Staple food

“ Usually Toodles was sent foraging to the delicatessen shops for fresh rolls, cold meats and sandwiches, eggs, fruit, tomatoes, and bakery dainties, and the hotel filled our thermos-bottles with hot coffee. We carried salt and11 pepper, mustard, sweet and sour pickles, or a relish, orange marmalade, or a fruit jam, in the hamper, and beyond that we took no staple supplies on the whole trip. We met so many people who carried with them a whole grocery-store, even to sacks of flour, that you would imagine there was not a place to get food from the Atlantic to the Pacific. ”

“ Food is of the utmost importance. Rice, biscuits, and oatmeal may form the staple, and tinned soups, Liebig’s extract of meat, and dried fish may be added. Chocolate [325] and milk in sealed tins is convenient and refreshing. Tea, coffee, sugar, and salt must be packed in well-corked bottles to keep them dry and free from ants, etc. A bottle of Yorkshire relish or Worcester sauce, and a tin or two of bloater paste are nice relishes for soups. Fowls, eggs, fruit, and sometimes freshly-caught fish may often be purchased en route. ”

“ To rice, rich in starch, they add butter and cream; with peas, they serve fat bacon; salt-fish has less nourishment than its egg sauce; beef steak is balanced by boiled potatoes. But the customs of the kitchen often err, and we have much to learn that our artificially stimulated appetites fail to teach.
Not only is the deficient supplied, but the indigestible is removed. Bran from flour, paring from potatoes, cellulose from vegetables go to feed animals whose digestions are stronger than ours, and who utilise our discarded food to produce other in a form more fitted to our powers. ”

“ Waste has no place in the substantial American home. The wise home manager uses every bit of wholesome edible product for food. She makes tasty dishes of all left-over foods. A bit of extract of beef adds just the flavor necessary to make many left-over meat and vegetable dishes favorites with the family.
Left-over egg yolks are rich in fat and may be used with skimmed milk in making custards, pudding sauces, salad dressings, noodles and in soups or drinks. ”

“ Any housewife can imagine the emotions of Sister Hope, when she took possession of a large, dilapidated kitchen, containing an old stove and the peculiar stores out of which food was to be evolved for her little family of eleven. Cakes of maple sugar, dried peas and beans, barley and hominy, meal of all sorts, potatoes, and dried fruit. No milk, butter, cheese, tea, or meat appeared. Even salt was considered a useless luxury and spice entirely forbidden by these lovers of Spartan simplicity. ”

“ By the substitution of a little cheese and an orange for the oatmeal, a meal containing about the same fuel value and proportion of protein could be arranged, and it would certainly appeal more to the appetite, and furnish better proportions of ash constituents.
In the construction of the menu for the day or meal, we must consider not only food values and time of day and combinations which shall be digestible, but flavor, color, texture, and temperature of our foods. The study of digestible combinations belongs to the science of nutrition. ”

“ I am full of milk-coffee sopped with bread, and you of bacon with eggs and marmalade. We say, what shall we give to our custom for its dinner and its luncheon? We think sadly—we who have but now brushed away the crumbs of breakfast—of those who must sit down so soon to the table groaning with viands. Therefore we say, ‘Market delicately. Have the soup clear, the entrée light and the salad green with plenty of vinegar.’ Even your calories—they do not help us much. They are in quantities so unexpected in the food that weighs nothing in the scales. ”

“ Indeed, the dyspeptic frequenting the usual Vegetarian restaurant has little opportunity to know much about vegetables as food, the menu being, as a rule, so crowded with various mixtures which are supposedly “meat substitutes” that vegetables pure and simple find small place. This book contains no meat substitutes, as such, but receipts for the palatable preparation of what is called by many “live foods,”—that is, food which has no blood to shed and does not, therefore, become dead before it can be eaten. ”

“ Combine them with different vegetables, cooked in the broth, and serve as the principal dish at a meal, or occasionally serve dumplings composed of a mixture of flour and milk, cooked in the broth, to extend the meat flavor. Frequently serve a dish of rice, hominy, cornmeal and oatmeal, dried beans and peas. These are all nutritious, nourishing foods when properly cooked and attractively served. And remember, Mary, to always serve food well seasoned. Many a well-cooked meal owes its failure to please to a lack of proper seasoning. This is a lesson a young cook must learn. ”

“ B. Foods of Contrasting Flavor.—If beef or some other protein-rich food is chosen for the main dish of a meal (such as dinner) , root vegetables or grains rich in starch, but bland in flavor, are good additions. By combining foods of decided flavor with those of less pronounced taste and those rich in one foodstuff with those abounding in another nutrient, combinations that are both pleasing and varied in flavor may be secured. A housekeeper needs to use "imagination" in selecting foods that will taste well together. ”

“ For that reason the receipts given in this book treat of the articles in common use, with the exception of lentils and macaroni, which are foods that I earnestly beg all to try. In meals made up of bacon, potatoes and bread, of corned beef and cabbage, and of pork and beans, there exists an equal and sufficient amount of nourishment; but if other dishes are added to these, the variety will result in better general health and contentment. If we were to live day after day on rice, bread, potatoes, or any one other article of food, we would not long be strong enough for any kind of work. ”

“ The varieties of nut-butters are many, and the various combinations of nuts and vegetables making potted savouries, add to a long list of highly nutritious and palatable nut-foods. There are the pulses dried and entire, or ground into flour, such as pea-, bean-, and lentil-flour. There are the cereals, barley, corn, oats, rice, rye, wheat, etc., from which the number of preparations made such as breakfast foods, bread, biscuits, cakes, pastries, etc., is legion. (One firm advertises twenty-three varieties of prepared breakfast foods made from cereals.) ”

“ The mess rooms with crude tables covered with oilcloth, with tin ware and lack of service, could exhibit at meal time the most unappetising display of food ever placed before any man. Stewed tripe—weeks old—lamb stew, clam-chowder, bread apparently made of cement, butter with a stench so strong that it outclassed the odours of the other provisions, fermented tomato catsup and hot cakes with the consistency of horse pads, greeted the unwashed eaters three times a day. The eaters themselves were a curious exhibition of mankind. ”

“ Hours of quiet simmering dissolve all dissoluble parts, soften the sternest fibre, and unlock every minute cell in which Nature has stored away her treasures of nourishment. This careful and protracted application of heat and the skillful use of flavors constitute the two main points in all those nice preparations of meat for which the French have so many names,—processes by which a delicacy can be imparted to the coarsest and cheapest food superior to that of the finest articles under less philosophic treatment. ”

“ The flavour and texture of food, its taste, in fact, stimulates the production of those secretions—such as the saliva and the gastric juice—by the action of which the food is digested or dissolved, and becomes finally a part of the body, or is assimilated. As food, then, must be relished it is desirable that it should be varied in character—it should neither be restricted to vegetable products on the one hand, nor to animal substances (including milk and eggs) on the other. ”

“ We cannot begin to describe the Elizabethan magnificence in dress. The artificial taste for dainty and costly living was also abundantly evident in the epicurism of the time. The court that allotted a scanty diet of cereal, oil, and vinegar to the men it sent out to subdue a wilderness, could partake of no simple food or drink. The cookery was complicated and consisted mainly of "villanous compounds" of great cost. Butter, cream, marrow, ambergris, lemons, spices, dried fruits, oranges, the scarce sugar—all of these entered largely in the composition of dishes. ”

“ Such are milk, honey, eggs, nuts, cereals, a few roots, legumina, and gums, and the countless variety of fruit, which are man-food par excellence. Our various kinds of bread, though artificially prepared, as well as other farinaceous dishes, are derived from an edible grain which is neither repulsive nor indigestible in its original state.
"To the second or adapted edibles belong different vegetables which are rendered palatable only by the process of cooking, as cabbage, beans, peas and lentils, and various roots and leaves. ”

“ Dinner, which should always be served near the middle of the day, should comprise meat, potatoes, one or two green vegetables, some form of light pudding or sweet. Supper, it is generally admitted, should comprise easily digested articles of food; such substances as pastry, cheese and meats are better omitted; it should consist of a porridge, with milk or cream, or a light, farinacious pudding of rice, tapioca or sago, with bread and butter, and some simple form of preserve, stewed apples or prunes, or very light, plain cake. ”

“ A basin of any kind of porridge with milk, but without sugar, also makes a light and good midday repast; or a basin of thin vegetable soup and bread, or macaroni, or even plain vegetables. The best lunch of all will be found in Allinson wholemeal bread, and salad or fruit, as it is not wise to burden the system with too much cooked food, and one never feels so light after made dishes as after bread and fruit. ”

“ A convalescent may use for drinks plenty of good milk, cocoa, carefully made tea and coffee, occasionally good wine, and the different mineral and drinking waters. Some foods to be avoided are pastry, dark or badly made cakes, pork, veal, any highly seasoned meat dish made with gravy, all kinds of fried food, sausages, heavy puddings, badly made bread, lobsters and crabs. ”

“ Cereals, eggs, and milk may be added to increase their food value. Cereals in the form of gruels or delicate puddings, as cornstarch blancmange and tapioca cream, are easily digested. Vegetables are best given rather sparingly, and only delicate, mild-flavored ones, such as spinach or asparagus, if digestion is much disturbed. In getting an invalid to take sufficient food, much depends upon the attractiveness of the service. Remember that very little things, like a fingermark on a glass, or coffee spilled into the saucer, may take away appetite and prevent enough food being eaten. ”

“ But there are vegetables and vegetables. No one who has gone in for the most elementary food reform will tolerate the sodden, soap-like potatoes, or the flabby, insipid, brown papery-looking stuff, called by courtesy cabbage, which so often does duty as companion to beef, mutton, or pork. ”

“ Convalescent's diet includes the liquid and light diets, and, in addition, all easily digested and nutritious food. For meats, game, especially venison and birds, beef, mutton, and chicken may be given, but never either pork or veal. They are difficult of digestion. Eggs in all ways, soft-cooked, scrambled, poached, and as omelets, well-baked potatoes, creamed potatoes, celery, snow pudding, cream of rice pudding, and tapioca cream, jellies, both those made from gelatine and fruits, Graham bread, Graham gems, rusk, and, in fact, any well-made bread, and good cake. ”

“ Foods that abound in protein—meat, poultry, fish, eggs, and cheese—make satisfying main dishes. Thrifty main dishes often combine these protein-rich foods with vegetables and cereals—beef stew with vegetables or dumplings, chicken with rice, fish with stuffing, cheese with macaroni. ”

“ No fried foods are permissible. Pastries, griddle cakes, rich puddings and sauces, candies, and alcoholic beverages must be omitted from the diet as well as the following articles of food: pork, veal, shellfish except oysters, sardines, canned meats and canned fish, highly seasoned and spiced dishes, twice-cooked meats, vinegar, [Pg 251] pickles, olives, cold slaw, pickled beets, catsup, mustard, coarse fibered vegetables such as cabbage, old onions, old turnips, and cucumbers, strong tea, coffee, or chocolate, rich cream or dishes made entirely of cream. ”

“ The basis of all soup is stock, and in making stock we, of course, have to depend upon vegetables, fruit, or some kind of farinaceous food. To a certain extent the water in which any kind of vegetable has been boiled may be regarded as stock, especially water that has boiled roots, such as potatoes; or grains, such as rice. ”

“ It is a fair inference from these facts that creatures like ourselves, who are not provided with a crop or compound stomach, and manifestly secrete less saliva than horses or other grain-munching animals, require some preliminary assistance when we adopt graminivorous habits; and one part of the business of cookery is to supply such preliminary treatment to the oats, barley, wheat, maize, peas, beans, &c., which we cultivate and use for food. ”

“ The idle, indigent and thriftless have equal advantages in the food they eat, with the toiling and industrious. The atole of all kinds, the barbecued meats, soups, beans and rice, together with the great variety and cheapness of fruits and vegetables, render their dietary one to be envied. ”