substances,--proteins, fats, carbohydrates, vitamines, salts,
cellulose, and water. The ideal diet is one in which these seven
elements are regularly supplied to the body in the amounts required
to meet its daily needs. A person living close to nature, receiving
his food first-handed, direct from nature's health food factory, and
eating it with only the cooking and seasoning necessary, and with a
reasonable variety, would probably find his diet sufficient, and the
elements in about the proper proportions; and with an honest appetite,
steadied by a little temperate-in-all-things ballast, he probably
would not go far astray as to the proper amounts. But unfortunately,
the average individual is not living close to nature. Much that is
artificial has come in. Our appetites are capricious, deceitful, and
unreasonable. Our foods come to us processed, cartonned, and tinned,
often embalmed, devitalized, or adulterated. They are often served to
us so disguised that we cannot tell whether their nutritive substance
has been concentrated or diluted, or indeed whether or not the body
will recognize it as having any nutritive value at all, despite its
pleasing flavor. Therefore, in order that the ideal may be approximated
to a reasonable and practical degree, we must have some knowledge not
only of the needs of the body, but also of these food elements, and how
their values may be estimated in the various food substances.
The foods that enter into the make-up of the body and supply its heat
and energy are three,--protein, fat, and carbohydrate. While the salts
to a certain extent enter into the body structure, they have but little
to do with heat and energy production. The remaining food classes are
adjuncts, their use being simply to make possible the utilization,
by the body, of the tissue and fuel foods. The cellulose assists
mechanically in digestion; the water furnishes the necessary fluid; and
the vitamines provide the battery, as it were, which sets the whole
apparatus in motion.
_The Heat Unit_
Of the many persons who, for economical or hygienic reasons, have tried
to adjust their diet better, some have undertaken the task without a
fundamental knowledge of the physiological and caloric value of foods,
their composition, or the nutritional needs of the body, and have done
themselves more harm than good. It is possible for us to measure the
value of our foods, and to express it in terms of heat units; and with
a knowledge of the bodily needs, we may supply ourselves with foods in
approximately the amounts needed, and in the best combinations. Food
oxidized in the body produces the same amount of heat as that burned
outside the body, and the instrument by which the heat value of any
substance is determined is called a calorimeter. The unit of measure of
heat is called the calorie or heat unit.
The calorimeter consists of a double chamber, the outer one containing
a given quantity of water. The inner chamber is thus surrounded by a
water jacket. In it is placed a definite amount of pure, water-free
food to be tested; for example, an ounce of sugar. By means of an
electric connection, the sugar is ignited and burned, and the heat
produced thereby is imparted to the water in the outer chamber. When
the process is complete, the difference in the temperature of the water
is noted, and the amount of heat generated is computed. The calorie
is the amount of heat necessary to raise the temperature of one pound
of water four degrees F., or one kilogram one degree C. In this way,
the heat values of pure protein, fat, starch, and sugar have been
determined. In the laboratories of the United States government, the
composition and caloric value of practically every food substance known
has been worked out. Any person can have access to these tables of food
values by applying to the government, or by purchasing from almost any
bookstore any one of the several books on food values, that are on the
market. (See pages 23-27 of this book.)
The heat value of a gram of pure, water-free protein--for example, the
casein of milk, egg albumen, or fiber of meat--is a trifle more than
four calories. That of pure starch or sugar is also four calories.
Fat is more than double this value, one gram yielding nine and three
tenths calories. Since an ounce equals about thirty grams, the number
of calories to an ounce is determined by multiplying the above figures
by thirty. Different kinds of food vary greatly in the proportion of
the food elements and also of the water and cellulose they contain.
(Cellulose has no fuel value in the human body.) We therefore find
a great variation as to their caloric values also. For example, one
heaping tablespoonful of home-baked beans will weigh about fifty grams,
thirty of which is water and cellulose. Its total caloric value is one
hundred, divided among protein fifteen, fat forty (the fat has largely
been added), and carbohydrate forty-five. Contrast with this the same
quantity of mashed turnips. One heaping tablespoonful will weigh about
seventy grams, of which sixty-five is water and cellulose. Its total
fuel value is three calories.
By a little study, one may very readily become familiar with the
approximate values of the more common foods, and be able to arrive at
some conclusion in regard to the correctness of one's daily food ration
as to amount and proportions. Many would be surprised to see how far
short their diet comes of the ideal.
It is easy to remember that an ordinary slice of bread--about three and
one half inches square--contains approximately one hundred calories; an
average egg, sixty-five; a glass of milk, one hundred fifty; an average
potato, one hundred twenty-five; a tablespoonful of gravity cream,
fifty; the usual serving of cooked cereal, seventy-five to one hundred;
vegetables, except potatoes, an ordinary serving, twenty-five to fifty,
depending on the amount of fat or milk added as seasoning; legumes,
average serving, one hundred to one hundred fifty. Desserts are usually
high in value, ranging from one hundred twenty-five calories in the
usual serving of simple custard or junket to three hundred fifty or
more in the usual one sixth of some pies, or the ordinary piece of cake.
Housewives who wish to go into the question of foods thoroughly, and
combine the science with the art of cookery, may arrange a table of the
staples and raw food that ordinarily enter into their various recipes,
somewhat after the following, the items of which have been taken at
random from such a list or table already prepared and in use:
A. _Food_
B. _Measure_
C. _Weight_
D. _Protein_
E. _Fat_
F. _Carbohydrate_
G. _Total_
A B C D E F G
Flour 1 cup 5 oz. 80 25 419 524
Eggs, average each 1½ oz. 23 40 0 63
Milk, whole 1 cup 8 oz. 30 88 46 164
Sugar, granulated 1 cup 7½ oz. 0 0 840 840
Butter 1 cup 8 oz. 0 1,744 0 1,744
Butter 1 tablespoon ½ oz. 0 109 0 109
If the housewife desires to know the food value of a cake, for instance,
that she is about to bake, whose recipe calls for two cups flour, one
and one half cups sugar, one half cup butter, four eggs, she can very
easily find out by consulting her table; as:
A. _Protein_
B. _Fat_
C. _Carbohydrate_
D. _Total_
A B C D
2 cups flour = 160 50 838 1,048
1½ cups sugar = 0 0 1,260 1,260
½ cup butter = 0 872 0 872
4 eggs = 92 160 0 252
------------------------------
Totals 252 1,082 2,098 3,432
If the cake is cut into twelve servings, the value of each may be
determined by dividing each of these sums by twelve. Thus each piece
will represent in value, protein, twenty-one calories; fat, ninety
calories; carbohydrate, one hundred seventy-five calories; total, two
hundred eighty-six calories.
The number of calories needed by the individual varies with height,
age, sex, climate, and state of muscular activity; but for the average
person, two thousand calories daily may be taken as a working basis.
If one is engaged in active muscular labor, the requirement may be
three thousand or more. Many persons of sedentary habits do better
on less than two thousand. Other things being equal, men need about
ten per cent more than women. Children need about ten per cent more
than adults. An obese individual, or one suffering from the results
of imperfect oxidation, as manifested in rheumatism, neuralgia, and
myalgia, may do well for a time on as low an allowance as one thousand
one hundred to one thousand two hundred food units daily, experiencing
marked relief from symptoms, and if obese, a reduction in weight of
from one to four pounds a week.
It should be kept in mind that the amount of protein needed is quite
constant, and does not vary with one's state of activity, as does the
demand for the fats and the carbohydrates. From two hundred to two
hundred fifty calories of this element are needed daily, even though
the total ration be low. If one does well on the low ration suggested
above, the protein should not be lowered proportionately, as would be
the tendency. This is the repair substance, which the body, not being
able to store up, must have supplied to it in regular daily amounts.
Excess in eating is often due to the use of certain concentrated foods.
A teaspoonful of olive oil contains forty calories; the ordinary pat
of butter (one fourth ounce), fifty calories; a heaping teaspoonful
of sugar, forty calories; one English walnut, thirty-three calories;
a fair sized olive, twenty calories. While these are good foods, they
should be eaten with due regard for their high energy value, that
the proper food balance be not disturbed. After eating a good square
meal, the average individual calls for the dessert, which, with its
accompaniments, actually constitutes a second meal; as, for example, a
serving of pie, three hundred fifty calories; its cheese accompaniment,
another one hundred calories; a few stuffed dates, another one hundred
calories; a few nuts and raisins and a cup of chocolate bringing the
total value of this second meal forced upon the body up to seven
hundred or eight hundred calories.
Vegetables of themselves are low in caloric value, their importance
being due to the cellulose, salts, and vitamines they contain. But
they are usually prepared with so much butter or cream that as served
they have a high caloric value in fat. Lean meat is practically pure
protein, and the tendency of the meat eater is to get an excess of
this element. The vegetarian often goes to the other extreme, his
diet showing a deficiency in protein, with an excess of fats and
carbohydrates. That the protein balance be kept normal is an important
matter, for a person may at one and the same time be suffering from the
results of a deficient diet and also from the effects of overeating.
The protein needed daily is from ten to thirteen per cent of the total
ration. If the total daily ration is but one thousand five hundred
calories, the protein should still be two hundred calories, and
therefore thirteen per cent of the total. Thus if a person is living
on foods containing less than ten per cent, there is danger of not
getting enough of this important element. Much of the food eaten is
less than ten per cent protein, because of the addition to it of fat
and sugar in large amounts.
So-called meat substitutes should be high in the percentage of protein,
in order to make up for the butter, sugar, oils, olives, desserts,
fruits, and other very low protein foods that enter so largely into
one's dietary. The question has been asked, Why object to the addition
of fat to a meat substance, since it does not actually reduce the
quantity of protein, though it does relatively? In reply, it may be
said that the relative reduction makes necessary an excess of the
nonnitrogenous foods, to get enough protein; and even though one's
capacity should receive it comfortably, still the objection to the
excess aliment remains.
A study of food composition and values will enable the housewife so to
plan her meals that the various elements may be served to her family
in the proper proportions. A knowledge of calories, and an intelligent
application of the principles involved in these questions of nutrition,
will enable any housewife to reduce the cost of feeding her family
from twenty-five to fifty per cent, which would be worth while from
an economical standpoint, not to mention the advantage to be realized
healthwise.
_Vitamines_
Says Lusk, "It has thus far been shown that nutrition means fuel for
the machinery, new parts with which to repair the machine, and minute
quantities of vitamines, which produce a harmonious interaction between
the materials in the food and their host."
In the words of another investigator, "The study of dietetics from
the standpoint of the vitamines has only just begun." Sufficient has
been learned and demonstrated about them, however, to show that they
play a most important part in nutrition and in vital tissue processes.
Since they are so little understood, a complete definition is not yet
possible. The pure vitamine, it seems, cannot be isolated, so their
exact chemical nature is not known. The chemical process necessary to
free it is no sooner begun than the vitamine is apparently decomposed,
and all trace of it is lost. One is reminded of the efforts of some
early investigators to submit living protoplasm to a chemical analysis,
they hoping thereby to reveal the mysteries of physical life itself;
but at the first intrusion, this subtle something flees, taking its
secrets with it, and leaving us only the empty shell of dead protein
matter. While the activities and manifestations of life are seen on
every hand in animal and plant, we are but little the wiser as to what
life really is.
Vitamines seem to stand closely related to the living process in the
tissue cells. Some investigators have thought them to be the mother
substances of the various bodily ferments and internal secretions,
any disturbance of which produces serious constitutional troubles.
Therefore the continuous use of a diet lacking in any of these mother
substances would of necessity lead to a deficiency of these absolutely
essential vital secretions and ferments.
_Vitamines and Disease_
Years were spent in investigation before it was found out that
beriberi, a disease of the Orient, could be cured and prevented by the
addition, to the diet, of certain nutritive elements in the covering
of the rice, that are ordinarily removed in the polishing process,
and thrown away. Just what these nutritive elements were, was not
understood; but the fact remained that a diet of polished rice resulted
in symptoms of beriberi, while a diet of the unpolished grain was
sufficient to prevent any manifestations of the disease. In Java,
where the people lived largely on whole rice, beriberi was unknown.
For years, the fact had been recognized, that sailors living on canned
and preserved foods sooner or later developed scurvy, which could
be quickly cured by an addition of fresh vegetables or the juice of
fruits, especially lemons and oranges, to the diet. In 1535, when all
but three of Cartier's one hundred ten sailors had scurvy, he cured
them all by giving them a decoction of fresh pine needles. Babies fed
on Pasteurized milk often develop infantile scurvy.
_Convincing Experiments_
Vitamines are made only in nature's laboratory. The body cannot make
them, therefore mother's milk is deficient in vitamine if her diet is.
This is demonstrated in a decided way in the Philippine Islands, where
the diet is deficient in the vitamine preventing beriberi. Among the
Filipinos, one half the deaths take place before the end of the first
year of age; and in these infants, one half the deaths are due to
beriberi. Pellagra, a disease of obscure ætiology, or cause, manifests
itself principally among a class of people who live on a monotonous
diet of corn bread, bacon, soda biscuit, and sirup. Some authorities
are quite convinced that it is a "deficiency" disease. Also rickets,
eczema, pyorrhea, and a number of other diseases of obscure cause
are beginning to be regarded as being, in part at least, deficiency
diseases. A predisposition to tuberculosis and other infections may
be of similar cause. There are probably a number, possibly many,
of these vitamine substances. At least two have been quite fully
demonstrated,--the one preventing scurvy, and the one preventing
beriberi.
The experiments of Cosimir Funk, a Russian, are convincing. He was
able to produce experimental beriberi in pigeons by feeding them for
three weeks on polished rice, then readily to cure them of the disease
by feeding the polishings from the same rice, showing that in the
rice polishings are certain elements absolutely essential to life. He
finally isolated what appeared to be this substance, one pound of the
polishings yielding about three grains of the material. Injecting under
the skin of pigeons dying of beriberi one third of a grain of this
crystalline substance, he was able not only to make them perfectly well
in a few hours, but to keep them in health for three weeks with but the
one dose, even though they were continued on a diet of polished rice.
Funk named this wonderful life-giving substance vitamine, because its
effects were life-giving, and chemically it seemed to belong to the
amines.
_Where Found_
Vitamines are found in plants, and especially in their seeds. Fresh
meat and raw milk contain them, although animals seem incapable
of making them. In summer, milk is richer in them than in winter,
because of the difference in feed for the cattle. They are contained
also in yolks of eggs, whole grains, potatoes, carrots, beans, peas,
lentils--in fact, practically all green garden vegetables, and fruit.
In the grains, they are found in the dark layer near the outer surface
or branny layer, and in the germ. In potatoes and other vegetables,
they lie immediately under the skin. Yeast bread contains more than
baking powder breads.
Vitamines are lost by the processing of grains; that is, by the removal
of the outer layers, which contain most of these substances. Hence the
whole grain should be included in the flour. They are also destroyed by
the subjection of foods to too high a temperature. It is therefore best
to cook cereals at a low temperature, as in a fireless cooker. The
vitamines are sacrificed in the drying of foods, and in the paring of
vegetables. If potatoes are boiled, there is great advantage in boiling
them in their "jackets," in which case the vitamines and the salts are
not lost. If they are pared before they are boiled, the potato water
should not be thrown away, as it is rich in vitamines, salts, and
protein. Parboiling of other vegetables is objectionable for the same
reason. Soda and baking powder and similar chemicals seem to destroy
the vitamines. This is one reason why yeast breads are better than
baking powder breads. Furthermore, in yeast fermentation, the vitamine
preventing beriberi is actually formed, but not the vitamine preventing
scurvy. The natural foods that require cooking to make them edible and
wholesome contain vitamines which are not destroyed thereby if the
cooking is done in the most wholesome and hygienic way.
A Word of Advice to Women
Stay at home and work. Do not rush into some romantic and
picturesque bit of action to the detriment of your home duties.
Work in your homes, and do whatever you can outside; the humbler
and more inconspicuous your accomplishment is, the more it may
be needed. There are enough women who will snatch at what is
accompanied by the limelight. Make your contribution of personal
service without thought of self, and keep on to the end.--_Lord
Northcliffe._
[Illustration]
[Illustration]
FRUITS AND THEIR DIETETIC VALUE
_by
GEORGE A. THOMASON, M.D., L.R.C.S., L.R.C.P._
No other class of foods more delightfully or deliciously contribute
to the needs of the body than fruit. Fresh from the lap of Nature,
lavishly supplied, and delightful to the eye, fruit makes most
satisfying appeal to the appetite of every one, from the quite
indifferent to the most discriminating epicure. Most easy of digestion,
in fact, practically predigested, fruit is most appropriate for all
people both in sickness and in health, and at all periods of life, from
babyhood to extreme age.
Fruit is made up of water, sugar, acids, some proteid, and organic
salts. Water is by far the largest constituent of fruit, being
seventy-five to eighty-five per cent. The water of fruit is of the
greatest possible purity, being doubly distilled, first as rain, then
as sap, drawn and filtered through the tree.
The sugar of fruit is one of the most easily digested forms, that of
levulose. The starch of the unripe fruit is converted into sugar in
the ripening process, or in the cooking of partially ripened fruit.
Sugar is present in varying amounts in fruits, averaging from five to
ten per cent. A well ripened banana contains twenty-one per cent of
sugar, dates about fifty per cent, while grapes contain from fourteen
to twenty per cent.
The outward appearance of the fruit is often a fairly reliable
indication of the amount of sugar. Trielle has observed that fruits
with yellow skins contain much sugar, and have a very penetrating odor.
Fruits with red skins contain a medium amount of sugar, and have a
pleasant, delicate perfume. Fruits with a reddish brown skin usually
contain much sugar, and have very little perfume.
As showing its perfectly digested state, demonstrations have proved
that fruit sugar may be injected directly into the blood, from which
it will be utilized in nourishing the body. This is in marked contrast
with ordinary cane sugar, which, if injected directly into the blood,
is expelled through the kidneys, the body being unable to appropriate
it as such from the blood.
Fruit sugar may be eaten in practically unlimited quantities. It
supplies the body with heat and energy in the most available form.
For this reason, fruit when eaten will quickly relieve the sense of
exhaustion.
_Fruit Acids_
The acids of fruits give to them their delightful and appetizing
flavors. Fruits in the unripe state contain tannic acid, a marked
astringent. The gastric and peristaltic woes of the small boy the night
following the green apple episode are due to the tannic acid the unripe
fruit contains. The three chief acids of fruit are citric acid, found
in oranges, lemons, and grapefruit; malic acid, as found in apples,
pears, peaches, and similar fruits; and tartaric acid, as found in
grapes. These are organic acids, recognized and readily digested by the
body.
The acids of fruits are remarkable peptogens; that is, they stimulate
the appetite and promote the flow of the digestive juices. Fruit acids
are most efficient disinfectants. Some years ago, an eminent medical
authority of this country, in a representative medical gathering,
said, "We are as yet without a satisfactory medicinal intestinal
disinfectant." In fruit acids, we possess such an agent in a most
desirable form. No germ, disease-producing or otherwise, can live in
the presence of fruit acid. Fruit acids can be taken practically _ad
libitum_. Fruit acids taken freely by mouth or diluted and injected
into the bowel, most efficiently asepticize the intestinal canal. Three
or four pints of water to which the juice of one lemon has been added,
injected into the bowel following a cleansing enema, will thoroughly
destroy disease-producing bacteria in the colon. Flushing the bowel
frequently with such a solution is one of the most efficient known
means of successfully combating the fetid summer diarrheas of children.
The proteid or nitrogenous element of fruits, as well as their fatty
element, may be passed over with little consideration. Fruit contains
little proteid; and aside from the olive, there is almost no fat in
fruit. The fat of the ripe olive, however, is one of the most delicious
and digestible forms of fat. Ripe olives contain about fifty per cent
fat. Olive oil can be mixed with water; therefore it readily mixes with
the intestinal juices, and is most easily digested.
_Fruit Salts_
The salts of fruit are most desirable, being so essential in tissue
building. Some of the most important of these salts are potash, lime,
phosphoric acid, and iron. Deficiency of the lime salts in the bones
of children produces conditions of bone softening, or rickets. This can
be largely prevented by adding fruit to the diet of these afflicted
children, using especially grapes, oranges, lemons, and grapefruit,
which contain high percentages of lime salts.
The condition of anæmia is a lack of iron in the blood. This cannot
be replaced by medicinal or metallic iron, as the body is unable to
appropriate these inorganic substances; but the iron in fruit is
perfectly adapted to the body needs. Plums, cherries, and especially
strawberries and currants contain considerable iron, and are most
helpful in the treatment of anæmic conditions.