cinnamon and 
 sugar. Roll like a jelly cake, and from 
 the end of the roll cat in inch wide 
 slices. Bake in a quick oven, laying 
 each slice flat on the bake-tin. With a 
 cup of coffee these are nice for dessert or 
 for afternoon tea. Now you can roll the 
 dough thin for another dessert, but this 
 time you will not cut it. You will 
 spread it with some jelly that did not 
 thicken well when you made it. Then 
 start at the smallest end and roll to the 
 other side. Bake this roly-poly and you 
 will find it good. If you have no jelly 
 you can spread it with nuts and raisins 
 run through the finest grinder, or slices 
 of fruit, sweetened as needed. The fruit 
 must be sliced very thin and the dough 
 must be so thin that when rolled it has a 
 chance to bake through. The thicker 
 the roll, the slower must be the oven, 
 otherwise the outside will be burned be- 
 fore the inside is baked. Practise makes 
 
DESSERTS 233 
 
 perfect, and is the only thing that does 
 make perfect the rolling of these bread- 
 dough desserts, but they are worth the 
 effort. When you have the knack you 
 can experiment and find something else 
 that rewards your efforts. 
 
 In England, griddle-cakes are served 
 as dessert. They are the thinnest cakes 
 imaginable, are rolled like jelly-cakes 
 after being spread with sugar or jelly, 
 and eaten without any other accompani- 
 ment. 
 
 At least once a week a tapioca dessert 
 should be served in a family where there 
 are children. It is not only very good 
 but it is one of the least expensive of 
 foods. Tapioca is excellent for little folk 
 and they always like tapioca desserts. 
 In cooking it, remember that it stiffens 
 considerably as it cools and is usually 
 eaten cold. You can give great variety 
 to the dessert of tapioca, and if you wish 
 to make it more of a food you can use 
 
234: THKIFT IN THE HOUSEHOLD 
 
 milk and eggs in the composition of your 
 dessert, but you can have many delicious 
 puddings without either. 
 
 The old-fashioned tapioca required 
 overnight soaking, but the present can 
 be used without preliminary soaking, 
 which is a great convenience. You can 
 modify the following recipe in many 
 ways by changing the fruit and with 
 each you will like it. Drain a can of 
 peaches or use the equivalent amount 
 of the fresh fruit. To peach syrup add 
 enough boiling water to make three cups 
 of liquid. Heat to boiling point and add 
 tapioca, prepared according to directions 
 on package. These directions vary with 
 different makers. Add three-fourths cup 
 of sugar ; cook in double-boiler until 
 transparent. Line a pudding-dish with 
 peaches cut in quarters, turn the tapioca 
 over them, and bake in moderate oven. 
 Apples cooked in this manner are deli- 
 cious. 
 
DESSERTS 235 
 
 Tapioca pudding may be made with 
 coffee, chocolate, jelly, or any fruit juice, 
 and the making is simple. Two table- 
 spoonfuls of tapioca, a scant quart of 
 boiling water, three tablespoonfuls of 
 sugar, make ample dessert for four per- 
 sons, in the form of either baked or boiled 
 pudding. If a coffee tapioca is made, use 
 the hot coffee left from breakfast in place 
 of water, and do the same with chocolate. 
 Treat as in the recipe given above. In- 
 stead of baking, after the tapioca has 
 boiled to transparency add the fruit and 
 cook until it is soft. It is equally good. 
 
 Corn-starch is also the base of many 
 good simple desserts, but they do not 
 quite equal those from tapioca. The sug- 
 gestions given for tapioca are as good for 
 corn-starch, and with either it is better 
 to have the pudding too soft than too 
 stiff. When it is too stiff it makes one 
 think of paste, which is not appetizing. 
 Banana or orange is a pleasant addition to 
 
236 THRIFT IN THE HOUSEHOLD 
 
 either and at little cost. One banana 
 will flavor the pudding, but two oranges 
 are needed for an orange pudding. 
 
 Corn-starch may be the foundation for 
 blanc-mange, and an economical dessert 
 is cocoanut blanc-mange. Save enough 
 milk from a quart to mix with the corn- 
 starch and cocoanut, a little more than a 
 cupful, and put the remainder into a 
 double-boiler to heat. When the milk 
 is hot, add a quarter-cup of dessicated 
 cocoanut and five level tablespoonfuls 
 of corn-starch rubbed smooth with cold 
 milk, cook until smooth and done. 
 Sweeten with two tablespoonfuls of 
 sugar, and turn the whole into molds. 
 Set where they will be cold, and when 
 serving sprinkle with shredded cocoanut. 
 Puddings will not stick to molds that 
 have been wet and are well chilled when 
 the contents are added. 
 
 Junket tablets and Irish moss com- 
 bined with milk make desirable desserts. 
 
DESSERTS 237 
 
 Rules for junket are printed with the 
 tablets. Irish moss is tied in muslin, 
 boiled with milk, and is the original 
 blanc-mange. It may be found by the 
 sea on the Atlantic coast, or bought 
 from the druggist. 
 
 Eggless puddings for cold days often 
 make a finish to a dinner that pleases a 
 man more than any fancy dish, however 
 nice it may be, and bring a satisfaction a 
 lighter dessert fails to give in winter. 
 When you want a pudding that supplies 
 nearly as much food as meat try this suet 
 pudding. Two cups chopped suet (if it 
 mats as you chop, sprinkle it with flour). 
 Two-thirds of a cup of molasses, a cup of 
 sweet milk, a teaspoonful of soda, four 
 cups of flour, a cup of chopped raisins. 
 Mix and steam four hours. Season with 
 spices if liked. This is better on reheat- 
 ing than at first. 
 
 Graham steamed pudding is better than 
 you might think it would be. For it 
 
238 THRIFT IJSf THE HOUSEHOLD 
 
 take two cups of Graham flour, cup of 
 molasses, cup sweet milk, cup of raisins, 
 teaspoonful soda and a little salt. Steam 
 this pudding two and a half hours. 
 
 The nicest and whitest of the eggless 
 puddings is cranberry pudding. Take a 
 cup of sugar, a cup of milk, two cups of 
 flour, three tablespoon fu Is melted short- 
 ening if you use a cooking oil for short- 
 ening take only a spoonful two tea- 
 spoonfuls baking-powder, a coffee-cup of 
 cranberries. This is very light and good. 
 Substitute raisins for cranberries if you 
 wish, and lessen the sugar one-half, or 
 use dates, or both. Fresh berries make 
 a good addition, but the dough must be 
 made stiffer to balance the moisture of 
 the berries. Use for any of these the 
 pudding-sauce you prefer. Bake this 
 pudding. 
 
 Apples furnish material for many in- 
 viting and inexpensive desserts. Bake 
 them after they have been cored and 
 
DESSERTS 239 
 
 stuffed with raisins and nuts. Serve 
 with cream. Any cook-book will give 
 you hints for using apples and making 
 desserts to be enjoyed. Take slices of 
 stale bread, butter them, and place in a 
 bake-dish in which they will be served. 
 Sprinkle them lightly with sugar, and 
 over each layer of bread put apple-sauce 
 generously. If it is moist, nothing more 
 will be necessary, but if the sauce is dry, 
 turn enough milk over it to moisten it. 
 Bake until it is done, and eat with milk 
 and sugar or with hard sauce. These are 
 simply hints for help in devising simple 
 desserts. It is safe to substitute one 
 fruit for another, and to experiment with 
 what you have, using your judgment for 
 such changes as should be made. 
 
 When you have tired of prunes in their 
 usual form, pit them and add to a custard, 
 or reheat them with some minced lemon 
 or orange-peel added to the water in which 
 you heat them. This makes them into 
 
240 THRIFT IN THE HOUSEHOLD 
 
 quite a different dish. Add quartered 
 prunes to a lemon jelly ; for breakfast or 
 dessert, try a combination of prunes cut 
 in half with segments of orange added. 
 Uncooked prunes, pitted and each stuffed 
 with a nut-meat or raisin, make a good 
 and cheap dessert. Peanuts may be 
 chosen, and peanuts are a true food. 
 
 Any dish compounded largely with 
 milk will be nourishing. Milk is one of 
 the best of foods, and those who cannot 
 eat it cold or uncooked can generally eat 
 it in soup or other cooked forms. Let it 
 serve in that way if there are children in 
 the family. A simple milk dish is made 
 by adding milk to crackers. If you can 
 get the old-fashioned kind that splits in 
 halves, take them. Split, butter, place in 
 pan, and add milk to cover. Season 
 with salt only. Bake slowly until the 
 milk is entirely absorbed and the crack- 
 ers more than doubled in size. This may 
 be elaborated by adding an egg, well 
 
DESSERTS 241 
 
 beaten, to the milk before covering the 
 crackers, or it may have slices of apple 
 or other uncooked fruit or raisins and 
 prunes, and in that case add sugar as 
 needed. It is good as a simple dessert or 
 as a breakfast dish. 
 
CHAPTER XV 
 THRIFT AND TEXTILES 
 
CHAPTER XV 
 THKIFT AND TEXTILES 
 
 BUYING covers all needs of the family, 
 and though the wastes are more numer- 
 ous in the kitchen than in any other 
 department of the household, it is equally 
 necessary to look after leakages in buy- 
 ing wearing-apparel, household linen, and 
 all such supplies. In these the best is 
 the cheapest, but it is not always true 
 that the highest-priced is the best. The 
 highest-priced are novelties which have 
 no merit above older patterns except that 
 of novelty if such it be. For service in 
 the household, a design that is ten years 
 old in table-linen, sheeting, towels, and 
 such things is just as good as the latest 
 and will cost one-third less at times. It 
 
 is thrift to renew these things when the 
 245 
 
246 THRIFT IN THE HOUSEHOLD 
 
 yearly sales are closing out the novelties 
 that came in the previous season. One 
 can buy better at the sales than at other 
 times, and it is distinctly thrifty to satisfy 
 one's needs for the year then. 
 
 Thrift does not wait until everything 
 has been worn thin before buying new, 
 but gets a few things as the year goes by. 
 It costs much more to make good the 
 neglect of several years than to foresee 
 the wear and to replenish as one knows 
 wear is telling on household linen. A 
 pair of sheets and pillow slips, a few tow- 
 els, et cetera, make no great drain on the 
 family treasury, while buying them in 
 quantity does. It is easier to find five 
 dollars a year than to wait and have to 
 pay twenty-five. 
 
 If you do not feel that you can afford 
 to buy fine table-linen it is not necessary 
 to economize by using table oilcloth. 
 There are as pretty designs in mercer- 
 ized cotton as one need want to see and 
 
THRIFT AND TEXTILES 247 
 
 at much less cost than for linen. With 
 these you can keep a table that you 
 need not be ashamed of. Treat yourself 
 to one fine linen cloth for the festal oc- 
 casions of the family, birthdays, Christ- 
 mas, and special guests, but use for every 
 day the napkins and cloths that you can 
 afford, and keep your table clean and 
 charming. You can do that even if dol- 
 lars are very few. Pretty dishes are not 
 costly and soap and water will keep 
 cloths clean. For breakfast and supper 
 let doilies take the place of the long 
 cloth. It saves work and is much more 
 attractive and is also the favored way at 
 the present day. It is poor thrift that 
 expresses itself in soiled table furnishings. 
 The table and its supplies are the heart 
 of the home, the expression of its highest 
 attainment in fineness of living, and for 
 the sake of all who gather about it let it 
 be as perfect as your means can buy, not 
 so much in high cost of cloth and food as 
 
248 THKIFT IN THE HOUSEHOLD 
 
 in cleanness, smoothness of the cloth, and 
 the manners of your family. It is better 
 to have only bread and butter served 
 with the courtesy that is the charm of 
 personal intercourse than untidy abun- 
 dance and the personal bearing that cor- 
 responds. 
 
 The table is one place where one may 
 not choose what is easier if one does her 
 duty to her children, because the fineness 
 of the child's nature and his future out- 
 look are affected by the table training he 
 receives. One may have the manner that 
 a prince is supposed to have if from early 
 childhood he has lived graciously, for it 
 costs nothing in money to have the grace 
 of the well-bred, but it takes thought, 
 and constant attention. Let your child 
 have the simplest food he will be the 
 better for it but do not use economy on 
 anything that will make it possible for 
 him to grow up with an idea that he can 
 eat with his fingers, or on a cracked dish 
 
THRIFT AND TEXTILES 249 
 
 at a coverless table or one with a dirty 
 cloth. 
 
 Treat children as you wish them to be 
 when the days of childhood are past. If 
 you can do it for no other reason, do it be- 
 cause it is an asset in business that increases 
 in value as business demands become more 
 intensive. The day of the successful boor 
 is nearly at its end. " Politeness is sur- 
 face Christianity," wrote Dr. Oliver Wen- 
 dell Holmes. It is the finest thrift, the 
 farthest-reaching, to insure its being a 
 part of your children. Those who have 
 learned in childhood the niceties of con- 
 duct will not forget them under the most 
 primitive conditions. They are a part of 
 the individual like his morals, but those 
 who get their good breeding after adult 
 years have come to them revert to the 
 habits of childhood at every opportunity 
 and often without knowledge of doing so. 
 Keep the table looking as it should even 
 if the children wear patches. There is no 
 
250 THRIFT IN THE HOUSEHOLD 
 
 disgrace in patches but there is nothing 
 else than disgrace in bad manners. 
 
 Now let us return to the point of 
 digression. The rules of buying are in 
 general the same ; the principles of thrift 
 in the kitchen will be the same in the 
 parlor or the bedroom. 
 
 Buy the standards in quantity if 
 thereby you get reduction in price, if 
 not, you would better save your money 
 until the need comes and have the in- 
 terest on it. Never buy anything for 
 which you have not a real need. If 
 you can buy sheeting very cheaply at a 
 certain time and you are near the time 
 when sheets must be bought you do well 
 to get them, but buying what is not 
 needed is a snare and a delusion that 
 takes many good dollars out of some 
 pockets. 
 
 If your time has a marketable value or 
 if you are not able to sew you will find it 
 more economical to buy your garments 
 
THRIFT AND TEXTILES 251 
 
 ready-made. A dress can be bought that 
 looks well and will be fitted to you prop- 
 erly for much less than the same garment 
 can be made, but not for as little as you 
 can make it if you know how to sew. If 
 every girl would take a course of instruc- 
 tion in dressmaking and millinery she 
 would save herself many dollars and dress 
 herself better than she ever did before, 
 while spending no more, and very likely 
 less. She would also have a business, 
 whether she ever followed it or not, in 
 which a really good worker is never 
 without profitable employment. 
 
 If one has a good dress that is worth 
 making over it pays her to have a dress- 
 maker at home. Never hire a poor dress- 
 maker, for she will spend half her time 
 correcting the mistakes she makes in the 
 other half. 
 
 Because they are wasteful, the thrifty 
 will not buy mixtures of cotton and wool. 
 They do not wear alike, and they shrink 
 
252 THRIFT IN THE HOUSEHOLD 
 
 surprisingly. All materials about the 
 unshrinking quality of which there is a 
 doubt should be shrunken before they 
 are made up. Men's trousers should not 
 be bought without a guarantee that they 
 will not shrink. It is distinctly poor 
 economy to buy garments without such 
 warrant of good material. More than 
 one man whose dollars are limited has 
 bought clothing at what he considered a 
 bargain, only to find after being out in a 
 rain that he could no longer wear what 
 he had bought. That kind of buying is 
 extravagance at any price, as any worth- 
 less thing is. No woolen clothing to-day 
 can be sold at a low price, for wool is 
 scarce and therefore dear. 
 
 Men's clothing may be found ready- 
 made, following good lines, and men 
 wear ready-made garments without the 
 sense of being ill dressed that once was 
 taken for granted with such clothing. 
 Just as the home-made shirt is practically 
 
THRIFT AND TEXTILES 253 
 
 unknown, and the custom-made seldom 
 worn, so now the entire wear of a man 
 is ready for him to don when minor 
 corrections have fitted it to his figure. 
 The same is becoming so much the case 
 with women's garments that it is really 
 an economy for the woman, whose time 
 or strength is limited, to get ready-made 
 gowns from a good house. She will have 
 them fitted to her, and the saving of time 
 and bother is a relief. 
 
 Whether it is cheaper to have a good 
 dressmaker come to the house, or take 
 material to her to make, or to buy ready- 
 made, are questions that have been de- 
 bated much. It is cheaper to buy a dress 
 ready-made than to buy the same ma- 
 terials and take them to a dressmaker, 
 counting in dollars and cents. There 
 are, however, times when there is no 
 question that it pays to have a good 
 woman, skilful with her needle, work at 
 your home. Turn it into an arithmetical 
 
254: THRIFT IN THE HOUSEHOLD 
 
 problem and you will find your answer. 
 Here is a dress that with a little revision 
 will do good service for a season and save 
 the expense of another. If that revision 
 costs less than the new one would cost, it 
 pays to have it made. Into the cost you 
 must reckon the dinner of the seamstress. 
 There is no profit in hiring a workwoman 
 who makes mistakes. There is better 
 profit in hiring one who charges more 
 but is so competent that each stitch is 
 right, each line of the shears just as it 
 should be. The profit or loss in hiring 
 work done at home depends upon the 
 personal equation, which each must know 
 for herself better than it can be told by 
 another. 
 
 In the ordinary household it is thrift 
 to buy one's sheeting by the quantity 
 and make one's sheets on the machine. 
 It is folly to hem them by hand. One 
 gets a much better sheet for the same 
 money by making it herself. Life is too 
 
THRIFT AND TEXTILES 255 
 
 short and too full to put any great 
 amount of it into hemming ordinary 
 things by hand. 
 
 Another point to consider in buying is 
 to get that which accords with your in- 
 come and position in life. If your in- 
 come warrants paying for good silk and 
 you want it, buy it, but if you cannot 
 pay for good silk do not be guilty of the 
 waste and sham of buying a poor quality. 
 Things that should be expensive look the 
 cheapest and commonest of everything 
 when bought in imitation or in cheap 
 quality, and are really very dear because 
 they do not last. 
 
 Cloth at fifty cents a yard which is so 
 mixed with cotton that it looks well only 
 three months is higher in price than ma- 
 terial at a dollar and a half that will 
 wear two years and look well longer when 
 remade. 
 
 Silk stockings at fifty cents do not look 
 well on any one. They are shabbier than 
 
256 THRIFT IN THE HOUSEHOLD 
 
 good cotton ones and much dearer at the 
 same money. A fine hose at fifty cents 
 really looks better and will outwear four 
 pair of cheap, and cheap-looking silk at 
 the same price. No girl on a salary of 
 ten dollars a week is well-dressed if she 
 wears silk stockings at any price, or if a 
 gift. She is attempting to be what she is 
 not, which is not good taste. If women 
 could realize that imitations make one 
 look ill-dressed, and be content to clothe 
 themselves truthfully they would serve 
 the gods of propriety, thrift, and beauty 
 instead of those to whom belong waste 
 and vulgarity. " Simplicity is the high- 
 est art," and it is a characteristic of gen- 
 uineness. 
 
CHAPTER XVI 
 CARE OF CLOTHING 
 
CHAPTER XVI 
 CAKE OF CLOTHING 
 
 CARE of clothing is true thrift, and 
 more important to one who would look 
 well on a small amount than the original 
 buying, for it not only doubles the life 
 of a garment but keeps it looking well as 
 long as anything of it is left. This is 
 noticeably true of material of good value. 
 With cheap garments, good care is more 
 necessary if one is to have any satisfac- 
 tion whatever from them. 
 
 Nothing looks well when there are 
 spots to be seen on it, so keep on hand 
 always ready for use a good cleansing 
 preparation. An application will remove 
 the spot before it has become hard. Try 
 the following, adding one and a half 
 ounces of pure white soap to a pint of 
 
 boiling water. Shave the soap so that it 
 259 
 
260 THRIFT IN THE HOUSEHOLD 
 
 will more quickly dissolve. Boil for ten 
 minutes after the soap has dissolved, and 
 then turn into a glass or china holder. 
 Keep closely covered. This was recom- 
 mended to me as being equal to the 
 needs of the family from taking out ink- 
 spots to cleansing gloves. 
 
 Fresh ink-spots may be removed by 
 soaking in milk. Old ink-stains that 
 have been dried in may be taken out by 
 washing in hot lard. Wash just as one 
 would with water, and wash again and 
 again, finally washing out the lard in 
 soapy water. I have known this to work 
 wonders with a bed-cover on which an 
 ink-bottle had been upset. 
 
 Paint on clothing should be treated 
 with turpentine and ammonia in equal 
 parts. Saturate two or three times if 
 necessary and wash out in white soap- 
 suds. 
 
 A mixture of Fuller's earth and pow- 
 dered alum, equal parts, is said to be 
 
CARE OF CLOTHING 261 
 
 excellent for cleaning white suede gloves. 
 For the glace kid give different treatment. 
 Undressed kid may also be cleaned by 
 rubbing with the finest sandpaper. It 
 should not be scrubbed but lightly 
 rubbed. The effect is excellent. These 
 are better than gasoline for cleaning be- 
 cause they leave no odor. The paste first 
 mentioned will clean glace" gloves. 
 
 Clear, black coffee diluted with water 
 and containing a little ammonia may be 
 used for cleaning black cloth garments. 
 To renew thin black dresses, dip a cloth 
 in gum-arabic water quite a weak solu- 
 tion and lay over the cloth on an 
 ironing-board covered with black. Use 
 a black cloth to dip in the solution. 
 Pin the cloth smoothly to the board, 
 right-side down. Cover with the cloth 
 that was dipped. Over this have a dry 
 piece, and press with a hot iron. The 
 effect is very good. If you wish to treat 
 a white muslin use rice-water instead of 
 
262 THRIFT IN THE HOUSEHOLD 
 
 the gum arable but pin it to the cloth, 
 cover with the wet cloth and the dry as 
 you did for the black muslin. It will 
 look like new. Never wring any thin 
 material. Pat it dry enough to press, 
 wrong-side up. 
 
 If you wish to remake a dress, rip it 
 carefully and pull out all the threads. 
 Take a good day for cleaning it and have 
 ready a bath of soap bark. Five cents' 
 worth from the druggist will give you 
 all you need. Put the dry bark in a 
 cheese-cloth bag and pour over it a gallon 
 of boiling water. Let the decoction stand 
 until dark colored. Put in a tub or pail 
 with your goods with warm water to 
 cover them and let stand overnight. In 
 the morning souse up and down, then 
 rinse thoroughly with warm water. Do 
 not wring. Hang in a shady place until 
 dry, or nearly dry, and if it has not dried 
 smooth press it under a clean cloth with 
 a hot iron. This treatment is like magic 
 
CARE OF CLOTHING 263 
 
 for removing spots and can be used on 
 material of delicate colors without harm- 
 ing them in the least. There are women 
 who clean their woolen coats and dresses 
 in this manner without ripping them, 
 but that requires some expertness as it 
 does to wash them in gasoline. 
 
 A gasoline bath can be used for laces, 
 dainty wraps, and nearly anything, 
 though since the price of that cleanser 
 has risen so much it is about as cheap to 
 send them to a professional. A bath of 
 gasoline means three relays of it. In the 
 first the material soaks enough to loosen 
 the dirt, and in the other two it is rinsed 
 out. The cleanest things are first treated 
 and the " waters " are used until they are 
 dirty. No water must touch the gar- 
 ments. The cleaning must be done out- 
 of-doors because gasoline is dangerous to 
 handle in a house. I have a friend who 
 cleans feathers, hose, gloves, and various 
 little things including summer frocks 
 
264: THRIFT IN THE HOUSEHOLD 
 
 that do not launder well in water. They 
 need no ironing when gasoline-cleaned. 
 Personally, my experience has never 
 been successful in the use of gasoline. If 
 I try to take out a spot with it, a bigger 
 one comes in the place of what I tried to 
 remove, but the fault is personal, not in 
 the method which many follow regularly. 
 Gloves may be cleaned with gasoline 
 by the most inexpert if she will do it this 
 way. Put the gloves in a quart glass 
 jar. Several pairs may be done at one 
 time. There must be gasoline to cover 
 them but not to fill the jar. Let them 
 stand half an hour, then shake the jar 
 fast. The dirt will fall out of the gloves. 
 Remove lid of jar and put the gloves 
 into another with an equal amount of 
 gasoline. Shake in this, and if after 
 standing ten minutes and the shaking 
 they are not clean, give them another 
 bath in a third jar. That will make 
 them as clean as ever they can be made. 
 
CAKE OF CLOTHING 265 
 
 To do one pair of gloves this way is ex- 
 travagant, but the gasoline for one pair 
 may be used to clean a dozen pairs and 
 its price then is not excessive for the 
 return. 
 
 If you have a nice dress which has 
 been spotted with something that you 
 are not sure of, do not try to remove it. 
 Send it to a professional cleaner. Re- 
 moving stains is a regular business and 
 wonders can be wrought by one who 
 knows it. Never practise on expensive 
 articles. It is cheaper to entrust the 
 work to one who knows just what to do 
 and how it should be done. 
 
 One of the most profitable forms of 
 thrift is to have street gowns for the 
 street only, removing as soon as one gets 
 home. Nothing can demoralize a gown 
 more than lounging around in it, or 
 wearing it out about the kitchen when 
 preparing supper or dinner. Have a 
 well-made street dress of good material, 
 
266 THRIFT IN THE HOUSEHOLD 
 
 remove it as soon as you get home, and 
 substitute a pretty house gown that you 
 can make for yourself by the help of any 
 dependable pattern. By house dress I 
 mean one that is daintier than is per- 
 missible for street wear. Under the term 
 house dress is not included kimonos, 
 wrappers, or any of the sloppy things 
 that are discreditable to a woman in her 
 home and enough to make matrimony 
 seem a failure to any husband. Even in 
 these days of high prices it is possible to 
 find material as low as a quarter of a 
 dollar a yard from which a woman can 
 construct attractive house frocks which 
 will make her look pleasant to the eyes 
 of her family, and her world will be 
 happy. A well-fitted and well-made cal- 
 ico house gown better becomes a woman 
 than a kimono of silk when occupied 
 with her duties, and far better than a 
 dirty, spotted woolen which can no longer 
 be worn on the street. 
 
CARE OF CLOTHING 26T 
 
 Clothing for man, woman, and child 
 should be hung on hangers as soon as 
 taken off. It should be aired before be- 
 ing shut in a closet. All articles should 
 be dusted before being put away, should 
 have the needed stitches taken, or laces 
 freshened up, and everything done that 
 should be before it is worn again. One's 
 clothing should be kept in condition for 
 wearing, not left neglected until time to 
 wear it again. Care will keep it young 
 in appearance much longer than is other- 
 wise possible. 
 
 If you have a dress of good material 
 which has faded, or if you are tired of 
 its color, why not dye it? If you are 
 afraid to try it yourself, have it done by 
 a good dyer. It is not necessary to rip 
 anything to have it dyed. If an over- 
 coat is of all-wool and has become shabby 
 from wear it may be made to look well 
 by a good dyer's work on it, and save the 
 expense of a new one. 
 
268 THRIFT IN THE HOUSEHOLD 
 
 Cottons that have become streaky have 
 been dyed so that they looked prettier 
 than new. I know a very charming 
 frock now pale green which began as a 
 lavender crepe, faded until it looked 
 more like a rag than anything else. The 
 owner boiled it in cream-of-tartar water 
 and made it white, then dyed it, changed 
 the neck, added touches of black velvet, 
 and at the cost of a few cents had a dress 
 that has been greatly admired. Had it 
 not been dyed it would have been worth- 
 less. She made it herself. It does not 
 often pay to hire such work done. 
 
 Shoes are so expensive that one likes 
 to know how to make them last their 
 longest. Two pairs worn alternately will 
 last nearly as long as three pairs, each 
 worn regularly until beyond repair. 
 When the shoes are removed from the 
 feet, every trace of dust should be wiped 
 from them, an old stocking-top being ex- 
 cellent for this purpose. Always air a 
 
CARE OF CLOTHING 269 
 
 shoe before setting it in a closed place. 
 Keep strings or buttons in order, and to 
 do this have extra strings and buttons at 
 hand. 
 
 Vaseline with lampblack added makes 
 a good dressing for shoes, and well 
 rubbed, will make a shine. The oil pre- 
 serves the shoe and should be rubbed 
 enough to soften it. Vaseline must not 
 be used on light shoes because any oil 
 deepens the color. 
 
 If shoes have been wet until they are 
 soaked, the stiffness may be avoided by 
 stuffing them while wet with newspaper 
 rolled in little balls. Fill the shoes, 
 stuffing the balls into the toes, and fill- 
 ing out the shape as if the foot were in 
 the shoe. The leather will be pliable 
 when dry. It is not wise to set wet 
 shoes in a hot place to dry. Sometimes 
 that treatment ruins them. Shoes filled 
 with oats will keep their proper shape, 
 but to use oats in that fashion to accom- 
 
270 THRIFT IN THE HOUSEHOLD 
 
 plish an end served as well by old papers 
 is not thrift. All articles of leather 
 which have become too stiff for use 
 through being wet may be softened by 
 vigorous rubbing with kerosene. 
 
 Corn meal is a very good cleaner. I 
 have used it to clean flannel collars and 
 cuffs, and it serves for many other things. 
 It is fine for taking dust from straw hats, 
 and whitens when used with lemon 
 juice. It is to be sprinkled on and 
 rubbed in with a brush. Any light 
 straw may be cleaned with a solution of 
 oxalic acid, rubbing it in with a small 
 brush. The solution should be made of 
 an ounce of the crystals to a quart of 
 water. See that the hat dries in the 
 shape wanted. For ten cents a Panama 
 hat can be cleaned to look like new. 
 Mix equal parts of oxalic acid and pre- 
 cipitated sulphur. Dissolve half a tea- 
 spoonful in half a tumbler of cold water, 
 remembering that you are dealing with 
 
CARE OF CLOTHING 2T1 
 
 a deadly poison when you use oxalic 
 acid, and must be very careful where you 
 put it and how you use it. Dip a clean 
 sponge in the liquid and wipe the hat 
 until clean. Dry in the sun and the hat 
 will reward you by its appearance. 
 
 If hats instead of being dirty are dis- 
 colored by the sun, they can be bleached 
 with sulphur fumes. Country girls 
 sometimes braid the straw for their hats 
 and then bleach the straw or the com- 
 pleted hats by hanging to the bottom of 
 a barrel which is turned upside down 
 over a fire-smudge sprinkled with sul- 
 phur. This is a successful method of 
 bleaching, practicable only when one has 
 outdoor space. Sulphur fumes are unsafe 
 in enclosed spaces. 
 
 Faded hats can be colored with dyes 
 that come for hats. Sometimes they are 
 not fast colors and then as soon as a rain 
 comes the result is very unpleasant, but 
 others are rain-proof and will improve 
 
2T2 THRIFT IN THE HOUSEHOLD 
 
 the hat greatly. You remember how one 
 of the " Little Women " painted her hat? 
 There is no patent on the idea and any 
 one who wants to try it can do so. Dyes 
 for hat-coloring are low-priced and of 
 many tints, so it is quite possible to turn 
 even a sailor old friend into a new one. 
 
 Laces also may be dyed to match a 
 costume if one cares for that trimming. 
 An old waist was metamorphosed into a 
 beautiful new one by being dyed brown, 
 with lace to match and only such changes 
 made in it as mode of sleeve necessitated. 
 Thrift will lead women to-day to look 
 over the put-away garments and revive 
 for wear those that may be done over by 
 any of these suggestions. 
 
 Pack away all garments where they 
 shall have no chance to get dusty. Wrap 
 silks and ribbons in blue paper and then 
 in brown. There is a tinge of chloride of 
 lime in white paper and that will discolor 
 them. Packed in the blue tissue and 
 
CAEE OF CLOTHING 2Y3 
 
 then in brown, nice silk and satin dresses 
 will hold their freshness for a considera- 
 ble time. This is equally good for laying 
 away soft white flannels. Old blue silk 
 makes as good a wrapper as does the 
 paper. 
 
 Woolens and furs can have no better 
 preservative than turpentine and news- 
 paper. There is the advantage with this 
 that if any eggs have been laid in the 
 garments before putting away the turpen- 
 tine will kill them. Those who insure 
 goods against moths say the insects do not 
 get in after the goods are laid away but 
 the eggs are in them when packed, and 
 that moths lay eggs in articles hung in 
 the open air on the line. Professionals 
 whip furs with tiny, flexible rods and 
 then comb with a fur comb. Thus pre- 
 pared and rolled in a close cover of news- 
 papers they will keep in any receptacle if 
 turpentine is sprinkled about it. Cayenne 
 is better than any moth-ball except that 
 
2T4 THRIFT IN THE HOUSEHOLD 
 
 the wearer of anything thus protected is 
 much inconvenienced on first wearing it 
 after taking from its box. I used it for 
 years and never had a moth touch fur or 
 woolen. 
 
 If one has a heavy, expensive overcoat 
 it should be sent to a cleaner before pack- 
 ing away. Perfect cleanliness is one of 
 the best protections from moths, and if a 
 garment has been well cleaned by a pro- 
 fessional it is almost certain to come safely 
 through a season even in a house where 
 moths are to be seen at almost any time. 
 By letting the sunshine in all the time 
 the moths will disappear. They are like 
 other evil-doers and have no desire to be 
 in the sunshine or to touch printers' ink. 
 
 Haven't you many a time cast away 
 your husband's discarded shirts with a 
 sigh that anything so good should be 
 worthless for any other purpose than for 
 cleaning? Finally I experimented with 
 what I had and first developed an apron. 
 
CAKE OF CLOTHING 275 
 
 The shirts were white with a hair line, and 
 good except around the collar. From the 
 back came the front of the apron and the 
 fronts made side gores. A belt and ruffle 
 were found from sleeves and shoulder- 
 piece. The result was a very pretty apron 
 for home wear. This turned out so well 
 that next I made a shirt-waist, which is 
 very easy unless one is larger than her 
 husband. I planned it to use the same 
 buttons and buttonholes, fitting by draw- 
 ing up on the shoulders. Now all dis- 
 carded shirts form the basis of rompers or 
 Dutch suits for a three-year-old boy. It 
 is a very simple matter to get either out 
 by laying a pattern on the shirt. This 
 really is a saving worth practising, and 
 the garment can be planned so that the 
 buttons and buttonholes may close the 
 garment. If you do not need to study 
 thrift for yourself, why not do it for some 
 one else who would be glad of your 
 help? 
 
276 THRIFT IN THE HOUSEHOLD 
 
 If you have an old carpet that is good 
 except in pattern you can bring it up to 
 date by painting it. Have it perfectly 
 clean and then use a paint that can serve. 
 Any painter can tell you the kind that 
 may be applied, but I may not advertise 
 it. Some paints will fail, but there are 
 several that will turn carpets into quite 
 new articles in appearance. You can 
 turn a rug into oilcloth. Tack it on the 
 floor after it has been washed clean. 
 Cover it with thick cooked paste put on 
 with a brush. Work it well into the rug. 
 When this is dry you must give it two 
 coats of paint and one of varnish. If a 
 border is wanted, use a stencil and another 
 color of paint. For coloring a carpet the 
 paste is not necessary. 
 
CHAPTER XVII 
 THE FAMILY GARDEN 
 
CHAPTER XVII 
 THE FAMILY GAKDEN 
 
 WE know experimentally that the fam- 
 ily garden is one of the largest sources of 
 saving of the family income. We started 
 our married life and our garden about the 
 same time, with equal ignorance on both 
 subjects. The garden was established in 
 our back-yard, a plot about 14x50 feet 
 in size, of very poor soil where never 
 had garden been. The Man dug it thor- 
 oughly, thus cultivating muscles never 
 before much exercised and learning what 
 it means to earn his food by the sweat of 
 his entire body. 
 
 The soil was very hard to spade, but 
 was finally dug to a good depth and left 
 to sun and ripen until planting time. As 
 
 gardening was an experiment, and our 
 279 
 
280 THRIFT IN THE HOUSEHOLD 
 
 dollars were not numerous enough to 
 waste we decided not to buy fertilizer 
 but to enrich our ground with our waste 
 from the table and such wood ashes as we 
 had. Much of the garbage was burned 
 on the inside top of the stove which is a 
 good way to dispose of it and makes no 
 odor if drafts are open. Garbage prop- 
 erly treated in a compost heap becomes 
 good fertilizer but we did not know that 
 then, and there was no place for com- 
 post. Not buying fertilizer was a mis- 
 taken economy, but nature was very good 
 to us for all that. Some plants are greedy 
 eaters and thrive better for every mouth- 
 ful of food given them. 
 
 One of the encouraging things to the 
 amateur gardener is the will of nature to 
 have things live, and the tenacity of life 
 in the seeds and plants. They will resist 
 lack of proper food and water, but they 
 will not thrive after bugs begin to live on 
 them, and the only plants in our garden 
 
THE FAMILY GARDEN 281 
 
 that did not have some kind of a bug 
 haunting them were okra and peppers. 
 
 Our seeds were given us by a sister 
 whose husband is a champion garden- 
 maker, and there was the expense of 
 thirty-nine cents for a small hand 
 sprayer, which was another mistaken sav- 
 ing. Spraying is so large a part of garden 
 making that it pays to provide one's self 
 with as large a sprayer as one can work. 
 Bordeaux mixture cost seventy-five cents^ 
 and we bought tomato plants to the ex- 
 tent of thirty cents, a total cost of one 
 dollar and forty-three cents. The time 
 cost after the seeds were in the ground 
 was about half an hour daily. The aver- 
 age would be higher if digging and plant- 
 ing were included. Most of the work 
 was done early in the morning, and oc- 
 casionally some little in the evening. 
 
 We made the mistake of all beginners 
 and planted enough in that small space 
 to have supplied an acre of ground, and 
 
282 THRIFT IN THE HOUSEHOLD 
 
 the seeds were so thick together that they 
 had no chance to grow. We planted 
 peas, beans, onions, summer and winter 
 squash, carrots, Swiss chard, spinach, 
 radishes, peppergrass, corn, cucumbers, 
 tomatoes, both seeds and plants, beets, 
 turnips, cabbage, lettuce and okra, these 
 not in rotation but all as nearly at once 
 as we could get them into the ground. 
 
 Peppergrass was the first return. It is 
 like watercress and we used it for salad 
 and sandwich rilling. There was a sec- 
 ond crop of that and we combined with 
 lettuce. We gave away pecks of it, and 
 at the market price of cress it had a 
 money value of a dollar and a half. The 
 peas did not thrive and we had only a 
 quart, worth eight cents ; the beans be- 
 came rusty and we did not get half as 
 many as we should have had, but we 
 sold four quarts at twelve cents each, and 
 canned six quarts. We had ten quarts to 
 eat so our beans brought us two dollars 
 
THE FAMILY GARDEN 283 
 
 and forty cents. Of shell-beans there 
 were four quarts, price twenty cents a 
 quart. Onions made sets for the second 
 year, but were worthless to us except for 
 the flavoring value of the tops. There 
 were two quarts of little carrots from 
 thinning the row, and they were deli- 
 cious but not worth more than six cents. 
 There were sixty large ones, the price of 
 which at that time would have been fif- 
 teen cents. The Swiss chard was the 
 most profitable article raised. It fur- 
 nishes a very delicate greens not often 
 found in the market because it wilts very 
 quickly. We had twenty-six pecks, sold 
 five at forty cents a peck, canned a dozen 
 jars, gave away three pecks, and had it 
 often on the table. At the market price 
 of spinach it brought ten dollars and 
 four cents. 
 
 Four plantings of radishes gave us 361 
 heads or thirty-six bunches at five cents 
 each, total, one dollar and eighty cents ; 
 
284: THRIFT IN THE HOUSEHOLD 
 
 there were thirty-five cucumbers, valued 
 at one cent each ; from the tomatoes we 
 got a peck of ripe ones and four pecks of 
 green ones, the ripe valued at thirty 
 cents, the green at sixty ; we had one 
 hundred heads of lettuce from three 
 plantings, and that summer lettuce never 
 went below ten cents. Part of the time 
 the price went to sixteen cents, but we 
 did not sell any of ours and reckoned its 
 value, at the lowest cost, to be ten dollars. 
 There were five summer squashes, worth 
 ten cents, and six winter squashes worth 
 fifty cents. 
 
 Three kinds of bugs worked hard all 
 day and night to make a living from the 
 squash and cucumbers and finally des- 
 troyed the vines in spite of efforts with 
 the sprayer. The amount destroyed was 
 several times greater than the crop se- 
 cured. From the beets were gathered 
 twenty-one quarts of tops with the little 
 beets, and five quarts were canned. The 
 
THE FAMILY GARDEN 285 
 
 marketman told me these were worth 
 four cents a quart, total eighty-four cents. 
 Of the roots there were two pecks, worth 
 twenty-five cents ; out of all the corn, only 
 one ear grew to maturity, but it was per- 
 fect. I sold twenty-five cents' worth of 
 young turnip greens, and three turnips 
 (two cents) were eaten at home. From 
 the green tomatoes six quarts of pickles 
 were made. The okra yielded a pint of 
 so little value it was not counted, and 
 the peppers had no selling value, as they 
 were too small, but they served as season- 
 ing. 
 
 There is another side to the story. Not 
 one seed of spinach sprouted; the cabbage 
 label blew off and when the young plants 
 appeared I thought they were weeds and 
 pulled up all but three before the Man 
 told me what they were. These were 
 finally devoured by cabbage-worms. The 
 bugs devoured the squashes and cucum- 
 bers, but enough fruit was gathered from 
 
286 THRIFT IN THE HOUSEHOLD 
 
 them to pay for having planted and 
 tended the seed. 
 
 Owing to business necessities we were 
 obliged to move to another city at the 
 end of August and as our garden was 
 late, there was more left in it than we 
 had gathered from it. The bed of chard 
 was still in full bearing, the tomatoes only 
 beginning to ripen, and those from seed 
 planted by us were heavy with green 
 fruit ; in the ground ungathered were 
 beets, carrots, turnips, beside chard, toma- 
 toes, lettuce, and peppergrass. In giving 
 prices I have given those common in 
 Baltimore markets that summer, and they 
 are much less than present prices. 
 
 It is wonderful how generous Nature 
 is to those who give her a chance, and if 
 she gives thus liberally to two ignorant 
 beginners, what will she not give to those 
 who plant properly, and feed fertilizers 
 with full hand ? We might have had 
 twice as much for our work had we not 
 
THE FAMILY GARDEN 287 
 
 economized at the source of profit. You 
 must remember that every cent paid out 
 that does not bring a return is loss. It was 
 waste to plant twice as much as there was 
 space for, because the plants that grew 
 did not accomplish nearly as much as was 
 natural to them. If one pays a man by 
 the hour or day, from the garden must 
 much more profit be gained. 
 
 We made a great profit because we had 
 practically no expense and all that came 
 to us after one dollar and forty-four cents 
 was gain. We sold to persons near by 
 who came for the vegetables that could 
 be bought fresh from the ground. Had 
 we tried to sell, we might have sold much 
 more. Some things we would not sell 
 at all because we wanted all there was. 
 We felt that with $30.14 to our credit our 
 investment paid, and we are enthusiastic 
 advocates of the pleasure and profit in 
 one's own garden. Beside the practical 
 side of abundance of fresh vegetables, 
 
288 THRIFT IN THE HOUSEHOLD 
 
 there is the delight of seeing things push 
 up their little green heads, put out new 
 leaves, yes, it surely pays to have a 
 garden. It was not by accident that 
 Eden was a garden. 
 
 THE END 
 
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