What to eat and when

The amount of fat in meat varies from two to forty per cent., according to the animal and to its condition at the time of killing.

The best meats are from young animals which have been kept fat and have not been subjected to any work to toughen the muscles.

It is possible to combine the fat and the lean of meat so as to meet the requirements of the body without waste. About ninety-seven per cent. of meat is assimilated by the system, while a large part of the vegetable matter consumed is excreted as refuse.

The compounds contained in animal foods are much like those of the body, therefore they require comparatively little digestion to prepare them for assimilation—this work having been done by the animal—while the vegetable compounds require much change by the digestive system before they can be used in the body.

The proportion of albuminoids, gelatinoids, and extractives in meat vary with different meats and with different cuts of the same meat.

The albuminoids of meat include the meat tissue, or the muscle cells. These constitute by far the greater part of the meat.

The gelatinoids are derived from the connective tissue forming the sheath of the muscle and of bundles of muscles, the skin, tendons, and the casing of bone. Gelatins are made from these and, if pure and prepared in a cleanly manner, they are wholesome.

Gelatin is distinguishable in rich meat soups, which jelly when cool.

The gelatinoids alone have not a large nutritive value; they serve to spare the albumin from being used, though they cannot replace albumin in the diet. They also, to some extent, keep the muscles from being consumed when starches, sugars, and fats are lacking.

The extractives are found most abundantly in the flesh of animals and birds noted for their muscular activity, as in game. Some of them exert a stimulant action on the nervous system and others are appetizers, giving to cooked meats, broths, etc., their pleasing flavor. In case of anemia, in which it is necessary to build red blood corpuscles, the blood of beef, the thought of which is usually repellent, may be made very palatable if it is heated sufficiently to bring out the flavor of the extractives, and then seasoned.

Unless the beef extracts on the market contain the blood tissue, in addition to the extractives, they are not particularly nourishing and are only valuable in soups, etc., as appetizers.

Soups for nourishment should be made by cooking the bones, connective tissue, and a part of the meat. Bones and connective tissue alone make an appetizing soup, but it contains little nutriment.

One reason why meat soups should constitute the first course at dinner is because the extractives stimulate the appetite and start the flow of gastric juices. Bouillons contain no nourishment, but they may be used as stimulant restoratives to the muscles, or as a basis for vegetables, rice, or barley to give them flavor.

Roasted flesh seems to be more completely digested than boiled meat; raw meat is more easily digested than cooked; rare meat is more easily digested than that thoroughly cooked.

Roasted young chicken and veal are tender, easily masticated, and easily and rapidly digested in the stomach. This is one reason why the white meats are considered a good diet for the invalid, though veal is usually avoided in cases of dyspepsia, as, if too young, it may cause diarrhea; if too old, it is less digestible than beef.

Fat meats remain in the stomach a much longer time than lean meats; thus, gastric digestion of pork, which usually contains much fat, is especially difficult, requiring from three and one-half to four hours (see page 22).

Preserved and canned meats should be eaten with the utmost caution, care being taken to know that they are put up by firms which use extreme care in their preparation. Inferior meat is sometimes used in the preparation of these foods. If meats are not fresh and the canning not carefully done, they may become putrid after being put up.

Fish and sea foods are, many of them, rich in protein, as noted in Table IV. They should never be used unless absolutely fresh.

The idea is prevalent that fish is a brain food. Fish is easily digested and builds brain as well as other tissue, but no more readily than beef does, or any easily digested, absorbed and assimilated food which contains a goodly proportion of protein.

Lobsters are difficult of digestion and contain little nutrition, so are not valuable as a food, though they are relished by many on account of their flavor.

Oysters, raw, are easier to digest than when cooked. Oysters should not be eaten during the spawning season from May to September.

Mussels are nutritious when well prepared and are rapidly gaining in popularity.

Clams furnish a valuable and nutritious food when prepared in chowder form. Clam broth will often be retained on an irritable stomach when other food is rejected by it.

Care should be taken to ascertain the method of their production as typhoid fever has been contracted from eating shell fish whose feeding beds were near or in polluted water.

Eggs are excellent articles of food for nutrition and for tissue building. They have practically the same value in the diet as meat, and make a very good substitute for meat. Egg yolk in abundance is often prescribed when it is necessary to supply a very nutritious and easily assimilated diet.

Eggs consist chiefly of two nutrients—protein and fat (ten per cent.). Because they contain so large a proportion of protein they are classified as nitrogenous foods.

The yolk, which is about one-third fat, contains iron, sulphur, potassium, calcium, magnesium, and phosphorus. The white contains some fat and phosphorus. The white and the yolk contain equal quantities of protein. The white of the egg is almost pure albumin.

The dark stain made by eggs on silver is due to the sulphur.

The iron in the yolk is a valuable assistant in building red blood corpuscles.

Eggs, in common with other proteins, are changed, mostly in the stomach, into peptone. That not digested in the stomach, as is the case with other proteins, is changed in the intestine.

If the egg is old, or if its absorption is delayed in the intestine, it decomposes, producing gas, and may cause intestinal disorder. For this reason no stale egg should ever be served, especially to an invalid.

One reason why eggs disagree with some is because too much fat is eaten at the same time. Egg yolk contains fat and if much extra fat is eaten indigestion and fermentation in the intestine may result. This is particularly true in those who digest fat with difficulty.

When eggs seem to disagree or the system does not assimilate them well on account of the fat in the yolk, and eggs are desirable to supply the protein in the diet, the whites, which contain practically no fat, may be used. They should be well beaten and if digestion is weak they may be mixed with fruit juices.

The citric acid in lemons and oranges partially digests the egg, the gastric juice quickly changing it to peptone.

One method of preparing eggs, which is especially valuable for those having delicate stomachs, is in egg lemonade or orangeade. Thoroughly beat the egg, add the juice of half a lemon or orange, sugar to taste, and fill the glass with water.

Grape juice, cream, and cocoa, if assimilated, may be used in place of lemon or orange, in order to give variety when it is necessary to use eggs freely.

Eggnog is another means of taking raw eggs.

One method of testing the freshness of eggs is to drop them into a strong, salt brine made by adding two ounces of salt to a pint of water. A fresh egg will at once sink to the bottom. If the egg is three days old the surface of the shell will be even with the surface of the water and an egg two weeks old will float mostly above the surface.

The opinion is prevalent that a hard-boiled egg is difficult of digestion, but this depends entirely on the mastication. If it is masticated so that it is a pulp before being swallowed, a hard-boiled egg is readily digested.

A soft-boiled egg should not be boiled longer than three or four minutes, or better, should be put into warm water, be allowed to come to a boil, then set off the fire and the egg be allowed to remain in the water for ten minutes. This method cooks the egg through more evenly.

Another method of cooking the yolk evenly with the white is to put the egg in cold water, let the water come to a boil, and again immerse the egg in cold water. The immersing in cold water after boiling makes hard-boiled eggs peel readily.

CARBO-NITROGENOUS FOODS

Under this class come cereals, legumes, nuts, milk, and milk products. In these foods the nitrogenous and carbonaceous elements are more evenly proportioned than in either the carbonaceous or nitrogenous groups. The different food elements in this group are so evenly divided that one could live for a considerable length of time on any one food. Some animals build flesh from nuts alone, while the herbivorous animals live on cereals and plants.

Under cereals, used by man for food, come wheat, oats, rye, barley, rice, and corn. As will be noted by Table V, cereals contain a large proportion of starch and are therefore used largely for heat and energy. Rice contains the largest proportion and next to rice, wheat flour.

TABLE V
Cereals

The values as given in the table refer to the whole of the grain. When the outer coverings are removed, as in the white flour and the outer covering of rice, the proportion of carbohydrates is increased and the protein and ash are almost entirely eliminated.

There is no part of the world, except the Arctic regions, where cereals are not extensively cultivated. From the oats and rye of the north, to the rice of the hot countries, grains of some kind are staple foods.

If one’s work calls for extreme muscular exertion, the cereals may be eaten freely, but if one’s habits are sedentary, and the cereals are used in excess, there is danger of clogging the system with too much starch. Indeed, for one whose occupation is indoors and requires little muscular activity, a very little cereal food, such as bread, cake, etc., will suffice; the carbohydrates will be supplied, in sufficient quantity, in vegetables.

Mineral matter is supplied in sufficient quantity in almost all classes of foods.

Cereals and legumes supply nutrients at less price than any class of foods; therefore a vegetarian diet involves less expense than the mixed diet. An entirely vegetarian diet, however, gradually induces a condition of muscular weakness in many people, resulting in a loss of strength. A well-proportioned mixed diet is best to give strength and activity of both body and mind.

Meat, eggs, and milk, which usually supply the proteins, are the most expensive foods, and when these, for any cause, are eliminated, a large proportion of proteins should be supplied by the legumes.

Perhaps no food is as commonly used as wheat in its various forms. It is composed of:

1. The nitrogenous or protein compound, chiefly represented in the cerealin and the gluten of the bran. This is removed from white flour and from much of the so-called “whole wheat” flour.

2. The starch—the center or white part of the kernel.

3. The fats, occurring chiefly in the germ of the grain.

4. The phosphorus compounds, iron, and lime, found in the bran.

The kernel of wheat consists of the bran or covering, which surrounds the white, pulpy mass of starch within. In the lower end of the kernel is the germ.

Flour. In the old-time process of making flour the wheat was crushed between stones and then sifted, first, through a sieve, which separated the outer shell of the bran; then through bolting cloth, which separated the white pulp from the inner bran coating. It was not ground as fine as in the present process, thus the gluten, phosphorus, and iron (all valuable substances) were, in the old process, nearly all left out of the white flour. The second bran coating, left by the second sifting, was not so coarse as the outer shell but coarser than the inner. Care was not formerly observed in having the grain clean before grinding, the bran containing chaff and dirt, so that it was not used as food but was considered valuable for stock, and was called “middlings.”

In the modern process of crushing the wheat between steel rollers, the white flour of to-day contains more of the protein from the inner coat of the bran than the white flour of the old process; hence, it is more nutritious.

Bran. Objection is sometimes made to bran because the cellulose shell is not digested, but bran contains much protein and mineral matter and even though it is crude fiber, as previously stated, this fiber has a value as a cleanser for the lining of the stomach and intestines, and for increasing peristalsis, thus encouraging the flow of digestive juices and the elimination of waste. In bread or breakfast foods, it is desirable to retain it for its laxative effect.

Bran has three coats—the tough, glossy outside, within this a coat containing most of the coloring matter, and a third coat, containing a special kind of protein, known as cerealin. The two outer layers contain phosphorus compounds, lime, and iron. All three coats contain gluten.

Gluten flour is made of the gluten of wheat. It is a valuable, easily digested food, containing a large proportion of protein and little starch. Gluten bread is used by those who wish to reduce in flesh and in diabetic cases.

Whole wheat flour does not contain the whole of the wheat, as the name implies; it, however, does contain all the proteins of the endosperm and the gluten and oil of the germ, together with all of the starch. As a flour, therefore, it is a more balanced food than the white flour, because it contains more nitrogenous elements.

Graham flour is made from the entire wheat kernel with the exception of the outermost scale of the bran. It contains the starch, gluten phosphorus compounds, iron, and lime. It is the most desirable of the flours because, containing the bran, it assists in digestion and elimination, and the phosphorus, iron, and lime, are valuable body builders.

Nutri meal is much the same as Graham flour, the chief difference being that the bran is ground finer. The wheat is ground between hot rollers, the heat bringing out the nutty flavor of the bran. Bread made from it is not only nutritious, but delicious in flavor. It contains all of the nutrition of the wheat.

Bread. As must be implied from the foregoing, the nutri meal, or graham flours are necessary for bread if it is to be used as a complete food, the “staff of life.” The white bread is made from flour which is almost pure starch; the lime, phosphorus compounds, and iron are removed.

Perhaps no form of prepared food has been longer in vogue than bread. It has been known since history began. When the entire wheat kernel is used it probably maintains and supports life and strength better than any single food, but bread is not the “staff of life” unless the entire kernel is in the flour.

Children should be given Graham bread or Graham crackers containing the whole of the grain in order to obtain the balanced food and the nutritive materials which are not obtained in bread made of white flour. Lime for the teeth and the growing bones is in the bran.

The more porous the bread the more easily it digests. When full of pores, it is more readily mixed with the digestive juices.

The pores in bread are produced by the effort of the gas, released by the yeast, to escape. When mixed with water, the flour forms a tenacious body which, when warm, expands under the pressure of the gas from the yeast, until the dough is full of gas-filled holes. The walls of gluten do not allow the gas to escape, and thus the dough is made light and porous. The more gluten the flour holds, the more water the dough will take up and the greater will be the yield of bread; hence, the more gluten, the more valuable the flour. If the bread is not porous, the fermentation is not complete, and the bread is heavy.

The albumin in the walls of the expanding bubbles causes substances which contain beaten eggs to be more porous when baked.

Yeast is a plant fungus. In its feeding, the plant consumes sugar, changing it into alcohol and carbon dioxid. If the bread contains no sugar the yeast plant will change the starch in the flour into sugar for its feeding.

Many housewives, realizing that the bread begins to “rise” quicker if it contains sugar, put a little into the sponge. Unless a large quantity of sugar is put in, the yeast will consume it and the bread will not have an unduly sweet taste.

As the yeast causes fermentation, alcohol forms in the dough. This is driven off in the baking. If the bread is not thoroughly baked, fermentation continues and the bread turns sour.

Bread is not thoroughly baked until fermentation ceases. It is claimed that fermentation does not entirely cease with one baking; this is the basis of the theory, held by some, that bread should be twice baked. The average housekeeper bakes an ordinary loaf one hour.

Time must be given for the products of fermentation to evaporate, during the cooling of the bread, before it is eaten.

Hot or insufficiently cooked bread is difficult of digestion, because it becomes more or less soggy on entering the mouth and the stomach, and the saliva and gastric juices cannot so readily mix with it.

The best flour for bread is that made from the spring wheat, grown in cooler climates, because it is richer in gluten than the winter wheat. The winter wheat flour is used more for cakes and pastries.

Bread made with milk, is, of course, richer and more nutritious than that made with water, and bread made with potato water contains more starch; both of these retain their moisture longer than bread made without them.

Mold, which sometimes forms on bread, is, like the yeast, a minute plant. It is floating about everywhere in the air, ready to settle down wherever it finds a suitable home. Moisture and heat favor its growth; hence bread should be thoroughly cooled before it is put into a jar or bread box. The bread box should be ventilated and kept in a cool place.

Rye bread contains a little more starch and less protein than wheat bread. It contains more water and holds its moisture longer.

Biscuits. The objection to eating hot bread does not hold for baking powder or soda biscuits, if well cooked, because these cool more rapidly and they do not contain the yeast plant; hence, they do not ferment as does the bread.

Baking powder is made from bicarbonate of soda (baking soda) and cream of tartar. When these are brought in contact with moisture, carbon dioxid is liberated, and in the effort to escape it causes the dough to expand and become light.

Breads made with pure baking powder are wholesome and, when light, are digestible. When made with cheap baking powder, however, in which alum or ammonia is employed, the stomach may be irritated by the chemical substances contained.

The reason that the cook attempts to bake her biscuits, or anything made with baking powder, as quickly as possible after the baking powder comes in contact with the moisture, is that the dough may have the full effect of the expansion of the gas. If the room in which she mixes her dough is cool, or if her biscuit dough is left in a cool place, this is not important, as heat and moisture are both required for full combustion. Enough baking powder biscuit dough may be mixed at one time to provide biscuits every morning for a week, if buried in flour immediately after mixing so that it is kept cool and from the air. A portion may be cut off each morning and the remainder again buried in the flour.

Macaroni and spaghetti are made from a special wheat flour known as Durum. They contain about seventy-seven per cent. of starch, little fat, and little protein. They may take the place of bread, rice, or potato at a meal.

Rice is a staple cereal in all tropical and temperate climates. It requires special machinery to remove the husk and the dark, outer skin of the kernel.

The polished rice commonly used, is almost pure starch, and, like white flour, lacks the nutritive qualities contained in the husk or covering.

It is seldom eaten within three months after harvesting and it is considered even better after two or three years. It requires thorough cooking.

Wild rice is used by the North American Indians. The seeds are longer, thinner, and darker, than the cultivated rice. It is coming into favor as a side dish but it is served more particularly at hotels in soup and with game.

As previously stated, rice contains a larger proportion of starch than any other cereal and the smallest proportion of protein. Next to rice, in starches, comes wheat flour; yet whole wheat or graham flour contain half as much again of protein.

Because of the quantity of starch in flour, potatoes, and rice, it is obvious that one should not eat freely of more than one of these at the same meal, else the digestive organs will be overworked in converting the starch into sugar, the liver overworked in converting the sugar into glycogen and back again into sugar, and be overloaded in storing it up.

By far the best plan is to eat but one cereal at a meal.

Rice contains no gluten, hence it cannot be raised in bread.

Unhusked rice is called paddy. The “vitamins” of rice are in the covering.

A German investigator, working to discover the cause of the disorder of nutrition known as “beriberi” occurring in those who used polished rice freely, found that in those who used unpolished rice, from which the outer husk had not been removed, the disease did not appear. He gave the name of “vitamin” to the substance in the outer husk, which prevented the disease.

While these substances were discovered while working with rice, they have since come to include other substances which affect the nutritive value of food. The term “vitamin” has since been given to other apparently necessary elements in foods which seem to determine their nutritive value to the system. These necessary elements, “vitamins,” may be the spices and flavors used in the food, and sometimes, perhaps, may be the flavors resulting from the action of benign bacteria, as those which give the delicious flavor to butter and cheese.

Food, however nutritious, is lessened in its value to the system unless it appeals to the senses by its mode of preparation, seasoning, serving, and freshness. Sternberg insists that the senses of smell and taste determine chemical changes in foods with greater sensitiveness than chemical tests.

Dishes unskillfully prepared are not relished. Some chemical change has occurred which the senses detect and these dishes are rendered less wholesome, lacking the necessary “vitamin.” Distaste, loss of appetite, and even nausea and vomiting may occur.

Sternberg calls attention anew to the fact that the science of cooking is a complicated one and is a matter of taste in the widest sense of the term, that vitamins may largely be produced in the preparation of the food.

Corn (maize) is a native of America and has been one of the most extensively used cereals.

The chief products of corn are hominy, corn meal, cracked corn, samp, glucose, corn-starch and laundry starch. Alcohol is also made from it.

Corn bread and corn-meal mush were important foods with the early settlers, partly because they are nutritious and partly because the corn meal was easily prepared at the mill and was cheap.

The germ of the corn is larger in proportion than the germs of other grains, and it contains much fat; therefore it is heating. For this reason, it is strange that corn bread is so largely used by inhabitants of the southern states. It is a more appropriate food for winter in cold climates.

Because of the fat in the germ, corn meal readily turns rancid, and, on this account, the germ is separated and omitted from many corn-meal preparations.

Hulled corn, sometimes called lye hominy, is one of the old-fashioned ways of using corn. In its preparation, the skin is loosened by steeping the corn in a weak solution of lye, which gives it a peculiar flavor, pleasing to many.

Corn-meal mush is a valuable breakfast food if eaten with milk. If fried it should be covered with flour or dry corn meal and fried in deep fat, so that it does not soak up the fat.

Popcorn. The bursting of the shell in popping corn is due to the expansion of the moisture in the starch, occasioned by the heat.

Green sweet corn does not contain the same proportion of starch as corn meal, it being, in its tender state, mostly water. It is laxative, because it is eaten with the coarse hull, which causes more rapid peristalsis of the intestines. It should be well masticated to break the covering of the husk; the digestive juices cannot penetrate the hard covering.

The claims made for various advertised breakfast foods would be amusing if they were not intended to mislead. Nearly all of them have sufficient merit to sell them if the advertiser confines himself strictly to the truth, but the ever pertinent desire to excel, which is one great incentive to progress, leads to exaggeration. For example: the claim is sometimes made that they contain more nutriment than the same quantity of beef. Reference to Table V does not bear out such a statement. They contain more starch but less protein.

It is also claimed by some advertisers that breakfast foods are brain and nerve foods. The idea that certain foods are brain and nerve foods is erroneous, except that any tissue-building food (protein) builds nerve and brain tissue as it builds any other tissue, and the foods which produce heat and energy for other tissues produce the same for brain and nerve.

The grains commonly used for breakfast foods are corn, oats, rice, and wheat. Barley, and wild rice, millet and buckwheat are used in some sections, but not enough to warrant discussion here.

Barley is used chiefly for making malt and in the form of pearled barley is used in soups.

Table VI, from one of the bulletins published by the United States Department of Agriculture, is interesting from an economical standpoint.

TABLE VI
Comparative Cost of Digestible Nutrients and Available
Energy in Different Cereal Breakfast Foods