COOKING Why We Cook our Food.

While some of all classes of food may be eaten raw, yet we have gradually come to submit most of our foods to the heat of a fire, in various ways; this process is known as _cooking_.

While cooking usually wastes a little, and sometimes a good deal, of the fuel value of the food and, if carelessly or stupidly done, may make it less digestible, in the main it makes it both more digestible and safer, though much more expensive.

This it does in three ways: by making it taste better; by softening it so as to make it more easily masticated; and by sterilizing it, or destroying any germs or animal parasites which may be in it.
Cooking Improves the Taste of Food.

It may seem almost absurd to regard changing the taste of a food as of sufficient importance to justify the expense and trouble of a long process like cooking.