POPEYE'S DELIGHT

New Zealand Listener, Volume 13, Issue 334, 16 November 1945, Page 19

POPEYE'S DELIGHT

(Written for "The Listener" by DR.

MURIEL

BELL

Nutri-

tionist to the Department of Health)

what the unshaven head was to Samson, we owe it to this vegetable to examine its properties. In the table below it is compared with cabbage -enough of each to make about half-a-cupful when cooked. ] F spinach is to Popeye-the-Sailorman According to that table spinach seems to be in the lead. Common to both is the valuable regulatory function due to the presence of insoluble vegetable material, sometimes called "roughage," but con-. taining what they are pleased in U.S.A. to call "smoothage," or soft residue like pectin. As to its mineral contributions, cabbage wins as far as calcium is concerned, 46 mg. vs. O. The 0.5 mg. of iron in cabbage is 80 per cent. available; the 3 to 4 milligrams of iron in spinach is stated to be available only to a limited extent, because it is in a form that is not attacked by digestive juices and therefore not absorbed.

The figures for calcium need some further explanation. There is an appreciable amount of calcium in spinach, but again it is not absorbed. The reason lies in the presence in spinach of oxalic acid which combines with the calcium to form insoluble calcium oxalate. There has even been a contention that some of the calcium from other foods, such as milk, is precipitated by the oxalic acid in spinach, and therefore, in some countries, advice has been given not to use it in infant feeding. That attitude may be justified -in a country where milk is in short. supply, but I cannot see that a vegetable that has so many positive virtues should be condemned because of this one disadvantage. If we do decide to condemn it, we must remain logical and condemn wholemeal bread. or oatmeal because they contain phytic acid which similarly causes precipitation of calcium. If there is plenty of milk in the diet, there is no need to worry about the oxalic acid in spinach. Some methods of serving it actually combine milk with it. I often wonder why we do not take a leaf out of Continental cookery books, and for example, dredge spinach with flour which thickens the liquor in which it has been cooked, adding milk and garnishing with chopped hard-boiled egg; or making it into a spinach custard. These methods serve to take the edge off its-rather peculiar flavour. If anyone is still worried about the oxalic acid, the whole of it can be precipitated by using at most half-a-teaspoon of precipitated calcium carbonate for half-a-cupful of the cooked vegetable; this has been found not to diminish the vitamin C or to alter the taste to any marked extent.

Calories Protein VitaminA Vit.C Vit.B1 Riboflavin Niacin éms. IU, mé. micograms mé. CABBAGE ...... eS 1.4 50 50 80 50 0.22 SPINACH Sei ee 2,3 9000 62 100 240 0.68