Travelers and Traveling Author:Eva March Tappan Purchase of this book includes free trial access to www.million-books.com where you can read more than a million books for free. This is an OCR edition with typos. Excerpt from book: Ill HOW REFRIGERATION BRINGS US FOOD When we say that food "spoils," we really mean that bacteria, or plants so tiny that they cannot be seen except with a... more » microscope, are living upon it. It is bacteria that cause butter to become rancid and meat to decay. Bacteria are like the fairies of the story-books; there are good ones and bad ones. When they live upon the bodies of dead animals in the woods and crumble them up and destroy them, they are useful; but when they live upon what we want for our own food and spoil it, we try our best to get rid of them. Some bacteria can be destroyed by drying; others wait contentedly till moisture comes and then set to work again. Heat kills all kinds of bacteria, and that is why boiling or baking any kind of food "sterilizes" it; that is, destroys any bacteria that maybe present. Cold kills most bacteria, though some kinds can live comfortably for months frozen in the center of a cake of ice, and can even keep on growing slowly. Nevertheless, since heat cannot be applied to all sorts of food, cold is generally employed to preserve it. The most common way is to shut it up with ice, as in the refrigerator. A good refrigerator should keep food cool and dry. It is not expected to freeze food, but with a reasonable amount of ice it ought to send the mercury down to 40 or 45 F. The airwithin should be so dry that crackers and dry cereals put into it will not get damp. Wrapping the ice in flannel delays its melting, but does not keep the refrigerator so cool. Food ought not to be set in at haphazard, but carefully arranged. Whatever needs to be kept coldest should be put directly under the ice. Melons, onions, and other things with a strong odor ought to go near the top, while such things as butter and milk, which absorb odors easily, ought to...« less