In the "Before you start to cook" section of Step by Step Cookery Marguerite Patten offers information to do with the basic rules of cookery, time management and, as in this chapter "Food the family need", instructions on how to stay healthy.
These sections are reminiscent of Mrs Beeton's Book of Household Management in that they aim to teach you just that - how to a manage a household.
Marguerite Patten tells her readers to "make sure" that they "provide" (14) their family with such things as a "reasonable amount of fat" - this commands makes it clear that Patten feels it is a woman's role as a mother and wife to maintain a healthy household. She also goes beyond simply making suggestions about what food to serve in order to remind her reader that "Children should be encouraged to clean their teeth." This fairly obvious statement fits with the identifiable tone of Marguerite Patten's work - easy to digest information that all women should know, offered in a way that doesn't seek to patronize - and is in many ways, utterly timeless.
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