PURE AND IMPURE FOODS. 



Edited by C. F. Langworthy, Ph.D. 

 Author of "On Citraconic, Itaconic and Mesaconic Acids," "Fish as Food," etc. 



"What a Man Eats He Is." 



TEA PRODUCTION IN BRITISH POSSES- 

 SIONS. 



In a paper on British grown tea, read be- 

 fore the Society of Arts in London, Mr. A. 

 G. Stanton stated that the total quantity of 

 tea exported in 1902 from all tea producing 

 countries was, in round numbers, 615,000,000 

 pounds, of which India and Ceylon togetlier 

 contributed more than one-half. The area 

 devoted to tea in India rose from 125,000 

 acres in 1875 to 284,000 acres in 1885, and 

 to 525,000 acres in 1902. In 1880 the tea 

 plantations of Ceylon occupied only 9,000 

 acres. Ten years later they covered 220,000 

 acres, and in 1903 their extent was 386,000 

 acres. 



Speaking. of the efforts to obtain a market 

 for Ceylon tea in the United States, Mr. 

 Stanton said it soon became apparent that 

 if the American market was to be captured, 

 ''determined efforts must be made for the 

 possession of the market for green and un- 

 colored tea. Hence Ceylon planters, out of 

 a tax raised by government, decided to give 

 a bounty for making suitable green or un- 

 colored tea. This resulted in small quanti- 

 ties being manufactured ; and a trade gradu- 

 ally grew up, until last year the bounty was 

 paid on 11,119,766 pounds, and a large mar- 

 ket has at last been found in North America 

 for this class of tea." 



India, too, it is claimed, is beginning to 

 increase her production of green tea as the 

 result of a bounty, first offered in 1901 ; and 

 this bounty was paid last year on 1,891,914 

 pounds of such tea. India has also offered 

 a bounty for the production of Oolong tea, 

 in the hope of further increasing her sup- 

 ply of teas suitable "for consumption in 

 North America." 



The consumption of tea is larger, it would 

 appear, in Great Britain than in most other 

 countries ; though the Australasian colonists 

 appear to be larger tea consumers than the 

 people of the mother country. The figures 

 given on comparative consumption per capita 

 were the following : Australasia 7 pounds, 

 Great Britain 6 pounds, Canada nearly 4 

 pounds, the Netherlands i l / 2 pounds, Russia 

 about i^4 pounds, and the United States 

 about one pound. 



The production of tea in Java amounted 

 in 1890 to about 7,000,000 pounds, but has 

 increased until it now amounts to nearly 

 20,000,000 pounds a year. 



The British colony of Natal has at pres- 

 ent 3,542 acres devoted to tea, and, with a 

 duty of 12 cents a pound on imported tea, 

 and a customs union securing free access to 



the markets of Cape Colony, Orange River 

 Colony, and the Transvaal, it finds ready 

 sale in South Africa for the limited produce 

 of its plantations. 



Tea growing has been tried in Jamaica, 

 Fiji, Borneo, Mauritius, and the Straits 

 Settlements, but has not gone beyond the 

 experimental stage except in the last named, 

 where about 35,000 pounds were produced 

 in 1902. Jamaica has, however, about 75 

 acres in tea plantations. 



MACARONI MAKING. 



Real macaroni is made of hard wheat of 

 a semi-translucent sort, which grows in 

 Southern Europe and Algeria, and which 

 is richer in gluten and other nitrogenous 

 matter than soft wheat. Macaroni is noth- 

 ing but flour and water, but it must be 

 carefully made. The best flour for making 

 it is, coarsely ground and called "semo- 

 lina." The flour is mixed with boiling 

 water in a cylinder which converts it into 

 stiff paste. Then it is rolled under a huge 

 granite wheel which flattens it into a 

 smooth mass. The man at the wheel cuts 

 1 into squares and claps it under the wheel 

 again and again until it is . thoroughly 

 kneaded. 



According to the writer quoted, the 

 dough then goes into an upright metal 

 cylinder closed at the lower end with a 

 thick disk of copper. This is pierced with 

 openings, through which a plunge piston 

 squeezes the dough into threads. The 

 threads are cut off at regular lengths 

 and handed to a man who hangs them 

 on wooden drying rods. In making spa- 

 ghetti the holes are small and the dough 

 comes out in solid strings. In the manu- 

 facture of macaroni the holes are larger 

 and centered by mandrels which make the 

 tubes hollow. Macaroni is also made into 

 pastes of various shapes, alphabets and thin 

 strips, cut by machinery. 



When the macaroni is -shaped, it is sent 

 up into a drying room, the small pieces in 

 trays, the long strips of vermicelli, the thin, 

 solid strips of spaghetti, and the large 

 hollow tubes of macaroni on long poles the 

 size of a broomstick. Here a current of 

 air dries the paste. Genuine macaroni al- 

 ways shows the bent ends where the long 

 hairpin shaped lengths have been hung 

 over the poles. Cheap imitations are made 

 from common flour, which is not glutinous 

 enough to bear its own weight, and, there- 

 fore, is dried flat. 



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