NUTS THE NATURAL AND ADEQUATE SOURCE OF PROTEIN AND FATS
By
JOHN HARVEY KELLOGG, M. D., F. A. C. S.,
Medical Director of the Battle Creek Sanitarium
In the writer's opinion, the most important thing which can be done to promote the nut growing industry is to make clear to men and women everywhere the necessity for returning to natural and biologic living. Since he left his primitive state, in his wanderings up and down the face of the earth to escape destruction by terrific terrestrial convulsions and cataclysmic changes in climate and temperatures, chilled during long glacial periods, parched and blistered by tropic heats, starved and wasted by drouth and famine, man has been driven by ages of hardships and emergencies to adopt every imaginable expedient to survive immediate destruction, and in so doing has acquired so great a number of unnatural tastes, appetites and habits, perversions and abnormalities in customs and modes of life, that it is the marvel of marvels that he still survives.
Man no longer seeks his food among the natural products of field and forest and prepares it at his own hearthstone, but finds it ready to eat, prepared in immense factories, slaughter-houses, mills, and bakeries and displayed in palatial emporiums. No longer led by a natural instinct, as were his remote forebears, in the selection of his foodstuffs, he finds his dietetic guidance in the advertising columns of the morning paper, and eats not what Nature prepared for his sustenance, but what his grocer, his butcher and his baker find most for their pecuniary interest to purvey to him. The average man no longer himself plants and tills and harvests the foods which enter into his bill of fare, that is, "earns his bread by the sweat of his brow," but accepts whatever is passed on to him by a long line of producers and purveyors who do his sweating for him, depriving him of the opportunity of earning both appetite and good digestion by honest toil. So he resorts to condiments and ragouts, palate-tickling and tongue-tickling sauces and nerve-rousing stimulants, as a means of securing the unearned felicity of gustatory enjoyment.
At the World's Eugenics Congress held in New York last fall, Professor Davenport expressed the opinion that the human race will ultimately perish, and Major Darwin, son of Charles Darwin, one of the world's leading economists, gave expression to similar views. We are evidently traveling a downhill road and the tide of degeneracy is rising so fast it will certainly sweep us on to race extinction unless we return to sane and biologic living. We are primates, not carnivores like the dog, nor omnivores like the hog. The primates are fruit and nut eaters in whatever part of the world they are found. All the primates adhere to the family bill of fare. The gorilla, reigning king of beasts in the forests of the Congo, his somewhat lesser relative, the chimpanzee, which tenants a wide area of the Dark Continent, the orang-utan of Borneo, and the gibbon of tropical Asia, diversified as they are in form and habitat, are all equally circumspect in their adherence to the diet of nuts and fruits, tender shoots and soft grains, foods which Nature has prescribed as the primate's bill of fare.
A return to natural eating would doubtless do, to say the least, as much as any one thing toward checking the downward race movement, and no one who has ever studied the economics of diet will question that the only way in which the earth's dense populations of the future can be fed will be by the elimination of the flesh-pots and a resumption of the natural dietary. This is clear when we recall the fact that the Agricultural Experiment Stations have demonstrated that 33 pounds of digestible foodstuffs are required to make one pound of beef. When an animal is fattened, the creature uses a large part of the food which it consumes for its own purposes. The eater of flesh does not get back the original corn and other foods given to the animal but only a small fraction of it; and hence dense populations can only indulge in beef eating by importing meats from other countries not yet fully occupied. Evidently, the present rapid increase of the earth's population will soon bring us to a point where this enormous waste must cease. Flesh eating will have to be abandoned for economic reasons. Even the milk supply will necessarily be limited, for we are compelled to feed the cow 5 pounds of digestible foodstuffs to obtain 1 pound of water-free food in the form of milk.
Those pessimistic economists who predict that by the year 2000 the American Continent will be so densely populated that means will have to be adopted to limit the increase of population because of the scarcity of foodstuffs, are evidently not aware of the activities of the Nut Growers Association and of the marvelous efficiency of nut trees as producers of protein and fats, the two elements of our foodstuffs which are most costly because hardest to produce.
I am creditably informed that one acre of land supporting 35 black walnut trees in full bearing, will produce not less than 350 pounds of walnut meats, each pound of which has a nutritive value in protein and fats fully four times that of an equal weight of beef or an equivalent of 1400 pounds of meat. To produce a steer weighing 1600 pounds, requires two acres and two years. Two acres and two years will produce 1400 pounds of nut meats, the equivalent of 5600 pounds of beef or more than 9 times the amount of nutritive material in the form of protein and fat produced by beef raising.
Of course, the question might be raised whether nuts as a source of food are equal in value to meats, which supply the same sort of food material, namely, protein and fats. If the anthropologists are right, this is a question which need not worry us, for, according to Professor Keith, the eminent English anatomist and a leading paleontologist, and Professor Elliot, of Oxford, nuts were the chief staple of our hardy ancestors of prehistoric times. Professor Elliot, indeed, tells us in his work, "Prehistoric Man," that the first representatives of the human race who appeared in the Eocene Period were fruit and nut eaters, and were abundantly supplied with this sort of nutriment. This eminent author says,—
"On the bushes by the rivers and along the shore there were all sorts of fruits and nuts. For the subsistence of our lemur-monkey-man in the early stages of evolution, what fruits would seem a priori most suitable?
"I think that one would select the banana and bread-fruit. Ancestral forms of both were flourishing in the Eocene. Many other fruits with which man has been afterwards continually (perhaps one might venture to say most intimately) associated, occur at this period. These are, most of them, found in so many places that one is apt to think they were then of world-wide distribution.
"In the temperate brushwood and on the river-sides, acorns, hazel-nut, hawthorne, sloe, cherry and plum might be found. Here and there, he might alight upon a walnut or an almond; figs also of one kind or another seem to have been common. Palm trees existed, and some of them were of enormous size."
If, in modern times, nuts have come to be used as a luxury rather than as a staple article of diet, it must be because we have neglected to cultivate this choicest of food products which Nature is ready to provide with a lavish hand when invited to do so by our co-operation. But as the public become better informed respecting the high food value of nuts and especially in view of the steadily rising cost of flesh meats, the nut is certain to gain higher appreciation, and the writer has no doubt that some time in the future nuts will become a leading constituent of the national bill of fare and will displace the flesh meats which today are held in high esteem but which in the broader light of the next century will be regarded as objectionable and inferior foods, and will give place to the products of the various varieties of nut trees which will be recognized as the choicest of all foods.
In nutritive value the nut far exceeds all other food substances; for example, the average number of food units per pound furnished by half a dozen of the more common varieties of nuts is 3231 calories while the average of the same number of varieties of cereals is 1654 calories, half the value of nuts. The average food value of the best vegetables is 300 calories per pound and of the best fresh fruits grown in this country, 278 calories. The average value of the six principal flesh foods is 810 calories per pound or one-fourth that of nuts.
Recent studies of the proteins of nuts by Osborne and Harris, Van Slyke, Johns and Cajori, have demonstrated that the proteins of nuts are at least equal to those of meat. This has been shown to be true of the almond, English walnut, black walnut, butternut, peanut, pecan, filbert, Brazil nut, pine nut, chestnut, hickory and cocoanut; that is, of practically all the nuts in common use.
Observations seem to show that, in general, the proteins of oily seeds are complete proteins.
Cajori's research has also shown the presence of growth-promoting vitamins in abundant quantity in the almond, English walnut, filbert, pine nut, hickory, chestnut and pecan.
That the nut is appreciated as a dainty is attested by the frequency with which it appears as a dessert and the extensive use of various nuts as confections. That nuts do not hold a more prominent place in the national bill of fare as food staples is due chiefly to two causes; first, the popular idea that nuts are highly indigestible, and second, the limited supply.
The notion that nuts are difficult of digestion has really no foundation in fact. The idea is probably the natural outgrowth of the custom of eating nuts at the close of a meal when an abundance, more likely a super-abundance, of highly nutritious foods has already been eaten and the equally injurious custom of eating nuts between meals.
Neglect of thorough mastication must also be mentioned as a common cause of indigestion following the use of nuts. Nuts are generally eaten dry and have a firm hard flesh which requires thorough use of the organs of mastication to prepare them for the action of the several digestive juices. It has been experimentally shown that nuts are not well digested unless reduced to a smooth paste in the mouth. Particles of nuts the size of small seeds may escape digestion. Nut paste or "butter" is easily digestible.
Delicious nut butters may be prepared from true nuts such as the almond, filbert and pine-nut, by blanching and crushing, without roasting. Peanuts require steam roasting. Over-roasting renders the nut difficult of digestion.
More than 50,000 tons of nut butters are produced in England every year. Peanut oil, palm kernel oil and coconut oil are the principal raw materials used. In face of vanishing meat supplies, it is most comforting to know that meats of all sorts may be safely replaced by nuts not only without loss, but with a decided gain. Nuts have several advantages over flesh foods which are well worth considering.
1. Nuts are free from waste products, uric acid, urea, and other tissue wastes which abound in meats.
2. Nuts are aseptic, free from putrefactive bacteria, and do not readily undergo decay either in the body or outside of it. Meats, on the other hand as found in the markets, are practically always in an advanced stage of putrefaction. Ordinary fresh, dried or salted meats contain from three million to ten times that number of bacteria per ounce, and such meats as Hamburger steak often contain more than a billion putrefactive organisms to the ounce. Nuts are clean and sterile.
3. Nuts are free from trichinae, tapeworm, and other parasites, as well as other infections due to specific organisms. Nuts are in good health when gathered and usually remain so until eaten.
In view of these facts, it is most interesting to know that in nuts, the most neglected of all well known food products, we find the assurance of an ample and complete food supply for all future time, even though necessity should compel the total abandonment of our present forms of animal industry.
Another of the great advantages of the nut is that with few exceptions, it may be eaten direct from the hand of nature without culinary preparation of any sort. Indeed, the common custom of offering nuts as dessert is an acknowledgment that in the nut the refined chemistry of Nature's laboratory permits of no improvement by the clumsy methods of the kitchen.
Every highway should be lined with trees. Many nut trees will grow on land unsuited to ordinary farm crops. The pinon flourishes on the bleak and barren peaks of the Rockies.
A few nut trees planted for each inhabitant would insure the country against any possibility of food shortage. A row of nut trees on each side of our 3,000,000 miles of country roads would provide half enough fat and protein for a population of 100,000,000.
If each one of the 6,000,000 farmers in the United States would plant and maintain an orchard of ten acres of black walnuts, the annual crop, with little or no attention, would yield not less than 3,000,000 tons of nut protein, the equivalent of more than 12,000,000 tons of meat, besides more than 6,000,000 tons of fat of the finest quality, sufficient to supply every one of 100,000,000 people with an ample amount of protein, and, in addition, the fat equivalent of 6-2/3 ounces of butter.
Nuts should be eaten every day and should be made a substantial part of the bill of fare. So long as the nut is regarded as a dainty, suitable only for dessert, the demand will be limited. But as its merits come to be appreciated, it will be in greater demand and the supply will rapidly grow in volume.
The Lime Content of Nuts
In proportion to their weight, nuts contain more lime than any other class of foodstuffs except legumes, the average being more than one-third grain to the ounce (.370 grs.). Certain nuts are surprisingly rich in lime. For example, the almond affords one and one-third grains of food lime to the ounce, while the hazel-nut or filbert affords one and three-quarters grains of lime to the ounce, or 11.3 per cent of a day's ration of lime. The pecan and the walnut are also fairly rich in lime, as is also the peanut.
An ounce and a half of each of almonds and hazel-nuts or filberts will supply one-third the total lime requirement for a day. In general, this addition to the ordinary bill of fare would be quite sufficient to insure against any serious deficiency of lime.
Meats of all sorts are poor in lime. The lime in animals is almost exclusively in the bones. One ounce of almonds, for instance, contains as much food lime as a pound of the choicest steak, and a quarter of a pound of black walnuts supplies as much food lime as nearly two pounds of average meats.
The Iron Content of Nuts
The almond, hazel-nut, chestnut, peanut, pecan and walnut, all contain a rich store of iron, the average iron content expressed as per cent. of the iron ration being 4.79, more than two and one-half times that of fruits (1.74), three times that of vegetables (1.46), greater than that of cereals and even superior to average meats. It is true that the extraordinarily high food value of nuts renders them less available than fruits as prime sources of iron, for one would have to eat 5,000 calories of chestnuts or walnuts or more than 4,000 calories of pecans or peanuts to get a day's ration of iron; but three-quarters of a pound of almonds or hazel-nuts would supply the needed quantum of iron with an energy intake of 2,500 calories, on account of their unusually rich store of iron.
It is worth while to know that vegetable milk prepared from almonds, by adding five parts of water to one part of blanched almonds made into a smooth paste, supplies two and a half times as much iron as does cow's milk in equal quantity, and furnishing the same amount of protein. It is worth noting, just here, also, that the protein of the almond is, like that of milk, a complete protein, that is, a protein out of which human tissues may be readily formed, which is by no means true of all vegetable proteins. Such a milk, however, would be somewhat deficient in lime, a lack which could be supplied by lentil soup.
A product commercially known as Malted Nuts, prepared from almonds or peanuts, has been found of very great service in meeting the needs of infants and some classes of invalids for an easily digestible liquid nourishment to take the place of milk when a substitute is needed.
The chief obstacle which at the present time stands in the way of making nuts a food staple is the meager supply. If the population of the United States should suddenly turn to nuts as the chief means of meeting their protein requirement, the total annual crop of nuts would be consumed in a day or two, or possibly less time. The American people readily change their eating habits. As nuts become more plentiful through the efforts of the Nut Growers Association, and the general enlightenment of the people concerning the superiority of this class of foodstuffs by a well conducted propaganda such as has been carried on in behalf of the raisin industry and such as the meat packers are now conducting in their effort to induce the American people to eat more meat, but of course on an honest, scientific basis rather than by means of untruthful and misleading statements, as the packers are doing, the intelligent people of this country could soon be brought to an appreciation of the great value of edible nuts and the important place which they should fill in the bill of fare.
Thirty years ago, the writer prepared a paste from peanuts which had been previously cooked by steaming or baking, and gave to the preparation the name of "Nut Butter." Little attention was paid to the product for two or three years, then it began rapidly to win favor and, according to a recent report by the Census Bureau, 56 establishments, in 1919, produced peanut butter to the value of nearly $6,000,000, and the peanut crop last year was 816,464,000 pounds. In 30 years, the peanut crop has increased from a few thousand acres to nearly 2,000,000 acres, and the peanut has come to occupy a place on the national bill of fare of considerable prominence. The peanut is not really a nut but a legume and is in flavor and other edible qualities greatly inferior to the products in which this Association is interested. Nevertheless, the fact that it is accessible has given it an opportunity to quickly gain popular favor. The writer feels very confident that if this association and other similar organizations will continue their efforts in behalf of nut growing, and will at the same time adopt measures to inform the public concerning the remarkable nutritive properties of these products which have been created expressly for the use of man and which are so wonderfully adapted to his sustenance, there will be a steady advance in their acceptance by the public and in the not far distant future, the raising of nuts will come to be as nearly universal among farmers as the production of apples or other fruit crops. If the uncultivated lands of this country not now occupied as farms were occupied by nut trees in good bearing, the annual crop of nut protein and fat would be amply sufficient, in connection with the corn, wheat and other crops harvested by our 6,000,000 farmers from our big billion acre farm to easily support a population of 1,000,000 persons. If the nut is given a chance, it will not only save the human race from perishing from starvation, but will give it a good boost upward in the direction of race betterment.
The Eat More Meat campaign which the packers are now conducting and for the support of which they at their recent convention in Kansas City, voted to raise a fund of $500,000, is being carried on by the grossest chicanery and misrepresentation. Pseudo-scientific men are being put before the public as great authorities in human nutrition and these men are sending out plausible but most misleading eulogies of meat as a foodstuff possessing essential qualities for the lack of which the American people are suffering. The only possible reason for these frantic appeals to the American people to consume more meat is the depletion of the packers' profits by the steady decrease in meat consumption which has been going on for a number of years and which begins to threaten the future development of their industry. The public will be damaged rather than benefited by an increase of meat consumption. A nation-wide campaign in behalf of the almond, the hazel-nut, the walnut, the pecan and other of our native nuts would unquestionably improve the health and vigor of the American people, provided the nut growers will supply the demand which would be created.
* * * * *
August 12th, 1922.
Dear Dr. Deming:
I have received your letters. I am sorry to answer you very late, because on March 28th my wife died. I have been again heart broken and delay everything for these few months.
I have not yet met Mr. Read, I went to the U. S. Consulate to find him, but no definite answer received yet.
The place Chuking is rather inconvenient to reach from Shanghai. I am gong to buy land near Shanghai i. e. one hour trip from business center. When I succeed that, I will remove all trees out.
I am sending you separate paper that you want for the convention.
The seeds that I sent you last year is Castanopsis sp. grows near
Hangchow, 100 feet high and ever green.
Yours very sincerely