Baking Powder Facts

From Chicago Tribune. The public is always responsive to ■uggestions ábout the food it eats. Great interest has been taken in the investigations made by the United States md Canadlan governments and by the different boards of health to show the purity or impurity -of milk, baking powders, t-pices, and other articles of daily use in the culinary department of our households. Just now the subject of baking powder is claiming public attention. We all desire pure and wholesotne bread and this cannot be had with the use of impnre or poisonous baking powder. There can be no longer any question that all the cheaper, lower grades of baking powders contain ei-ther alum, lime, or phosphatic acid. The official analyses by the United States and Canadian governments have tberefore been studied with interest and have pretty clearly established the facts upon this subject. The United StateR government report gives the ñames of eiehteen wellknown powders, some of them advertised as pure cream of tartar baking powders, that contain alum. The report shows that the Royal baking powder was found the hiahest in leavening strength, evolving 160.6 cubic inches of gas per siugle ounce of powder. There were eight other branda of cream of tartar powders tested their average strength being reported to be 111.5 cubic inches of gas per ounce of powder. The Canadian government investigations were of a still larger number of powders. The Eoyal baking powder was here also shown the purest and highest in strength, containing 129.32 cubic inches of leavening gas per ounce of powder. Nine other cream of tartar powdera were tested, and their average strength was 89 cubic incbes of gas per ounce of powder. These figures are very instructive to the practical housekeeper. They indícate that the Royal bakihg powder goes more than 33 per cent further in use than the others, or is one-third more economical. Still more important than this, however, they proved this popular article has been brought to the highest deeree of purity - for to it3 superlative purity this superiority in strength is due- and consequently that by its use we may be insured the purest and mos wholesome'food. The powders of lower strength are found to leave large amounts of inert mattere in the food. This fact is phasized by the report of the Ohio State Food Commissioner, who, while finding the Royal practically pure, found no other powder to contain les than 10 per cent. of inert or foreign matters. The public interest in this qnestion has likewise caused to be made investí (rationa by our local authorities. Pro W. S. Haines, of Rush Medical College consulting chemist of the Chicag Board of Health, has found results sim ilar to those reporter1 by the nationa and Canadian authorities. Dr. Hainc says: Rush Medical College, Chicago, III. I have reoently obtained samples o the chief baking powdera in the marke andhavesubjected them tonarefulchem ical examinationto determine their pur ity,wholesomenes8 and leavening power As the result of my tests I find th Royal baking powder superior to all th others in every respect. It is entirel; free from all adultèrations and whole some in purity, and in baking it give ofl'agreater volume of leavening ga thanany other powder. Itis,therefore not only the purest, but also the strong est powder with which I am acquaintec Walter S. Haines. M. D. Consulting Chemist, Chicago Board of Health. The statistics sho w that there is used in the manufacture of the Royal baking powder more than half of all the cream of tartar consumed in the United States for all purposes. The wonderful sale thus indicated for the Royal baking powder - greater than that of all other baking powders combined - is perhaps even a higher evldence than that already quoted of the superiority of this article, and of its indispensableness to modern cookery.