This section is from the book "The Laurel Health Cookery", by Evora Bucknum Perkins. Also available from Amazon: The Laurel Health Cookery.
Since experience has taught us that the delicate machinery of the body requires oil to keep it running smoothly, salads as one of the most agreeable means of supplying this need, have been growing in favor.
In our recipes for salad dressings, we have endeavored to give sufficient variety in oils to suit all tastes and circumstances.
"Vinegar-acetic acid, is about ten times as strong as alcohol, and makes more trouble in the stomach than any other acid except oxalic."-Dr. Rand.
"No acid should be taken into the mouth with starch as it will prevent the action of the saliva; but if starches have been properly masticated, and a proper amount of saliva mingled with them, lemon juice will not interfere with the digestion of starch in the stomach."-Dr. Kress.
For the above reasons, we use no flour or cornstarch in dressings, use lemon juice as the acid, and exclude potato salad. Cold potatoes of themselves are difficult of digestion and combining them with an acid renders them still more so.
 
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