The San Francisco Call. Newspaper, April 15, 1906, Page 14

0x we now—before ter b en re brown twenty mi ing properly minutes weighing in es illed being placed is ended the list A TWO COMPART - MENT COOXKER P o< four minutes. thing was re cooker packed osed by half- I have Captain Murray's report of this i the temperatures of the various dishes registered when the box was of and 1 think it will interest you. »ast 10 in the morning until afternoon the fireless stove was Then we opened it and every f food was perfectly cooked and by bakers' and cooks' The hafm showed a temperature grees; chicken, 162 degrees; rib grees; vegetables, 149 degrees. that is hotter than Fahrenheit without g the mouth, the temperatures rticles taken from the cooker enough for the satisfaction of the sons served. To serve articles any r would mean that the diner must 1 his appetite In check until they gh to be palatable. trial was made at the fort, but a s Jater a hunt was planned and w cooker was given an out-of-door About sixty persons made up the Luncheon was cooked while break- was under way so there need be no g with 1t when the hunt was over. “Creamed chicken, enjoyed the messe e cannot eat oo 120 degrees e. are part ham, roast beef and coffec were cooked for a few minutes and ed in ‘the firelgss’ by 9 o'clock. The box was put on the escort wagon and drag of d over rough roads a distance ten miles from the fort. “It was about 3 p. m. when the chase endec d sixty people came back to camp. They wanted lunch and they want- ed it in & hurry, so the cooker was opened and there, after six hours, was every sin- gle dish as warm and as perfectly cooked if it had just been takefi off the range. “That lunch was a tremendous success and enough praise was heaped upon the THE SAN REST For 7%/ SNNER — COoKER > reless covkstove to have turned tne neag of its originator. “On another jaunt suet pudding wita white sauce was prepared, and Boston brown bread—each as perfect as anything else we tried “Then came a @izzard, in February, and the firele: ove was given a test under s¢ ce conditions. With the thermometer hovering around zero a fire was built in an opép trench, and over this, suspended from an old Style iron bar and hooks, hung the utensils for the cooker. Ham, veal roast, potatoes and coffee were all ready and packed by 10 a. m., and when opencd seven hours later the cooker sent forth a thoroughly ctory dinner. ‘We had planned the fireless stove so that it would serve a meal for 124 men, a war-strength company, each of the six receptacles holding enough of one article of food for that number. But I think we ought not try to have so large a box for the reason that, after all, the fireless cebker, if it is adopted by the War De- ' partment, will probably not be intended for use In war times—in active service. It isn’t expected that the soldier will have all the comforts of home while on the march or in the field, and one of these cookers would rank with a refrigerator as a luxury. “Other experiments will be made at vari- ous posts—we shall probably have an:out- fit here within ihe next few weeks—before the department makes,any ruling ‘for'the stove's adoption as a regular ‘plece. of% cquipment. I am anxious to see whethy cereals and breakfast dishes can b ite; parcd over night and opened In the t ing ready for use. We never t'flm-‘, at Fort Ril % “The saving in fuel is something Itke 50 or 85 per cent and the economyof time and labor -is -quite as important. Besides all this, certain dishes are much Py ® 5 filter and more delicat® of flavor when cooked by the fircless method, particu- larly baked ham, brown. bread and fowl. Tor flo! cooking this modern successor of the old Norwegi®h hay-box, first used forty years ago, is just as nearly “perfect as it can well be made.” FRANCISCO SUNDAY CALL. > TAMILY Here there enters a travel-stained officer who reports ithe arrival of a new company at the post and Captain Fer- guson’s - excursion to the happenings at Fort Riley is cut short by the neces- sity of providing for the welfare of these new troops. As I take my depar- 4 KIRMISH LINE < > - ture I am thinking that though the eco- nomical feeding of the army Is a big thing, and surely most important, yet the greatest service a fireless cooker can render will concern the housewife. She represents an army that includes us all in its enrollment, and one of the ‘dest signs of the times is to be found in the general effort to make smooth her path. Fireless cookers of a size and style adapted to the small family are not yet on the market, but they soon will be— backed by San Francisco men, too, the Barlow Fireless Cook Stove Company, and what a wilderness of domestic dif- ficulties they will banish! The working modefs, here illustrated, are very plain of construction, with tight-fitting doors and lining of a non- absorbent, heat-containing composition of which asbestos and cement are im- portant s, Differing from the cooker used in the army tests, these do not require a spe- cial utensil. The regular pots, Kettles and p: will serve admirably, it being necessary only that all lids fit closely. Agateware vesscls give better service than tin, as they hold the heat for longer time, and heat retention is the secret of the fireless cooker. Handles and bales must fold closely agalnst the Kketties' sides, for space is precious, but there is no other positive command. In one of the least of these here shown, a careful housewife will find room for two three dishes, decreas- ing the empty space and preventing by so much the waste of heat. Just think for one minute what a saving in fuel it must effect. Suppose you are cooking a ten-pound ham and the thought of the constant clicking of the gas meter for three or four hours almost destroys your enjoy- ment of the meat when served. With the fireless cook stove you need have the gas burning for only thirty minutes —just so the ham is thoroughly heated —then whisk the pot or baking dish into the cooker and forget all about it for the rest of the afterncon. In four hours you may reopen the fireless stove and remove a ham perfectly cooked, thoroughly tender and of an unexcelled flavor. 4 Could anything be easier? Or cheaper? Perhaps your family is very fond of lamb stew and laments over your re- fusal to prepare it, flndin; your com- plaint of the odor of cooking lamb and carrots and enions not suf- turnips u ficlent “reason why.” Then they will welcoui. the fireless cooker as remov- ing your vbjections, for with this new device you need boil the stew for only ten minutes hefore putting it in the heat retainer, whence it will emerge two hours later a most delicious dish. There will be no breath of its prepara- tion throughout the house, the neigh- bors will not be able to sniff the alr and comment on your menu, and the family will enjoy a dish well worth while. Every cock book printed has added its anathema against the cook who shall proceed with the cooking of beans, split peas and lentils in any but the slowest .way, and comprehensive have been the promises of indigestion for those who should not heed. But It is very casy to shorten the cooking process when fuel cost io- creases minute by minutey and, without intending to inflict penalties on those about her, the economical cook soon learns to hurry her Kettles and pans as much as possible. So it happens that many & vegetable is rendered unfit to eat by the‘high temperature at which it cooked, and many a case of chronic <spepsia thus has its beginning. 2 The fireless cooker is the answer to that problem. You cannot hurry the vegetables placed In its care. The heat is azlow and even, and the cellulose covering of lentils, beans and peas is softensd and made safe for even the delicate stomach. It would be unjust to represent the fireless stove as solving every culinary fll. For it isn't an Aladdin’s ring. It will not take the place of a cook. Intelligent care must be given to tha preparation of the meats and vege- as to be served. Eve le nust be heated through, X n transferred from coal or gas range to fireless stove the water In the steamer must be boiling. The water kept at the cooking point long enough to cook the food inclosed, and if it is not at this point in the first place one might leave the dish in the cooker for days, with the result that it would still be underdone. As made with two doors, the fire 1t he cook st has three compartment shelves or partit adjustable, so that however the utensil used it can be accomm ed. With its strong brass hinges and effective catch this two-story cooker ot unl the compact refrigerators with w flats and apartments are now So gen- erally equippec 11 probably be before the hot not ronsidered quite as ispensable as the cold storage box ated seeker of a desirable d this fireless cooker becomes, of need, an iceless refrigerator, its perfect insulation serving to retain cold as effectively as heat. So if meat or fruits taken off the ice, after b g penetrated by the cold and placed in s cooker, they will retain the low temperature for hours, thus ar- resting all deterioration. But it 2 heat retainer, rather than as box. this simple appliance its strongest plea for favor, and even in,a modified dinner pail is its principle made mani- e tor an ice ces ¢ its provision the cold lunch that lies like a stone in the stomach of the laboring man or farmer's helper be- es a needless infliction. The tin pail. with coffee cup atop, fol- lows its predecessors, the small basket er wrapped parcel into the ain Land, its place being taken eat wood box lined throughout with nducting and suppii>d single partition by which a coffee tin—capacity two cups—is separated from the rest ofsthe contents. And this coffee, when lunch time comes, is as warm—or nearly so—as when the wif= or mother made it ready four or five hours earlier, hot sandwiches, hard boiled eggs and hot minee pie not only restore the body’s used strength. but by their very warmth nourish the entire system—nerve, muscle and brain. Such a device is valuable, for the promises 1t holds out, for thers is no avoiding its tacit assurance that the heat retaining box can and will be adapted to the partioular needs of camper, tourist, hunter and motorist. It is only a question of time—time and public approval. There is no virtue in the size of the box; a small one serves as surely as a3 case ten feet square—just as a small gas or coal range works as well as a large one, provided always that not too mucn is expected of it in point of quantity of work. ‘When the fireless cooker is introduced it will-so the manufacturers solemnly as- severate—effect a saving not only of tuel, but of food as well, since by rendering scorching and burning impossible, no part of meat or vegetable can adhere to the utensil. Loss of flavor is equally impossible, for all juices are, perforce, retained, and one may be sure of getting the best of the dish when it is prepared in the new way. Perhaps through science we shall yet be enabled to overcome one of the charges brought against us by our more deliberate brothers overseas—that we are a nation of rapid eaters of rapidly cooked food. There will yet remain enough points of dispute to keep our international para- and the substance and the a M_Myd. never fear!