Page:Richards and Treat - Quantity Cookery.djvu/18

6 conditions as they have been in the average home. It should consider itself an industrial plant where one of the aims is maximum production with minimum labor; and it should realize that proper equipment and proper working conditions are necessary in the accomplishment of this aim. Even though the labor supply may be adequate, efficient planning of menus demands that there be an adjustment between those foods requiring much labor and those requiring little, so that proper balance may be maintained.

In discussing the limitations in menu making the element of cost has come up again and again. It becomes a definite restriction in institutions that work on a budget, or where the group to be served demands good wholesome food at the lowest price. As examples of such institutions there are the factory cafeteria, the school lunch and the college cafeteria.

Though menus must be made out in advance of the day when they are to be used, they should be sufficiently elastic to allow for proper utilization of left-overs. Using left-overs may mean very little change and substitution, or may require complete revision of the day's meals. Left-overs must be used, for it is only by constant care that the food cost can be kept down to a minimum. That this is true of all institutions, whether great or small, is shown by the extreme care exercised in the largest hotels to the end that no food shall be wasted. Where there is family service, rather than plate service from the kitchen, there will probably be a large amount of left-over food. It requires a good deal of ingenuity to use these left-overs in some other form so as to maintain variety and that element of surprise which is so essential. In the cafeteria or other institution using à la carte service the left-over problem is not so serious. It is very nicely taken care of in tea