Dried Vegetables 



Will this startling process end 

 high prices for farm produce ? 



Pi 



and Cheap Living 



By Leigh Danen 



Illustrations by 

 Universal Film 

 Company • 



A pound of dried mixed vegetables prepared especially for soup, is ^.^iLic^^ui *oi o.xLj, 

 adults. The vegetables are dried and shredded within eight hours after they are picked 



A WONDERFUL method for con- 

 serving vegetables by drying has 

 recently been perfected by three 

 Americans. The new system is based on 

 the fact that the micro-organisms which 

 promote fermentation in vegetable matter, 

 depend upon moisture in order to live and 

 propagate. The problem, therefore, nar- 

 rowed itself down to finding a way of 

 removing as much of the water as possible 

 from the vegetables which were to be pre- 

 served, of "dehydrating" them. 



The greatest difficulty encountered was 

 not in abstracting the water from, or 

 drying, the food products, but in preserving 

 intact their cell 

 structure so that 

 their original food 

 value would not be 

 lost. After more 

 than five years of 

 experimentation, 

 this has been ac- 

 complished. It is 

 now possible to 

 reduce the percen- 

 tage of moisture 

 in vegetables to 

 well within twelve 

 per cent ; by which 

 process the devel- 

 opment of bac- 

 teria is prevented. 



The vegetables are sliced and then subjected 

 to the action of heated air currents in ovens 



698 



The vegetables are first sliced and then 

 brought into contact with heated air. Air 

 at any given temperature can take up a 

 certain definite maximum amount of mois- 

 ture; this, under ordinary conditions, it 

 finds no difficulty in extracting from its 

 surroundings. 



Heated air containing less than such 

 maximum amount of moisture is introduced 

 into a chamber where the vegetable matter 

 which is to be dried has been placed. The 

 water-seeking air then dehydrates this 

 material almost completely. 



The names of the three men who have 

 developed this process are Waldron Wil- 

 liams, Woodford. 

 Brooks and Dr. 

 F, G. Wiechmann. 

 Not more than 

 fifty per cent of 

 the vegetables 

 grown in the 

 United States 

 ever reach the 

 consumer. From 

 the standpoint of 

 the utilization of 

 foodstuffs, this 

 seems almost 

 criminal. Many 

 must have won- 

 dered whether 

 somedaya method 



