Have you ever wondered about how humankind learned about things like cooking food or smoking meat? As a species, we evolved from hunter-gatherers to agrarian societies, but when or how did our ancient ancestors learn such things as how to cook food? Maybe a clumsy person dropped his share of the mammoth into the fire and had to fish it out or go hungry. Once he or she got the meat from the fire and allowed it to cool, they may have found that it tasted better cooked than raw.

Smoking may have evo…

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About the Author

Richard F. Stier is a consulting food scientist with international experience in food safety (HACCP), food plant sanitation, quality systems, process optimization, GMP compliance, and food microbiology ([email protected]).