Has the reader ever spent a summer in a farmhouse and casually come into a corner of the woodshed where smoked hams were suspended from the rafters? If so, he will remember the appetizing fragrance which suddenly made his mouth water and make him long for breakfast. Some persons think they do not like smoked meats; but they almost invariably do when they thus come across the real thing.
[Illustration: Where smoked hams were suspended from the rafters]
Smoke is not only the best of all preservatives, it is also the most valuable of condiments, imparting to meats or fish a delicate aroma without altering their natural flavor. A famous Austrian physiologist, Professor Brücke, pointed out many years ago that smoked meats are more digestible than fresh meats; but he did not give the reason, which is that the delicate yet penetrating Flavor added by the smoke creates an appetite and thus causes a flow of digestive juices to the stomach. The American consumer is now usually deprived of this healthful condiment and wholesome pleasure because those who handle pork products have discovered that they can save much time, trouble, and money by soaking them, as just intimated, in cheap solutions of chemicals instead of smoking them in the old-fashioned way, carefully and _slowly_.
Farmers are busy folk and therefore naturally eager to learn ways of lessening their labors. They consequently succumb readily on reading an alluring advertisement like the following, clipped from a paper published in a Western village:
There's a new and better way of smoking meat. You accomplish in but a trifle of time all that you can by the tedious old fashioned process. Your meat will be hard and firm, it will be protected from all germs and insects and it will have a more delicate flavor than if smoked in the old way. Use
It contains all the preservative elements of the smoke, without the rank, disagreeable elements. You simply apply it with a brush or sponge, giving the meat one or two coats, and the smoking is done. Price 75c."
In England, also, long famed for its deliciously flavored smoked hams and bacon, the farmers and packers have been approached by the tempter. "A case in point," says the "Lancet" of February 5, 1910, "is seen in a rapid method of making hams, bacon, and certain fishes appear to be smoked by applying to them a fluid called 'smoke essence.'"
