POTATOES AND VITAMIN C

Otago Daily Times, Issue 26043, 5 January 1946, Page 7

POTATOES AND VITAMIN C

The season for new potatoes is with us (states a bulletin issued by the Health Department) and many of our womenfolk are afraid to eat too many because they think they are fattening, potatoes new or old, are not going to widen your figure any more than other food. If you are getting fat through eating, it is because too many calories are being ingested daily—you are eating too much total food, and you have to retreat somewhat, keeping a balanced diet, but eating less total food. So you cannot dismiss potatoes tor they are part of the balanced diet. There is no need to deprive yourself of the pleasure of eating them, Iresh and full of flavour from your own garden. Potatoes are good for us. ! Their carbohydrate gives us fuel for muscular energy They contain minerals, especially iron, and vitamins B and C. Now iron and vitamin B arc inclined to be short in our diets, and anything with vitamin C is useful. There is no food that readily takes the place of the potato, so' do not encourage any funny ideas about it! New potatoes are quite a good source of vitamin C. When we are hungry we would eat about seven ounces of potatoes, and there is more vitamin C in that than in the juice of one lemon. Here is a little story. It is pretty bleak in Nova Scotia, and if the fishing harvest foils they have not much food to come and go on. One winter the people lived almost entirely on potatoes. Illness was prevalent. Many people went down with scurvy. But one family remained well. On inquiry they were found to be eating their potatoes in their skins, while everyone else was pealing them. Potatoes store their vitamins and minerals .lust beneath the skins. So eat them every day. Enjoy them new. Bake old ones and boil new ones in their skins.