Cherries

Cherries may be regarded in the same light as the plum, which they resemble in composition, and in their influence on health. The softer, large Blacks are preferable to the firmer White varieties, which require more mastication.

Grapes

Grapes are, it is almost needless to say, one of the most delicious and valuable of all fruits. Rich in sugar, they vary enormously, some varieties being almost twice as rich as others. They are easily digested without the skins and pips, and contain almost as much nutritive matter as meat, and that of a more useful character. The richest grapes, however, are much too costly for general consumption, while the imported varieties, when they cost 4d. a pound, as they frequently do, provide about 80 units of energy for a penny. The grape is a useful and simple laxative. For some disorders, caused by over-eating, or the consumption of too much animal food, grapes are given as a whole or partial diet to patients, who are sometimes blessed with remarkable cures. More careful discrimination, and less food, of which grapes and other fruits should form regular portions, would prevent many of these troubles. When grapes are dried there are few complaints of their skins by those who consume them.

Strawberries And Raspberries

Strawberries And Raspberries are exceptionally rich in water, and poor in food, which is chiefly present in the form of sugar. Both make an excellent porridge in their raw condition, and both are laxatives. These fruits play a greater part in their contribution to health than to food.

Gooseberries

Gooseberries should never be eaten green, whether cooked or not. In this condition they are useless as food, and are always liable to upset the digestion of the strongest. Ripe gooseberries, although richer foods than other berries, are so little eaten, because so little grown for market, or saleable at a popular price, that they are not a food of importance. Like all fruits with pips they have a laxative tendency.

Currants

Currants may be included in the same category as the gooseberry, although the black currant is believed to exert some influence in enriching the blood, owing to the iron which it contains. It should be pointed out that, although some of these fruits possess small nutritive value, they exercise considerable influence on the appetite and in the enjoyment of the more substantial foods, and especially of those which possess little or no flavour to recommend them. The piquant principle in the black currant, for example, is an important addition to rice, macaroni, sago, tapioca, maize, and other milk puddings, as well as to those which are chiefly made with flour. As the digestion of food depends so largely upon that enjoyment which causes the flow of saliva in the mouth, it is obvious that fruits exercise a function which is next in importance to that of nutrition itself.

Peaches, Apricots, Nectarines, Melons, And Pines

Peaches, Apricots, Nectarines, Melons, And Pines are all more or less luxuries, which do not in this country enter into the list of foods. The three stone fruits are of less value than the plum, the damson, and the cherry. The melon, like the marrow and the cucumber, is composed almost entirely of water. The pineapple is an especially healthy dessert fruit, containing nearly 10 per cent, of food, chiefly consisting of sugar.

The Orange

The Orange is one of the most valuable of all fruits when eaten in a perfectly ripe and sweet condition. It is rich in sugar, and when eaten with cream provides a food at once nourishing and highly conducive to fitness and health. During one summer season the writer made the experiment of eating two oranges before lunch and dinner daily for six weeks, maintaining excellent health. Sour oranges are better avoided, still more so when eaten with a liberal supply of sugar, which may cover but never neutralise the acid they contain. An orange should possess a thin skin and few pips. Its colour should be pale and its flesh juicy, with so little fibre that all can be eaten. The finest oranges are not brought to England, as those which are exported are removed from the trees before they are ripe. An orange perfectly ripe on the tree is a much superior fruit when gathered and eaten at once. Oranges take the next place to apples as a cheap fruit of the highest value to health eaten all the year round. They contain 10 per cent. of nutrient food, while the juice contains nearly 10 per cent. of sugar.

The Banana

It has been estimated that this fruit provides more food on a given area of soil than any other plant known to man. It contains more food than any other fresh fruit, with the possible exception of the richest varieties of the grape. Some authorities state that the banana contains 24 to 25 per cent. of feeding matter, of which sugar is the most important constituent; but, if we make sufficient allowance for the proportion which is indigestible, we shall probably bring down the figure to 15 or 16 per cent. Bananas come to us largely from Jamaica and the Canaries - the Canary variety being smaller and more appreciated, without adequate reason. In the West Indies the fruit, which is not popular with the rich, is sometimes given to cattle. It is gathered and exported in its unripe and green condition - ripening chiefly on the voyagel Bananas are dried and ground into flour, or partly dried, when they occupy less space for exportation. If six bananas weigh 16 oz. and cost 3d. they provide 100 units of energy for a penny - at a low computation - or more than any other fruit that is sold in its fresh condition.