William Mattieu Williams

“ I now conclude this series, with the expression of my firm conviction that the application of chemical science to cookery is capable of vastly extending and improving our food-supplies, and thereby of greatly increasing the numbers of prosperous human beings capable of living on the earth. ”

“ The idea of malt-feeding was theoretically sound. By the malting of barley or other grain its diastase is made to act upon its insoluble starch, and to convert it more or less completely into soluble dextrine, a change which is absolutely necessary as a part of the business of digestion. Therefore, if you feed cattle on malted grain instead of raw grain, you supply them with a food so prepared that a part of the business of digestion is already done for them, and their nutrition is thereby advanced. ”

“ We all practically admit every day, in eating our ordinary English dinner, that this excess of nitrogenous matter and fat is bad; we do so by mixing the meat with that particular vegetable which contains an excess of the carbo-hydrates (starch) with the smallest available quantity of albuminoids and fat. The slice of meat, diluted with the lump of potato, brings the whole down to about the average composition of a fairly-arranged vegetarian repast. When I speak of a vegetarian repast, I do not mean mere cabbages and potatoes, but properly selected, well-cooked, nutritious vegetable food. ”

“ The question is not whether we are herbivorous or carnivorous animals. It is perfectly certain that we are neither. The carnivora feed on flesh alone, and eat that flesh raw. Nobody proposes that we should do this. The herbivora eat raw grass. Nobody suggests that we should follow their example.
It is perfectly clear that man can not be classed either with the carnivorous animals nor the herbivorous animals, nor with the graminivorous animals. ”

“ Whether we do all the preparation in the kitchen by bringing the produce of the earth directly there, or whether, on account of our ignorance and incapacity as cooks, we pass our food through the stomach, intestines, blood-vessels, etc., of sheep and oxen, as a substitute for the first stages of scientific cookery, the result is about the same as regards the dietetic result. ”

“ We can easily supply our natural deficiencies in the matter of grinding, and do so in our flour-mills; but at first thought the idea of finding an artificial substitute for saliva does not recommend itself. When, however, it is understood that the chief active principle of the saliva so closely resembles the diastase of grain that it has received the name of animal diastase, and is probably the same compound, the aspect of the problem changes. ”

“ The food which Nature provides for the human infant differs from that provided for the young carnivorous animal, just in the same way as flesh-food differs from the cultivated and cooked vegetables and fruit within easy reach of man. ”

“ The milk prepared for the young of the different animals in the laboratory or kitchen of Nature is surely adapted to their structure as regards natural food requirements. Without assuming that the human dietetic requirements are identical with either of the other mammals, we may learn something concerning our approximation to one class or another by comparing the composition of human milk with that of the animals in question. ”

“ Those who advocate the use of flesh-food usually do so on the ground that it it is more nutritious, contains more nitrogenous material and more fat than vegetable food. So much the worse for the human being, says Nature, when she prepares food. ”

“ I find that oatmeal-porridge, when thus treated with malt or malt extract, is thinned by the conversion of the bulk of its insoluble starch into soluble dextrine; that boiled rice is similarly thinned; that a stiff jelly of arrowroot is at once rendered watery, and its conversion into dextrine is demonstrated by its altered action on a solution of iodine. Instead of instantly striking a blue-black color on admixture, only a slight brownish tinge is displayed, and not even this when the temperature has been carefully maintained. ”

“ The production of malt-flour by grinding and sifting malted wheat, malted barley, or malted oats, or all of these, and the retailing of this at its fair value as a staple article of human food. Every shopkeeper who sells flour or meal of any kind should sell this. ”

“ Not only is this the case with the secretion from the glands surrounding the mouth, but the pancreas, which is concerned in a later stage of digestion, is a gland so similar to the salivary glands that in ordinary cookery both are dressed and served as "sweetbreads," and its secretion, the pancreatic juice, is a liquid closely resembling saliva and containing a similar diastase, or substance that converts starch into dextrine, and from dextrine to sugar. ”

“ A small proportion of malt flour, one twentieth for example, has a considerable effect, and if a fancy price is to be paid for it such a proportion may be used; but, if it comes into sufficient demand to be subject to wholesome competition, larger proportions up to one fourth will be desirable. ”

“ Swedes, turnips, mangel-wurzels, etc., will become delicate diet for invalids, horse-beans better than beef; delicate biscuits and fancy pastry, as well as ordinary bread, will be produced from sawdust and wood-shavings, plus a little leguminous flour. ”

“ If all Englishmen were vegetarians, the whole aspect of the country would be changed. It would be a land of gardens and orchards, instead of gradually reverting to prairie grazing-ground as at present. The unemployed miserables of our great towns, the inhabitants of our union workhouses, and all our rogues and vagabonds, would find ample and suitable employment in agriculture. ”

“ From what I am able to learn, the reason why this hopeful theory has not been carried out is simply that it does not "pay." The advantage to the cattle is not sufficient to remunerate the farmer for the extra cost of the malted food. ”

“ There are certain albuminoids, certain carbo-hydrates, certain hydrocarbons, and certain salts demanded for our sustenance. Excepting in fruit, these are not supplied by Nature in a fit condition for our use. They must be prepared. ”

“ In the limestone caverns of this and other European countries we find human bones gnawed by human teeth, and split open by flint implements for the evident purpose of extracting the marrow, according to the domestic economy of the period. ”

“ His teeth are not constructed for munching and grinding raw grain, nor his digestive organs for assimilating such grain in this condition.
He is not even to be classed with the omnivorous animals. He stands apart from all as The Cooking Animal. ”