Part 10

Professor Chittenden also points out the common blunder which is made in assuming that persons who are doing hard work need an additional amount of proteid substance. One commonly hears the phrase that laborers and athletes can eat meat in large quantities, and “work it off.” As we have seen, one can “work off” sugars and starches and fats completely; but one cannot “work off” proteid completely. Professor Chittenden is now recognized as the leading authority of the world upon this particular question; and he sets forth clearly in his book the fact that the quantity of proteid needed is not increased by muscular activity. One may work as hard as he pleases, but his body will use no more nitrogen, save only in the case where a sufficiency of other food elements is not supplied. Only as a last resort will the system undertake the labor of burning up proteid to make energy.

HOW MUCH SHOULD WE EAT

When foodstuffs are taken into the body, digested, assimilated, and used up, they produce the same amount of heat and other forms of energy as if burned outside of the body; and hence it follows that the number of calories, or units of heat, represented in a given foodstuff, is taken by scientists as a common measure of its food value.

A calory is a heat unit, which has been adopted as a means of estimating the nutritive value of foodstuffs. It represents the amount of energy required to raise the temperature of four pounds of water one degree Fahrenheit. The number of calories contained in food is obtained by burning the food and measuring the heat produced by means of a calorimeter.

It has been calculated that the normal, average person needs from one hundred and sixty to two hundred and forty calories of proteids every day, in order to build blood and tissues. He needs daily from five hundred to nine hundred calories of fats, which supply heat.

He needs of carbohydrates, which are the starches and sugars, and which the body uses to produce energy for work and heat, from one thousand to one thousand four hundred calories daily. It is declared by Chittenden and Kellogg, whose work has overset the old notions, that the total number of calories, or food units, should rarely exceed two thousand.

Two thousand calories are furnished respectively by twenty-eight ounces of bread, or ninety-six ounces of milk, or sixty-two ounces of potatoes, or nine ounces of butter. One quarter of each of these, or any other fractions which together equal unity, will make up a ration containing two thousand calories.

It is quite impossible, however, to make a hard and fast rule in this matter. Every individual differs from others in his requirements. Moreover, the weather, the season of the year, the amount and kind of work done, are all factors in the situation. Hard physical work and exposure to cold demands the largest food supply. A person who naturally perspires freely needs more food than a person who does not, because of the large amount of heat carried off from his body by the evaporation of sweat from the skin. Adults require food chiefly to repair waste and losses. Growing children require in addition to food to repair waste and losses, material for tissue building. According to the best authorities upon the diet of children, a growing infant utilizes fully one-third of its total intake of food in tissue building. When an adult becomes emaciated he requires more tissue building material than the normal adult, his need for it being practically the same as that of a growing child.

We give below a table showing the average number of food units or calories required daily by people of various heights and weights. This table is one drawn up by Dr. J. H. Kellogg, Superintendent of the Battle Creek Sanitarium. In calculating the number of calories required in a given case, the estimate should be based not upon the actual weight of the individual, but upon the weight of the average person of his height.

“Persons who are in good health,” says Dr. Kellogg, “and find their weight somewhat greater than the figures given in the table, should not necessarily consider themselves obese. While above the average in weight, their condition is probably natural, and no attempt should be made to reduce the weight to any considerable amount, as injury may result. The average for adults applies especially to healthy adults between twenty and thirty years of age. Most people who are above forty years of age have a natural tendency to increase of flesh, which requires no attention unless it becomes excessive. Any reduction in foods made by an obese person should be in carbohydrates rather than in proteids or fats, unless these latter have been taken in excess.”

TABLE NO. 1

Showing for different ages the average height, weight, and the number of food units or calories required daily.

Boys

Height in Weight in Calories or Age Inches Pounds Food Units 5 41.57 41.09 816.2 7 45.74 49.07 912.4 9 49.69 59.23 1,043.7 11 53.33 70.18 1,178.2 13 57.21 84.85 1,352.6

Girls

Height in Weight in Calories or Age Inches Pounds Food Units 5 41.29 39.66 784.5 7 45.52 47.46 881.7 9 49.37 57.07 1,018.5 11 53.42 68.84 1,148.5

Men

Calories or Food Units Height in Weight in Inches Pounds Proteids Fats Carbohydrates Total 62 110.0 165 495 890 1650 64 121.0 181 543 1086 1810 66 132.0 198 594 1188 1980 68 143.0 215 645 1290 2150 70 154.0 231 693 1386 2310 72 165.0 247 741 1482 2470 74 176.0 264 792 1584 2640

Women

Calories or Food Units Height in Weight in Inches Pounds Proteids Fats Carbohydrates Total 57 78.4 118 344 688 1180 59 88.8 132 396 792 1320 61 99.2 149 447 894 1490 63 109.3 163 489 978 1630 65 120.2 180 540 1080 1800 67 130.7 195 585 1170 1950 69 143.0 215 645 1290 2150 71 155.0 232 696 1392 2320

PRACTICAL APPLICATION OF DIETARY RULES

While dieticians have ascertained the number of food units daily required by the average person, yet on no point do they reach more thorough agreement than in saying that the average person should not establish any hard and fast rules as to the quantity and kinds of food he consumes. It is really only an invalid, one who is in a physician’s care, who needs to have his food regulated in this precise fashion. The average person should be careful to practice thorough mastication, and should see to it that the proteid part of his meals is not excessive, but he should avoid worrying about his food habits. Any person who fusses and fumes about the kind of foodstuffs and the number of calories they contain, will be apt to cause himself harm; for science has proved by laboratory experiments, which we shall describe later on, that worry, in fact any of the unpleasant emotions, exercises a prohibitive effect upon the flow of digestive juices.

The really important thing to do is to follow a simple dietary, which at the same time is well balanced in its food elements, well cooked, and tastefully served. The housewife will see to it that the foodstuffs she chooses represent more of carbohydrates and fats than of proteids; her guiding rule in this matter being that the proportion of proteids to the other food elements be ten per cent. The United States Department of Agriculture has prepared a list of foodstuffs, comprising all those in common use, which shows the proportion of their constituents, and their total energy value, in calories, per pound of material.

This is “Bulletin No. 28, Revised Edition,” the work of two of the leading physiological chemists of America, W. O. Atwater and A. P. Bryant; and may be had on sending five cents to the Department. We have inserted in the Appendix a selected list of foodstuffs taken from this publication; and we give here a rough classification of foods, from which one can see at a glance their leading elements:

FOODSTUFFS WHICH ARE RICH IN PROTEIDS

Eggs White of Egg Skimmed Milk Buttermilk Yogurt Cottage Cheese Nut Products

FOODSTUFFS WHICH ARE RICH IN FATS

Butter Nut Oils Olive Oil Cream Olives Nuts (except chestnuts) Egg Yolks