When did we start eating...?

Filed in archive Morsels of Info , Web Resources on May 14, 2006

Since I got serious about food blogging, I often found myself wondering about the history of food. How did humans realise those wild plants could be eaten and ended up cultivating them? Now we have all those grains and vegetables.

Do you know that refrigerators a.k.a. ice pits were in existence in Mesopotamia 4,000 years ago? How about sushi, do you know that its origins are not Japanese but Southeast Asian?

Did you notice or even wonder why cakes are traditionally round? Perhaps it had something to do with their use in ancient times, associated with annual cycles - the sun and the moon.

Interesting? Sources for these and more are compiled on The Food Timeline website. Here's its own introduction:

Ever wonder what foods the Vikings ate when they set off to explore the new world? How Thomas Jefferson made his ice cream? What the pioneers cooked along the Oregon Trail? Who invented the potato chip...and why? Welcome to the Food Timeline.

The wonderful resource was created by Ms. Lynne Olver, a Supervising Librarian of Reference Services at the Morris County Library in New Jersey. Her passion for food history just shows in the meticulous research!

Visit The Food Timeline and deliciously lose yourself in time!