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ANYONE CAN COOK

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Lucille Iremonger, who describ-
ed herself in a BBC program as
“the most useless bride who ever
stepped into a kitchen,” produced
a cookery book that was published
in three languages. eighteen
months after she first began to
cook. This remarkable achieve-
ment was the odder because her
book was for people who had
“practically nothing to cook.”

Mrs. Iremonger clarified her
contradictory statements by ex-
plaining that her husband was a
district officer on his first tour of
duty, which took him to the Ellice
Islands in the Pacific. No one but
the interpreter could speak English
and nobody could cook in the Eng-
lish way so the new bride had to
learn to cook and to speak Ellice
all at once. Supplies were scarce
and she had no fresh beef, milk or
butter, no green vegetables, little
fruit and inadequate water.

When she had learnt a little
about cooking she decided to put
down fifty of her laboriously col-
lected recipes in the Ellice lang-
uage. Her book soon became
known by the people of the Ellice
and Gilbert Islands and_ they
christened it ‘“‘Tusi Cuka’”’, coming
to her begging her to put in re-
cipes using unambitious materials.

Her simplifying of these went
on to such an extent that her list
of essential ingredients became
smaller and smaller. She had fish.
eggs and coconuts and the rare
cut of pork seen on great occasions.
The only imported goods were
those that could be bought in
small quantities from the local
trader’s shops or passing ships—
potatoes, rice, onions, flour, sugar,
tinned milk and butter, dripping

Anyone can cook—Anywhere

and coffee. And this, bar season-
ing, was all.

She pointed out that coconut
milk could be substituted for tin-
ned, the local tuber. taro, would
do instead of potatoes or rice, mol-
asses from boiled-down coconut
could replace sugar, and onions
could be abandoned, That left
flour as the only really necessary
import and, 1f hard put to it, ban-
anas could be saved up to make
banana flour. 7

From these meagre ingredients
it was possible to make many of
her fifty recipes, sixteen of fish,
egg and meat, eight from vege-
tables, fourteen puddings and
seven cakes. “Tusi Cuka’s” glos-
sary explained the simplest cook-
ing terms—toasting, making bread
crumbs, seasoning, flavoring,
steaming and keating an egg, all of
them totally unknown to the Ellice
Islanders.

The little book had success with
both the Islanders and the white
population and when the Ameri-
cans came to the Pacific after
Pearl Harbour “Tusi Cuka” was a
natural souvenir to send home.
Complimentary letters soon came
from women in America who had
tried out the recipes from the Eng-
lish section printed at the back of
the book but the most treasured
were those from museums with
Pacific collections.

“Tusi Cuka” is the first book to
be published in the Ellice lang-
uage and it now lies in isolated
splendour in the museums’ glass
cases. “But neither the Ellice Is-
landers nor I shall ever be able to
take it seriously.” said Lucille Ire-
monger.—London Calling.

Courtesy Columbian Magazine Section