It is easy to remember that an ordinary slice of bread—about three and one half inches square—contains approximately one hundred calories; an average egg, sixty-five; a glass of milk, one hundred fifty; an average potato, one hundred twenty-five; a tablespoonful of gravity cream, fifty; the usual serving of cooked cereal, seventy-five to one hundred; vegetables, except potatoes, an ordinary serving, twenty-five to fifty, depending on the amount of fat or milk added as seasoning; legumes, average serving, one hundred to one hundred fifty. Desserts are usually high in value, ranging from one hundred twenty-five calories in the usual serving of simple custard or junket to three hundred fifty or more in the usual one sixth of some pies, or the ordinary piece of cake.
Housewives who wish to go into the question of foods thoroughly, and combine the science with the art of cookery, may arrange a table of the staples and raw food that ordinarily enter into their various recipes, somewhat after the following, the items of which have been taken at random from such a list or table already prepared and in use:
| A. Food | ||||||
| B. Measure | ||||||
| C. Weight | ||||||
| D. Protein | ||||||
| E. Fat | ||||||
| F. Carbohydrate | ||||||
| G. Total | ||||||
| A | B | C | D | E | F | G |
| Flour | 1 cup | 5 oz. | 80 | 25 | 419 | 524 |
| Eggs, average | each | 1½ oz. | 23 | 40 | 0 | 63 |
| Milk, whole | 1 cup | 8 oz. | 30 | 88 | 46 | 164 |
| Sugar, granulated | 1 cup | 7½ oz. | 0 | 0 | 840 | 840 |
| Butter | 1 cup | 8 oz. | 0 | 1,744 | 0 | 1,744 |
| Butter | 1 tablespoon | ½ oz. | 0 | 109 | 0 | 109 |
If the housewife desires to know the food value of a cake, for instance, that she is about to bake, whose recipe calls for two cups flour, one and one half cups sugar, one half cup butter, four eggs, she can very easily find out by consulting her table; as:
| A. Protein | |||||
| B. Fat | |||||
| C. Carbohydrate | |||||
| D. Total | |||||
| A | B | C | D | ||
| 2 cups flour | = | 160 | 50 | 838 | 1,048 |
| 1½ cups sugar | = | 0 | 0 | 1,260 | 1,260 |
| ½ cup butter | = | 0 | 872 | 0 | 872 |
| 4 eggs | = | 92 | 160 | 0 | 252 |
| Totals | 252 | 1,082 | 2,098 | 3,432 | |
If the cake is cut into twelve servings, the value of each may be determined by dividing each of these sums by twelve. Thus each piece will represent in value, protein, twenty-one calories; fat, ninety calories; carbohydrate, one hundred seventy-five calories; total, two hundred eighty-six calories.
The number of calories needed by the individual varies with height, age, sex, climate, and state of muscular activity; but for the average person, two thousand calories daily may be taken as a working basis. If one is engaged in active muscular labor, the requirement may be three thousand or more. Many persons of sedentary habits do better on less than two thousand. Other things being equal, men need about ten per cent more than women. Children need about ten per cent more than adults. An obese individual, or one suffering from the results of imperfect oxidation, as manifested in rheumatism, neuralgia, and myalgia, may do well for a time on as low an allowance as one thousand one hundred to one thousand two hundred food units daily, experiencing marked relief from symptoms, and if obese, a reduction in weight of from one to four pounds a week.
It should be kept in mind that the amount of protein needed is quite constant, and does not vary with one's state of activity, as does the demand for the fats and the carbohydrates. From two hundred to two hundred fifty calories of this element are needed daily, even though the total ration be low. If one does well on the low ration suggested above, the protein should not be lowered proportionately, as would be the tendency. This is the repair substance, which the body, not being able to store up, must have supplied to it in regular daily amounts.
Excess in eating is often due to the use of certain concentrated foods. A teaspoonful of olive oil contains forty calories; the ordinary pat of butter (one fourth ounce), fifty calories; a heaping teaspoonful of sugar, forty calories; one English walnut, thirty-three calories; a fair sized olive, twenty calories. While these are good foods, they should be eaten with due regard for their high energy value, that the proper food balance be not disturbed. After eating a good square meal, the average individual calls for the dessert, which, with its accompaniments, actually constitutes a second meal; as, for example, a serving of pie, three hundred fifty calories; its cheese accompaniment, another one hundred calories; a few stuffed dates, another one hundred calories; a few nuts and raisins and a cup of chocolate bringing the total value of this second meal forced upon the body up to seven hundred or eight hundred calories.