(>2 WORCESTER COUNTY HORTICULTURAL SOCIETY. [1899. 



exhibit where there was oflered a sweepstakes premium for the 

 best bread, and in addition three first and second premiums for 

 bread made with home made, compressed and dry yeast? Add 

 to this, distinctive premiums for graham and entire wheat, which 

 are not the same although often classed as one. Then might 

 come the various kinds of rye and Indian, rolls and I)iscuits. 



The New England man loves pie even if pie is not an adjunct 

 of the fashionable dinner. It may be daring to -ay that here 

 in the great pie belt; the home-made pie is seldom well made, 

 and a number of premiums for toothsome pastry would prol)- 

 ably set cooks to experitnenting until undercrusts were as light 

 as uppers. A few societies make one or two additions to the 

 articles named. 



Accuracy ought to be encouraged in cooking exhibits ; but in 

 looking over the recipes which are sometimes required to be 

 sent with them I seldom tind one so complete that I dare to 

 print it. "Sweeten to taste" or "Hour to mix "convey no 

 instruction. The written recipe should be as exact as a drug- 

 gist's formula, and should always be required. 



In this connection allusion is proper to the effort now being 

 made to establish in connection with the national department of 

 agriculture, a bureau of domestic science in which investiga- 

 tions as to methods for the preparation of food shall be con- 

 ducted and the information printed for distribution in the form 

 of bulletins. The movement started in Illinois and the advo- 

 cates of this plan call attention to the fact I hat colleges are 

 established throughout the country where every facility is pro- 

 vided for education in the production of food material ; State 

 fairs have generous appropriations and institutes are conducted 

 for further consideration of this question. The best results of 

 all this effort and expenditure may be, and often are, ruined by 

 the ignorant or careless cook. The Illinois State fair intro- 

 duced a department of domestic science in I89() and continued 

 it at following exhibitions. A domestic science committee had 

 a larffe corn exhibit at the corn convention in Chicago. 



Managers of fairs ought to keep in step with such movements 

 and can much bettei- afford to give less premium money for 



