The cooking of any article of food has evidently much, very much, to do
with its digestibility. It is not the purpose of this paper to teach
cooking, but merely to give some general hints as to the best as well as
the simplest methods of preparing staple articles of food. The same
articles of food can and should be prepared differently on each day of the
week. Changes of diet are too likely to be underestimated. By constant
change the digestive organs in the average person are prevented from
having that repulsion of food which, to a greater or less extent, is
likely to result from a sameness of diet continued for a long time.

We often hear from our scientific men that this or that article of food is
excellent for muscle, another for brain, another for bone, etc., etc. Now,
stubborn facts are like stone walls, against which theories often butt out
their beauty and their power. It is well known to almost every one
nowadays that _well-cooked_ food, whether it be potatoes, meat and bread,
fish, or anything else worthy the name of food, will well maintain,
indefinitely, either the philosopher or the hodcarrier.

Many of you know, and all of you ought to know, that the principal
ingredients of nearly all our foods are starch and albumen. Starch is the
principal nutritive ingredient of vegetables and breadstuffs. Albumen is
the principal ingredient of meats, eggs, milk, and other animal
derivatives.

Starch never enters the system as starch, but must first be converted into
sugar either in the body or out of it. The process of this transformation
of starch into sugar is beautifully exemplified in certain plants, such as
the beet, the so-called sugar cane, and other growths. The young plant is,
to a great extent, composed of starch; as the plant grows older, a
substance is produced which is called _diastase_. Through the influence of