Melons are eaten raw either with sugar or with ginger and pepper. The
seeds of the Indian melon (kaukoor) contain a great deal of starch and
vegetable fat ; they are ground into meal.
Gourds. — ^Vegetable marrow is the best-known member of this group
in the British Isles. The pumpkin is a large-sized variety, and so is the
squash. Marrow is a succulent, wholesome vegetable with an ^reeable
flavour. It may be baked, boiled, or stuffed, or made into preserves.
It is an easily digested vegetable.
Onion family are all nutritious, containing a quantity of nitrogenous
material, also sugar, with a pungent oil rich in sulphur, to which they



102 THE BOOK OF DIET.
owe their pungency and smell. The parts used are the bulb, young
leaves, and seedlings.
Onions when scalded — that is, covered with boiling water and a pinch
of salt — are not nearly so strong in flavour as unscalded ones. Boiling
makes them much milder in taste than when raw. Onions are valuable
as blood-purifiers. They are edible as fresh vegetables — for example,
spring onions in salads— and after long keeping are useful as flavouring
agents for salads, stews, soup, etc. There are a good many varieties.
The onion proper is of two sizes — the strong, small onion, largely used
for flavouring, and the Spanish onion, much milder in flavour. Syboes
are the young seedlings, and are much esteemed for soups and stews.
Shallot or eschalot is a delicate onion with a strong taste, but wanting
the pungent smell of onion. Chives, a smaller variety, where the leaves
and bulb are also both used.
All onions impart a strong typical odour to the breath. It appears in
two or three hours, and may persist for twenty-four hours or more.
