The USDA’s shorthand definition of a preservative is any substance that slows or stops the deterioration of food. The sugar we add to make jam to keep fruit from rotting is a preservative. So is the salt we use to cure ham. We’ve employed preservatives like sugar and salt for millennia.
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It sounds basic but I’ll just get it out of the way first: cured meat isn’t cooked. Curing was one of the key discoveries our species hit upon to make meat last for a long time at ambient temperatures and not get us sick. Curing is what differentiates a sausage (uncured) from a salami (cured).
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It starts with the olive varietal Just like wine made from Chardonnay grapes tastes different than a wine made from Merlot grapes, olive oils made from different types of olives can have totally different flavors. There are thousands of different olives in the world. Some are milder. Some are more bitter. Some are more buttery. […]
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Think of a powdered food like ground cinnamon or cornmeal. What do you get if you add it to some water and mix them together? Something like a paste. Now imagine the powder is wheat flour. Mix it with water and it creates a dough that holds together, yet stretches. What makes wet wheat flour […]
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First things first. What’s a grain? The foods we call grains are the seeds of certain members of the grass family. Wheat, barley, oats, rye, rice, corn, sorghum, and millet are all grains. Each grain has three main components: (A) The endosperm: the starchy part that would feed a baby plant if the seed were […]
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