144 
The RURAL. NEW-YORKER 
January 29, 1921 
HOPE FARM NOTES 
Some i/ears o<io you printed something 
of the strange “language ” or jargon em¬ 
ployed by waiters in certain New York 
restaurants in giving orders to the cook. 
Can you tell us about it once moref 
8. H. J. 
I can, though it seems to me doubtful 
if many readers will be interested. As 
individuals, most of us will agree with 
the farmer that I once worked for. That 
man was very fond of what he called 
“sowbelly and greens”—which, of course, 
is boiled bacon and cabbage. Some deli¬ 
cate visitor was offended at the name, 
and gave him what he said was the French 
for it. The farmer very truly said: “I 
don’t care what you call it so long as 
you put it on the table within reach.” 
The most interesting item about food to 
a farmer is the price he receives for it, 
while the consumer worries most about 
what he pays. The language used by va¬ 
rious middlemen doesn’t matter so much, 
although I presume we should all be bet-* 
ter off if we eould master several lan¬ 
guages. We are all supposed to be Amer¬ 
icans, and English is our natural lan¬ 
guage. yet the different classes of Ameri¬ 
cans are developing dialects or forms of 
speech which seem to be splitting the good 
old English up like a pile of kindling 
wood. Perhaps that is a good thing, in 
its way. for the new words and dialects 
are based upon personal objects or hab¬ 
its. and they serve to enlighten, just as 
kindling seems to ignite the longer sticks. 
***** 
I find many definitions of “language.” 
Here is one; “Articulate utterance for 
the expression of thought.” Here is an¬ 
other : “A medium of communication 
among intelligent "beings.” You may take 
your choice, or add or subtract as you like. 
The “intelligent beings” whose language 
we are now to discuss inhabited the little 
eating-houses which formerly were so 
numerous in the lower part of New York. 
Times have greatly changed now. New 
York is fed in different ways—largely by 
big “chain” restaurants or lunch coun¬ 
ters. In the old days waiters yelled their 
orders—often across a big room. Now 
there is little yelling; the waiter takes 
your order quietly or writes it on paper. 
This is what I read the other day : 
“Noise is an automatic alarm, indicat¬ 
ing lost motion and wasted energy. Si¬ 
lence is economy." 
A deaf man must agree with that, 
though I must confess that it is an ele¬ 
mental desire of human nature to waste 
something now and then. I imagine this 
silence treatment has taken something 
out of the language of restaurant life, 
much as modern popular music has driven 
away many of the fine old songs we used 
to sing. 
* * * * * 
The old-time restaurant was a small 
affair. In front were tables for guests, 
with waiters wearing more or less clean 
aprons circling among them. At the back 
of the room were two little cells or cubby¬ 
holes, where food was served and dishes 
were washed. Some of the women who 
read this walk about as far as from Bos¬ 
ton to Omaha in traveling about their 
big kitchens during a lifetime of farm 
work. City rents are high, and they 
save the cook exercise. He is usually 
a fat man—a living advertisement for his 
products. At one side of his little room 
is a flat piece of sheet iron, with many 
gas jets burning under it. Turn on the 
full gas power and you could almost beat 
it red hot. By the side is a little nickel- 
plated affair with several large bowls and 
steam pipes. In a corner are two metal 
urns, one for coffee and one for ten. with 
another smaller one containing milk. In 
front of the cook are eggs, meat, a boiled 
ham. loaves of bread and various other 
kinds of food. There is a boy in with him, 
and between them they can reach any 
part of the furniture or any of the food 
with hardly a stop. In a smaller room 
behind them is the dishwasher. The 
dirty dishes are put in through a slide. 
This man scrapes the remnants off into a 
pail and puts the dishes into a wire screen. 
They are dusted over with soap powder 
or sprayed with kerosene and then the 
tray is put down into a stout chest or box. 
The cover is clamped dov T n, a valve 
turned, and jets of steam pour in over 
and around tiles dishes. Some of them may 
need a little hand work, but after steam¬ 
ing and drying, back they go for more 
service—sanitary and free from germs. 
$ H* V V 
Now comes the rash hour at noon—■ 
everyone feeling like a farmer with hay 
down and a rumbling in the west. Let 
us stand beside the cook, if you can crowd 
in. and listen to a little restaurant lan¬ 
guage. Here comes a waiter. He stands 
by the window and roars: 
“Draw one!” 
You and I might stop and ask : “One 
what?” The cook understands. Of course, 
this man wanted a cup of coffee. With 
two quick motions the cooks holds a cup 
under the faucet, partly fills the cup with 
black coffee, adds a dash of milk in the 
same way, and the job is done. 
“hi the dark comes the next order. 
It is light as a lamp to the cook; he 
knows that a customer wants his coffee 
without milk—and he gets it. 
If you smile at this I will ask you why 
this is not as serviceable as for the 
waiter to come and say: 
“Be kind enough to prepare a cup of 
the beverage which cheers and not inebri¬ 
ates and which is really a decoction ob¬ 
tained by steeping the fruit of a certain 
tropical shrub in hot water. The gentle¬ 
man who orders this requests me to ask 
you to abstain from adding the customary 
lacteal fluid.” 
“Brand the steer!" 
The cook at once does the most obvious 
thing. He puts a piece of beefsteak over 
the fire. 
“Sunny side up!” 
No; nothing to do with the sunny side 
of the barn. The boy catches up two eggs 
and with a quick motion breaks them 
out on that hot iron, over the gas flame. 
He has previously greased it with a brush 
dipped in melted fat. “Sunny side up” 
means fried on one side only. “Turn ’em 
over” means both sides fried. 
“Gland!" roars a great voice at the 
window. That is easy. The cook snatches 
a piece of liver off a near-by plate and 
tosses it on the hot sheet iron. There is 
a plate of fried bacon all ready to serve. 
“Beef and!" 
We can all understand “beef,” but what 
is “and”? It must be something of vital 
importance. lit is. Watch the cook. 
With a great knife he slashes off a slice 
of corned beef from the piece before him 
and adds a heaping spoonful of baked 
beans. They represent the “and” of 
many a good meal. 
“Pork and Boston" comes an order from 
some literary gentleman. We n”e to 
know that there are two styles of baked 
beans. New York is crude and a little 
lacking in artistic skill. Her beans are 
merely boiled and baked in an open dish. 
Boston is a city of culture. Her Iwr- 
are boiled and then slowly baked in deep 
brown pots, with pork and molasses. You 
have your choice of culture or plain beans. 
“Woodchuck!" That waiter must be 
an artist—born on a farm. Watch the 
cook. He merely reaches up to a shelf 
and takes down two sausages, which the 
boy puts over the fire. Then we see the 
connection. A woodchuck is a ground¬ 
hog. and what is sausage but a hog well 
ground ud? 
“Sociable." This must be another 
country-bred waiter, whose mind goes 
back to old-time country feasts. The boy 
reaches up to a shelf and takes one of 
several white bowls standing there. He 
pours the contents into one of the metal 
bowls beside hie heater. We see that it 
is milk containing six or eight oysters 
well seasoned with salt and pepper.' The 
boy turns a steam valve and almost be¬ 
fore you think about it the oyster stew 
is boiling. A lump of butter is'added and 
out it goes to some guest. The waiter 
has forgotten all about the old church 
suppers at home, and the joke about rub¬ 
ber oysters, for here he is back. 
“Woof! Woof! The ax!" 
It might be ancient Gaelic for all we 
would know, but the cook knows what 
animal grunts and what we do with an 
ax. so the boy puts a pork chop on the 
irons and everyone 's satisfied. 
“Two on a raft!" 
Nothing hard about that. The cook 
break two eggs into a small pan of boil¬ 
ing water and they are soon “poached.” 
There is a plate of toasted bread all readv. 
Two slices make the raft which floats the 
poached eggs off to some customer, who 
pays 40 cents for them. 
“Beat ’em up!" 
Easy to understand. There is a dish 
of scrambled eggs kept hot beside the fire. 
All you do is to serve out a small portion 
with a few pieces of fried bacon. 
“Moo! Moo!” 
Here is our countryman once more, 
and. of course, the boy draws a glass of 
cold milk and passes it out. 
“Chinaman !" 
By this time we begin to understand, 
and we are not surprised to see the cook 
serve out a generous dish of rice pudding, 
and we are ready for the next one. 
“M ystery !" 
Of course, the boy takes a spoonful of 
hash from a dish at the side and browns 
it on the hot iron. 
“Brown three!" 
Three what? The boy reaches out for 
a big pitcher and pours three small round 
patches of batter on his hot sbce 1 1 <• 
turns them over with his broad knife, and 
we have three good griddle cakes. If the 
order had been “three holes” he would 
have sent out three doughnuts. 
“ All wool—strong!" 
It is hardly a yard wide—the distance 
between the cook and the kettle over the 
gas flame. The cook takes off the cover 
and ladles out a good helping of mutton 
stew. “Strong” menus that an extra 
supply of onions must be served with it. 
Had the waiter added “doughboys.” the 
cook would have given an extra dumpling. 
***** 
It is hard for one who has not watched 
and listened to realize how rapidly the 
cook and his helper work. Every motion 
counts, and there are no extra steps, for 
every item is right in place. We may 
learn a great lesson in saving steps, if 
not in economy of language. If a farmer 
had his tools and supplies in a shop as 
well arranged as this little kitchen is. he 
could save many hours in the busy season. 
Mother could have far more time to her¬ 
self—and that wouM mean time for the 
family—if she could have such conveni¬ 
ences in her kitchen. Would we gain 
anything by trying to economize in lan¬ 
guage? Well, many of us talk too much ; 
there is no doubt as to that; yet language 
is often a relief to the weary mind. 
Without perhaps knowing it. we all use 
words and phrases which mean little to 
others. I once testified in a court trial, 
and spoke of using a bucksaw. Not a 
man on the jury knew what it was. We 
all know the story of the farmer -who told 
the city hired man to go to the barn and 
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