it quite easily absorbed by the stomach. Cereals, if properly boiled at
the right temperature, and for the right length of time, will have the
starch granules so broken up that the saliva will act easily on the
broken granules. Raw vegetables containing starch are not acted upon in
the mouth and are digested afterwards only with great difficulty, while
cooked vegetables are a most desirable article of diet.

A great deal is said nowadays about overeating, and Horace Fletcher
affirms that the average man would be much healthier and much stronger
if he ate not more than two meals and generally only one meal a day. The
relation between the amount of food eaten or the amount of food absorbed
or utilized and the need for food cannot be determined for the average
but only for the individual. There is no doubt but that men or women
doing muscular work require greater amounts of food than those not so
engaged. It is a common practice to increase the amount of oats which a
horse consumes when the horse has hard work to do and to cut down the
amount of grain when the horse stands in the stable. It is curious that
this practice, so well known to give good results, is not applied to the
human animal as well. But very few men will be found voluntarily to
diminish the amount of their breakfast or dinner because on that day or
on the following day they are going to stay in the house instead of
engaging in vigorous outdoor labor.

No discussion on foods would be complete without a repetition of the
frequently given warning, against fried meats and vegetables. Frying
coats the outside of the food with a layer of fat not easily penetrated
by the digestive juice and not acted on in the stomach. Therefore, all
fried food, unless thoroughly chewed and then only when the frying is
done in very hot fat so that it remains on the outside of the whole
piece, will pass through the stomach without being acted upon. Frying is
a quicker process than roasting, an advantage which appeals to the
American notion of haste, but it is better to begin the preparation of
the meal earlier and cook the meat by roasting or stewing and the
vegetables by boiling or baking rather than to postpone the preparation
of the meal until ten minutes before the hour and then fry everything.

_Muscular and psychic reactions._

Another factor in the power of the body to utilize the food values is
the condition of the body at the time of the meal. If the individual is
ex