A Simple Rule. There is one point that is good to remember. The average person needs twice as much starch as he needs of protein and fat together. That is, if he needs four parts of protein and three of fat, he ought to eat about fourteen parts of starch. This does not mean that we need to bother ourselves with troublesome tables of what to eat, but only to keep in mind in a general way that we need more bread and
potatoes than we do meat and eggs. The body does not have to rebuild itself every day. It is probable that a good many people eat too much protein food. If a man is doing hearty work he must have a good supply of meat, but the average person needs only a moderate amount. Here again, the habits of the more intelligent families are likely to come pretty near the dictates of science.
For the Children. The mother of a family ought to know that the children need plenty of bread, butter, and milk. Despite all the notions to the contrary, good well-baked white bread is neither indigestible nor constipating. It is indeed the staff of life. Two large slices should form the background of every meal, unless there is an extraordinary amount of other starchy food or unless the person is too fat. Milk-fat (from whole milk, cream, and butter) is by far the best fat for children. Besides fat, it furnishes a certain growth-principle necessary for development. As the dairyman cannot raise good calves on skimmed milk, so we cannot raise robust children without plenty of butter and milk. The pity of it is that poor people are forced to try! Milk is also the best protein for children, whose kidneys may be overstrained by trying to care for the waste matter from an excessive quantity of eggs and meat. Bread and butter, milk, fruit, vegetables, and sugar in ample quantities and meat and eggs in
moderate quantities are pretty sure to make the kind of children we want. Above all things, let us train them not to be afraid of normal amounts of any regular food or of any combination of foods.
The Fear of Mixtures. There are many people who can without flinching face almost any single food, but who quail before mixtures. Perhaps there is no notion which is more firmly entrenched in the popular mind than this fear of certain food-combinations, acquired largely from the advertisements of certain so-called "food specialists."
The most persistent idea is the fear of acid and milk. It is interesting to watch the new people when they first come to my table. Confronted with grape-fruit and cream at the same meal, or oranges and milk, or cucumbers and milk, they eat under protest, in consternation over the disastrous results that are sure to follow. Out of all these scores of people, many of whom are supposed to have weak stomachs, I have never had one case of indigestion from such a combination. When a person knows that the stomach juices themselves include hydrochloric acid which is far more acid than any orange or grapefruit, that the milk curdles as soon as it reaches the stomach, and that it must curdle if it is to be digested, he has to be very "set" indeed if he is to cling to any remnant of fear.
Of course to say that the stomach is well prepared
chemically, muscularly, and by its nerve supply to handle any combination of ordinary food in ordinary amounts is not the same thing as saying that we may devour with impunity any amount of anything. It is a good thing for every one to know when he has reached his limit, and a person with organic heart disease should avoid eating large quantities at one time, or when he is extraordinarily fatigued or emotionally disturbed, lest at such a time he may put a fatal strain on the pneumogastric nerve that controls both stomach and heart.
The Fear of Certain Foods
Physical Idiosyncrasies. Most of our false fears on food subjects come from some tradition—either a social tradition or a little private, pet tradition of one's own. Some one once was ill after eating strawberries and cream. What more natural than to look back to those little curdles in the dish and to start the tradition that such mixtures are dangerous? The worst of it is that the taboo habit is very likely to grow. One after another, innocent foods are thrown out until one wonders what is left. A patient of mine, Mr. G., told me that he had a short time before gone to a physician with a tale of woe about his sour stomach. "What are you eating?" asked the doctor. "Bran crackers and prunes." "Then," said the learned doctor, "you will