Mexicans put their fat into the food, while the American puts his on the food. Therefore if he eats bread and butter, or potatoes with butter and green peppers fried in oil and rice, he is getting more fat than a Mexican would get. He would eat his bread without butter, and would not eat potato and butter with peppers and rice.
As the Mexicans come north or intermarry, it would be better for the children and adults to learn to eat the simpler foods of the American people, boiled or baked, with less spice and fat.
Any nurse or dietitian can persuade them to use cereals or baked or boiled fish and meats and vegetables, if they gradually reduce the amount of tomato or pepper for flavor until it becomes a bland dish, easier to digest and not harmful to the kidneys.
RECIPES
Chicken Soup
- 1 chicken
- 4 cups water
- 1 green pepper
- ½ cup rice
- 2 tablespoons salt
Cut up chicken and boil in salted water with chopped green pepper. When chicken is done, remove and add rice to liquid. Cook until soft.
Baked Chicken and Rice
Make as Chicken Soup, adding chicken, cut in dice, to rice drained from soup. Brown in oven.
Hot Milk Soup
Put into kettle two cups of milk. Add one tablespoon of allspice. Serve hot. This is usually drunk from a cup or bowl.
Stuffed Peppers
- 6 green peppers
- 1 tin sardines, 4¼ ounces
- 1 cup fresh bread crumbs
- 1 tablespn. grated cheese
- ¼ cup tomato sauce
- Salt
Cut peppers in half, lengthwise, and remove stem and seeds, so as to leave peppers boat shape. Wash well and pour boiling water over them, and let stand till cold.
Bone the sardines and rub to a paste. Add the bread crumbs and cheese, mix well, and moisten with tomato sauce. Season highly with salt. Fill the halves of peppers, place in a greased baking dish, pour tomato sauce or soup over them, and bake in moderate oven till peppers are tender. Remove peppers, and thicken and season the liquid in the dish to serve with them.
Eggs
- 6 eggs
- 2 onions
- 2 green peppers tomatoes
- 1 teaspoon chopped parsley
- 3 tomatoes, or
- 1 cup thick canned
- 1 tablespoon butter
Remove seeds from peppers and pour boiling water over them. Let stand till cold. Chop fine the onions, peppers, and tomatoes, and cook five minutes in the butter. Add parsley, and season highly with salt and pepper. Use this sauce to serve over the eggs fried.
Rice
Make a sauce as directed above; add two cups boiled rice to it, with a little water, and let cook till most of the water is absorbed.
To Prepare Chili Peppers
Remove seeds from the pods. If dried, soak in one pint of warm water till soft. Scrape the pulp from the skin and discard the skins. Use the pulp and water.
Chili Con Carne
- 2 pounds round steak
- 2 tablespoons fat
- 4 tablespoons flour
- 1 clove of garlic
- 4 chili peppers
- Salt
Cut the steak in small squares and cook in hot fat till well browned. Add the flour, garlic sliced, and the chili pulp prepared as below (or use green or red peppers and season with cayenne). Let simmer about two hours, adding more water if necessary. Season to taste with salt.
Tamales
- 15 dried corn husks
- 1 onion and garlic
- 1 pound pork meat
- 2 cups hominy
- 4 teaspoons cornstarch
- 2 teaspoons salt
- 25 almonds
- 1 cup raisins
- 4 teaspoons lard
- 3½ cups hot water
- 2 teaspoons baking powder
- 3 teaspoons red pepper
- 2 tablespns. peanut butter
Take the hominy and corn starch and mix with salt, baking powder, and hot lard. Add the hot water and beat it with a spoon until it makes a soft, light dough, and let it stand for fifteen minutes.
Put your pork in hot water and salt and cook it until it is quite done. Add the peanut butter, onion and garlic, raisins and almonds, and let it cook until it is thick. Take the large corn husk and spread the dough with a spoon. Then put on a spoonful of the sauce and cover it with some more of the dough. Then fold it in the husk, and when you have fixed in that way all your dough and sauce, steam it for twenty-five minutes.
PORTUGUESE
Most of the Portuguese in this country come to us from the Azores or Western Islands, only a small proportion coming from Portugal. We have grown to know them in their homeland much better since the war, as at that time we used Delgada, the capital of the island of Saint Michael as a coaling station.
The Portuguese are among the most gifted city builders in the world. They do not plan for efficiency, as the Americans or French would do, but have a gift for tucking a sense of beauty into every little corner of a town. In this they are hard to rival.
The natural environment of these island people is a sparkling cluster of white houses, dashed here and there with spots of vermilion, blue, and lavender, and flanked on either side by an ancient fortress, with no sooty railroad yard or fuming factory visible to mar the loveliness. Even their rowboats are artistic. As one approaches the shore one notices the striking beauty, the wonderfully graceful lines, and the charming decorations of the boats dotting the shore line.
From the boat landings of the port cities on the several islands of Saint Michael, Angra, Madeira, and the northerly island of Terceira, the streets usually radiate up the hills like the ribs of a jeweled fan. The public markets occupy whole squares, located among the cross streets. These are tempting places, with their stalls of melons, bananas, pineapples, eggs, squashes, tomatoes (both red and yellow), meat, fish, and the brown potatoes (two or three times the size of the largest American ones), with splashes of sunlight and shade giving cheer and inspiration to the most depressed mind. The fuel burned is cedar, and through the streets floats its evanescent fragrance.
The few Portuguese who come to us from Portugal have had the same surroundings. Even Lisbon is as romantic and full of color as the island towns and cities. The whole environment of these people has avoided the grimy, sordid, commonplaceness of the neighborhoods into which they come in America.
In the old country, the chief pursuits of the people are fishing and gardening; over here they usually locate in a seaport, but these occupations become only their recreation, with often very little of that. In America, most of them work indoors in the big mills. Their diet, too, has changed; not because a new one has been thoughtfully planned to fit the need, but because foods are too expensive. Fruit and vegetables are not grown near at hand, and therefore cost more. Fish, too, is three times the price paid in the islands. There are few goats in the city neighborhoods into which they come.
Their cooked foods have much the same flavor as those of the Mexicans. Spices and peppers are freely used, their favorite spices being allspice and mace.
When the income is sufficient, the children's food is easily planned for. They are fond of fruits and vegetables, as well as of cereals. If they were born here, they enjoy milk; but if they were brought up on goats' milk in the homeland, they must be taught to like the flavor of cows' milk. They like eggs, and chowders and soups are used freely. This helps in the care of underweight or tuberculous children and adults.
All nephritic patients must be warned against the frequent use of salt fish and many kinds of spices.
Hypotension cases, also, are difficult to treat, as they have been in the habit of using various kinds of salt fish as well as irritating spices.
RECIPES
Hot Milk Drink
- 1 cup milk
- 1 stick cinnamon
Heat one cup of milk with a stick of cinnamon in it. When hot, remove cinnamon stick and serve. Can be served cold.
Egg Milk
- 1 cup milk
- 1 egg
- 1 stick cinnamon
- 2 tablespoons sugar
Prepare milk and cinnamon as above. Beat egg and sugar together. When milk is hot, add to egg and serve hot.
Chicken Soup
- 1 chicken
- 4 cups water
- 1 cup rice
- 2 tablespoons salt
- 1 teaspoon sweet mace
Cut up chicken and boil in water until done. Remove chicken and skim off fat; add rice and salt. Cook until done, then add water and mace.
Beef Stew
- 2 pounds stew meat
- 2 tablespoons drippings
- 4 potatoes
- 2 onions
- 1 tablespoon vinegar
- 2 tomatoes
- 1 teaspoon allspice
- 4 cloves
- 2 tablespoons salt
- 3 cups water
Cut up onions. Put drippings in kettle and add onions. When brown, add other ingredients, and cook until meat is tender.
Roast Meat
- 6 pounds beef, pork, or lamb
- 1 clove of garlic
- 3 onions
- 2 tablespoons salt
- 2 green peppers
- 4 tomatoes
- 1 tablespoon mace
- 1 cup vinegar
- 1 teaspoon black pepper
Rub meat with salt, mace, and pepper. Pour vinegar over it and let stand over night, or four hours. Cut up peppers, onions, and tomatoes. Place meat in roasting pan, cover with the vegetables, and roast until meat is tender, basting every fifteen minutes with vegetables.
Boiled Fish
- 4 or 5 pounds haddock
- 2 tablespoons vinegar
- 2 tablespoons salt
- 1 green pepper
- 1 clove of garlic
- 1 onion
- 2 tomatoes
- 4 cloves
Clean fish and spread open. Cover with salt, vinegar, spices, and vegetables. Add two cups of water, and simmer until fish is done. The fish may be roasted in a pan.
Fish Chowder
- 4 or 5 pounds haddock
- 2 quarts water
- 2 tablespoons drippings
- 4 potatoes
- 3 onions
- 2 teaspoons mace
Cut up fish, cook in water, and remove bones. Save water in which fish was cooked, and cook potatoes and onions in it. Add mace and serve. No milk is used.
Boiled Potatoes with Mace
Boil potatoes until soft. Drain and add mace until potatoes are nicely coated. Serve hot with drawn butter, or meat or fish gravy.
Boiled or Baked Custard
This will be eaten if flavored with mace instead of vanilla.
Bread
Corn breads are generally used, made with baking powder or raised with yeast.