Fig. 96. — Side cuts of pork. a. Loin. b. Fat back. c. Spare ribs. d. Bacon strip, e. Trim- mings, f. Leaf. 212 FOOD AND HEALTH than the tough. It is not good sense to buy porter- house steak at 30 or 32 cents a pound, or to take it in exchange for eggs at that price. It is better to buy the round or rump steak and cook it in such a way that it loses its toughness. Can you explain why the meat of young animals is more tender than that of the full- grown creature ? How shall we cook our meat ? Sometimes we wish to keep the juices in the meat, and sometimes we wish to draw out the juices for beef tea or soup, or for making gravy. If we buy a tender meat, we do not wish to make it hard by poor cooking. If the meat is tough, we should select some cooking process that will make the meat as tender as possible. Let us try two simple experiments that will show us what to do when we wish to draw the juices out, or to keep the juices in. TWO EXPERIMENTS WITH MEAT Ezpeiiment A. Chop finely a small piece of meat, squeeze out the juice with a lemon squeezer, and heat this juice in a saucepan. Notice a whitish substance that results. This is meat albu- min that is affected by heat in about the same way that the white of egg is affected. We say that the albumin has coagu- lated. Experiment B. Apparatus, If possible, 2 glass beakers, i square wire net. If these are not available, use an ordinary tumbler and a small saucepan. THE HOME DINNER 213 Method, a. Put a small piece of meat in a beaker with cold water, and allow it to stand. h. Bring water to the boiling point in the beaker. Throw in a small piece of meat. Compare the appearance of the two pieces of meat and the water in the two beakers. What has happened .? You see that the juices of the meat have come out in the cold water. In the other piece you can see that the surface of the piece is cooked and that little of the juice is in the water. The heat of -the water has coagulated the meat albumin just as it did in Experiment A. This has made a little crust over the meat and the juices cannot escape. A hot pan has just the same effect. In order to understand what cooking does to meat we must know something more of the structure of the muscle. Each muscle is made up of bundles of tiny tubes held together by a strong substance that we call connective tissue. In tough meat the muscle tubes are thicker and there is more of the connective tissue. If you examine a piece of meat, you can easily find this tissue. The structure of the muscle is a little like thact of an orange. Take a section from an orange, open it, and take out some of the single cells. These cells may stand for the muscle cells of meat that you can see only through a microscope. If you cut one of the tiny or- ange cells, the juice escapes, and this is what happens when the muscle cells are cut across. The juices will also pass through the wall of the cell when the muscle is heated and when the meat is put into cold water. When, however, we sear the outside of the meat, a crust is formed which keeps the other juices in. 214 FOOD AND HEALTH Whether the meat is tough or tender, the most valu- able protein stays behind in the muscle cell. The substances that we can draw out from the cells are called the extractives, because they can be extracted. The tough meat has as much nutritive value as, if not more than, the tender; and our problem is to soften the strong connective tissue. This can be done by long, slow cooking with plenty of moisture, which dissolves out the gelatin and softens the whole mass. A high temperature shrinks and hardens fiber, and the tender- est meat will become like sole leather, if cooked too hard and too long. This is true with tough or tender fowl.

AI-modernized reading of the original text

Fig. 96. — Side cuts of pork. a. Loin. b. Fat back. c. Spare ribs. d. Bacon strip, e. Trimmings, f. Leaf. than the tough. It is not good sense to buy porterhouse steak at 30 or 32 cents a pound, or to take it in exchange for eggs at that price. It is better to buy the round or rump steak and cook it in such a way that it loses its toughness. Can you explain why the meat of young animals is more tender than that of the fullgrown creature ? How shall we cook our meat ? Sometimes we wish to keep the juices in the meat, and sometimes we wish to draw out the juices for beef tea or soup, or for making gravy. If we buy a tender meat, we do not wish to make it hard by poor cooking. If the meat is tough, we should select some cooking process that will make the meat as tender as possible. Let us try two simple experiments that will show us what to do when we wish to draw the juices out, or to keep the juices in. TWO EXPERIMENTS WITH MEAT Ezpeiiment A. Chop finely a small piece of meat, squeeze out the juice with a lemon squeezer, and heat this juice in a saucepan. Notice a whitish substance that results. This is meat albumin that is affected by heat in about the same way that the white of egg is affected. We say that the albumin has coagulated. Experiment B. Apparatus, If possible, 2 glass beakers, i square wire net. If these are not available, use an ordinary tumbler and a small saucepan. Method, a. Put a small piece of meat in a beaker with cold water, and allow it to stand. h. Bring water to the boiling point in the beaker. Throw in a small piece of meat. Compare the appearance of the two pieces of meat and the water in the two beakers. What has happened .? You see that the juices of the meat have come out in the cold water. In the other piece you can see that the surface of the piece is cooked and that little of the juice is in the water. The heat of -the water has coagulated the meat albumin just as it did in Experiment A. This has made a little crust over the meat and the juices cannot escape. A hot pan has just the same effect. In order to understand what cooking does to meat we must know something more of the structure of the muscle. Each muscle is made up of bundles of tiny tubes held together by a strong substance that we call connective tissue. In tough meat the muscle tubes are thicker and there is more of the connective tissue. If you examine a piece of meat, you can easily find this tissue. The structure of the muscle is a little like that of an orange. Take a section from an orange, open it, and take out some of the single cells. These cells may stand for the muscle cells of meat that you can see only through a microscope. If you cut one of the tiny orange cells, the juice escapes, and this is what happens when the muscle cells are cut across. The juices will also pass through the wall of the cell when the muscle is heated and when the meat is put into cold water. When, however, we sear the outside of the meat, a crust is formed which keeps the other juices in. Whether the meat is tough or tender, the most valuable protein stays behind in the muscle cell. The substances that we can draw out from the cells are called the extractives, because they can be extracted. The tough meat has as much nutritive value as, if not more than, the tender; and our problem is to soften the strong connective tissue. This can be done by long, slow cooking with plenty of moisture, which dissolves out the gelatin and softens the whole mass. A high temperature shrinks and hardens fiber, and the tenderest meat will become like sole leather, if cooked too hard and too long. This is true with tough or tender fowl.

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