Oil, when it agrees with the stomach, is certainly very nourishing. It is seldom used alone, but generally along with some other vegetable or animal food. With some particular stomachs it never agrees. In Italy and the south of Europe, olive oil is largely consumed in lieu of butter. In this country, it is more sparingly used, and chiefly as a sauce or condiment to sallads, fish, &c.
The leaves, stalks, and flowers of vegetables, contain much less nutritious matter than the farinaceous seeds and roots already noticed. Watery and mucilaginous, the aliment afforded by the oleraceous herbs is there fore not very great ; nor can man be well supported by them alone. As adjuvant articles of diet, however, they are useful. They are cooling and aperient, and thus serve to correct the stimulant and septic tendency of animal food, or the binding effects of the more nourish ing and farinaceous vegetables. Too freely indulged in, they are apt, in some constitutions, to produce flatulence and cholic.
The vegetables to which these remarks apply, are, Brassica oleracea Cabbage, colewo•t, cauliflower, broccoli, savoy Crainbe maritime Sea-kale CithQrecWn intyous Succory c ndiva EndiveLactuca saliva Lettuce Portulaca olcracea Purslane Spinacia oleracea ..... Spinage ?sparagas officinalis Asparagus Cynara scolynzus Artichoke.
Of these, there is none more tender, or more whole some, than spinage. Of the varieties of cabbage, the broccoli and cauliflower are the most easily digested, and least flatulent. The asparagus and artichoke, are agreeable and wholesome enough, tolerably nutritious, and have besides some power as diuretics. The as paragus communicates to the urine a strong and peculiar odour, which shews that it is not of very easy assimila tion.
The endive and lettuce are chiefly used raw as sallads, Lettuce has also some degree of narcotic and soporific effect ; a quality which depends on the bitter milky juice contained in the leaf stalks.
?1pianz pci•oselinuizz . . Parsli y -graveolens Smallage, celery.
Parsley is slightly aromatic, little nutritive, and chiefly used to season sal lads, broths, Scc.
Celery, naturally too acrimonious to be used as ali ment, becomes by cultivation milder, and is then high ly relished by many people as a sallad. It is also used
boiled or stewed, and affords a light mucilaginous nourishment.
Lepidium sativate • . . . Garden cress. Sisymbrium nasturtium . . . Water cress.
These are used as warm aromatic sallads, or as sea sonings merely. They promote digestion, and are es teemed antiscorbutie.
Rumex acctosa . Sorrel.
Sorrel is little used in this country. When boiled, how ever, and dressed like spinage, its acidity is considera bly lessened ; it is rendered extremely tender and pala table, and affords a cooling opening, acid and mucilagin ous aliment. In this way it is much used in France and other countries on the Continent Lichen Iceland liverwort This moss is used as an aliment by the Icelanuers. Freed by maceration from a hitter principle which contains, and then boiled in water or milk, it yields a wholesome gelatinous nourishment, which has lately been highly extolled as a restorative in consumptive cases.
Some species of the fucus and ulva arc slightly nu tritive, as the Faces esculentus Eatable fucus.
Ulva lactuca Green laver.
-palnzata Dulse.
They are used raw as sallads, or are boiled till they be come tender.
The fungi are rather used as condiments than as food. Their principles seem somewhat different from those of other vegetable productions ; and from being liable to the putrefactive fermentation, and yielding ammonia, on distillation, their elements resemble those of animal matters. Those which are esculent are stimulant, and, it is presumed, highly nutritious. The best known, and most used, are, ?garicus campestris . . . . Common mushroom Fhalus rscalentas . . . . More II LycoJierdon tuber . . . Truffle.
Some few fruits, rich in farinaceous and mucilaginous matter, yield an aliment scarcely less nutritious than the farinaceous grains and roots. But none of these are indigenous. The examples are, .4rto Ca 111 s incisa Bread fruit Brosimum alicastruM , . • Masa sapient UM Banana --naradisiaca Plantain.
These, in the East and West Indies, are used as sub stitutes for bread.
The fagus castanea, chesnut, when roasted, resembles a good deal some of these alimentary fruits, and is, like them, farinaceous and nourishing.