The Vermont watchman. [volume] (Montpelier, Vt.) 1883-1911, 1899-01-25
AGRICULTURAL.
The Food We Eat.

Joy the very richest food and wine, the
young men refused this tempting food
and chose a plain vegetable diet with
nothing but water for a drink. The
result was that after few days upon
this simple diet, 1t was found that they
were looking better and had gained
more in weight than the eaters OF the
rich foods and drinkers of the wine.
The result was that they gained their
point and after that received the sim
pie food which they chose. That was
good while ago, you will find an &C.
count of it in the first chapter of the
Book Of Danie), but the lesson is valu-
able to day from practical standpoint,
and the principles of simple living are
as needful to men now as then. The
food of the American people costs them
q great deal. In very few homes is the
food prepared with view to economy
and health, but the subject is being
much studied, discussed, and expert
mented upon. We may consider foods
from standpoint of economy or of
health, and we may combine the two.
1t might be expected in this day when
everything which pertains to human
welfare is being taken up, studied, and
the people stirred up to better ways,
the matter of food would not escape.
This food question is being taken up
in good many different ways. The
u. S. Government is doing good deal
of work in the line of its scientific
study. The work is chiefly done at the
Storrs Agricultural Experiment Sta
ton, in Connecticut, and the results
are printed in the reports of that sta
ton, and in the Year Book and other
publications of the Department of
Agriculture. On the other hand a
great deal has been done by various
persons, usually physicians connected
with some of the hygienic establish
ments or sanatoriums of this country,
who have made healthful diet one of
their chief means of restoring the sick.
The Government publications empha-
size the economical side of the food
question:; the doctors take up the
healthfulness or the opposite of foods,
but also consider the subject of econ
omy. The latter is question in which
many are interested, the former one in
which all should be interested. Now
it is fact that no body of workers are
go well prepared to study these ques-
tions inteligeutly as the farmers, and
the reason is that they have been
forced or led to study these problems
in connection with cattle feeding.
Every intelligent dairyman knows
something of foods, and the terms
"protein," "fats," carbohydrates"
and the like are well known to every
farmer who reads daily literature. So,
too, the farmer knows that he must
feed "balanced ration" to produce the
best results, and he understands some
thing of how to compound this ration.
Hence farmers are better prepared than
any other class of people to understand
and use the teachings of science as to
the right use of foods.
The greatest obstacle in the way of
the use of healthful and economical
foods lies in habit and taste. People
get into the habit of cooking certain
things in certain ways, and a busy
woman does not like to change. Some
housewives like to try new things;
others are 30 constituted that they
cannot make new things, especially
food preparations, without good deal
of care and trouble. Sometimes an
other member of the family gets zeal
GUS for change in the foods and
cooking, and the one who does the
cooking will have nothing to do with
the new notions. So it requires quite
bit of wisdom and patience all round
to introduce any change for the better
into family. And when Everybody
else is suited, perhaps the hired man
grumbles or threatens to leave if
things do not go back to the old way.
So it is with full realization OF all
these difficulties that this subject is
preached, but the writer feels sure that
all readers of the WATCHMAN will be
glad to know something of this subject,
and that some of them at least will be
able to make practical use of such
information as may be given.
The food we eat has several uses, the
chief of which are the repair of waste
and wear, the maintenance of muscular
strength, and the keeping up the heat
of the body. AS most up-to-date dairy
men know, there are only three classes
OF food elements especially required to
meet our bodily needs. These are