200 MEALS MEDICINAL. 
of beef, when eaten raw, disappear completely from the stomach 
in two hours, whereas when half-boiled the meat has not 
disappeared until at the end of two and a half hours, nor when 
wholly boiled until three hours have expired ; when half-roasted 
it takes three hours to undergo digestion in the stomach, and 
when wholly roasted four hours. ‘“ Raw flesh,” says Brillat 
Savarin, “though it sticks to the teeth, is not at all un- 
pleasant to the taste; seasoned with a little salt it is 
readily digested, and is certainly as nourishing as in any other 
form.’ 
The effect of heat on the albuminous parts (proteids) of foods 
is to coagulate them, this being effected at about a temperature 
of 170° Fahr*- or 42° below the boiling point. If the degree of 
heat employed in cooking goes beyond this, the value of the food 
is lessened by the hardening, and shrinking of the albuminous 
materials ; the importance of which fact in its practical application 
to cooking has long been recognized, though commonly neglected, 
or disregarded in effect. In the cooking of vegetables the moist 
heat of the water, raised to nearly, or quite boiling point, swells 
up the starch grains, and ruptures their surrounding envelopes, 
so that the invading water makes a paste with the escaping 
starch, or a form of starch jelly. If green vegetables are cooked 
in any excess of water, their bulk is reduced, and their valuable 
mineral salts become dissolved away; so that in this manner 
their nutritive value is considerably lessened, though perhaps 
their digestibility may be enhanced; but their chief worth as 
food lies in their undiminished bulk, and in their mineral salts. 
When a cabbage, or carrot, or potato, is boiled, a large proportion 
of the soluble potash salts pass from the vegetable tissue into 
the water, which is generally poured away, and with it the 
precious elixir which is the true preventive of gout, rheumatism, 
lumbago, and rheumatic neuralgia. The French housewife’s 
method of cooking vegetables is far more sensible, and excellent : 
by her the quantity of water used is so nicely measured as not 
to require any abstraction, but it forms a sort of emulsion of 
the juices with the oil, or fat, which she always adds at the right 
time, and in proper proportion. Vegetables should never be 
salted until they are nearly cooked, else they will be hardened 
by this addition. It is interesting to know that the advantages 
of slow cooking are well recognized by some savage tribes; and 
in this respect the civilized cook has something to learn from 
