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In cold or frozen climates man would freeze seal meat. In tropical climates, fruit was dried. Food preservation allowed man to not need to consume kill or harvest right away.

Drying

In ancient times the sun and wind naturally dried out foods. Middle Eastern and Oriental cultures started drying foods in 12,00 B.C. in the sun. The Romans used a lot of dry fruit. In the Middle Ages, the people made “still houses” where fruits, vegetables, and herbs were could dry out in climates that did not have strong sunlight for drying. Sometimes fires were made to create heat to dry foods. Drying prevents yeasts and molds from growing by removing moisture so bacteria cannot grow.

Freezing

Cellars, caves, and cool streams were used for freezing. American estates that had ice houses built to store ice and food on the ice. Icehouse was then converted to an “icebox”. Icebox was converted in the 1800's to mechanical refrigeration. Clarence Birdseye found in the 1800's that freezing meats and vegetables at a low temperature made them taste better.

Fermenting

Fermenting was discovered when a few grains of barley were left in the rain and turned into beer. Microorganisms ferment the starch-derived sugars into alcohols. This is also how fruits are fermented into wine and cabbage into Kimchi or sauerkraut. Anthropologists believe that as early as 10,00 B.C people began to settle and grow barley. They began to make beer and believed that it was a gift from gods. It was used to preserve foods and to create more nutritious foods from less desirable ingredients. Vitamins are produced through fermentation by microorganisms making the end product more nutritious.

Pickling

Pickling occurs when foods are placed in a container with vinegar or another acid. It is thought that pickling came about when people used to place food in wine or beer to preserve it due to them having a low pH. Containers had to be stoneware or glass (vinegar will dissolve metal from pots). After the food was eaten, the pickling brine had other uses. Romans would make a concentrated pickle sauce called “garum”. It was very concentrated and the dish that it would be used in would only need a few drops to get the fish taste. Due to new foods arriving from Europe in the 16th century, food preservation increased. Ketchup originated from Europe as an oriental fish brine and when it made it to America, sugar was added. Pickling sauces were soon part of many recipes such as chutneys, relish, piccalilli, mustard, and ketchup when different spices were added to them.

Curing

The beginning of curing was done through dehydration. Salting was used by early cultures to help desiccate foods. Many different salts were used from different places such as rock salt, sea salt, spiced salt, etc.. People began to experiment and found in the 1800's that some salts gave meat an appealing red color instead of the grey that they were used to. During their experimenting in the 1920's they realized this mixture of salts were nitrates (saltpeter) that prevented Clostridium botulinum growth.

Jam and Jelly

The early cultures also used honey or sugar as a preservative. Greece used a quince and honey mixture with a slight amount of drying and then tightly packed into jars. The Romans used the same technique but instead cooked the honey and quince mixture to make a solid texture. The Indian and Oriental traders brought sugarcane to the northern climates where housewives were then able to learn to make preservatives by heating fruit with the sugarcane.

Canning

Canning started in 1790 from a French confectioner, Nicolas Appert, when he found that by applying heat to food in sealed glass bottles, the food is free from spoilage. Appert’s ideas were tried by the French Navy with meat, vegetables, fruit, and milk in 1806. An Englishman, Peter Durand decided to use Appert’s method on tin cans in 1810. Even though Appert found a method that worked, he did not understand why it worked because many believed that the lack of air caused the preservation. In 1864 Louis Pasteur linked food spoilage/illness to microorganisms.Different foods are placed into jars or cans and heated to a microorganism and inactivating enzyme temperature. They are then cooled forming a vacuum seal which prevents microorganisms from contaminating the foods.

Food preservation is to prevent the growth of microorganisms (such as yeasts), or other micro-organisms (although some methods work by introducing benign bacteria or fungi to the food), as well as slowing the oxidation of fats that cause rancidity. Food preservation may also include processes that inhibit visual deterioration, such as the enzymatic browning reaction in apples after they are cut during food preparation.

Many processes designed to preserve food involve more than one food preservation method. Preserving fruit by turning it into jam, for example, involves boiling (to reduce the fruit’s moisture content and to kill bacteria, etc.), sugaring (to prevent their re-growth) and sealing within an airtight jar (to prevent recontamination). Some traditional methods of preserving food have been shown to have a lower energy input and carbon footprint, when compared to modern methods.

Some methods of food preservation are known to create carcinogens. In 2015, the International Agency for Research on Cancer of the World Health Organization classified processed meat, i.e. meat that has undergone salting, curing, fermenting, and smoking, as "carcinogenic to humans".

Maintaining or creating nutritional value, texture and flavor is an important aspect of food preservation.