CHAPTER ONE

Development of Food Chemistry

THE ORIGINS OF SCIENCE go back to prehistory when man could not write a record of his successes and his failures, his trials and experiments, and his traditions. We assume that as man emerged as a thinking animal he began to explore the world around him, to wonder at its operation, and finally to try to control it.

Consequently, it seems that as the centuries roll by man's understanding and control of his environment, although still incom- plete, continue to improve. In the early days every science had a tenuous start-even one as dependent on the development of mathematics and lab- oratory procedures as chemistry. At this time man had learned only a few chemical skills, some of which were in food chemistry.

Probably they were accidently discovered, then carefully passed on from one generation to another so that by the time writing was invented man could not only make pottery and soap, cook food, and smelt a few metals but also make wine and vinegar. These processes were hedged around with superstitions, but the vintner could control the process; although he had never heard of a yeast or an Acetobacter, he knew how to handle the fermenting fruit.

In the seventeenth century, as laboratory procedures and an apprecia- tion of the scientific method developed and as scientists began to ex- change information, chemistry began to emerge as a true science. A con- siderable accumulation of information and a beginning study of foods reflected the general interest in the composition of the entire world.

Some of the early experiments attempted to separate food components, to study the pigments that give color to the world, or to find the "life-giving" compound. As time passed these studies were successful to a limited extent. In the eighteenth century simple compounds were isolated, and during the first half of the nineteenth century the old idea that the living and the nonliving world were completely different was abandoned.