In Spain, the inhabitants subsist chiefly on maize and rice, with some wheat and legumes. Among the latter the garbanzo, or "chickpea" (cicer arietinum), is one of the principal vegetable components of the national olla, which contains also a considerable proportion of animal food in variety, as bacon, sausage, fowl, etc. The chick-pea is cultivated in the East, and being roasted is known as "parched pulse," as portable food for travellers there. Fruit is fine and abundant; especially so are grapes, figs, and melons. There is little or no butter, the universal substitute for which is olive oil, produced in great quantity. Fowls, meat broths, and the pig furnish the chief animal food, and garlic is the favourite condiment.

Going northward, flesh of all kinds occupies a more considerable place in the dietary. In France the garden vegetables and legumes form an important staple of diet for all classes; the very numerous small land proprietors subsist largely on the direct products of the soil, with some milk, poultry, and eggs, the produce of their small farms. Beef is employed for their national pot-au-feu, an admirable mixed dish, in which a small portion of meat is made to yield all its, nutritive qualities, and to go far in mingling its odour and savour with those of the fragrant vegetables, including sweet and savoury herbs, which are largely added to the stock. The beef, which is an essential portion of the dish, is often eaten hot after the soup, but sometimes cold, with plenty of green salad and oil, doubtless the most palatable mode of serving, while it furnishes a source of fat, if not otherwise provided for by butter, cheese, etc.*

Spain

Different food necessary in Northern Europe.