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THE PILLARS OF HEALTH

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Pacific Press Publishing Company · Mountain View, California · Apr 10, 1907

FromSigns of the Times, Vol. 33, No. 15.

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THE PILLARS OF HEALTH

By William S. Sadler, M.D.

By WILLIAM S. SADLER, M. D.

VI. THE STARCH FAMILY.

THOSE foodstuffs belonging to the starch family are called carbohydrates; and in addition to ordinary starch, they consist of sugar, dextrin, and cellulose.
Starch is by far the most abundant and important of the food elements. No other food comes to us in so many different forms.
Plants have the power of manufacturing starch from the elements of the earth and air, under the mysterious influence of the sunlight. It is during this process of manufacturing starch that plants exhale, or give off, oxygen.
Starch, when properly cooked, that is, thoroly boiled or baked, is acted upon by the saliva of the mouth, and turned to sugar.
The whole problem of cooking has to do with the preparation of starch for digestion. Almost all food substances are just about as easily digested raw as cooked, with the exception of starch. Raw starch can not be acted upon by the saliva, and even the starch as cooked by boiling, or ordinary moist heat, is more or less difficult of digestion by those with weak digestive powers.
The accompanying diagram illustrates the different kinds of starch, from raw starch, as found in nature, up thru the various processes of converting it into dextrin, to that perfect state of digestion as found in ripe fruit—where all the starch has been converted into fruit-sugar—and fruit-sugar is ready for assimilation into the blood with practically no digestion.

THE STARCH LADDER.

FRUIT SUGAR

Found in ripe fruits and green grains.

MALTED STARCH

This represents all the starch converted into sugar-maltose by the action of diastase.

ROASTED STARCH

Found in bread crust or flake foods which have been thoroly toasted.

BAKED, OR OVEN-COOKED, STARCH

Found in baked potato, toasted bread (zwieback), bread crust, and other dextrinized cereals.

BOILED, OR WATER-COOKED, STARCH

Found in soft, fresh bread, mushes, boiled potatoes, and other kettle-cooked cereals.

RAW STARCH

Found in raw potatoes, flour, rice, and other grains.
A study of this diagram must be sufficient to convince the reader that it is more economical to use the energy of the cook-stove, rather than unnecessarily to waste the energy of the digestive organs in trying to digest raw starch. Inverted starch, that which has been properly cooked,—that is, dextrinized,—cooked until it has a dark color or reddish tinge, like the crust of well-baked bread, furnishes much more heat and strength to the body than raw or half-cooked starch. For in eating the insufficiently-cooked starch, much of its food value is lost, as the digestive organs are able to convert but a portion of it into sugar; and all starch must be converted into sugar before it can be assimilated by the digestive organs and turned into a blood stream.
A study of the starch family, then, shows us that raw starch as found in flour, potatoes, rice, etc., can not be acted upon by the saliva; that boiled starch, as found in the mushy breakfast foods, boiled potatoes, and the inside of a soft loaf of bread, can be digested only with difficulty, and is a wasteful way in which to eat starch, as it is probably not all used for heat and energy; while baked foods, such as baked potatoes, zwieback, and other toasted cereals, afford the best way to eat starch, as it is in this state thoroly dextrinized, and quite easy of digestion.
In fruits we have starch completely digested by nature's method. Under the influence, and by means of the digestive principles within the fruit, the starch of the green apple has all been converted into sugar in the ripe apple. In this form it can be assimilated by the weakest digestive organs.
Malt and malt preparations represent the starch of the grain after it has been thoroly digested by the diastase (diastase is a substance similar to the ptyalin of the saliva), and in this way man is able to accomplish by artificial means what nature does in her laboratory in the case of the ripening fruit.
It must be borne in mind that the grains contain sugar when they are green,—that is, in the "milky stage," and that it is turned to starch by ripening. Just the reverse is true of fruit. Fruit contains starch when it is green, and sugar when in the ripe stage.
(In the next article we will deal further with the Starch Family, concerning digestion, and the use of starch in the body.)