Scouting For Girls, Official Handbook of the Girl Scouts Part 20

It is worth while for you to go to look at furniture in stores and to think about buying it. Then you will discover that a piece of furniture that looks well in the store might not look at all well in your house, for furniture must "suit" the house and the room into which it goes. It must "fit," we say. No other furniture will do. So the Girl Scout will make up her mind what will fit her house; and of course this means also what will fit the family purse. For the keeper of the house must not let into her house one single thing that she cannot afford to buy. She will take pride in that.

So when you make a list of furniture--with its price--make sure that everything you choose, suits, or fits, _your_ house.

_The Cellar._ Most houses are built over cellars, for purposes of sanitation, heating and water supply, as well as for storage.

The Girl Scout who lives in the country probably knows all about cellars for they are much needed there. The city girl may live in an apartment and may never think of a cellar.

Look at the cellars of two or three houses. How are they built? Did you plan for one in your house?

The cellar should be well ventilated, having light as well as air. Its windows should be screened; the floor should be dry and if possible made of cement; the walls should be whitewashed. Ashes should be kept in a galvanized iron barrel, to prevent fire.

A cellar should be a clean place, corners and all.

_The Kitchen._ The kitchen is a work-shop; it should be sunny and airy.

Look out for windows to let in the fresh air and suns.h.i.+ne. And while you are thinking of windows, be sure that they can open at the top and bottom to let sweetness in, and drive bad odors out.

Your kitchen should hold things that are necessary, and nothing else. It should be easy to keep clean, having painted walls, and the floor should be of hard pine or else covered with linoleum. When a Girl Scout takes care of the kitchen she is in honor bound to keep all the corners clean and to leave no dust nor crumbs of food anywhere about. She will take great pains to keep flies out of the kitchen and so will have her windows screened.

A good kitchen is provided with a sink and if possible with running water; and it must have a good stove, with a place for keeping wood or coal if either is used.

_The Kitchen Floor._ The floor of the kitchen should be made of hard wood. Maple or hard pine will make a good floor. A hard-wood floor can be dressed with sh.e.l.lac or with oil. The wood absorbs this dressing so that water will not soak in. A floor which has been sh.e.l.lacked should be wiped with warm water. Not much water will be needed. The oiled floor can be wiped and dried, then oiled lightly from time to time.

Linoleum or oilcloth may be used to cover an old floor. If the floor is rough it should be made even by planing before the linoleum is put down, and the cracks should be filled. If you can't get linoleum you can paint your floor with a hard floor paint. Be sure to get a paint that dries hard. The linoleum should be frequently washed with warm water and soap and then rinsed carefully before it is dried.

_The Kitchen Stove._ The chief business of the kitchen stove is to provide heat for cooking. It must hold a fire, and so must be made of something which will not burn. Stoves are usually made of iron. Fire will not burn without air, so a place must be arranged to let air into the stove, and just enough to make the fire burn clearly and furnish the right amount of heat. That is what the front dampers or slides are for.

The fuel, wood or coal, is held in the fire-box. The heated air makes the top of the stove hot for frying, broiling or boiling, and the oven hot for baking.

The smoke and gases from the fire must not come out into the room to blind our eyes or suffocate us; the chimney is built to take care of the smoke and gases, and there must be a way for them to get into the chimney; the stove pipe is for this. But the game you have to play with your stove is to let the smoke and gases run up chimney, but to save all the heat you can for the work to be done. So your stove is supplied with dampers. When the fire is new, and there is much smoke or gas, you open the damper into the stovepipe, and in the stovepipe. Try to get a picture of the way the heated air goes from the fire-box up into the chimney. We call this direct draft. Of course a great deal of heat runs away through the chimney, and so your fuel is wasted. Now if you want to save heat, and particularly if you want to bake, and must have a hot oven, you will close the oven damper that has made the short easy way into the stovepipe. Then the heated air must find another way to get to the chimney, and it has to go around the oven to do this. While the hot air is finding its way around the oven, it heats it, ready for your baking. We call this the "indirect draft." Look over your kitchen stove and see how this happens. Take off the covers, open every door, and examine every part.

Stoves must be carefully managed. The fires must burn readily and the cooking must be done with the least possible amount of wood or coal.

This means a clean stove, free from ashes and with a clear draft. Wood or coal will burn freely in the air. They will stop burning if there is no draft.

Learn to manage your draft. Remember that stoves are made with a damper, in order to control the current of hot air. If the oven damper is closed this heated air _must_ pa.s.s over and around the oven before it gets to the chimney and so heat the oven. If it is open the hot air can immediately escape up the chimney.

When starting the fire leave the damper open. As soon as it is burning well, close it so that the oven will be heated. Your stove should also have a damper in the pipe, to save the heat which would otherwise run up the chimney. If there is none, have one put in. There are also dampers or slides in front of the stove to control the amount of air going in.

The housekeeper must learn how to manage her stove; she must get acquainted with it, for every stove has its own way. Draw a picture or plan of the stove that you know best. See if you can tell plainly how to build a fire in your stove. If you use natural gas or a kerosene stove tell how that should be managed.

_Gas and Oil Stoves._ Cooking may be done on an iron stove with either coal or wood as fuel, or the stove may be planned for burning gas or kerosene. The coal fire must be fed several times a day with coal and the ashes must be removed to keep the fire burning clearly. Wood burns out quickly and must be replaced often. Both wood and coal stoves mean almost constant care for the housekeeper.

Gas gives less trouble. It comes in pipes from outside the house. This means that somebody else--the gas company--provides the supply. You turn on the gas when you want to use it and turn it off, if you are wise and thoughtful, the moment it is not needed. The gas company measures the amount of gas that you use by its meter, and you pay for every bit that you burn or waste. The important thing, then, is to use as little gas as possible in order to pay for as little as possible. You would rather pay twenty-five cents for a thrift stamp, than for gas that had burned simply because you had forgotten to turn it off. Be sure that gas is turned completely off at all places and never have a low light burning, as the flame may be blown out and the unburned gas escape. This would be dangerous and might even kill persons in the house.

The kerosene stove may be used instead of a gas stove in houses which are not piped for a gas supply. If wicks are used they must be carefully trimmed, so that they will be clean and even. A kerosene stove needs frequent cleaning. It should be kept free from dust and from drippings of oil.

The Fireless Cooker

When a Girl Scout gets to thinking about all the work to be done in a kitchen she will ask some very important questions. How much work is to be done? How long does it take to do it? Can time be saved by doing it in a better way? How can I save labor? Save time? Save money?

The Girl Scout will find the answers one at a time, if she does her own work. And if you do your own work you will at once call for a fireless cooker. The name sounds impossible, for you have always cooked with a stove, and, of course, a fire. How can you cook without a fire?

The women of Norway taught us how. When they went out to work in the fields or on the farm they took the hot kettle of soup off the stove and hid it away in a hay box. The hay kept the heat in the kettle instead of letting it escape; so the soup kept on cooking, and when the women came home from their work in the fields there it was, all steaming hot and ready for dinner.

Everyone has noticed how some things carry or conduct heat and other things don't. That's why we use a "holder," when handling a hot dish or stove lifter or tea-pot. The "holder" does not carry the heat to the hand; it keeps it away. So the hay packed around the hot kettle kept the heat in the kettle, refusing to "conduct" it away. Therefore the soup went on cooking.

Your English cousins use a "cosy" to cover the hot teapot or coffee pot.

This "cosy" is made of quilted cotton; and looks like the quilted hood that your great-grandmother used to have. This keeps the heat in the tea or coffee, so that you can have a second cup for the asking.

America was slow to learn from her thrifty cousins, but at last she adopted the fireless cooker; and this is what it does:

The fireless cooker, a case packed with some material which refuses to conduct heat, is used to continue the cooking of foods after they have been made hot on the stove. When securely covered in the cooker they will go on cooking for several hours because the heat is retained by the protecting case. A Girl Scout may buy a fireless cooker, paying from $5 to $25 for it, or she may make one, which will cost less than one dollar. Of course this is a challenge to make one. You may be very sure that if you make a fireless cooker you will understand all about it. To make a fireless cooker you will need:

(1) _A cooker or container_, which should be an agate pail with a close fitting cover. The sides should be straight up and down, the bottom just as big as the top. You can choose a small one holding two quarts, or a gallon pail which would be large enough for anything an ordinary family would be likely to cook.

(2) _A case_, which must be at least eight inches wider than your container, for the packing must extend at least four inches around the pail on every side. You may use a round case like a big wooden candy pail, which you can usually get at the ten cent store for ten cents; or it may be a galvanized iron can with a cover like the one ordinarily used for garbage; or it may be a box shaped like a cube.

(3) For packing you may use crumpled newspapers tightly packed in; or ground cork, which is used in packing Malaga grapes, is fine, and you may be able to get it from a fruit store. Excelsior is good, and perhaps you will find that in the shed in some packing case; while, if you live in the country, you may be able to get Spanish moss. This should be dried, of course. And then there is hay--which our Norwegian cousins use.

Let us try paper. Pack the box or can four inches deep, with crumpled paper, making a very even layer. Put a piece of pasteboard much larger than the bottom of your pail upon this layer and set your pail in the middle of it. Now pack the paper tightly around the pail up to the very top, using a stick of wood or mallet to press it down.

Now you must make a cloth cover for your pail in the shape of a tall hat. The rim of the hat must reach out to the edges of your case and be tacked there. Take out your pail, fit this cloth cover into the hole and tack the edge evenly to the box.

You must now make a cus.h.i.+on to fill the rest of the box, packing it full of the crumpled paper. Make hinges for the lid of your box and put some sort of fastener on the front to keep the lid down tight.

Now you have your fireless cooker. When your oatmeal or your stew, or your chicken, or your vegetables have boiled ten or fifteen minutes on the stove in your agate pail, clap on its cover, set it into the nest, push the cus.h.i.+on into the top of the cooker, clamp down the lid, and your work is done, for the cooking will go merrily on all alone by itself in your fireless cooker.

While you are making your fireless cooker, remember that the thermos bottle is made on the same principle. And remember, too, that your non-conducting packing material will keep heat out just as well as it keeps heat in. In the summer time you may wish to keep your ice cream cold for a while in your fireless cooker. Perhaps you will see how this might help on a hot summer's day and what a comfort a fireless cooker might prove in a sick room.

The Ice Chest. How It Is Made

In taking care of food we must be provided with a cool place, for the storage of milk, b.u.t.ter, cream, and all cooked food that may spoil. In summer this is especially important; in an apartment, and in most city houses the ice chest is needed all the year around; in the country, it is needed only in the warm months.

The ice chest is built much as the fireless cooker is made. Its case is usually made of wood, its packing material must be non-conducting, and its lining must be some smooth surface through which water cannot pa.s.s.

Some ice chests are lined with zinc and some with porcelain tiles. In some ice chests, food and ice are kept in the same box, which usually opens at the top; in other chests there is a separate chamber for the ice. From the ice chamber a drain pipe carries away the water which drips from the melting ice.

Every ice chest must be kept clean and sweet. It should be looked over every day and washed carefully at least once a week. No crumbs of food should be left on the shelves. If you spill anything, wipe it up _clean_ at once.

The drain pipe must be kept clean. A long wire brush is used for this.

If you are buying an ice box, get one with removable pipes, which are easily cleaned. If there is any odor from the chest, scald with water and soda, a teaspoonful of soda to a quart of water. Rinse with fresh cold water.

If your ice chest drips into a pan which must be emptied daily, have a regular time for emptying it. An overflowing pan in an apartment may damage the ceiling below. If it drips into a pan which drains itself, be sure that the drain is kept clean and the entrance to the pipe unclogged. Clean the drip pan whenever you clean the ice chest.

It is a good plan to keep food in closed containers like fruit jars.

Wide dishes take up too much s.p.a.ce. Containers should be tall rather than broad.

Put no hot dishes in the ice box; it wastes the ice.