likewise undesirable to
spread butter on heated breads, as is so often done just before eating
biscuits, waffles and batter-cakes. The combination is certainly a
seductive one, and pleasing to the taste of most persons, but this in no
way invalidates the fact that the mixture is exceedingly indigestible.

_Pastries and Cakes._--Peculiarly unwholesome are pastries containing any
considerable proportion of fat, and also most varieties of cake. With the
exception possibly of hot batter-cakes served with an abundance of butter
and syrup, cooks have so far produced no compound so heinous and totally
depraved as pound-cake. Fruit-cake also stands high up in the list of
undesirable sweets. It certainly passes all understanding why cooks
should continue to persecute the stomachs of a dependent world with such
highly obnoxious concoctions; the only excuse that can be given for them
is that the mixtures are palatable. Where a housekeeper feels it
necessary to prepare cake, she should select some receipt free from
butter or other fat, such as angel-cake or sponge-cake, both of which
when properly made are exceedingly good to the taste, and lack the
undesirable quality of containing fats. Explanation for the peculiarly
unwholesome character of food containing melted grease lies probably in
the fact that the grains of starch under such circumstances must be to a
greater or less extent covered by a thin layer of the fatty substances,
and as a consequence it is impossible for the saliva to penetrate to the
starch and perform its normal digestive function.

CHAPTER VII

MEATS, SUGARS AND MILK

First in the list of foods the writer would place those nitrogenous
substances commonly eaten that belong to the class of albumins. That
these substances are in reality the most important of all food-stuffs
there can be no sort of question, since they, of all things eaten by the
human being, are alone absolutely essential for his well being and even
his existence. They are the substances that almost exclusively go to make
up the muscle and tendons. Along with the lime-salts they enter largely
into the composition of the bones and cartilages, brain, spinal cord and
nerves. Other foods are incapable of taking the place of the albumins, so
that they are absolutely essential for normal life in the human being.

The amount of albumin necessary for the normal adult has been variously
estimated, the tendency at the present time being to plac