Vegetable food, in its widest sense, includes some part of every form of plant growth, - herb, shrub, or tree, -used either as vegetables, fruits, grains, condiments, or beverages. Vegetables, as the term is generally used, are such plants as are cultivated for culinary purposes. They comprise a variety of the parts of the plant, - roots, stems, leaves, flowers, and fruit.

Before studying vegetables proper, it may be interesting for those who have never considered food from a botanical point of view to glance at the various forms of vegetable growth commonly used as food.

Beginning with roots, we find, among fleshy roots, the carrot, turnip, parsnip, beet, salsify, and radish, which are cooked in their natural state or used raw. Also from roots we get ginger, arrowroot, and tapioca. Rootstocks, or stems growing underground, consist of tubers, like the potato, yam, and artichoke, and of scaly bulbs, like the onion, chives, leek, and garlic. Stems we eat in asparagus; and whole trunks of trees are felled and used in making sago, which is the pith of a species of palm-tree.

Leaves include lettuce, endive, spinach, parsley, cabbage, and greens of various kinds. Dried leaves and flowers are used in the form of tea, sage, thyme, bay leaves, tobacco, marjoram, savory, and other herbs. Leaf stalks include celery and rhubarb; flower stalks, cauliflower and globe artichokes. The juices of vegetables furnish many forms of food, - sugar, acids, honey, oil, gum, and wines. The bark we use in cinnamon. Unexpanded flower-buds are pickled, as in capers, or dried, as in cloves. Ripe cloves have no aroma.

Many seeds or berries are gathered green, and are then dried for use. Allspice, or Jamaica pepper, cassia buds, long peppers, and black pepper are of this class. Mustard and celery seeds are used as well as the leaves. Nutmegs are seeds; and mace is the aril, or covering, of the nutmeg. Seed vessels are used green, as in string beans, and also dried and ground, as in cayenne pepper. Farinaceous seeds or grains include wheat, rye, oats, corn, barley, rice, and buckwheat. They have a thin seed vessel adhering closely to the whole surface of the seed. Oleaginous seeds contain oil and starch, like the cocoanut, walnut, chestnut, almond, etc. Leguminous seeds are enclosed in pods, as peas, beans, lentils, etc.

Under the general name of fruit we eat very different things. Fleshy fruits, like grapes, tomatoes, gooseberries, blueberries, cranberries, and currants, are pulpy seed vessels. Oranges and lemons are pulpy seed vessels, with a thick leathery rind. Squashes, melon, cucumbers, egg-plant, etc., are fleshy fruits with a hard rind. Chocolate is made from the seed of a fleshy fruit. In checkerberries, quinces, and in all parts of the apple and pear but the core, we eat a fleshy, enlarged calyx. In peaches, plums, apricots, cherries, and other stone fruits, we eat the outer part of a pericarp or seed vessel. Olives belong to this class, and are used green and in the form of oil expressed from the fleshy pericarp. Coffee is the seed of a stone fruit. In figs we eat a hollow flower stalk, grown pulpy, and the inside lined with a great number of flowers. Mulberries are clusters of the pulpy flower leaves and stalk of minute multiple flowers. Pineapples are mulberries on a large scale. The strawberry is the receptacle of a flower grown juicy and pulpy, and bearing many one-seeded seed vessels on its surface. Blackberries also are receptacles, though smaller, covered with clusters of little stone fruits. Raspberries are the little stone fruits in a cluster without the receptacle.

Many fruits, when dried, are called by different names. Dried currants are small grapes. Sultanas are larger grapes, and raisins are another and larger variety of the same fruit. Prunes and prunellas are dried plums.

Some of the lower orders of vegetation afford valuable food. Irish and Ceylon mosses are seaweeds. Iceland moss is a lichen. Truffles and mushrooms are a species of fungi of vegetable growth, but possessing a strong meaty or animal flavor.

We need a large variety of vegetables in our food to promote perfect health. Vegetables are rich in saline substances which counteract the evil effect of too much animal food. Some are rich in organic acids, and many abound in indigestible ligneous tissues which are useful in certain conditions. Those which contain starch and albumen and which can be stored for use during the winter months are considered the most valuable. All vegetables need the addition of salt and butter, or some form of fat, and many are rendered less indigestible by seasoning with pepper. Peas, beans, squashes, beets, turnips, etc., which contain sugar, should be slightly sweetened, as much of the natural sweetness is lost in cooking; and those containing potash salts, as cabbage and lettuce, need an acid condiment. Beans, peas, and other vegetables, which are difficult of digestion, are less indigestible if eaten in the form of purees.

Green vegetables should be freshly gathered, thoroughly washed in cold water, and cooked in freshly boiling salted water. It is impossible to give a definite time for cooking, as much depends upon their age and the time they have been gathered. Wilted vegetables require a much longer time than fresh. All vegetables should be cooked until soft and tender, and no longer. This is better ascertained by watching them carefully and piercing with a fork than by depending upon any time-table. Vegetables which are eaten raw and are liable to ferment in the stomach are usually dressed with some condiment, -oil, vinegar, salt, and pepper.

Every green vegetable keeps its color better if it be boiled rapidly and uncovered. Many use soda for the same purpose, but unwisely.