Читать книгу Foods and Their Adulteration - Harvey Washington Wiley - Страница 146

—It cannot be denied that meat extract, as has been said in the case of soup stock, contains only a small part of nutritive matter. This nutritive substance is in a state of solution and probably is more readily absorbed than a similar amount of other nutritives in the form of ordinary meat. Its chief value as a nutrient, therefore, is not in the amount of nutrient material which it contains, but in the ease and speed with which it may become absorbed into the circulation. In case of illness this is often a very important point. It is not a question so much of the utilization of a large amount of nutrients as the absorption and assimilation in small quantities which will sustain life until the disordered conditions disappear. For these reasons the meat extracts have a value. There is, however, little doubt of the fact that in the popular mind a great deal more credit is given to meat extracts than should properly belong to them. They must be regarded principally as condimental and incident to nutrition rather than as nutritive substances. The claims which are made by the manufacturers are sometimes misleading, as, for instance, that one pound of extract contains the nutritive properties of many pounds of meat. Such a statement, of course, is absurd upon its face and should not be allowed to go unchallenged. Even when meat extracts are reinforced by the addition of soluble or comminuted fiber, as is often the case, the quantity of nourishment is very small as compared with a similar weight of meat itself.

It is not intended by the above remarks to cast any discredit upon the value of beef extract, as its value has been attested in numerous cases. It is only designed to call attention to the fact that as food these extracts have comparatively little value. They may be useful as stimulants or as condimental substances or as a means of speedily introducing a soluble nutrient in the case of disease where it is extremely important that even small amounts of nutritious material should enter the body.