[II]
THE “SOUPES”
I shall never think of Belgium without seeing endless processions of silent men and black-shawled women, pitchers in hand, waiting, waiting for the day’s pint of soup. One and one-quarter million make a long procession. If you have imagined it in the sunshine, think of it in the rain!
One may shut himself up in his house and forget the war for a few hours, but he dare not venture outside. If he does he will quickly stumble against a part of this line, or on hundreds of little children guarding their precious cards as they wait to be passed in to one of the “Enfants Débiles” dining-rooms, or on a very long line of women in front of a communal store where “identity cards” permit the purchase every week of limited rations of American bacon or rice and a few other foods at fixt prices (prices set by American efficiency below those of America itself); or on a group of black-shawled mothers waiting for the dinner that enables them to nurse the babies in their arms.
The destitute must have a “supplement” to their daily ration of carbohydrates and fat which will give them protein—says the C. R. B., and thus we have “Soupes”;—but these dry statements of engineers now become dieticians convey to no one the human story of these dumb, waiting lines.
We can have little conception of what it means for just one city, the Agglomeration of Brussels, for instance, to keep 200,000 out of its 1,000,000 people on the “Soupes,” not for a month or two, but for over two years! Nor does this include the soup made by the “Little Bees,” an organization which cares especially for children, for the thousands in their cantines; or the soup served to the 8,500 children in sixty communal schools of central Brussels at four o’clock each afternoon, which is prepared in a special kitchen. These quantities are all over and above the regular soup served to 200,000—and do not think of soup as an American knows it, think more of a kind of stew; for it is thick, and, in the words of the C. R. B., “full of calories.”
To make it for central Brussels the slaughter-house has been converted into a mighty kitchen, in charge of a famous pre-war maître d’hôtel. Ninety-five cooks and assistants from the best restaurants of the capital have been transferred from the making of pâtés and soufflés to the daily preparation of 25,000 quarts of soup! And they use the ingenuity born of long experience, to secure an appetizing variety while strictly following the orders of directing physicians. They had been doing this over 700 days when I visited the kitchen, but there was still a fresh eagerness to produce something savory and different. And one must remember that the changes can come only from shifting the emphasis from our dried American peas to beans, from carrots to cabbages, from macaroni to rice. The quantity of meat remains about the same, 1,200 pounds a day, which, tho the committee kills its own cattle, costs almost fifty cents a pound. There must be, too, 10,000 pounds of potatoes. The great fear has been that this quantity might be cut, and unfortunately, in November, 1916, that fear was realized to the extent of a 2,000 pound drop—and then remedied by the C. R. B. with more beans, more rice, more peas!
Personal inspection of this marvelous kitchen is the only thing that could give an idea of its extraordinary cleanliness. The building offers great space, plenty of air and light and unlimited supply of water. The potato rooms, where each potato is put through two peeling processes, are in one quarter. Near them are the green vegetable rooms with their stone troughs, where everything is washed four or five times. The problem of purchasing the vegetables is so great that a special committee has been formed at Malines to buy for Brussels on the spot. One of the saving things for Belgium has been that she produces quantities of these delicious greens. In the smaller towns a committeeman usually goes each morning to market the day’s supply. For instance, the lawyer who occupies himself with the vegetables for the Charleroi soup, makes his own selection at four o’clock each morning, and is extravagantly proud of the quality of his carrots and lettuces! The most important section, naturally, is that which cares for the meat and unsmoked bacon or “lard” the C. R. B. brings in. The more fat in the soup, the happier the recipient! With the little meat that can still be had in the butcher shop, selling at over one dollar a pound, one can imagine what it means to find a few pieces in the pint of soup! Then there is the great kitchen proper, with the one hundred and forty gas-heated caldrons, and the dozens of cooks hurrying from one to another. There seem to be running rivers of water everywhere, a perpetual washing of food and receptacles and premises.
The first shift of cooks arrives at two-thirty in the morning to start the gas under the one hundred and forty great kettles, for an early truck-load of cans must be off at 8 o’clock. That shift leaves at noon; the second works from 8 till 5, on an average wage of four francs a day and soupe!