Well I know how the topic sound, but it has to do with civil war lol. I remember a while ago when I watched a history channel program on civil war, it talked about a specific campaign that lasted a few days on a hill after heavy rain. Both sides were exhausted in the fighting, because the wet muddy ground, and the slope of the hill. However, it said the southern soldiers were more exhausted than the union soldiers because of the diet. It mentioned that the Union soldiers were having beef and bread as meals, while the Confederation soldiers were having pork and corn. Does beef and bread really give that much more energy to humans compare to pork and corn?
I think that while the mainstay of the meals were somewhat equivalent, meaning that there was a protein and a carbohydrate component, beef is generally less salty than pork, so the Union troops were most likely better hydrated and the simple carbs in the bread are more easily and quickly broken down into energy than corn, which the body uses less energy to digest it....all of which would contribute to the Union troops having more energy than the Confederate soldiers.
Why is pork salty? I am not following on that part. Meat are salty when we add too much salt. From what I understand, beef is the hardest to digest. Yes, that means it is harder to digest than pork. Beef has higher protein content, pork has more fat. It takes more energy to digest highly concentrated protein. It also takes more water to digest protein.
In those days, pork was cured, or preserved with salt...I think it still is today.But that would account for its extra saltiness. The soldiers would definitely have to drink more water if they ate only salt pork for meat...but I don't think the fat would be a problem as they certainly didn't sit around in the the Civil War and fat didn't get a chance to accumulate.
I know it is hard to have fresh food at the front line those days. It made sense to have preserved meat instead of fresh meat. If pork must be preserved with a lot of salt, then how was beef preserved? Beef jerky? Union soldiers couldn't be eating jerky every day, could they? I was thinking about steak.
Beef was also preserved with salt-which draws out moisture and helps prevent bacteria from growing. I'm not sure why only pork was called 'salt pork', and beef wasn't called 'salt beef'...maybe bc pork was more plentiful and so it was salted and eaten more than beef....The soldiers had huge barrels of salt; they would put their meats in, cover them up and leave them for days to cure-both beef and pork.
Beef and bread and pork and corn are sad choices to send men to fight. I can't decide if the outcome of the war would have changed had the diet been any different. We continue to send men to war with a much healthier diet and yet they still die. War is just hell!
I could see this being a factor. Beef and break provide whole grains and beef itself provides more energy. Corn is good for you, but with pork I don't see it working to allow the confederates to be more focused.
Beef and bread have been staples for centuries, and if they are of quality, they are as good as anything else. The Bible says that bread is the staff of life.
I've heard that you could live off bread and water only. Is this actually true? I've never tested this, and don't plan to.
If you are a grown man (or woman for that matter), then you can survive with bread and water, because you have done growing, and bread provide carbohydrate for you to have energy to stay alive and only to stay alive. However if that's the only thing you eat, you won't live healthy and won't live long. Because human body needs other nutrition such as vitamin, iron, protein, etc. If you only eat bread, you might be ok for a month or two, but you will definitely struggling if you keep it up for a year or two.
There is a limit to how long you can go without good food- water you can only go without for three days- think about anorexics.....they die bc of not eating...
Yeah I can see that not providing the nutrients the body needs. I would get sick of it after a while. I think people would be miserable if they had to resort to that.
So true- and we know that the body needs a wide variety of foods to be truly healthy. Scurvy may have been common in those days bc of lack of fresh fruits and vegetables with Vitamin C...just one example of how food could have made a difference.
Yeah even I can tell when I have a vitamin deficiency and not enough fruits and veggies. You start to feel like crap and you feel out of it. I recently started eating more of them and am starting to feel better.
I agree-if we stay closer to the diet that is prescribed in the Bible, we would be lots healthier-fruits, grains, olive oil....we can eat meat, but I think it should be sparingly-not sure where the Bible stands on this....
I love meat and I don't think I'll ever be able to get rid of it. We had some steak last night that was very delicious. I wonder if they could cook steak back then like we do now with all the marinates.
They probably didn't marinate it-but back in those days, meat was more pure and might have tasted better....
Yes, of course you can live off of bread and water. In fact, you could live off of just water. Depending on one's size and level of activity a person could live off water for at least 40 days or more. If you add bread one could manage to survive quite a bit longer. The problem would be, you are not getting your proper nutrients and the body would become frail and suffer other health issues.
I see! I think one would be miserable with bread and water only. Can you imagine how old that would get after the first week? I hate eating the same thing two nights in a row! I couldn't imagine being forced to eat only bread and water, but if I had to I certainly could.
