I’m fascinated by the existence of so many foods. Who decided to boil tree sap for 3 weeks to make maple syrup? Who agitated cows milk vigorously for 20 minutes to discover butter? Who saw cheese for the first time and decided to still eat moldy milk?
I thank those nameless humans for their service to society.
Butter was discovered by accident when humans were still nomadic tribes. Milk was transported in animal skin bags and the agitation from travel turned it into butter. Probably being chased by something or running very fast.
It’s proposed that cheese was discovered the same way, when the rennet in sheep stomach sacks used to transport milk curdled the milk into curds and whey.
They clearly had good cardio if they were agitating it that vigorously for long enough to make butter! Forget fitness watches, maybe I should wear a sack of milk at the gym to see if I’m working hard enough.
blue cheese was discovered from a guy eating lunch in a cave, and leaving it unfinished to go talk to a pretty girl. when he came back months later the cheese had molded into blue cheese and he ate it and it was good
The first one would have been obvious by the time Europeans reached the Americas because reducing things to increase the intensity of flavours by removing water would have been a known cooking technique for a long time by then (and I’m guessing would have been figured out soon after the invention of pots). Then, it would have been a matter of someone who was aware of that technique tasting raw sap, realizing it was sweet, then trying to extract the sugar through reduction, then discovering it’s still pretty good as a syrup rather than dry sugar.
And extracting sap from trees goes way back, as that’s what frankincense and myr were (and disappointing to find out these “precious substances” just smell like church).
Thus this custom of firing houses continued, till in process of time, says my manuscript, a sage arose, like our Locke, who made a discovery, that the flesh of swine, or indeed of any other animal, might be cooked… without the necessity of consuming a whole house to dress it.
I’m fascinated by the existence of so many foods. Who decided to boil tree sap for 3 weeks to make maple syrup? Who agitated cows milk vigorously for 20 minutes to discover butter? Who saw cheese for the first time and decided to still eat moldy milk?
I thank those nameless humans for their service to society.
Butter was discovered by accident when humans were still nomadic tribes. Milk was transported in animal skin bags and the agitation from travel turned it into butter. Probably being chased by something or running very fast.
It’s proposed that cheese was discovered the same way, when the rennet in sheep stomach sacks used to transport milk curdled the milk into curds and whey.
The question remains - how hungry must they have been to still eat that?
They clearly had good cardio if they were agitating it that vigorously for long enough to make butter! Forget fitness watches, maybe I should wear a sack of milk at the gym to see if I’m working hard enough.
For every person that managed to make maple syrup there must be several that made a stew from danger-mushrooms.
Darwinian evolution is as much luck as it is skill
I think there’s a lot of “dare you to eat that” in food history.
There’s also a lot of " Tom didn’t make it" and “Not gonna do that again” in food history.
blue cheese was discovered from a guy eating lunch in a cave, and leaving it unfinished to go talk to a pretty girl. when he came back months later the cheese had molded into blue cheese and he ate it and it was good
What a moron.
The first one would have been obvious by the time Europeans reached the Americas because reducing things to increase the intensity of flavours by removing water would have been a known cooking technique for a long time by then (and I’m guessing would have been figured out soon after the invention of pots). Then, it would have been a matter of someone who was aware of that technique tasting raw sap, realizing it was sweet, then trying to extract the sugar through reduction, then discovering it’s still pretty good as a syrup rather than dry sugar.
And extracting sap from trees goes way back, as that’s what frankincense and myr were (and disappointing to find out these “precious substances” just smell like church).
From the 1888 A Dissertation Upon Roast Pig
Unfortunately the rest of it is pretty trash.