662 Reading-Course for Farmers' Wives. 



satisfying the ai)petite quickly without providing the material for growth, 

 or from other mistakes in diet. 



3. A study of the food helps us in avoiding zvastc. If, for instance, 

 an over amount of nitrogenous food, as meat, fish, eggs, cheese, and milk 

 are used in the course of a month or of a year, one of two things may be 

 true : Either the family is having too much proteid or there is unneces- 

 sary waste and the problem for the housekeeper is to find out which is 

 the case. 



4. One of the questions that is considered more and more frequently 

 in discussions of food problems is that of tJie relative value of animal 

 and vegetable foods. An increasing number of people are confining their 

 diet largely, if not exclusively, to vegetable products, and such animal 

 substances as milk and eggs that do not imply the taking of life, while a 

 smaller number exclude anything of animal origin. Is a mixed diet 

 essential for health, or may we at will choose from the animal and vege- 

 table kingdom? Certain broad distinctions immediately present them- 

 selves. As a rule animal foods are richer in nitrogenous matter, while 

 vegetable foods are the chief source of carbohydrates. This becomes 

 much more evident if we compare the foods in a dried condition. Milk, 

 for example, makes a poor showing in proteid compared with dried peas 

 or even with rice, but if we take the solids of the milk as a basis of com- 

 parison, the case is quite otherwise. This is the fairer method, for the 

 dried peas and rice absorb many times their weight in water in the process 

 of cooking, so that the composition of the raw material is quite difi^erent 

 from that of the cooked food. Hutchison gives the following composi- 

 tion of a few typical dried foods : 



100 parts of dried lean beef contain 89 parts of proteid. 



ICO parts of dried fat beef contain 51 parts of proteid. 



100 parts of dried pea flour contain 27 parts of proteid. 



100 parts of dried wheat contain 16 parts of proteid. 



100 parts of dried rice contain 7 parts of proteid. 



Another difference between animal and vegetable foods is found in 

 their cost. Under most conditions animal food is more expensive than 

 vegetable. This is not difficult to understand when we remember that our 

 animal food has been pat through a further process of manufacture than 

 the vegetable. If the grain raised, instead of going directly to man as 

 food, is used to feed cattle, which in turn are slaughtered to furnish nour- 

 ishment for human beings, the process necessarily adds to the cost of 

 the food. 



As a rule, animal foods are more easily digested than are vegetable. 

 With the addition of milk, butter, cheese and eggs it is not difficult with 

 care to provide a satisfactory diet without the use of meat. The case is 



