Certain of our habits, however, are based on a scientific foundation. There is a reason for eating butter on our bread, or for serving pork with baked beans, or cheese with rice or macaroni. Nutrition is an exact science, and has been built up slowly through the years from the studies and investigations made by many famous scientists, each one adding one more round to the ladder of knowledge. Some of the steps have been: the discovery of the circulation of the blood; the function of oxygen in the body; the evolution and measurement of heat and energy from food in the body; the composition of foods and their relation to body activity; and the recent discovery, the presence or absence in foods of certain substances that are essential to growth.

New discoveries and new studies are constantly being made with which the housekeeper should keep in touch. They are popularized sooner or later in some of the magazines, but the best way to keep accurately informed is to have one's name put on the mailing list for the Farmers' Bulletins, Bureau of Publications, Department of Agriculture, Washington, D.C.

Food habits