The Kitchen — Healthful Foods

Bread, milk, cream, butter,
laban, cornmeal porridge, eggs, beef,
mutton from a sheep of advanced age,
fish, red mullet,
all fresh fish,
rice,
lettuce,
asparagus,
celery,
spinach,
small beets,
carrots,
boiled onions,
blood oranges,
sweet lemons,
ripe cherries,
grapes,
raisins,
figs,
sugar,
dibs, honey

Some Properties of Foods

Beets: benefit the heart, as a purifier.
Laban: if it is sweet, it strengthens the body's tissue quickly; and if it is sour, it kills the germs in the intestines and adds to the body's growth.
Butter: softens the nerves and takes the place of olive oil.
Carrots: give the face freshness.
Cherries: kill the substance of old age in the body.
Dates, figs, and raisins: the value of each of them is stronger than meat.

Some Properties of Fruit

Peaches: must be ripe and deep red in color.
Raisins: the large are more beneficial than the small.
Pineapple juice: kills the microbe of the throat, and if mixed with sugar it relieves its congestion.
Bread: should be eaten only after three days have passed since its baking.
Milk: for its benefit to be complete, it should not be taken as a drink; rather, toasted bread should be crumbled into it.
Potatoes: boil them, then remove the outer skin so thin it is like cigarette paper, for the benefit of the potato lies in the skin that clings to it.
Lettuce: eat it after washing it well, for it carries the microbe of fever.
Spinach: this king of the greens should be small and tender, cooked well, and eaten with butter and salt; it contains a quantity of iron and loosens the stomach.
Red fish: binding for the stomach; it is extremely stimulating and a great strengthener, and for that reason the ordinary person can eat of it only once every three days.
Fish of all kinds: must be fresh, and eaten boiled or grilled, not fried.

Foods Digested in Five Minutes
Raw egg white, plain soup, butter, honey, dibs, cream.

Foods Digested in One to Two Hours
Mutton, bread, laban, cheese, egg yolk, cakes, chicken soup, chocolate, cocoa, starch with milk, lettuce, olives.