FOOD WASTE—BOILING VERSUS STEAMING.
(To THE EDITOR or THE " SPECTATOR.") Stn,—When the Government, and necessity, are urging upon us economy in food, and the use of more vegetables and lees meat, allow me to point out a source of enormous waste in food, as well as deterioration in health, by the wasteful methods of cooking vegetables commonly adopted. The United States authorities have made a careful study of this for their people, and the results are issued in the Farmers' Bulletin, No. 43, which may be obtained by any one sending five cents (2id.) to the Superintendent of Docu- ments, Government Printing Office, Washington, DX., U.S.A. I briefly summarize the results :—Potatoes cooked in their skins: the loss is very trifling. Potatoes peeled and soaked in water for several hours, as is often done : the loss of nitrogenous material is about fifty per cent. and of mineral matter forty per cent. Potatoes peeled and boiled at once lose about eight per cent. proteid, and about thirty per cent. of starch. Carroty cut into small pieces and boiled lose about thirty per cent total food material present. Sugar lost by boiling in this way equals one pound per bushel of carrots. Cabbage boiled loses one-third of the total food material present, especially ash and mineral matter. Eaten raw, it is digested in half the time required for boiled cabbage. Vegetables steamed lose only one-third of the material that is lost by boiling. The above are striking facts. The loss of food and valuable salts may be avoided by baking, steaming, or, if boiled, the water should all be used in soups or sauces; but much of the delicate flavour of vegetables is lost by boiling. Since the beginning of the war Germany has forbidden the cooking of potatoes without their skins, even in private houses, to save waste.
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