12 DEHYDRATION OF FRUITS AND VKGETABLES. 



The Chaibman. You did not quite get in another point^ — that is, 

 that there is some kind of salts that are saved. 



Mr. HoEST. In all vegetables that are canned the valuable mineral 

 salts are very largely leached out in the cans. That is the case in 

 spinach, particularly. If you take spinach and put it in wat^r and 

 leave it in water two days you will turn the water absolutely black 

 from the salts. In the canning process, or Avhere the stuff remains in 

 the cans on an average of six months from one season to the other, 

 you have lost the very properties that you want to save, and although 

 you may save in cooking you will put the entire contents into the pot 

 when you are cooking it, still the salts have been lost to a very large 

 extent. While in the drying process it is entirely saved. 



Senator Raxsdell. How do you pack these different vegetables for 

 preservation and shipment; for instance, tomatoes? 



Mr. HoEST. Wp pack them in carton boxes of pasteboard, which 

 are sufficient for all vegetables, with perhaps the desirability of wrap- 

 ping tomatoes and onions in the carton, and then having thin paraffin 

 paper on the outside or inside in order to keep off the moisture. The 

 tomatoes and tlie onions will take on moisture after dried, although. 

 (hey do not take on sufficient to hurt them. I have had onions and 

 tomatoes exposed to the damp atmosphere of San Francisco for a 

 period of two months' time without any injury whatever to the 

 product, although they have taken on a great deal of moisture. They 

 (ake on moisture just so far, and then they stop and they are not 

 hurt. 



The Chairman. I do not know whether this process of drying 

 fruits and vegetables differs from the one used in Germany and 

 whether it explains to some extent the wonderful power of endurance 

 of the German people. I understand you loiow something about 

 that. 



Mr. HoRsf. The drying plants in Germany are estimated to be in 

 number somewhere between 1,000 and 2,000. There were something 

 like 850 plants before the war, and it is reported — how reliably I do 

 not know — that they now have close on to 2,000 plants, the purpose 

 being, of course, to save everything. 



The Chairman. And the potatoes — how extensively do they dry 

 those ? 



Mr. HoEST. The quantity of potatoes dried in Germany for the last 

 year of which there is official record by our Government is 800.000,000 

 bushels, which is more than twice the quantity of potatoes that are 

 raised in the United States per annum; and figuring it on a per 

 capita basis it is seven times as many potatoes as we raise. On top 

 of that quantity, of course, Germany raises a very large additional 

 amount of potatoes. Their crop in 1915, according to our Govern- 

 ment Yearbook, was, in round figures, 2,000,000,000 bushels, as against 

 350,000,000 bushels in our country. 



The Chairman. Those are Irish potatoes? 



Mr. HoRST. Those are Irish potatoes. 



The Chairman. Does this process preserve sweet potatoes equally 

 as well as Irish potatoes? 



Mr. HoEST. This process will preserve sweet potatoes and Irish 

 potatoes, and all other products, equally well. 



Senator Ransdell. Are you going to tell us how to do that? 



