In a general way we can say that the more labor needed, the more the food costs. If there is a small supply of some food material and many people want it, then the price is high; and when the season is bad or some disease attacks the food, the supply becomes short and the price goes up.

1 U. S. Department of Agriculture, Farmers' Bulletin 487.

Here is another table that shows how the calories may be divided among the foods served at the three meals:

Food

Milk

Cereal

Eggs (for children)

Fruit

Green vegetables

Meat or meat substitute

Bread

Butter

100-Calorie Portions

20 (6 for each child, the rest for the adults)

2 (counting 2/3 portion per egg)

5 2

15 15

Suppose now that each one of you study her own family. Take the three meals a day that you are likely to have, using very simple dishes. From the tables given, see if you can decide if your family is having about the right amount.

This is a hard problem indeed, but your teacher may use it for an arithmetic lesson just as Miss James did.1

Exercises And Problems

1. Explain the meaning of the word "calorie" to some one who has never heard the word before.

2. Explain why it is important to think about calories in planning food for a meal.

1 For further work of this kind, see Foods and Household Management, Kinne-Cooley, and Laboratory Handbook for Dietetics, and Food for the Family, Mary Swartz Rose, The Macmillan Co.

3. Why is the 100-calorie portion of lettuce so much larger than the 100-calorie portion of meat, butter, and sugar?

4. Can you decide what kind of meals Mrs. Allen gave to her husband that would lower the number of calories?

5. Why did Mr. Allen need fewer calories in his diet?