ant a
variety of flavors in our diet and might welcome the change which comes
from this way of treating food as well as that which comes from different
methods of cooking. Nobody expects a stew to taste like a roast, and yet
both may be good and we would not want either one all the time. Instead of
regretting that canned peas do not taste like those fresh from the garden
(incomparable ones!) let us be glad that they taste as good as they do.
Would we like them any better if they tasted like cornmeal mush?

While a potato has about as much phosphorus as an egg yolk, substitutes
for it in this respect are not hard to find. Five tablespoonfuls of milk
or half an ounce of cheese will easily supply as much, while half a cup of
cooked string beans will provide all the iron as well as half the
phosphorus in a potato, and a teaspoon of butter or other fat added to the
beans will make them equal in fuel value. On the other hand, two small
slices of whole wheat bread would furnish all the phosphorus, half the
iron, and an equal amount of fuel.

The potato is conspicuously high in potassium, but it is not likely that
in any diet containing one kind of fruit and one kind of vegetable each
day there will be any permanent shortage of this substance. Spinach,
celery, parsnips, lettuce, cabbage, rutabagas, beets, carrots, tomatoes,
cucumbers, and turnips are all good sources of potassium and some of them
are available all the year round without canning and drying.

But what significance has the "Anti-Scorbutic Property"? Does that not
make potatoes indispensable? Scurvy, Madam, occurs whenever people live
for a long time on a monotonous diet without fresh food. The potato offers
good protection against this disease at a low cost, but other foods have
long been known to possess the same power, among them oranges, lemons,
limes, and other fruits, and cabbage and other green vegetables; in fact,
a mixed diet in which fruits and vegetables occur is assurance of freedom
from scurvy. Just how far the potato will go in providing the specific
vitamines essential for growth is still unsettled. It undoubtedly contains
one of them in goodly amount, but for the present it is wise to include
some green (leaf) vegetable in the diet even when potatoes are plentiful,
especially if butter, milk, and eggs cannot be freely used.

Nutritionally then, we can find substitutes for the potato; practically,
too, we can find quite satisfactory alternatives fo