158 THE WAR GARDEN VICTORIOUS 



Scientists have pointed the way and by their careful 

 research have discovered methods by which potatoes 

 and other vegetables can be dried so that they will re- 

 tain all their original flavor and food value over long 

 periods of time and under all conditions of weather and 

 temperature. In going into the work on a commercial 

 scale and in preparing such food for large bodies of peo- 

 ple such as an army, where some of the products may 

 not be consumed for many months and where they are 

 likely to undergo many changes of temperature in being 

 transported from place to place, it is necessary, of course, 

 to observe scientific precision in the preparation and 

 packing of the goods. For home consumption no such 

 elaborate processes need be followed. This is why any 

 household may prepare with ease its own supplies of 

 this sort. As practiced in the home, vegetable and 

 fruit drying is largely a matter of following with rea- 

 sonable care a few simple rules. During the season of 

 1918 the National War Garden Commission distrib- 

 uted throughout the United States almost two mil- 

 lion copies of its canning and drying book which gave 

 all needed instructions. Thousands of war gardeners, 

 both as individuals and through community effort, 

 added a considerable amount to their winter store by 

 vegetable and fruit drying. 



It was during the Boer War that dried foods were 

 used for the first time to any extent in the provisioning 

 of an army. Large quantities of these goods were ship- 

 ped from Canada to South Africa by the British War 

 Office, and the experiment proved a complete success. 



