The Midday Luncheon

The Midday Luncheon consists of an occasional small plate of cereal, pulse, or vegetable soup, two or three vegetables with sauce, a savoury made with rice or spaghetti and tomatoes or curry, a farinaceous or milk pudding with stewed fruit, light dried fruit pudding, or simple confectionery, wholemeal bread and butter - sometimes a small piece of cheese - salad whenever available, and a claret glass of non-alcoholic wine or cider when it can be obtained, although the real thing is not made in England. Fruit as desired completes the repast.

Examples Of Meals (The Weights Are Approximate)

Breakfast

Plus more fruit, fat bacon, or an egg, as desired.

Luncheon

Plus sauce to vegetables.

Dinner Or Supper

Total 2435 units, without the additions referred to.

These three repasts are supplemented by an orange, or a small cup of coffee, at five o'clock, with a slice of coarse bread and butter, or toast, or a small piece of plain cake, when the last meal is delayed by the duties of the day, or for any other tangible reason. In this case from 50 to 200 units are added to the total. It will be observed that the protein consumed is almost wholly confined to that present in milk and vegetable foods - the daily average seldom exceeding 80 grammes (2 3/4 oz.), unless on those rare occasions when a small portion of meat or eggs form part of the menu, as when staying from home, or dining with friends.

It has been urged that in order to obtain the requisite nourishment it is necessary, when meat and other animal foods are not included in a diet regime, to eat more, and thus to overburden the stomach. There is no occasion for this, but I have observed that young people with fruit placed before them in great variety are prone to eat more than they need, although I know of no instance in which they have complained of indigestion in consequence, if it is ripe. Meat-eating, as already remarked, is always accompanied by a desire to drink, and the larger the consumption of animal food the more that desire is emphasised. On the contrary, there is, in my experience, no thirst where the chief meal is composed entirely of vegetable foods and fruit. The water for which nature would crave under other conditions is taken in the food, and is of greater value than any of those liquid concoctions which man has invented.

This absence of thirst is of portentous value in this system of diet, for it practically excludes alcohol.

It is assumed by medical science that a man needs 40 oz. of liquid per day. Many persons take very much more, and what they sow in this way they are certain to reap. Large draughts of water at dinner are incentives to trouble, causing distention and pain, and diluting the juices which nature provides for the digestion of food. If drinking is inevitable it is better between meals than at dinner, in those advancing in years, or who cannot take liberties common to youth. Large draughts of hot, or cold, or mineral water are frequently taken for particular reasons by the advice of medical men, but, like the water cure of a German spa, they are no remedy for bodily troubles caused by persistence in eating too freely, or in eating those foods which are destructive of health. The food described in the above tables includes 42 oz. of water, without taking account of the fruit frequently eaten at the close of a meal. If the consumer of the usual English meal drinks, as he certainly does, a great deal more than this quantity, which is slightly in excess of a quart, he increases the bulk of what he has eaten still more than the non-meat-eater.