Maintaining Health (Formerly Health and Efficiency) Part 20

This milk is practically free from bacteria, for without adding preservatives it will remain sweet, for as long as thirteen days. If ordinary milk fails to sour in two or three days it shows that it has been treated.

According to the Country Gentleman, it will cost from one cent and a quarter to one cent and three-quarters extra per quart to produce clean milk. Healthy adults can take milk teeming with bacteria without harm, but for babies it is best to have very few or none in the milk. At Dusseldorf the babies used to die as they do here when fed unclean milk.

Herr Klingelhofer says that when fed on his product "sterben keine."

(None die.)

This is submitted to those who advocate pasteurizing the milk. Denatured milk makes sickly babies. Clean natural milk makes healthy babies. The extra cost of less than two cents a quart is not prohibitive. Most fathers, no matter how poor, waste more than that daily on tobacco and alcoholics. The extra cost would be more than saved in lessened doctor bills, to say nothing of funeral expenses. The recompense that comes from the satisfaction of having thriving, st.u.r.dy, healthy children can not be figured in dollars and cents.

Dr. Robert Mond, of London, after investigating for years, has come to the conclusion that sterilized milk predisposes to tuberculosis, instead of preventing it. He believes that milk so treated is so inferior that he would not personally use it. That sterilized milk predisposes to tuberculosis, as well as to other diseases which can attack the body only when it is run down, is natural. Any food that has been rendered inferior can not build the robust health that comes to those who live on natural food. Adults who use sterilized milk should counteract its bad effects by partaking liberally of fresh fruits and vegetables.

If the milk is clean, put into clean containers by careful milkers and is then kept cold until delivered, it will reach the consumers in good condition. Do not let the fact that when you consume a gla.s.s of milk you are also engulfing some millions of bacteria bother you, for bacteria are necessary to our existence. If all the bacteria on earth should perish, it would also mean the end of the human race.

Today the progressive farmer is coming to the fore. He is a man who is justly proud of his work, so it will probably not be long before all city people who desire clean milk can get it.

The milk cure consists in feeding sick people on nothing but milk for varying periods. Generally the patient is told to either take great quant.i.ties three or four times a day, or to take smaller quant.i.ties perhaps every half hour. The milk cure has no special virtue, except that it is a monotonous diet. The body soon rebels if forced to subsist on an excessive amount of but one kind of food. The individual loses his desire for food and even becomes nauseated. If the advocates of the milk cure would prescribe milk in moderation, instead of in excess, they would have better success. (It is fully as harmful to partake of too much milk as it is to eat excessively of other foods.)

The benefit derived from the milk cure comes from the simplicity, not from the milk. A grape cure, an orange cure or a bread and milk cure would be as beneficial. The milk cure is ancient. It was employed twenty-five centuries ago.

_Clabbered milk_: Clabbered milk or sour milk needs no special preparation. Put the milk into an earthen or china dish. Do not use metal dishes, for the lactic acid acts upon various metals. Cover the dish so as to keep particles of matter in the air away, but the covering is not to be airtight. Put the dish in a warm place, but not in the sun.

Milk that sours in the sun or in an air-tight bottle is generally of poor flavor. Clabbered milk is a good food. It does not form big, tough curds in the stomach, it is easy to digest, and the lactic acid helps to keep the alimentary tract sweet. The various forms of milk may be used in similar combinations.

_b.u.t.termilk_: The real b.u.t.termilk is what remains of the cream after the fat has been removed by churning. It is slightly acid and has a characteristic taste, to most people very agreeable. The flavor is different from that of artificially made b.u.t.termilk. In composition it is almost like whole milk, except that it contains very little fat.

Many people make b.u.t.termilk by beating the clabbered milk thoroughly, until it becomes light. The b.u.t.termilk made from sweet milk and the various brands of bacterial ferments obtainable at the drug stores is all right. These ferments have as their basis the lactic acid bacteria, and if the manufacturers wish to call their germs by other names, such as Bacillus Bulgaricus, no harm is done. It is unnecessary to add any of these ferments, for the milk clabbers about as quickly without them.

b.u.t.termilk is an excellent food. The casein can be seen in fine flakes in the real b.u.t.termilk. Adults usually digest b.u.t.termilk and clabbered milk more easily than the sweet milk. The lactic acid seems to be quite beneficial. Metchnikoff thought for a while that he had discovered how to ward off decay and old age by means of the lactic acid bacteria in milk.

Milk can be clabbered quickly by adding lemon juice to sweet milk.

_Junket_: Add rennet to milk and let it stand until it thickens. The milk is not to be disturbed while coagulation takes place, for agitation will cause a separation of the whey. The rennet can be bought at the drug stores.

_Whey_ contains milk sugar, some salts, and a little alb.u.min. It is easily digested, but not very nourishing. It is what is left of the milk after the fat and almost all of the protein are removed.

_Cottage cheese_: This is sometimes called Dutch cheese or white cheese.

It is a delicious and nutritious dairy product that is easy to digest.

Put the clabbered milk in a muslin bag, hang the bag up and allow the milk to lose its whey through drainage. In summer this bag must be kept in a cool place. After draining, beat the curds. Then add enough clabbered milk to make the curds soft when well beaten. A small amount of cream may also be added. Cottage cheese made in this way is superior in flavor and digestibility to that which has been scalded. No seasoning is needed. A little salt is allowable, but sugar and pepper should not be used. Fruit and cottage cheese make a satisfying as well as nutritious meal.

Delicious cottage cheese is also made by using the whole clabbered milk.

Hang it up to drain in a bag until it has lost a part of its whey. Then beat it until the curds are rather small, but not fine. No milk or cream is to be added to this, for it contains all the fat that is in the whole milk. Do not drain this cheese so long that it becomes dry.

_Other cheeses_: The various cheeses on the market are made princ.i.p.ally from ripened curds, with which more or less fat has been mixed. The ripening is a form of decay, and it is no exaggeration to say that some of the very ripe cheeses on the market are rotten. The flavors are due to ferments, molds and bacteria, which split up the proteins and the fats.

The mild cheeses are generally good and may be eaten with fruits or vegetables or with bread. Two or three ounces are sufficient for the protein part of the meal, taking the place of flesh. Use less if less is desired.

When cheese becomes very odorous and ripe, no one with normal nose and palate will eat it. People who partake of excessive amounts of meats or alcoholic beverages are often fond of these foul cheeses. One perversion leads to another.

Cheese of good quality, eaten in moderation, is a nutritious food, easily digested. Gauthier says of cheese: "Indeed, this casein, which has the composition of muscular tissue, scarcely produces during digestion either residue or toxins."

Because good cheese is concentrated and of agreeable flavor, it is necessary to guard against overeating. An excess of rich cheese soon causes trouble with the liver or constipation or both.

Cheese should not be eaten in the same meal with fish, meat, eggs, nuts or legumes, for such combining makes the protein intake too great.

There is nothing incompatible about such combinations, but it is safest not to make them. The course dinners, ending up with a savory cheese, crackers and coffee, are abominations. They are health-destroyers. They lead to overeating. As nearly everybody overeats, and because overeating is the greatest single factor in producing disease and premature death, it is advisable not to eat cheese and other foods rich in protein in the same meal. The greater the variety of food, the more surely the diner will overeat.

The term, "full cream cheese" is misleading, for cheeses are not made of whole cream. The cream does not contain enough protein (casein) for the manufacture of cheese. Some cheeses are made of skimmed milk. Others are made of milk which contains part, or even all, of the cream. Some have cream added. The cheeses containing but a moderate amount of fat are the best.

The popular Roquefort cheese is made of a mixture of goat's milk and sheep's milk. The savor is due to bacterial action and fat saponification, which result in ammonia, glycerine, alcohol, fatty acids and other chemicals in very small quant.i.ties.

The peculiar colorings which run in streaks through some cheeses that are well ripened are due to molds, bacteria and yeasts. Gentlemen who would discharge the cook if a moldy piece of bread appeared on the table, eat decaying, moldy cheese with relish.

The best cheese of all is cottage cheese. People of normal taste will soon weary of the frequent consumption of strong cheese, but they can take cottage cheese every other day with relish. Occasionally put a few caraway seeds in it if this flavor is agreeable.

Cottage cheese may be eaten plain or with bread, or with fruit or vegetables. It may be used as dressing both on fruit and vegetable salads.

Cheese should play no part in the alimentation of the sick, with the exception of cottage cheese, which may be given to almost anyone who is in condition to eat anything. The other cheeses are too concentrated for sick people. In acute disease nothing is to be fed.

_Skimmed milk_ is about the same in composition as b.u.t.termilk. It is inferior in flavor, but a good food. It is used a great deal in cooking.

Milk should not be used very much in cooking. When cooked it does not digest very readily and it has a tendency to make other foods indigestible.

_Sour cream_ or clabbered cream is best when it is taken from clabbered milk. It may be used as dressing on fruits and salads. Sweet cream will clabber, but it is not as delicious as when it clabbers on the milk.

_Clotted cream_ is made by putting the milk aside in pans in a cool place until the cream rises. Then, without disturbing the cream, scald the milk. Put the pan aside until the contents are cold and remove the cream, which has a rich, agreeable flavor. This may be used as a dressing.

Whipped cream and ice cream are so familiar that they hardly need comment. Cream is such a rich food that it must be eaten in moderation.

Otherwise it will cause discomfort and disease. Ice cream is made of milk and cream, in varying proportions, flavored to taste and frozen. It is not necessary to add eggs and cornstarch. If eaten slowly it is a good food, but taken in too large quant.i.ties and too rapidly it may cause digestive troubles. It is not best to chill the stomach. Those with weak digestion should be very careful not to do so.

b.u.t.termilk is sometimes flavored and frozen. This ice is easy to digest.

Some doctors recommend this dish to their convalescents. It is an agreeable change, and can be eaten by many who are unable to take care of the rich ice cream.

CHAPTER XIX.

MENUS.

For a balanced dietary we need some building food, protein; some force food, starch, sugar and fat; some of the mineral salts in organic form, best obtained from raw fruits and vegetables; and a medium in which the foods can be dissolved, water.

We need a replenishment of these food stuffs at intervals, but it is not necessary to take all of them at the same meal, or even during the same day. Those who believe that all alimentary principles must enter into every meal must necessarily injure themselves through too complex eating. In talking of these alimentary principles, reference is made to them only when they are present in appreciable quant.i.ties.

To have the subject better in hand, let us again cla.s.sify the most important foods:

Flesh foods, which are rich in protein.

Nuts, which contain considerable protein and fat.

Milk and cheese, which contain much protein.

Eggs, taken princ.i.p.ally for their protein.

Cereals, the most important contents being starches.