Page:Wood - Foods of the Foreign-Born.djvu/107

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THE JEWS
91

noon meals of milk have to be introduced. This is impossible if the children are in school unless there is a school lunch. Enuresis is quite common among these children, as they are accustomed to having highly-spiced foods in their diet, with pickles at and between meals.

For undernourished children among the Jews, it is necessary not only to urge the use of milk, but to plan when it may be taken, as it cannot be taken at the same meal with meat. Vegetables are usually needed in greater abundance. These may be eaten in borsht, a favorite soup corresponding somewhat with our vegetable soup, but this does not give them in very large portions. Therefore a menu should be given to show how they may be combined with other foods. If served with a white sauce or butter, vegetables must be eaten without meat, but can be eaten at the noon meal or lunch with bread. Creamed vegetable soups may also be given in this same way, but never with meat at the same meal. Poached or "dropped" eggs are not often used. The process is unknown. A "dropped" egg was prescribed for a patient who did not know what it meant. When it was explained that an egg was broken and its contents dropped into hot water, he shook his head and said, "Oh, no! I lose my egg; he get all mixed up with the water." When he was taken to the stove and saw an egg poached, he stood in wonder and admiration. He said, "I go home and tell my wife; she never knowed that." Since then many mothers and even children themselves have been shown in this same Food Clinic how to poach eggs.

Cereals, if used as a breakfast food, are usually tested as follows: "Place them on a hot plate. If no worms or other insects appear, they are fit to be eaten; if not fit, they must be thrown away." The cereals used by the