Ah, food. Who doesn’t love it? Books, websites, even careers are dedicated to the creation and understanding of food. Let’s celebrate this fact of life by embracing the one thing we all have in common: eating! In honor of this perpetual celebration, I propose a sharing of interesting food facts. So to all you picky eaters out there, get ready for some strange sounding dishes…
Crazy Carrots:
If your grandma ever sat you down and said, “When I was your age, carrots were purple,” you’d probably attribute it to early onset of dementia. But what if I, in my 20-year-old sanity (I think), told you that before the sixteenth century, carrots were indeed purple? Its true! Leave it to the Dutch to blend mutant strands of the purple-y carrots to eventually create orange ones. So, does that mean I can make my broccoli pink? I’ll send a message to the Dutch to get on that.
Mixing Meals: Ever have breakfast for dinner? Well, guess what—the word for dinner used to mean breakfast! The English word “dinner” comes from the French word “disnar,” which refers to breakfast. At this time, dinner (breakfast) was the first meal of the day, eaten around noon. Eventually, more meals started being added to the day (no, not quite like your fourth meal at Marvin’s) so people were sitting down to eat before their noon “dinner.” But the word “dinner” still referred to the largest meal eaten during the day, and as time passed this was pushed to the final meal in our day. Thus, “breakfast” replaced “dinner” as the first meal! It looks like our ancestors were smarter to eat their largest meal in the morning, followed by lighter ones. Who knows, maybe they even ate purple carrots for dessert.
Quality Camel: Speaking of large meals, ever heard the phrase, “I’m so hungry I could eat a horse”? Well, I can’t tell you where that came from, but I could give you an explanation for being “so hungry you could eat a roast camel!” Yes, friends—the largest food item ever to appear on a menu is the great, roast camel. First, the camel is stuffed with a sheep’s carcass, which is stuffed with chickens, which are each stuffed with fish, which are stuffed with eggs. This delicacy often appears in Bedouin weddings, so find yourself an invite and get some of that camel goodness. YUM.
Aside from camels, we rarely give credit to the other exotic animals that have appeared on plates (or other serving devices, like my assignment notebook…). Would you eat a hippo? Well, the first soup ever made was out of good ol’ hippopotamus. The date was 6000 B.C. and demand was high. Oh, how times have changed.
Forgetful genius: Now, at this point I’d like to highlight the Popsicle, which was kept a secret for 18 years after being invented by an eleven year old. Yes, Frank Epperson had the nerve to keep this frozen wonderfulness from the world following an incident where he accidentally left a mixture of powdered soda and water on his porch in a cup with a stir stick. The following morning, after temperatures had reached record low levels, he found the creation stuck to the stick, and nicknamed it the “Epsicle.” It took him another eighteen years to patent it as the Popsicle. I guess better late than never, Frank.
A Nut Case: Last, but not least, my bountiful knowledge of weird food has lead to discovering that dynamite is made with peanuts. So, if you’re feeling crafty, peanut oil can be processed into glycerol, which can in turn make nitroglycerin. True, dynamite can be produced in other ways, but I guess this proves that peanut allergies are pretty legit.
I only hope my multitude of strange, useless facts have provided some sort of entertainment. You never know, maybe the hub will start selling roasted camels with a side of purple carrots.