Chronography of Food
Page last
modified 14 November 2023
Work House weekly menu (Staffordshire). UK. Source, p.52, Poverty & Public Health 1815-1948, Heinemann,
Essex, UK, 2001. See also price and economy, 1834 and other dates, for more
UK on workhouses.
4 September 1939, Weekly menu suggested for
�evacuated�children in Britain, removed from cities due to War risk.
1941, UK Food rationing �Peeks� image..
For
famines and food shortages, see individual country pages. See also prices and wages for historic wage and food price
levels.
See also Food � cooking and refridgeration
See also Food �Alcoholic drinks
See also Meat, Chicken, Poultry, Eggs
See
also Farming for agricultural technology and farming
See also Railways � social effects (1881) for
effects of railways on agricultural prices.
See also Prices and other Economic Events for
agricultural wages and trades unions
See
also Great Britain pre 1901 for agricultural unrest e.g. Swing Revolt
1830
See
also Canal-Sea for declining shipping rates of food etc.
See also Education-University for founding
dates of agricultural colleges.
�If you want to defeat a country easily�feed
it your food.� Ivan the Terrible. "Food is a tool. It is a weapon in the
U.S. negotiating kit" Earl
Butz, US President Nixon's agricultural secretary �The golden arches are the most recognized symbol in the world. The
restaurant provides food for people in 119 countries, especially the USA. There
are even 179 restaurants in India where most people don't eat either beef or
pork.� Business Insider, 17 December
2010.
�When I give food to the poor, they call me a
saint. When I ask why they have no food, they call me a Communist�
Archbishop Helder Camara, Brazil.
�I saw in one
single farmyard [near London] more than enough food for four times the
inhabitants of the parish, and this yard did not contain a tenth perhaps of the
produce of the parish, but while the poor creatures that raise the� barley and wheat and cheese and the mutton
and beef are living on potatoes, an accursed canal comes kindly through the
parish to convey away the wheat and all the good food to the tax eaters and
their attendants in the Wen�. Cobbett,
1820s, SE England
Food
crime, adulteration, pollution � see Appendix 0.1
Obesity
and Dieting � see Appendix 0.2
Supermarkets � see Appendix
0.3
Food
Fashion, Dining Manners and Etiquette � see Appendix 0.6
Baked Beans � see Appendix
2
Bananas � see Appendix 3
Biscuits � see Appendix
3a
Bread, buns, cereals � see Appendix 4
Butter and Margarine � See Appendix 5
Chocolate � see Appendix 7
Desserts and Ice Cream � see Appendix 8
Fish � see Appendix 9
Frozen Foods (savoury) � see Appendix
10
Fruit and Vegetables,
Vegetarianism � see Appendix 11
Milk,� cheese, dairy � see Appendix 13
Pasta
and Rice � see Appendix 13a
Pizzas,
Pizza outlets � see Appendix 13b
Potatoes and Crisps � see Appendix 14
Soft Drinks � see Appendix
15
Spices, Salt and Herbs � see Appendix
16
Spreads and condiments � see Appendix
17
Tinned / Canned food � see Appendix
19
2016, The number of undernourished people rose
for the first time since 2003, when the figure stood at 947 million (14/7%
of global population). In 2015 the figure was 777 million (10.6%), rising to
815 million (11.0%) in 2016. Armed conficts were blamed for the rise. Climate disasters also cause conflict
through creating food shortages.
1984, Quorn, a mushroom-protein derived meat substitute, first appeared.
16 March 1974, Daniel Frank Gerber, US manufacturer of baby
food, died aged 75.
23 April 1971, New York City became the first US government to require
that a definitive expiration date on packages of perishable foods. While food
distributors had information printed on packages to allow store managers to
determine the date of shipment of an article of food as part of knowing when to
withdraw it from the shelf), these had been in "codes indecipherable to
the average shopper." Violations of the law were punishable by fines
ranging from $25 to $250
4 June 1963, At the World Food Congress, John F Kennedy said �The war
against hunger is truly mankind�s war of liberation�.
27 June 2006, Robert Carrier, celebrity chef, died (born 10
October 1923)
27 May� 1975, Jamie Oliver, celebrity chef,
was born.
6 January 1960, Nigella Lawson, celebrity� chef, was born.
23 February 1947, Anton Mosimann, chef, was born.
4 January 1947, Rick Stein, celebrity chef, was born.
18 June 1941, Delia Smith was born.
21 January 1937, Marcel Boulestin appeared on TV on Cook�s
Night Out, demonstrating how to cook an omelette; he thereby became the first TV chef.
10 October 1923, Robert Carrier, celebrity chef,
was born (died 27 June 2006)
10 July 1954, US President Eisenhower
signed Public Law 480, the Agricultural Trade Development and Assistance Act of
1954, better known as PL-480. This facilitated the export of grain to
US-aligned governments that were facing threats from Leftist agencies, either
internal rebels or intimidation from a Soviet-aligned State next door. PL-480
could be used to keep recalcitrant allies, those possibly sliding towards
Communism, in line. For example in 1965 US President Johnson shifted the renewal of
PL-480 food aid to India from an annual to a�
monthly basis, threatening India with withdrawal of food aid as India�s President Shastri
expressed disapproval of US bombing in Vietnam. However if Shastri abandoned Nehru�s
ideas of land distribution to Indian peasants then India would receive US
agricultural technology, enhancing food yields.
1949, The first
appearance of quiche, a savoury
flan, in Britain. Derived from the German kuchen,
cake, it was then� exotic but became
commonplace in the 1970s, and then derided for connotations of vegetarian
wimpishness.
8 January 1949, Wolfgang Puck, chef, was born.
16 October 1945, The
Food and Agriculture Organisation (FAO) was established.� Its aim was to raise levels of nutrition and
standards of living.
11 April 1929, Popeye the cartoon character first appeared
in a comic strip in a New York newspaper.
18 October 1911, Wrigleys launched their Spearmint Gum
in the UK.
They set up a factory in Wembley in 1927, moving to Plymouth in 1970.
29 December 1908, Dr Magnus Pyke, nutritional scientist, was
born.
Chinese
food introduced to the West
1903, The southern Chinese dish
Chow Mein (meaning,�fried flour�) appeared on the west coast of the USA. It
usually contains noodles, sauce, chopped meat, vegetables, ginger, mushrooms.
29 August 1897. A New York chef, to appeal to Chinese
and American tastes, devised Chop Suey, meaning �various things�, the most famous Chinese dish.
1895,
The concept of �calorie� as a
measure of the energy content of food was introduced by Wesleyan university
professor Wilbur
Olin Atwater, aged 41, who had also worked in the US Department of
Agriculture. A calorie is the amount of energy needed to raise the temperature
of a kilogramme of water by 1 degree C, from 15 C to 16 C at pressure 1
atmosphere. He was developing a measure
of the foods with best value based on calories per Dollar.
1863, In the UK, the first National Food Survey was conducted. 370
familes of the �labouring classes� were questioned on their daily diet.
15 May� 1862, The US Department of Agriculture was created.
30 September 1861, William Wrigley junior, who popularised
chewing gum, was born this day.
23 September 1848. Chewing gum was commercially produced for the
first time. It was called �State of Maine Pure Spruce Gum�.
11 March 1845, Self-raising flour
was patented by Henry
Jones of Bristol.
14 March 1836. Isabella Mary Mayson, who became Mrs Beeton
of cookery book fame, was born in Heidelberg.
2 February 1826, Anthelme Brillat-Savarin, French gastronomist,
died (born 1 April 1755).
1805, The first allotments in Britain were created, at
Brompton, Yorkshire; rented out to households drawn into cities by the
Industrial Revolution. �The Allotment Extension Act 1882 made it
compulsory for parish authorities in Britain to provide land for
allotments.� In 1978 the UK had 480,000
allotments.
1760, A
two-volume cookery book, �The British
Housewife�, by Martha Bradley, late of Bath, was published.
It also described the origins and properties of the food, a sort of food
encyclopedia.
1 April 1755, Anthelme Brillat-Savarin, French gastronomist,
was born (died 2 February 1826).
1727,
The highly successful cookery book, �The
Compleat Housewife� was written by Eliza Smith, with 500 recipes. It went through
100 editions and was in print until 1773.
1707,
The upmarket food store Fortnum and
Mason�s was founded in Picadilly, London.
1706,
The food, condiments, company Crosse and
Blackwell was founded, to supply produce to the English colonies.
1686, �Cordon Bleu� cookery originated in the
Institut de Saint-Louis, founded by Madame Maintenon for 250 daughters of impoverished
nobility, especially titled army officers. The school became famous for its
cookery lessons, and the girls who graduated from there wore blue ribbons (cordon
bleu) as part of the graduation uniform.
1249, A Mediaeval northern
European town of 3,000 people consumed 1,500 tons of grain annually, which
would require 10,000 acres (40 square kilometres) of agricultural land.
Palm Sunday, 1098.
The first Cistercian Abbey was founded,
in a desolate swamp 14 miles from Dijon. The Cistercian order monks �subject
themselves to severe discipline, eating no meat or fat, wearing no
comfortable clothing such as breeches or coats. They observed strict silence
as they work, and abhored sloth.� They
did not use slave labour and they did much of their own farming and were
skilled at building and civil engineering.
300,
The average citizen of Rome breakfasted on bean stew and then unleavened bread,
toasted on cinders, with milk or honey. At midday, lunch consisted of fruit, a
sweet confection, fruit, cheese and watered wine (the prandium). The evening meal, or convivium,
might include meat, fish, cereals, porridge, and onions fried in oil and
seasoned with chickpeas and vinegar.
Appendix 0.1 - Food crime,madulteration, pollution
28 August 1988, The longest trial in Spanish history came to an end
after 15 months. Alleged sales of toxic
olive oil
had killed 600 and injured thousands more.
28 August 1975, The U.S. Food
and Drug Administration announced a ban
on the use of polyvinyl chloride plastic for packaging of certain foods,
because of its potential for causing cancer. At the time, PVC was the
second most-used plastic in American food packaging. Although PVC film wrapping
of meat and fruits was still permitted, the use of hard PVC plastic on lunch
meat packages, and for bottles of liquids, was to be prohibited.
1820, Accum published his famous work on the
aduoteration and contramination of food in Britain. This was widespread, and
included, the use of toxic chemicals like arsenic sulphide and lead oxide (red)
or copper salts (green0 to colour sweets, tye dilution of beer woith water but
then the restitutiom of its intoxicating properties with picrotoxin (a plant
extract used to poison fish), similar dilution and adulteration of milk with
water then chalk and herbs, and similar practices with medications bought at
chemists. Gravel or sand was added to wheat and barley to increase its weight.
Accum raised the anger of the food producers, who succeeded in raising a civil
case against him for theft of a ten�
pages ot journals from the Royal Institution; he fled back to Germany
where he died in Berlin in1838.
29 March 1769, Friedrich Accum,
pioneer on combatting food adulteration, was born in Buckeburg, Hanover,
Germany, to Jewish parents. He moved to Britain in 1793 and worked at a pharmacy
in Arlington Street, London. By 1800 he had his own chemical analytical and
laboratory equipment business.
857, The first recorded outbreak
of ergotism; a disease causded by
eating fungally-contaminated rye. Thousands were killed, in the Rhine Valley.
Appendix 0.2�
- Obesity and Dieting
3 June 2016, In the UK, four of the seven board members of the
National Obesity Forum resigned in protest over a report that people should eat
more fat, less sugar, to lose weight.
10 September 1983, The heaviest man in the US, Jon Browner
Minnoch, died weighing 362 kg. When admitted to hospital in March 1978, he
weighed 635 kg, or 102 stone.
1963, Weight Watchers was founded in New York.
1927, Health farms became popular amongst the Western middle classes;
residential places where one went for several days to improve health and/or
fitness by speical dieting.
Appendix 0.3�
- Supermarkets; see also Supermarket History
28 April 2018, The second and
third largest UK supermarkets, Asda and Sainsbury, announced a merger.
Wal-Mart, who had owned Asda, was disposing of it. If cleared by the� Office of Fair Trading and Competition
Commission, this would create a supermarket with a larger share than Tesco, see
supermarket share.
22 September 2014, Tesco
shared fell sharply as the food retailer admitted overstating its profits by
some �250 million. The issue was with clawed-back payments from Tesco�s
suppliers, in return for better shelf positioning and other �perks�; future
such payments had been included in earlier-period profit statements.
13 January 2013, The Food Safety
Authority of Ireland announced the discovery of horsemeat in four Tesco beef products.
31 December 1997, The US retail chain Wal-Mart announced its intention to expand into Europe, by acquiring the German
retailer Werkauf with its 21 supermarkets.
29 August 1994. In Britain, large
shops were allowed to open legally for the first time on a Sunday.
8 December 1993. The
House of Commons voted to allow large British shops to open for six hours on
Sundays. High Street shops now
prepared for a price war with the supermarkets.
17 May� 1988. Sainsbury
announced sales of over �5 billion in the UK in 1987, selling 10.7% of all UK
groceries.
1980, Marks and Spencer started selling sandwiches. Some doubted
whether consumers would pay for a product they could easily make at home. They
quickly sold out.
26 June 1974, The first use of barcodes
in a supermarket.
A pack of Wrigley�s Juicy Fruit was scanned at a March�s supermarket in Troy,
Ohio.
8 December 1964, Simon Marks, successful retailer in conjunction with Thomas Spencer,
knighted in 1944, and made a peer in 1961, died in London at his head office.
16 July 1964, In the UK, the abolition
of Resale Price Maintenance on most goods facilitated the subsequent growth
of the supermarkets.
25 March 1963, The Co-op on
Frodingham Road, Scunthorpe, converted from counter service to self service. Now 24 of the 35 Co-ops in the area were
self service, and just three remained offering counter service in Scunthorpe
itself.
1962, The first Wal-Mart was
opened, by Sam Walton, in Rogers, Arkansas.
31 July 1950. Britain�s first self-service store, Sainsbury
in Croydon, opened.
12 January 1948. The Co-op opened the first supermarket in Britain, at Manor Park.
4 June 1937. The first
supermarket trolleys were wheeled out at a Humpty Dumpty Supermarket in
Oklahoma, USA.
The manager, Sylvan
Goldman, had noticed that business was slack because women would
come in and shop until their baskets were full, then stop purchasing. He had
the idea of a basket on wheels to enable shoppers to carry more, so he attached
wheels to a metal chair and fitted two baskets one above the other. He then
employed people to wheel it round and round the shop full of groceries, until
shoppers got the idea.
6 September 1916, US
retailer Clarence
Saunders opened the first Piggly
Wiggly supermarket,
in Memphis, Tennessee.
10 May� 1850, Sir Thomas Lipton, British grocer
and philanthropist, was born in Glasgow.
1707. Fortnum and Mason, renowned for its range of exotic foods, was
founded by William
Fortnum (footman to Queen Anne) and Hugh Mason, a local shopkeeper.
Appendix 0.6�
- Food Fashion, Dining Manners and Etiquette
4 September 1988.
Nutritionists blamed junk food for Britain�s increased youth violence.
19 September 1949, �Twiggy�, British model, actress, and singer,
was born in Neasden, London, as Lesley Hornby.
1941, Click here for Peek Frean�s Mrs Peek�s Puddings advert
ca. 1941. Note the social context of
this advert.
1909, First mention of the �spork�, a combination spoon and fork. Registered as a trademark
only in the 1970s, it was proposed as an aid for the disabled to cope at home.
1660, Earliest mention of the fork in England. Early iusers might be
mocked as �pitchfork-handlers�. Forks only became commonplace in England after
1750.
1608, Earliest recorded use of
the fork, in Italy, by Thomas Coryate.
(Or, 1518, banquet in Venice). Before this time, people cut meat with a knife
then ate with their fingers. However in northern Europe most people continued
to carve meat with a knife but eat with their fingers (or use a piece of bread
and a spoon) until after 1700.
1290, Advice on Italian table
manners included washing one�s hands before a meal (when forks were not in use
and people might carve meat with a knife but then eat with their fingers). Even
more important was not to scratch one�s bare skin and then carry on eating (withone�s
bare hands). Lice and fleas were very prevalent; it was good manners, if
scratching an itch was unavoidable, to take a portion of one�s clothes and
scratch with that. Also very frowned upon was the habit of scratching out one�s
ears and then continuing eating.
185 BCE,
With the Roman
conquest of Syria, luxurious eastern eating habits began to permeate
Roman culture. Meals became more elaborate and expensive, and cooks became
elevated from lowly slaves to professionals.
Appendix 2
� Baked Beans
1928, Heinz baked
beans were manufactured in Britain for the first time.
1905, Heinz baked
beans went on sale in Britain.
1895, The first
baked beans with tomato sauce were produced by the W J Heinz Company,
Pittsburgh, USA.
1875, The first
canned baked beans were produced by Burnham and Morrill Company, Portland,
Maine, USA.
11 October 1844. The baked beans
magnate H J Heinz was born
of German
parents in Pittsburgh, Pennsylvania.
Appendix 3 �- Bananas
8 March 1946, In Covent Garden, London, bananas went on sale for the
first time since the War.
30 December 1945, The SS Tilapia docked in Bristol with the first cargo of bananas
to enter the UK since the War, since 11/1940, when the UK Government banned
all fruit imports except oranges.
1944, The Chiquita banana company was established.
1866, Bananas were introduced to the
USA. Only from the 1880s, with the advent of refrigerated ships, did mass
imports of these tropical fruits become feasible.
10 April 1633. Bananas
were displayed for the first time in a London shop window.
1482, The Portuguese, sailing
along the west coast of Africa, became the first Europeans to discover bananas.
327 BCE,
The Greeks
who had invaded India under Alexander the Great first
encountered bananas,
in the Indus Valley.
Appendix 3a
- Biscuits
1933, Ritz Crackers went on sale in the US.
1925, Ryvita crispbreads went on sale in the
UK. The name is a combination of �rye� and �vita�, Latin for �life�.
6 March 1912, The National Biscuit Company (now Nabisco) introduced the Oreo cookie.
1912, Oreo Biscuits were first produced by the National Biscuit Company.
1826, Thomas Huntly established a
biscuit manufacturing company in Reading, UK, that later became Huntly and
Palmers.
1815, The UKs first biscuit
factory opened, in Carlisle. By 1990 the UK was Europe�s largest produced and
consumer of factory-made biscuits.
Appendix 4� - Bread, buns, cereals
1962,
The Chorleywood Baking Process was
invented by the bread industry�s research organisation. As a
chemical-mechanical baking procedure, it enabled the bread to be baked faster,
with weaker flour, so saving time and money. The quick baking process meant
less water was lost, so the loaf was heavier; a typical white standard loaf in
the 1970s was 40% water by weight and 75% air by volume.
1969, Kaboom breakfast cereal was introduced by General Mills. It contained
43.8% sugar.
In the same year Frosted Mini-Wheats
breakfast ceral was introduced by Kellogg�s, containing 28% sugar.
1965, Apple Jacks breakfast food was introduced by Kellogg�s. It
contained 55%
sugar.
1964, Lucky Charms breakfast cereal was introduced by General Mills. It
contained 50.4%
sugar.
1959, Concentrate breakfast food was introduced by Kellogg�s. It
contained 9.9%
sugar. Frosty-O
sugar-coated creal was introduced by General Mills.
1958, Cocoa Krispies breakfast cereal was introduced by Kellogg�s. It
contained 45.9%
sugar. Cocoa Puffs cereal
was introduced by General Mills. It contained 43% sugar.
1955, Special K breakfast cereal was introduced by Kellogg�s. It
contained 4.4%
sugar.
1954, Trix breakfast cereal was introduced by General Mills. It contained
46.6% sugar.
1953, Sugar Smacks cereal was introduced by Kellogg�s. It contained 56% sugar.
1952, Kellogg�s Sugar Frosted Flakes were introduced. They contained 29% sugar.
1951, Garlic bread appeared in Britain;
an early incursion of foreign food, encouraged by military service abroad and
the cookery books of Elizabeth David. Increasing foreign holidays
later on encouraged more non-English dishes into the country.
25 July 1948. Bread rationing ended in Britain.
21 July 1946. Bread rationing began in Britain because of a world shortage of wheat, caused by a
poor harvest and shortages of transport and fertilisers.
30 May� 1946. In the UK, the Labour Minister of Food,
John
Strachey, announced that bread
would be rationed. The greatest allowance would go to manual workers in
heavy industry.
1942, Kellogg�s Raisin Bran was introduced by the Kellogg�s Company. It
contained 10.6%
sugar.
6 April 1942, According to an order made by the UK Government on
6 March 1942, it was now illegal to bake white bread in the UK.
1941, Cheerios breakfast cereal was introduced in the USA by General
Mills. It contained 2.2% sugar.
1936, Rice Krispies bramnd name cereal was registered in the UK.
1930, Wrapped pre-sliced bread
first went on sale in Britain.
26 October 1928, Otto Rohwedder patented a bread slicing
machine, He first began work on this concept in 1912; bakers responded that
sliced bread would quickly go stale, and slices could be stolen. Therefore a
wrapping was necessary. Rohwedder suffered various setbacks including
serious illness and a fire in 1917 that destroyed his work. He only secured
financial backing for his work in 1922.
7 July 1928, Sliced
bread was first produced.
2 May� 1917, King George V called for
national restraint in bread consumption.
2 February 1917, In the UK,
bread rationing began.
13 September 1915. The process for making cornflakes was patented by Frank Martin. Previous combinations of
corn, oats, and grain, tried from ca. 1906 onwards, �proved indigestible for the public.
19 February 1906. The American, William Kellogg, formed the Battle Creek
Toasted Corn Flake Company of Michigan to market to the public the breakfast cereal he had invented as a health food for mental patients 8 years earlier
with his brother John Kellogg. John, a Seventh Day Adventist, had claimed the
new food would curb the sex drive but the latest adverts failed to mention
that.
30 July 1898, William Kellogg invented
cornflakes. With his brother, Dr John Kellogg, he had been developing foods
to offer patients at their sanatorium.
1901,
The Quaker Oats Company was founded
by HP Crowell and Robvert Stuart.
1900,
The term �hot dog�, for a hot
sausage enclosed in a bread roll, was first used.
1898,
The Hovis Bread Company was founded.
The name derives from the Latin for �strength of man�, homino vis.
1891, Britain�s frst white bread was produced at the
Clarence Flour Mill, erected this year in Hull. The mill became part of Rank
Hovis McDougall in 1962.
27 March 1889, John Bright, reformer who worked with Richard Cobden
for the repeal of the Corn Laws,
died.
9 July 1872. John Blondel patented the first doughnut cutter in
America. A sea captain, he is said to have invented the hole so he could slip
the doughnut over the handle of the ship�s wheel and enjoy his snack whilst
steering.
7 April 1860, Birth of William Kellogg, inventor of breakfast cereal,
originally used in the treatment of mental patients.
1762, John Montagu,
Earl of Sandwich, created the first �sandwich� by placing a slice of
meat between two slices of bread, to alow him to eat whilst continuing to
gamble,
1686, The croissant was invented about this time,
either in Vienna or Budapest; one story has the night bakers in Budapest
hearing the Ottoman Turks tunnelling into the city; they raised the alarm and
saved the city, Afterwards they baked the crescent-shaped rolls as a copy of
the symbol on the vanquished Ottoman flag.
1266, English bakers
were ordered to mark their loaves of bread, so a faulty loaf could be
attributed to its manufacturer. These were amongst the earliest trademarks.
123 BCE,
Rome
began to intervene in the grain market so as to distribute grain to peasant
households at below market rate or even for free.
170 BCE,
The first commercial cooks appeared in Rome, as retail bakers. However most
Roman households continued to grind their own corn and make their own bread.
350 BCE,
First references to wheat cultivation in Greece, for making bread. Wheat had originated in Egypt.
1680 BCE,
Production of leavened (raised) bread
began in Egypt.
12,000 BCE,
Possible date for the earliest bread;
discovered at an archeological site in Jordan. Bread from 7,000 BCE has also
been found in Turkey. This predates
agriculture and the grains must have been gathered from wild grasses and
ground into flour. That would have been a major undertaking, and it is possible
that this bread was only made for special ceremonial occasions. Possibly, the desire for bread gave rise to
agriculture, not vice versa.
Appendix 5� - Butter and Margarine
1964, Flora Margarine was launched by Unilever, and first advertised on TV in
1965. It was marketed as a healthy alternative to butter, especially for men,
being �high in polyunsaturates�.
1928, The first
commercially-viable, stable, peanut butter went on sale.
1902, The US Federal Government
raised the tax on magarine fivefold, from 2c to 10c per lb; this
resulted in consumption falling by 50% by 1904.
1889, Peanut butter
was developed by a St Louis, USA, physician, as a health food.
1886,
US Congress passed the Margarine Act;
this imposed a 2 cents per lb tax on margarine
and required
manufacturers and sellers of margarine to obtain a
licence. Individual US States had been restricting margarine sales since 1877,
by, for example, prohibiting the addition of yellow colouring. This stopped the
margarine being passed off as butter and it was intended that the greyish
undyed colour would be off-putting to consumers. The motivation for these laws
was the protection of the US dairy cow industry.
1872, The world�s
first magarine
factory was built, in Germany.
3 January 1871, In the USA, Henry W
Bradley claimed the US patent for oleomargarine, the butter substitute based on
clarified beef fat developed by chemist Hippolyte Mege Mouries in 1869 in France.
15 July 1869. Hippolyte Mege Mouries of Paris patented margarine in France.
22 September 1699, Citizens of Rotterdam went on strike over the high
price of butter.
406,
Butter
was introduced into the Roman Empire by invading Vandals, Aland and
Sciri; it replaced olive oil.
Appendix 7� - Chocolate
17 March 2010,
Kraft Foods said it was "truly sorry" over its closure of Cadbury's
Somerdale Factory. Senior Kraft executive Marc Firestone made the public
apology to MPs at a parliamentary select committee hearing
19 January 2010, Cadbury approved a
revised offer from Kraft, valuing the confectionery business at $19.5 billion
(�11.5 billion).
3 May� 2002. Research showed Britons
increasingly spending on comfort items
such as chocolate, desserts, and wine, to relieve stress. Spending on these
items was running at �2 million an hour.
26 April 1988. The Swiss food giant Nestle
bid �2.1 billion for the York confectioners, Rowntree.
On 23 June 1988 Rowntree accepted a �2.55 billion bid from Nestle. Nestle
already owned 12% of Rowntree, and Suchard owned 29.9% of Rowntree. Both Swiss
companies wanted Rowntree, maker of brands like
Kit Kat, Quality Street, and Smarties, as a bridgehead into the
European Community.
1959, The Caramac Bar was introduced by Nestle. It is not a chocolate bar but
was often sold alongside them. It was withdrawn from sale in 2023.
24 April 1949. Sweets and chocolates came off rations
in Britain, but rations were soon re-imposed, see 2 May� 1952. All food rationing ended on 3 July 1954.
1940, M&Ms began as a candy-coated chocolate made for the military,by
Forrest E
Mars and Bruce E Murrie.
1938, Cadbury�s Roses went on sale in the UK � but was soon withdrawn
again as World War Two broke out.
1937, Rolo, Aero and Smarties went on sale in the UK.
1936, Quality Street and Maltesers
went on sale in the UK.
1935, The first Kit Kat bar was produced in the UK; it
was initially called Rowntree�s Chocolate Crisp. Milky Way bars went on sale in the UK.
1 August 1932. The first Mars Bar, made in Slough, went on sale, at 2d. Made by Mr Forrest E
Mars, son of
a US confectioner, the bar was innovative, because until then all
chocolate bars had been just solid blocks of chocolate.
1930, In the USA, Snickers Bars (Mars Bars in the UK) were introduced. Cadbury�s Whole Nut bars appeared in Britain.
24 February 1925, Joseph Rowntree, chocolate manufacturer in
York, died in that city.
1923, The Milky Way chocolate bar was
introduced in the USA by confectioner Frank C Mars, aged 39. Sales went from
US$78,200 in the first year of sales to US$ 792,000 in the second year. It was
sold in the UK from 1935.
1922, US confectioner Frank C Mars
introduced the Mars-O-Bar, a
precursor to his son�s more successful Mars
Bar.
24 October 1922, George Cadbury, English chocolate manufacturer
and social reformer, died in Birmingham aged 83.
1908, The first Toblerone Bar was produced.
1905, The first bar
of Cadbury�s Dairy Milk chocolate
was produced.
1905, Milton Hershey,
a Mennonite from Penssylvania, established a chocolate-manufacturing town,
called Hershey. Chocolate was
manufactured on the mass-production model of Henry Ford.
1900, The first Hershey chocolate bar was produced. In
1893 caramel maker Milton Snaveley Hershey, then aged 36, visited
the Chicago Fair and saw chocolate-making machinery made in Dresden. He bought
this machinery and began trialling chocolate manufacture in a partof his
caramel factory.
1876, British
confectionery company Fry�s launched chocolate Easter Eggs.
13 September 1857, Birth of William Snaveley Hershey, US chocolate
manufacturer who built the world�s largest chocolate factory. He also
established the Hershey Foundation, to promote education.
19 September 1839. George Cadbury
was born in Birmingham. He expanded his father�s chocolate business and
established a model village for his workers at Bourneville,
Birmingham. The Cadbury chocolate manufacturing family owed a debt to the
collector Sir
Hans Sloane, who died on 11 January 1753.
24 May� 1836, Joseph Rowntree, British cocoa manufacturer and
philanthropist, was born in York
1826, Philippe Suchard set up a chocolate
factory near Neuchatel, Switzerland.
1787, Joseph Fry,
a Quaker, started a chocolate manufacturing business in Bristol.
11 January 1753. Death at age 93 of the collector Sir Hans Sloane.
Born in County Down, Ireland in 1660, Sloane studied in London and France before
finally settling in London as a physician. He was famous for his collection of
plants, antiquities, cons, and some 50,000 books and 3,650 manuscripts that
were to form the nucleus of the British Museum collection after his death. In
Jamaica in 1685-6 he had collected a herbarium of 800 species. The Birmingham
chocolate manufacturers, the Cadbury family, owe Sloane a debt for� while in Jamaica he came across a cocoa drink
favoured by the locals which Sloane found nauseous. However if mixed with
milk it became more palatable. He brought this back to England where it was
used by the Cadbury
family.
1659, The Spanish Infanta Maria
Theresa introduced cocoa to Paris.
16 June 1657, The first
mention of chocolate in the British media,
in the Public Advertiser. The
foodstuff was then used either as a drink or as a paste for brewing a tasty but
rather greasy beverage, as the ground beans were rich in cocoa butter. At that
time it was being sold by a Frenchman in Bishopsgate, London. The first factory
to produce chocolate bars opened at
Vevey, Switzerland, in 1819; the
bars were used as emergency rations. In 1842 John Cadbury introduced �French
Eating Chocolate�, the first chocolate bar for pleasurable eating. Cadbury also
introduced the first chocolate boxes to Britain, in 1866. Their first
assortment included almond, lemon, orange and raspberry flavoured centres. Also
in 1866 Cadbury introduced the first modern cocoa powder, with all the greasy
butter removed, for an improved chocolate drink.
1520, Chocolate first brought to
Europe, to Spain, from Mexico.
Appendix 8 �
Desserts and Ice Cream (see also Chocolate)
1960, Hagen Daz ice cream went
on sale in New York, USA.
1948, The US Baskin-Robbins ice cream chain began to
grow as California entrepreneur Burton Baskin merged his business with
Snowbird Ice Cream (founded by Irvine Robbins, aged 30 in 1948). Baskin-Robbins grew to offer a huge range
of over 100 flavours.
1939, Ripple ice cream (vanilla with swirls of fruit syrup) first
appeared in the UK (registered as a brand name in the USA 1942).
1938, Fruit Gums were introduced by Rowntrees, under the slogan �Don�t forget the Fruit Gums, Mum!�
23 February 1931, Dame Nellie Melba, the Australian opera singer after whom peach melba
is named, died.
29 January 1924. The ice cream cone making machine was patented by Carl Taylor.
1923, Frank Epperson, USA, patented
the first iced lollipop, which he called the Epsicle. He later changed the name
to Popsicle. He is said to have got the idea when he left a glass of lemonade
with a spoon in it on a windowsill overnight and it froze. When he tried to
remove the spoon, he found himself with the world�s first ice lolly.
1922, Thomas Wall, sausage and pie
manufacturer, produced the first factory-made ice cream in Britain.
1921, Christian K Nelson, USA, sold
the first choc ice, which he marketed as �Eskimo Pie�.
23 July 1904. The first ice cream cone was commercially sold, by
Charles Menches in Missouri.
15 December 1903, Italian-American
food cart vendor Italo Marchiony received a US� patent for inventing a machine to make ice
cream cones.
1896,The first ice cream cone was made by
Italian-American Italo Marconi.
1894, Peach Melba was created by Auguste
Escoffier, chef at London�s Savoy
Hotel (opened 1889), named in honour of Australian singer Madame Nellie
Melba (real name Helen Porter Mitchell, aged 33), who was then
performing at Covent Garden.� Escoffier
was inspired by the swan in Wagner�s Lohengrin opera (composed 1850) and
put a scoop of vanilla ice cream on a peach with an almond and raspberry puree.
15 June 1851, The first factory-produced ice cream was made in
the USA by John Fussell.
He wanted to avoid wastage of cream so he froze it; his new food became very
popular, and his factory ice cream cost less than a third of the same amount of
hand made ice cream.
1726, Rum baba was invented; a sponge cake soaked in rum from the French
West Indies.
50,
The Roman Emperor Nero
reportedly sent slaves out to collect snow, which was then flavoured with
honey, nuts and fruit; an early version of sorbet.
Appendix 9
- Fish
5 February 2004, 20 Chinese cockle pickers drowned in Morecambe
Bay, Lancashire.
1955, Frozen fish fingers first
appeared in British shops. See 8 October 1973.
1924, In the USA, Clarence Birdseye founded the
General Seafoods Company, to prepare and sell frozen fish.
10 May� 1883, In London, the Lord Mayor opened the Central Fish Market, Farringdon Street.
1877, Fleetwood Docks (Lancashire) opened
in 1877, with capital provided by the railways. The fish trade was significant
from here, and the railways were credited with reducing the price
of fish in Manchester by almost 90%.
1870, Fish and chip shops became popular in Britain as refrigerated trawlers
were developed that fished the North Sea and more distant areas north towards Iceland.
The fish was covered in batter to disguise any discolouration, and sprinkled
with vinegar to cover any spoilage in flavour.
110 BCE,
Near Naples, oyster
cultivation began; the first efforts by
humans to farm marine life.
25,000 BCE, The estimated date of the
earliest baited fish hooks. Discovered in the Dordogne, France,these hooks were made of
thorn or bone, and designed so when a fish took the bait the fisherman could
pull the line taut, catching the hook in the fish�s jaw.
Appendix 10� - �Frozen Foods (savoury)
8 October 1973. The first TV
commercial in Britain for frozen fish fingers
was broadcast.
7 October 1956. Death of US frozen foods pioneer, Clarence
Birdseye.
10 May� 1937, Britain�s
first frozen food, asparagus, went on sale. It was produced by
Smedleys of Wisbech, Cambridgeshire.
6 March 1930. The first frozen food, peas, went on sale, at
grocery stores in Springfield, Massachusetts. It was produced by Clarence
Birdseye. Birdseye got the idea when surveying wildlife in Labrador
in 1912, and noticing how local people preserved fish by packing them in snow.
It took till 1930 to develop a commercially viable method of bulk freezing and
to get financial backing. Sales were slow at first, because the products were
not readily visible, being kept in with the ice cream, and because their price
was relatively high. However the availability of vegetables out of season and
of seafood made frozen foods popular. Birdseye sold his company within months
for US4 22million. By 1933 there were 516 frozen food outlets across the USA..
In Britain frozen foods were pioneered by S W Smedley of Wisbech, who began freezing
fruit and vegetables in 1936.
18 June 1927, Clarence Birdseye (1886-1956) took out a
patent for �flash-freezing� of fish. Whilst cold storage of food was known
beforehand, if it was only frozen slowly some spoilage of taste and appearance
still occurred. Birdseye
noticed that fish caught in winter and left exposed to freezing winds retained
their taste as the froze quickly, His machine flash froze food under high
pressure.
1925, Clarence
Birsdeye extended his frozen food process from fish to pre-cooked
foods.
1896, New Zealand
lamb could be reared, killed, transported to the UK in frozen cargo ships, and
sold to UK retailers for 2 � d per lb.
9 December 1886, Clarence Birdseye, US inventor of a process
for deep-freezing foodstuffs, was
born in New York City.
15 February 1882. The
first shipment of frozen meat
left New Zealand for Britain aboard SS
Dunedin.
2 February 1880, The first shipment of frozen meat from Sydney, Australia,
arrived in Britain aboard the SS
Strathaven.
Appendix 11
� Fruit and Vegetables, Vegetarianism,
1987, Quorn was introduced; a trade name for Textured Vegetable Protein, TVP (a term iutaelf intordiuced in the
USA in 1968) and made from edible fungi. It was named after its manufacturer,
which was located near the village of Quorndon, Leicestershire, UK. TVP has
been promoted as avoiding cruelty to farm animals, also as extending the
world�s food supply in a sustainable manner.
1972, The name Vegeburger appeared for a patty
resembling a meat burger but made of vegetable protein. It was registered in
the USA in 1976.
4 July 1924, Caesar�s
Salad made its debut, at the Caesar�s Place Restaurant, Tihuana, Mexico,
owned by US citizen Caesar Cardini.
1908, The nut cutlet first appeared, as a cutlet-shaped patty based on
chopped nuts. It has become a well-worn means of poking fun at vegetarians.
1 January 1905. In Italy, Belgian Henri Oedenkoven founded the
world�s first vegetarian organisation.
1903, Tinned pineapples, cut into small cubes, became available as a
convenience dessert.
1899,
The United Fruit Company was
founded.
1891, The Del Monte canned fruit
brand was created. The name was inspired by the upmarket Del Monte Hotel
(opened 1880) at Monterrey, California, and was adopted by executives at the
Oakland Prewserving Company, Oakland, California.
1847, The Vegan Society held its first annual
general meeting in Manchester, UK.
1847, A Vegetarian Society was established in London.
1812,
The first English vegetarian cookery book was published.
3 July 1806. Michael Keen, of Isleworth, exhibited the first edible
cultivated strawberry.
1805, Tangerines began to be exported from
Tangier, Morocco, to European countries.
1721, Broccoli, then known as �Italian
asparagus�, was introduced to England, some 70 years after it became popular in
France.
1683, A Christian
reformer, Thomas
Tryon, first advocated vegetarianism, on the grounds of the cruelty
of slaughtering farm animals.
1596, Tomatoes introduced to England.
1514, Fresh green peas
became popular in England.
1514, Pineapples first arrived in
Europe.
1492, Christopher Columbus discovered
foods unknown in Europe, including capsicums (peppers),
maize, pineapples,
plantains, sweet
potatoes and turtle meat.
1301, Chinese recipes included wheat
gluten as an ingredient in mock-meat dishes that in fact were meat-free.
1200, New foods brought back to
Europe from the East by the Crusaders included damson trees, rice, sugar and
lemons, as well as cotton.
827, Spinach was introduced
into Sicily by the Saracens, who originally found the plant growing in Persia.
They also introduced the lemon to Sicily and Spain.
70 BCE,
Cherries
from the newly conquered lands of Armenia wer introduced to Rome by Lucullus. By 65 BCE
Rome was consuming raspberries from Mount Ida (near Troy), quinces from Sidon
and plums from Damascus.
140 BCE,
Rome began to establish links with China, as China sent its emissary Chang Ch�ien
into Sogdiana and Bactria. Peach
and apricot
trees from China had now reached Roma, also Chinese silk; meanwhile China began
importing grapes,
walnuts
and dates
from the west.
300 BCE,
Peach trees,
originally from China, had reached Greece via Persia.
Appendix 13� - �Milk,
cheese, dairy
1994,
Oatly, the world�s largest producer of oat milk, was founded (see also Vegetarianism).
20 February 1968, In Britain, the provision of free school milk at secondary schools ceased.
1952, The Tetrapak first appeared as a commercial container for milk. It was
easy to store, transport and open, and kept the liquid inside hygienically
sealed. By the 1990s other loquid foodstuffs from soup to wine were sold in
Tetrapaks.
28 March 1946, The British Government announced plans for free school dinners and free milk
at school.
1942, Dannon Yoghurt was introduced in New York by Joe Metzger.
26 July 1926, The French Government made Roquefort Cheese a geographically-protected brand, passing a law
that this cheese can only be made in the limestone caves of Roquefort, near
Toulouse. This was the first law of its kind.
1924, The average American
consumed, over the year, 17.8 lbs of butter, 6.8 lbs of ice cream, 4.5 lbs of
cheese and 350 lbs of milk.
10 December 1923, The Kraft Company started as National Dairy
Products Corporation (National Dairy), formed on December 10, 1923, by Thomas H.
McInnerney.
1910, Londoners now
consumed some 180 pints of milk a year, compared to 48 pints in 1850. In 1850
Londoners generally obtained their milk from some 20,000 cows tethered in the
back yard or even kept in a cellar. Milk brought in by rail was initially
regarded with suspicion because it would be shaken up, copmpared to the fresh
undisturbed milk obtainable locally. However after� an outbreak of cattle disease in London, and
by 1870 half of London�s milk was being brought in by rail, from as far as pastures in
Derbyshire 130 miles away. By 1910 96% of London�s milk came in by rail, from
as far as 300 miles away.
1906, A nut-based butter
supplement (see Appendix 11, Vegetarian) came on the UK market, called Nutter. However� by the 1960s �nutter� had come to mean a
mentally-deranged person, and the brand was pulled in the 1970s. A similar fate
overtook Ayds, a slimming tablet,
popular in the 1970s but pulled in the 1980s when AIDS arrived � a disease that
actually caused acute weight loss.
25 October 1884, John Mayenberg of St Louis, Missouri, patented
evaporated
milk.
22 January 1878. Milk was delivered in glass bottles for the
first time.
1877, In Denmark, Gustav de Laval
invented a mechanical cream separator, greatly reducing production costs.
18 August 1856. Condensed milk was patented.
1844,
Milk reached Manchester (UK) by rail for the first time. Growing urban
populations, distant from the countryside, could now receive fresh milk and
other produce that was both fresh and cheap. Fresh vegetables, meat and fish
supplies were niw improved in cities.
1817, Port au
salut cheese was first manufactured in France, by Trappist monks in northern
Tourraine.
1791, Camembert
cheese was (re)invented by Marie Fontaine Harel, a farmer�s wife, in
Vimoutiers, Orme Department. Mr. Ridel pioneered the characteristic
light wooden round boxes in which the cheese could be safely shipped to distant
markets.
1722, Gruyere
cheese was introduced in France.
1654,
Bechamel
cream sauce was named after French financier Louis de Bechamel, Marquis de Nointel, who
served King Louis XIV
of France in the honorary post of Lord Stewart of the Royal
Household.
16 September 1542, The French King, Francois I, was prescribed a new food by his Ottoman
Turkish
doctor. This food was yoghurt.
4 June 1070. Roquefort cheese was created in a cave near Roquefort, France.
7,700 BCE,
Sheep milk
first consumed as food, in the Middle East. By 7,200 BCE sheep were domesticated
in Greece.
8,500 BCE,
Goat milk
first consumed as a food, in the Middle East.
13a - Pasta
and Rice
1 April 1957, The BBC ran an
April fools spoof documentary about spaghetti being harvested from trees in
Switzerland.
1941, Buitoni Foods Corporation was set up in New York by Giovanni
Buitoni� (see 1827).
1827, Buitoni macaroni was first produced in San Sepulcro, Italy, by Giulia Buitoni
and her husband Giovambattista.
In 1856 their son Giovanni Buitoni opened a pasta factory at
Citta del Castello, Umbria.
1250, Ravioli, in the form of cheese
sauce contained in parcels of pasta, was now being consumed in Rome (see 1941)
500 BCE
Wet rice
cultivation began in Japan,
800 BCE,
Rice
was now a major part of the Chinese diet (see 2300 BCE).
Appendix
13b� - �Pizzas and pizza outlets (see also Restaurants)
1960, The Domino pizza chain originated when Thomas and James Monaghan bought Dominick�s
pizza shop in Ypsilanti, Michigan, USA. They renamed it Domino�s in 1965.
1958, The first Pizza Hut restaurant opened in Wichita, Kansas, USA.
1955, The USA now had 15,000
pizza outlets, one for every 11,000 people, along with at least 100,000 food
stores selling refridgerated or frozen pizzas.
1943, Pizzerias were becoming common in the USA. They are often branded
as Italian, but they are really a global food, eaten almost everywhere, simply
a bread base with various toppings.
1895,
The first pizzeria opened in New
York, at 53 � Spring Street.
1889, Italian baker Raphael
Esposito made the first pizza margherita in the Italian colours red white and green. He
used red tomatoes, white mozzarella cheese and green basil. This was in honour
of a visit to Naples by King Umberto and Queen Margherita.
Appendix 14� - �Potatoes and Crisps,
1954, The first flavoured crisps
(barbecue) were produced.
1953, Crisps were first put in
sealed bags, by Californian entrepreneur Laura Scudder.
17 September 1941. The UK government ordered potatoes to be sold at 1p so more people would eat them.
21 March 1934, The slimming craze was blamed for a fall in UK potato sales.
1920, Smiths Crisps Company was
founded in London, UK.
1913, The potato crisp was
launched in Britain, by Carter�s Crisps. They became popular in Britain in the
1930s.
1910, The world�s furst
commercially-produced crisps were manufactured by the Mikesells Potato Chip
Company in the USA.
24 August 1853, Crisps
were allegedly invented by George Crum, a chef in the Moon Lake Lodge Hotel
in Saratoga
Springs, New York State, when his customers
complained that his potato chips were cut too thickly. So he cut the potatoes
wafer-thin. People loved the new �Saratoga chips�. Crisps reached the UK in
1913. However something very much like
the modern crisp appears to have existed as far back as 1817.
26 February 1827, Death of William Kitchiner, who allegedly
invented the potato crisp
1817, The first known recipe for
potato crisps was published in The Cook�s
Oracle.
17 September 1879, The International Potato Exhibition
opened at Crystal Palace; thousands flocked to see it.
1785, Potatoes first planted in France.
1688, Potatoes had become a
staple food of Irish
farm labourers (see Ireland
for famine)
1621, Potatoes first planted in Germany.
28 July 1586. Potatoes arrived in Britain,
brought from Colombia by Sir
Thomas Harriott. They were to be used to feed livestock.
1565, Potaotes forst arrived in Spain.
1563,
The first potato was brought to Britain
from South
America by sea-captain John
Hawkins.
1540,
The first potato from South America
was brought to Pope Paul III.
It was then taken to France
to be used as an ornamental plant.
3,500 BCE,
Potatoes first cultivated in South
America.
Appendix 15
� Soft Drinks
2017, The UK Government
introduced a sugar tax on soft drinks. By 2019 this had led to a 28.8% fall in
the sugar content of these drinks. However overall UK sugar consumotion rose by
2.6% as new processed products appeared and people bought more of them.
14 February 1990, Perrier had to recall 160 million bottles of
mineral water after traces of benzene were found.
1987, The Red Bull energy drink was
created by the Austrian company Red Bull GmbH. 5,387 million
cans of Red Bull were sold worldwide in 2013, giving it the highest market
share of any energy drink.
23 April 1985, New Coke
was introduced by the Coca Cola company, and production of the
original Coke was halted.� A few months
later in July 1985 the company had to admit the new product was a flop and
reverted to the original soft drink.
1965, Diet Pepsi was introduced by tye Pepsi-Cola Company.
1962, Ring pull cans first appeared in the shops. This meant cans could
be opened without a tin opener, meaning soft drinks and beer could be more
easily consumed away from the home.
1961, Coca-Cola introduced Sprite,
a new lemon-lime drink to compete with Seven-Up.
28 February 1950. France passed a Bill limiting the sale of Coca Cola.
1936, The
orange-flavoured soft drink Orangina
orginiated when a Spanish pharmacist, Dr Trigo, introduced an orange
flavour drink called Naranjina at the Marseilles Fair. Leon Beton, a Frenchman
living in Algeria,
was so impressed that he bought the rights to the drink and renamed it Orangina.
19 February 1934, Death of Caleb Bradham,
inventor of Pepsi
Cola.
1929,
The lemon-lime drink Seven-Up was
first sold as Lithiated Lemon by St Louis bottler Charles Grigg. It�s name was
changed to Seven Up in 1933.
1 July 1916. Coca Cola introduced its distinctively-shaped
bottle.
1908, Production of Horlicks began at Slough, UK.
1907, The Perrier Water brand was first registered.
1904, Thermos flasks
became commercially available for keeping drinks warm. The Scottish scientist James Dewar
had produced the frst vacuum flask in 1892, for scientific experiments.
Reinhold Burger, a German student of Dewar, had the idea of
marketing these flasks for domestic use.
1903, Pepsi Cola
was registered as a brand name in the USA.
31 August 1900. Coca
Cola went on sale in Britain, 14 years after it went on
sale in the USA.
12 March 1894, Coca Cola
was sold in bottles for the first time. The Coca Cola trade mark dates from
1887.
10 August 1889. The screw bottle top was patented by
Dan Ryelands
of Barnsley.
1 May� 1889. Asa Briggs Candler of Atlanta
bought the exclusive rights to a drink called Coca Cola.
1886, The first drinking straws
were manufactured by Marvin Chester Stone in the USA.
29 March 1886. Coca-cola, invented by Dr John S
Pemberton of Atlanta, Georgia, was launched as an �esteemed brain
tonic and intellectual beverage�. Claimed to cure almost anything from hysteria
to the common cold, the beverage faced competition from drinks such as Imperial Inca Cola.
1863, Ovaltine
was first developed in Berne, Switzerland, as a sweet drink to combat infant
malnutrition. In the 1930s the brand was boosted by the �Ovaltineys�, a children�s club promoted by radio advetrtising.
6 October 1769, Jacob Schweppe,
a German
born Swiss
chemist, perfected the process for making artificial mineral water.
1741, English doctor William Brownrigg created the first
artificially-carbonated mineral water at Whitehaven, Cumbria.
Appendix 16
Spices, Salt Sauces and Herbs
1937, Pesto sauce (made of crushed
basil, garlic and oilive oil) appeared�
in Britain. It was the forerunner of a major penetration into English
cuisine of many Italian foodstuffs from the 1950s onward.
12 March 1930, Ghandi
began a 300-mile march to the sea to protest at the British salt tax in India.
24 March 1923. The salt tax in India was restored.
14 May� 1919. Death of the American food manufacturer Henry John Heinz. Heinz founded his company in
Pittsburgh in 1869 as a partnership to market and prepare horseradish. This company collapsed in
the business panic of 1875 but Heinz reorganised it in 1876 and it re-emerged
as a major food company by 1900. By 1905 the Heinz company was the USA�s
largest manufacturer of pickles, vinegar, and ketchup, and employed thousands.
The company was headed by members of the Heinz family until 1969.
1908, Monosodium glutamate was first used to enhance savoury tastes in
Japan.
1900, The Dutch nutmeg monopoly
was broken, by pigeons. In the late 1800s, nutmeg trees grew only on the
Dutch-colonised islands of Ambon and Banda, because Dutch traders had destroyed
hutmeg trees elsewhere. This enabled the Dutch to charge high prices for
nutmeg. However by 1900 island-hopping pigeons had eaten the nutmeg tree seeds
and dropped them on other islands not under Dutch control.
1894, Garton�s HP
sauce was launched in Britain by the Midland Vinegar Company. It was later
renamed as HP Sauce.
1837,
Britsh chemists John
Lee and William
Perrins created Worcester Sauce.
1756, The Duc de Richelieu invented mayonnaise.
1621, It was reckoned in England
that 3,000 tons of spices could be purchased in India for �91,041
but this shipload could be sold in Aleppo for �789,168. By the time the spices
had been sold on via Venetian merchants the price had risen still further. Shipping
had now improved to the point where a vessel could tackle the open seas to
reach the Spice Islands, and a three-masted design meant oars were unnecessary.
1599, England faced a rise in
pepper prices from three shillings a pound to eight shillings (see 1594, also
restricted trade since Constantinople fell to the Turks in 1453). This inspired
80 London
merchants
to estanlish the East India Company, which ultimately led to
the creation of the British Empire.
1594, Lisbon closed its spice
market to Dutch
and English
traders; at this time Portugal was in personal union with Spain,
both being ruled by Philip II, and England was helping the Dutch to gain
independecnce from Spain. This forced traders from those countries to get their
spices directly from India, and the
creation of the Dutch East India Company followed.
20 May� 1498. Vasco da Gama arrived at Calicut, southern India,
after discovering a route via the tip of southern Africa. , proving the feasibility of a sea
route from Portugal to India and the Spice Islands. This meant Europe could buy
spices
independent from Venetian and Muslim middlemen.
1400, In England, the use of spices and
sauces became widespread, in an effort to counter the monotony of a diet of
dried and salted foods.
1250, The Crusaders had now brought back
to Europe a range of spices including cinnamon, cloves, coriander, cumin,
cubebs, ginger, mace and nutmeg. Only the wealthy could afford these, and they
were often used medicinally rather than to season food.
1100, The first Crusaders
brought back spices from southern
Asia, and the knowledge of how to use them in cooking.
400,
A recipe for mustard
appeared in De re coquinaria, an
anonymously compiled Roman cookbook.
24 BCE,
Concerned about the high price of spices in Rome, Emperor Augustaus made preparations for
invading and incorporating into the Roman Empire the lands of southern Arabia where
these spices originated. However due to poor roads and fatigue the proposed
invasion failed.
430 BCE,
Black pepper,
originally from India, was common in Greece. However it was used medicinally
rather than to season food.
Appendix 17
- Spreads and Condiments.
1923, The brand name Vegemite
was registered in Australia.
1912, Helmann�s Blue Label Mayonnaise was first produced by Richard Helmann,
a German-American aged 35, who had� run
Hellmann�s Delicatessen at 490 Columbus Avenue New York since 1905.
1910, Bisto, a gravy base, went on
sale as a powder,
1908, Monosodium Glutamate was isolated from seaweed by Kikunae Ikeda,
chemist at Tokyo University. It gives a strong savoury, meaty, flavour to
vegetable dishes.
1907, Gentleman�s Relish, a type of
savoury sporead, went on sale.
1902, Marmite
was first produced at Burton on Trent, made from brewer�s yeast. A
�marmite� was originally a cooking pot to make meat stews in, an illustration
of which appears on the marmite jar, sublimina;lly suggesting meat extract.
1896,
The slogan �57 Varieties� was adopted by Heinz,
although their total product range exceeded that number.
1889, Bovril,
concentrated beef essence, was first produced in Britain.
1873, The Chivers family began a jam factory near
Cambridge.
28 August 1837,
Pharmacists John Lea and William Perrins began to manufacture Worcestershire Sauce.
It was possibly an attempt to recreate an Indian sauce enjoyed by a retired
Governor of Bengal.
1797, James Kieller
began to manufacture the first orange marmalade, in Dundee, Scotland.
1722,
Dry Durham Mustard first appeared. It was produced in Durham, England. Until
now, mustard seeds were brought to the table and diners crushed them with their
knife handles on the side of the plate, but Mrs Clements pioneered the idea of
grinding the mustard seeds like wheat.
Appendix 19
- �Tinned / Canned food (see also Fruit
and Vegetables)
1910, Vichysoisse soup was invented by chef Louis Diat, at New York�s
Ritz-Carlton Hotel. It was a cold version of the French hot soupe bonne femme.
6 January 1901, Philip Amour, one of the first American meat
packers to use refrigerated transport
and to make canned
meat products, died.
1898, Campbells Soups adopted their characteristic red and white label.
1871, Imports of Australian
canned meat into the UK had risen from 16,000 lbs to 22 million lbs. This was
partly down to an epidemic of cattle disease in the UK, 1863-67; it was more
down to the perfection of canning techniques. Early canning techniques involved
heating the can to �drive off the air�, with a small hole for air expulsion
that was then sealed with solder. However it was not the air expulsion that
killed the bacteria but the heating; early large cans were heated
insufficiently for this, and their contents putrefied. Once the heating was
perfected, it was much easier to transport canned meat by ship than livestock,
which could become injured in a storm, diseased, and required food and water.
1870, In the US, 30 million cans
of food were being produced a year, up from 5 million in 1860.
1869, Campbells Soup was first produced in Camden, New Jersey by Joseph Campbell.
1862, British food manufacturer Cross and Blackwell launched tinned
soups.
