FOOD COMBINATIONS.

Nearly every article of food known, as bad as some of them are, will agree with the stomach if eaten alone or with a few other articles, in normal quantities, whose chemical properties harmonize. When we say that certain things do not agree with us, the fact is that these things do not agree with themselves. The truth is, we have eaten a combination of things that do not agree one with the other; and the stomach, being the receptacle of this chemical disturbance, is made the sufferer. The question of combinations is extremely important in cooked foods, because the tendency of modern cookery is to mix, to jumble together an innumerable number of things and pour over them condiments, sauces and dressings that are composed of dozens of other ingredients, until it becomes utterly impossible to ascertain by any method of calculation how many different articles compose one whole. While it is always well to observe correct combinations, it is in reality of secondary importance, for in subsisting on uncooked foods the natural tendency is towards simplicity. This is one of the greatest virtues following their adoption. In the beginning many are likely to desire each meal to be composed of a large number of articles. They like to see it spread around; they want to see the table covered; they want to see it groaning beneath a load, simply because they were raised that way. They have no standard to measure from, except a cooked standard; but this optical appetite soon wears off, and the taste and delicious flavors that are developed by combining two or three things, lead the elementary student to ignore numerical display and make a meal upon three or four things.

A very delicious taste will be developed by eating fruits and nuts together, care being taken to masticate the nuts thoroughly before the fruits are put into the mouth. If this rule is observed in eating vegetables and nuts, the same delightful taste will be experienced.

The following combinations have been found by experience to be chemically harmonious, healthful and very nutritious:

Flaked wheat, with nuts, dates and cream.

Flaked wheat, nuts, honey, milk and cream.

Combination cereal with grated nuts and cream.

Egg-nog, protoid nuts, dates, lettuce salad with olive oil and cream.

Cold slaw with olive oil, protoid nuts, unfired bread, sweet apple with thick cream.

The following articles compose three ideal meals for a perfectly normal person:

Breakfast.

One red apple with combination nut butter.

One ounce protoid nuts.

Five or six black dates.

One glass Milk.

Luncheon.

Sauce dish Combination Cereal.

One ounce Pecan Meats.

Two Turkish pulled Figs.

One ounce protoid nuts

Cold Slaw with Olive Oil.

Two cakes of Unfired Bread

Four prunes with thick cream.

Sweet Butter.

Glass of Egg-nog.

Dinner.

Two ounces Nut Meats.

Vegetable Salad with Hygeia Dressing.

Two or three cakes Unfired Bread.

Combination nut butter.

Very ripe Banana with thick cream.

Pint of Whole Milk.

There is a popular opinion among the majority of people that appetite, that is, a desire for food, is an evidence of good health. This is one of the serious mistakes into which people have gradually evolved. Irritation of the mucous membranes of the stomach is one of the most serious and unhealthy conditions with which this much-abused organ is afflicted; and while in this condition, it calls with ferocity for food, the satisfying of which has killed suddenly hundreds of thousands of people whose death is attributed nearly always by the learned doctors to heart failure. And we agree with them completely. We have never known any other method of demise, except for the heart to fail. It is unquestionably the customary way to die, and it matters but little whether the “heart failed” on account of being shot, beheaded by a Cuban machete, or on account of an over-loaded stomach,—the doctor’s “heart-failure” theory is safely correct.

There are five different classes of food; there are five different digestive organs and five different kinds of digestive fluids.

The five classes of foods are, water, proteids, carbohydrates, fat and mineral salts. The five organs of digestion are, the mouth, stomach, liver, pancreas and intestinal glands.

The five different digestive fluids are, saliva, gastric juice, pancreatic juice, bile and intestinal juices.

All the different kinds of food contain more or less water. All of the different digestive fluids are composed largely of water.

Foods classed under the head of proteids are composed largely of nitrogen, and embrace albumen in animal foods, the gluten and gelatine in cereals, cellulose in vegetables, and the casein in milk and cheese.

The foods classed under the head of carbohydrates contain mostly starch and sugar. All the cereals, vegetables, fruits and nuts are composed, more or less, of carbohydrates. Many of these also contain nitrogen to a sufficient degree to class them under the head of protein.

Mineral salts are found in all vegetables and fruits in sufficient quantities to supply the needs of the body if it is fed upon these articles. The salts of sodium, potassium, chlorides, calcium, magnesium, phosphates and iron are the principal mineral or organic salts and are the most important elements in forming the bony structure of the human body.

These salts are found in abundance in all fruits, nuts and vegetables, and when taken into the body in their natural or organic state they contribute to the body all of their value as building material, but in cooked foods these elements are rendered inorganic and become so changed and dissipated as to be in many cases totally worthless. For instance, iron is one of the principal properties of cabbage. Eaten naturally it is an excellent food, easy of digestion and assimilation; but cooked, the iron is set free and is as indigestible as saw filings.

In digesting starch and sugar, and all carbohydrates, an alkaline solution or digestive fluid is required, a large amount of which is furnished by the saliva. Hence, all cereals, fruits and vegetables should be thoroughly masticated, insalivated and pulverized before entering the stomach. And as the saliva is an alkaline substance, the digestion of these foods, therefore, begins in the mouth.

All foods composed largely of starch, such as cereals, potatoes, and nearly all legumes, should not be eaten at the same meal with sweets, especially cane sugar.

All foods, whether fluids or solids, that contain starch or sugar, such as rice, potatoes, corn, oats, in fact, all the cereal class, may be eaten with safety at the same meal. Milk can also be taken with all the carbohydrate family of foods.

All foods containing gluten, albumen or gelatine, such as meat, eggs, and a few kinds of nuts, are classed as protein, and require an acid solvent to be digested; therefore can be eaten with safety with all kinds of fruits.

The digestive fluid secreted by the stomach is an acid substance; therefore, the last-named foods are digested mainly in the stomach.

Milk, one of the best foods known, can be taken with all kinds of fruits, provided no cereal starch be eaten at the same meal. All foods that contain both carbohydrates and proteins compose healthful combinations.

Starch, sugar and fats may be properly termed the “fuel of the body.” They supply all the force, energy, heat and brain power of the system, while proteids produce the structure in which this energy is reposed.

The few fundamental rules given here apply to a normal or healthy stomach. Where any abnormal condition is present, selections of food must be made to counteract and overcome them.

The study of food combinations, however, in its last analysis, is the science of trying to ascertain the best way to do the wrong thing. The less foods are mixed and combined at the same meal, the healthier and higher that form of life will be which they build.

The system requires daily so much water, proteids, carbohydrates, fat and salts. The foods necessary to supply these elements can be eaten at different meals, instead of combining them all at the same time. It is this most interesting and important problem that the use of uncooked foods will solve.

The ultimate and most scientific end that can be attained in the study of the food question is, to find in foods the exact requirements of a normal body; in other words, a perfectly balanced bill of fare. This is rendered extremely difficult when we subsist upon foods which have been changed by any process from their elemental condition; but in subsisting upon natural or elementary foods it is but a matter of time when the taste will dictate the quality, and hunger the quantity, and the perfectly balanced bill of fare becomes possible.