Food Facts....10 Food Trivia

Food Facts....10

wynnebaer 15 years ago

TODAY’S EVENTS IN FOOD HISTORY....2/27
* National Kahlua Day...(one of my personal favorite days)

1827 The first Mardi Gras celebration was held in New Orleans.

1879 Saccharin, an artificial sweetener, was discovered by Constantine Fahlberg and Ira Remsen at Johns Hopkins University in Baltimore, Maryland. The FDA has required warning labels since 1972, on products using saccharin because it is a suspected carcinogen.

1902 John Steinbeck was born. American novelist, some of his titles were: 'The Grapes of Wrath,' 'Tortilla Flats' and 'Cannery Row.'

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notyourmomma 15 years ago said:

'Cannery Row' was an all-time favorite read and the movie was quite enjoyable. I think I'll go to the library and borrow 'Tortilla Flats'.

I can remember my mom sweetening her coffee with little saccharin tablets and changing over to the liquid variety in the mid 60's. She used it every day.

Hmmm, Kahlua crunch pie.....that recipe is around somewhere.

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wynnebaer 15 years ago said:

TODAY’S EVENTS IN FOOD HISTORY....2/28
* National Chocolate Souffle Day

2006 Chicago's oldest restaurant, the 107 year old Berghoff Restaurant closed today.

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notyourmomma 15 years ago said:

I'm a day behind on the chocolate souffle! shoot.

Wow, how sad when a restaurant institution is closed.

Today is also the day that "Martha" recommends that you start brining your brisket for your own corned beef. I think I'll pass on that recipe this year. According to MS, you need two weeks of brining before you can cook your freshly corned brisket for your St. Patrick's day dinner. With the bankruptcy of Bennigan's where are all the "Kiss me I'm Irish" partiers going to go this year?

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wynnebaer 15 years ago said:

Tried my hand at corned beef last year and it wasn't such a huge hit....Maybe because I didn't know I was supposed to brine it....Thanks Tina

TODAY’S EVENTS IN FOOD HISTORY....3/2
* National Banana Cream Pie Day

1799 The first U.S. weights and measures law was passed by Congress. Actually it did not set standards, but rather required the surveyor of each port to test and correct the instruments and weights used to calculate duties on imports. Basically each surveyor was on his own in setting the standards to be tested.

1887 Harry E. Soref was born. Inventor of the laminated steel padlock, founder of the Master Lock Company in 1921. The company became well known in 1928 when it shipped 147,600 padlocks to federal prohibition agents in New York for locking up speakeasies they raided.

1989 A phone call to the U.S. Embassy in Santiago, Chile begins a chain of events that results in an 11 day embargo of Chilian fruit. The anonymous phone call, and another one on March 9, warns that Red Flame grapes on the way to the U.S. have been injected with cyanide. Over 2 million crates of Chilean fruit is impounded and 20.000 Chilean food workers lose their jobs. Consumers in the U.S. and several other countries stop eating grapes of any kind for a month. No real evidence of contamination was found.

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wynnebaer 15 years ago said:

TODAY’S EVENTS IN FOOD HISTORY...3/3
* National Mulled Wine Day

1709 Andreas Sigismund Marggraf was born. A German chemist, in 1747 he extracted sugar from the sugar beet and determined it was identical to cane sugar. It wasn't until 1802 that the first beet sugar refinery would be built.

1879 Elmer McCollum was born. He was a chemist who discovered vitamins A, B and D.

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wynnebaer 15 years ago said:

TODAY’S EVENTS IN FOOD HISTORY....3/4
* National Pound Cake Day

1634 Samuel Cole supposedly opened the first tavern in the U.S., in Boston. What took so long?

1792 Oranges were supposedly introduced to Hawaii.

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notyourmomma 15 years ago said:

National Pound Cake Day! Hurrah, another great day.

Hurray for for entrepreneurship and Samuel Cole. I guess everyone drank their beer at home??

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lovebreezy 15 years ago said:

Sorry I'm late on this but FYI I have a How to Corn Your Own Beef / Venison recipe posted here. I don't know if I added it to this group or not -- I'll check. I think with all the sales that go on for corned beef during this month it's cheaper just to buy one from the grocer.
I only use the recipe for Game Meat and other times of the year when it's not on sale.

Also, just want to say that even though I don't usually comment -- I do read these Food Fact posts -- Thank you all for the info and the fun.

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notyourmomma 15 years ago said:

Thanks lovebreezy.....I'll have to look up your "corn" -ing recipe for beef. Although I think I'm a week behind the schedule Martha outlined. Again, a day late and a dollar short.

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wynnebaer 15 years ago said:

Thanks so much, Lovebreezy...:)

TODAY’S EVENTS IN FOOD HISTORY....3/7
* National Crown Roast of Pork Day
* Feast of St. Perpetua, patron of cattle.

1804 John Wedgwood, the son of Josiah Wedgwood of pottery fame, founded the Royal Horticultural Society.

1849 Luther Burbank was born. American horticulturist, he developed many new varieties of fruits and vegetables, including the Burbank Potato (1873), the Shasta Daisy, over 100 varieties of plums and prunes and 10 varieties of berries.

1897 Dr. John Kellogg served corn flakes for the first time to his patients at his hospital in Battle Creek, Michigan. They wouldn't be sold commercially until 1906.

1914 The Coca Cola Bottler's Association was formed.

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notyourmomma 15 years ago said:

Favorite thing to do with cornflakes....make cookies. I don't think Dr. John would approve. Aren't they wonderful in a cookie batter? Yum.

Have a piece of Wedgewood, inherited from the mom-in-law, very pretty stuff.

Thanks, Wynne for looking this up each day. Loving the new look, by the by.

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wynnebaer 15 years ago said:

You are so very welcome, TIna.

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trigger 15 years ago said:

i heard about corned beef on the radio from a Trader Joe's advertisement so I looked it up and the article that I found said the same thing.

Corned Beef has nothing to do with corn.

The term “Corned” comes from putting meat in a large crock and covering
it with large rock-salt kernels of salt that were referred to as “corns of salt”
as early as 888 AD . (Oxford English Dictionary)
Origin of the word "Corn"
The term Corn is modified from an Old Germanic (P.Gmc) Word
Kurnam which meant small seed of anything. Since a kernel of rock
salt look like a wheat or oat kernel size it became known as a corn of salt.
Even the word Kernel comes from this word Kurnam. or Kurnilo which meant
the root of the seed.
The First Salted Beef
The practice of salting meat goes back probably ancient times in cold areas when they found you could preserve meat by salting it. Nomads on foot or horse could also put salt on meat and hike for days without refrigerating it.

Over time brine based recipes replaced the old salting method but the corny name stuck.
See Breezy's recipe it sounds fantastic.

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wynnebaer 15 years ago said:

Thanks for the info, Michael....Very Interesting and very infomative..:)

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