Flesh foods combine best with the succulent vegetables and the salad vegetables or with juicy fruits. It is more usual to take vegetables with flesh than to take fruit, but those who prefer fruit may take it with equally as good results. Both fruits and vegetables are rich in tissue salts, in which flesh foods are rather deficient. The succulent vegetables contain some starch and the juicy fruits some sugar, but not enough to do any harm. They both act as fillers.
Flesh is quite concentrated and it is customary to take it with other concentrated foods, such as bread and potatoes. As a result too much food is ingested. It would be a splendid rule to make to avoid bread and potatoes when flesh food is taken, but if this seems too rigid, make it a rule never to eat all three at the same meal. It is best to eat the flesh foods without bread or potatoes, but if starch is desired, take only one kind at a time.
Most people crave a certain amount of food as filler, and they have fallen into the habit of using bread and potatoes for this purpose. This is a mistake. Use the juicy fruits and the succulent vegetables for filling purposes and thus get sufficient salts and avoid the many ills that come from eating great quantities of concentrated foods.
When possible, have a raw salad vegetable or two with the meat or fish meal.
Eat only one concentrated albuminous food at a meal. If you have meat, take no fish, eggs, nuts or cheese.
CHAPTER XI.
NUTS.
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Pro- Carbohy- Calories
Water tein Fat drates Ash per lb.
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Acorns 4.1 8.1 37.4 48.0 2.4 2718
Almonds 4.8 21.0 54.9 17.3 2.0 3030
Brazil nuts 5.3 17.0 66.8 7.0 3.9 3329
Filberts 3.7 15.6 65.3 13.0 2.4 3432
Hickory nuts 3.7 15.4 67.4 11.4 2.1 3495
Pecans 3.0 11.0 71.2 13.3 1.5 3633
English walnuts 2.8 16.7 64.4 14.8 1.3 3305
Chestnuts, dried 5.9 10.7 7.0 74.2 2.2 1875
Butternuts 4.5 27.9 61.2 3.4 3.0 3371
Cocoanuts 14.1 5.7 50.6 27.9 1.7 2986
Pistachio nuts 4.2 22.6 54.5 15.6 3.1 3010
Peanuts, roasted 1.6 30.5 49.2 16.2 2.5 3177
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Nuts vary a great deal in composition. They are generally the seeds of trees, enclosed in shells, but other substances are also called nuts. The representative nuts are rich in fat and protein, containing some carbohydrate (sugar or starch.)
A few nuts, such as the acorn, cocoanut and chestnut, are very rich in starch, and these should be classified as starchy foods. Very few foods contain as high per cent of starch as the dry chestnut. In southern Europe chestnuts are made into flour, and this is made into bread or cakes. An inferior bread is also made of acorn flour. Chestnuts may be boiled or roasted. They are very nutritious.