SECRETS OF HEALTH.

Waikato Times, Volume 103, Issue 17384, 21 April 1928, Page 4

SECRETS OF HEALTH.

GREEN VEGETABLES. Sir YV. Arbuthnot Lane, Bart., C. 8., writes in the London Daily Mail:— When I recommend people io eat plenty of fresh green vegetables they frequently write to me and say they cannot afford this—that vegetables are too dear. No doubt when we needlessly import so many of our fresh vegetables, instead of growing them for ourselves! fche prices are higrh, because of the cost of freight and so forth. But one of the most important factors in 'the high price of green vegetables is the horrible way in which the outside leaves of cabbages, cauliflowers, celery, and so on are wastdd. For my own information I have recently walked through several vegetable markets, and I find the streets and floors smothered with thoroughly good food material. A short time ago 1 was in a London hotel, and from the window I could look down into a very large vegetable market, the floor ■of which was littered some eighteen inches or two feet deep with celery and cauliflower leaves, ruthlessly chopped off and thrown away. As I watched Die scene some Roman Catholic nuns came in with large baskets and sacks, and gathered up large quantities of this residue, which was given to them free.

x Usg The Liquor,

The scientific advisers 'of the New Health Society tell us that the cauliflower is one of the most valuable and most easily digested vegetables, and the outside leaves can be cooked separately us a delicate kind of cabbage. Cooked separately in inchlong pieces and served with butter sauce, they are excellent; but on no account must these leaves or other green vegetables be spoilt by adding soda to the boiling water. They should be cooked quickly, just sufficiently to soften the fibres, in a very small quantity of water; then drained and served al once.

All vegetable liquors should be used for soups and gravies, or taken as a vegetable-essence beverage, useful and necessary for aiding in eliminating waste products, iajnd flor other reasons.

The outside leaves and tops and roots of the celery should also be cooked and made into appropriate dishes, which are no) merely inexpensive, but cost nothing if they would otherwise be thrown away.

Spinach is another vefy variable green vegetable, especially when cooked with about one-'quarter to one-half of sorrel. Sorrel cooked by itself .is practically a broom for the Intestinal canal, and it should be eaten freely by itself and used with omelettes. It is most valuable. A cheap substitute is the turnip top.

Watercress is very good and very cheap, and if can always be fresh in the home because, if two or three bunches of watercress are united and put info a deep basin of water, the watercress grows freely, and a fresh cutting can be made for several days in succession. Boiled watercress is cheap and wholesome dish frequently used on the Continent.