3. That when sugar and milk are taken together, the digestion
of the protein of the milk is greatly delayed because of the presence
of mucus resulting from stimulation of the glands by cane sugar.
4. That this mucus, combining with the acid, delays the action
of the gastric juice on protein. Thus the materials present in the
stomach, remaining for an abnormally long time, are likely to
undergo fermentation, and cause definite gastric distress.
The sugar originally designed for human consumption was
fruit sugar. It is served by nature in a dilute form, and requires
practically no digesting, needing only to be absorbed. It does not
tax or derange the organs of digestion, but furnishes a form of
nutriment that can be utilized by almost every one, even by those
whose digestive powers have become weakened. Persons who
partake freely of those sweets will not greatly desire the artificial.
FREE FATS IN COOKING
The question of the use of free fats in cooking should receive
careful and thoughtful consideration, inasmuch as any extreme
course in either direction is fraught with consequences that are
detrimental to health. Many of the edible plants are deficient in
the fat element; and instinctively, it would seem, man puts cream
or butter on his bread. Fresh vegetables, while they have their
delicate and characteristic flavors, taste "flat" without the addition
of a little cream or free fat of some kind.
Nature serves fats in the very best form to be utilized by the
body; that is, emulsified. These wholesome fats are supplied in
nuts and olives, also in the yolk of egg, and in milk and cream.
When taken in this form, each minute globule of fat is surrounded
with a thin envelope, which holds the fat particles apart, and
protects the foods from the free fat, thus permitting them to be
readily digested.
Free or neutral fats, if used too freely with meals, have a
tendency to smear over the foods, and interfere with their diges-
tion. The prolonged retention of free fats in the stomach favors
fermentation and rancidity, often producing heartburn and in-
testinal catarrh.
77
SCIENCE of FOOD and COOKERY
Free fats, however, are more digestible when cold than when
hot, because hot fats not only coat but intimately penetrate the
food with which they are cooked. This is especially true of fried
foods, where each part of food is coated with a layer of fat, which
keeps the digestive juices from acting on the other food elements.
In the making of gravies where the flour is browned in hot fat
before the liquid is added, it is well to bear in mind that when
starch granules are so browned and crisped, they are beyond the
fermentation stage, and are not inclined to cause distress from
that standpoint. It is more particularly the soluble starches (boiled
or steamed), being dependent on the ptyalin of saliva for their
digestion, that, when soaked in fats, are not acted upon by the
saliva, but must wait digestion until they reach the small intestine,
where the fats are split up by the pancreatic juice. Thus delayed,
they are more or less liable to set up fermentation, while with
browned flour, the case is different, as it is less, if at all, liable
to ferment.
Page 42
Presented as published in 1921. Historical recipes may not meet modern food-safety standards. Cook from the modern interpretation, not the original instructions.
AI-modernized reading of the original text
3. That when sugar and milk are taken together, the digestion of the protein of the milk is greatly delayed because of the presence of mucus resulting from stimulation of the glands by cane sugar.
4. That this mucus, combining with the acid, delays the action of the gastric juice on protein. Thus the materials present in the stomach, remaining for an abnormally long time, are likely to undergo fermentation, and cause definite gastric distress.
The sugar originally designed for human consumption was fruit sugar. It is served by nature in a dilute form, and requires practically no digesting, needing only to be absorbed. It does not tax or derange the organs of digestion, but furnishes a form of nutriment that can be utilized by almost every one, even by those whose digestive powers have become weakened. Persons who partake freely of those sweets will not greatly desire the artificial.
FREE FATS IN COOKING
The question of the use of free fats in cooking should receive careful and thoughtful consideration, inasmuch as any extreme course in either direction is fraught with consequences that are detrimental to health. Many of the edible plants are deficient in the fat element; and instinctively, it would seem, man puts cream or butter on his bread. Fresh vegetables, while they have their delicate and characteristic flavors, taste "flat" without the addition of a little cream or free fat of some kind.
Nature serves fats in the very best form to be utilized by the body; that is, emulsified. These wholesome fats are supplied in nuts and olives, also in the yolk of egg, and in milk and cream. When taken in this form, each minute globule of fat is surrounded with a thin envelope, which holds the fat particles apart, and protects the foods from the free fat, thus permitting them to be readily digested.
Free or neutral fats, if used too freely with meals, have a tendency to smear over the foods, and interfere with their digestion. The prolonged retention of free fats in the stomach favors fermentation and rancidity, often producing heartburn and intestinal catarrh.
Free fats, however, are more digestible when cold than when hot, because hot fats not only coat but intimately penetrate the food with which they are cooked. This is especially true of fried foods, where each part of food is coated with a layer of fat, which keeps the digestive juices from acting on the other food elements.
In the making of gravies where the flour is browned in hot fat before the liquid is added, it is well to bear in mind that when starch granules are so browned and crisped, they are beyond the fermentation stage, and are not inclined to cause distress from that standpoint. It is more particularly the soluble starches (boiled or steamed), being dependent on the ptyalin of saliva for their digestion, that, when soaked in fats, are not acted upon by the saliva, but must wait digestion until they reach the small intestine, where the fats are split up by the pancreatic juice. Thus delayed, they are more or less liable to set up fermentation, while with browned flour, the case is different, as it is less, if at all, liable to ferment.