Evening Republican, Volume 15, Number 193, Rensselaer, Jasper County, 16 August 1911 — JESTS BY EPICURE [ARTICLE]

JESTS BY EPICURE

German Makes Many Joke* About American Cooking.

Criticises' Our Sweet Tooth and Declares Our Roasts Are Tasteless —Tells of Chickens as Big as Storks.

New York—Ernst von Wolgozen, who came to New York last winter to study social conditions, is a man of letters and in his own country ranks higher in a literary sense than many of his countrymen who visit the United States. It was to be expected, therefore, that he would carry home valuable impressions of life here, but! he seems to have been impressed chiefly by the crudities of the cuisine. To him American cooking is so gro-' tesque and naive a gastromonlc system that his ridicule of it lies in the least serious fields of burlesque. As| a conclusion to all be observed here, he thinks Americans want everything so sweet that a frequent visit to the dentist is Inevitable. From the coffee in the morning until the late supper he finds that Americans must have their sweet tooth satisfied or they are unhappy. It is not easy to say in what kinds of homes Herr von Wolgozen studied life here, since he finds that the domestic service In the best houses is bo poor that it is difficult to get the dishes washed and the result of this is the necessity of getting along with one knife. This condition he says makes it difficult to eat roast beef, as the silver knives will not cut it and there are no houses in whihh both kinds of knives are found. A / Ho remarks that of all the/roaati served on New York is alone possible to eat, since lamb chops and veal cutlets are tasteless. Perhaps the most astonishing statement he makes in reference to the roasts is that at a certain house he received "for dinner honey as a compote. Surely this is unique not only In his experience, but in that of most New Yorkers. Compote or stewed fruits are seldom served in American families, but are to be found on the tables of Germans, so Herr von Wolgozen must have had this experience in the house of some of his compatriots. “Game," he says in one place, “is much more eaten in the United States than it is with us. Poultry grows to the most improbable dimensions her#, haye seen chickens as tall as stores and as fat as a poodle dog. “The flesh of these abnormally large beasts is, however, not tender; and the limbs in particular acquire an entirely different character fronl the flesh on the breasts. It turns brown and succulent in the roasting, while the white flesh remains dry and flavorless. It is evident that what Herr von Wolgozen describes as a chicken must have been a turkey. Some of his other experiences at table were more remarkable, but they probably hap pened in a boarding house —if the}, happened anywhere. He says tha. young chicken is even served with sweet flour sauce, which he finds very disagreeable, since even in the finer houses the servants will not wash the dishes and it Is necessary to eat everything on the plate with the chicken and the sweet sauce. He says that in his boarding house after soup a piece of fish was served to him. About this plate from which he was supposed to eat the fish were lair many small dishes containing vegetables, chicken and various combinations of vegetables and meat He was compelled to eat these on the fisff plate and liked only potatoes, which, baked in their skins, Jie found delicious. He observes with the air of an authority that all the fish from the Atlantic ocean are so poor that only the river and fresh-water fish are re garded as worth eating.” “I do not think," he said, “that there is in the three kingdoms of nature anything that is not to be found in an American salad. The groundwork of this is composed of two or three large! green leaves. On these is poured oil mixed with vinegar, and there arises a more or less striking structure of all Impossible sours and sweets, salts and bitters, toughs and tenders, liquid, edible and inedible objects."