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Show 4 L By Frances Ainsworth The other morning:, as I packed my small daughter's lunch box for school, I began thinking about the tremendous role waxed paper plays in our every-day life. Why, I'm sure I must use it a dozen different ways a day to wrap lunch box sandwiches ... to keep food fresh when stored in the refrigerator . . . and on my kitchen table when I -roll pie dough to mention just a few! When I stopped at my grocer's that afternoon, I remarked about it to him, and he told me some very unusual facts. Did you know that waxed paper was used to keep products clean and sanitary as early as 1854 ? That enough waxed paper is used every year tocircle the earth 500 times? Well, that figure really amazed me and I decided de-cided to find out how waxed paper is made. , Perhaps you've been curious, too. Waxed paper is merely a thin sheet of paper which has been treated with purified paraffin, a wax similar to that used in preserving pre-serving jelly. To make it, rolls of paper are fed over rollers into tanks of hot liquid paraffin. Then the paper goes through a squeezing squeez-ing process similar to that of your washing machine wringer, and passes into a cold water bath which sets the wax. I watched the whole procedure one afternoon and it was really fascinating. Every woman knows that waxed paper pays for itself in the foods it saves. Here's how it saves food and money for me: Whenever I serve bread, crackers or cereals, I always make sure I properly re-close re-close the waxed paper wrapper. 1 This helps keep them fresher longer, and in the long run saves me money. Try it. It takes but a few minutes. |