supper at the best table: the diet quietly imposed from the top
the skim milk at E.T.A. has been pre-mixed powdered milk since Charles Tavis assumed the helm four years back and told Mrs. Clarke he wanted the kids’ animal-fat intake halved in a month by any and all means.
Context
Under all of Troeltsch's paranoid milk-theorizing sits a real administrative fact about bodies being managed: the skim has been secret powdered milk for four years because Tavis "wanted the kids' animal-fat intake halved in a month by any and all means." The dietary control is real, top-down, and covert — poured into real-milk bags for "a kind of placebo effect." The institution engineers what goes into the machine and manages the machine's belief about it too.