OCR Text |
Show Nutritive Value of Foods. In the United States the tendency to extravagance, combined with the mistaken mis-taken notion ns to the nutritive value of costly food, causes exceptions to the rule. Taking the world through, however, the poorer communities and classes of people almost universally select those foods i which chemical analysis shows to supply i the actual nutrients at the lowest cost. But, unfortunately, the proper propor- , tiousof the nutrients in their dietaries are often very defective. Tims in portions of India and China rice, in northern Italy maize meal, in certain districts of Ger- , many and in some regions and seasons in Ireland potatoes, and among tho poor whites of the southern United States maize meal and bacon, make a large part of the sustenance of the people. These foods supply the nutrients In the cheapest forms, but they are all deficient in protein. pro-tein. The people who live upon them are ill nourished, and suffer physically, Intel-, leclually and morally thereby. On the other hand the Scotchman, as shrewd in his diet as in his dealings, finds , a most economical supply of protein in oatmeal, haddock and herring; and tho thrifty inhabitants of New England supplement sup-plement the fat of their pork with the protein of beans and the carbohydrates of potatoes, and supplement maize and wheat flour with the protein of codfish and mackerel; and while subsisting largely upon such frugal but rational diets, are well nourished, physically strong and distinguished for their Intel-1 lectual and moral force. Professor W. O. Atwater in The Century. |