Questions raised about food preservatives in 1900

- Jonathan Smyth -

Food glorious food’ goes the melodic song in the Oliver Twist musical. But as the world’s population grows and new markets are opened further afield it is necessary to increase production and to make sure the food stays fresher for longer. To do this, some highbrow people developed preservatives and, without these chemical enhancers, you might find all the shelves emptier in the supermarket. Professionals in the science world are always producing new and jolly ideas on how to feed the world. Without food what would we do?

The latest entertainment in certain food laboratories is that they are growing heaps of flesh from animal cells. Harvested chicken flesh grown in tanks is now available on the menu in some American restaurants. In other countries there will be tens of billions of euros spent on artificially growing lamb and beef flesh and, in England, they have approved it to be tested in pet food first.

This Frankenstein food stuff may save the planet they say and, in the process, take the cow out of the field. Now, if you think that sounds like tasty tack, then you should consider that, in 1900, the boffins were at it then too.

Arthur S. Lough, managing director of the Cavan Creameries organisation, was called to give evidence about the use of preservatives and additives.

Additives

The Anglo-Celt gave an account of Arthur’s attendance at the Departmental Committee inquiry into the use of preservatives and colouring matters in food. The Committee, no doubt, consisting of the England's top experts held a sitting in the rooms of the suspiciously named ‘Chemical Society’ in Burlington House, London. The investigation was chaired by Sir Herbert Maxwell, in the company of its committee members, Professor Thorpe, Dr Tunnicliffe and Dr Bulstrode.

When Arthur began to speak, he told them he was a member of the Irish Agricultural Organisation Society and enlightened them about his connections to various co-operative dairy societies and how he was the managing director of Cavan Creameries Limited. They quickly realised that he was most certainly not the proverbial ‘back of a clock’ and had plenty of valuable experience on the matters about which they questioned him. He said that two and a half years earlier, creameries were formed across the southern part of Ireland and, since then, over 600 new societies had been set up.

Regarding the cooperative creameries, Lough was interested in about 260 premises, and he believed that Ulster had experienced a co-operative revolution through the formation of 108 companies with another thirty creameries in the process of being built. Most remarkable, in Lough’s opinion, was the fact that Ulster was not a region that, until then, had focused on dairy farming. Sir Herbert Maxwell who chaired the meeting addressed the potential elephant in the room and asked what the story was when it came to Irish creameries using ‘preservatives'.

Food additives are nothing new. The ancients used them as long ago as 3000 BC when the bronze age began and spices and preservatives were traded throughout Asia and the Middle East. Salt is one of the oldest products used as a preservative and additive and it was not so readily available in the past.

The Romans were paid by salt, which in turn lent its name to the word ‘salary'. The Latin word for salt is ‘sal’, derived from ‘salarium’, which translated as an allowance Roman soldiers received for the purchase of salt. Another ancient preservation method first used by the cavemen was that of smoking meats and fish over smoke fires. Meats treated over smoke fire have a pleasant flavour and they keep for longer.

Mostly, preservatives used in creameries were added to butter and cream to maintain the products' life expectancy for exporting overseas. Without such an additive, the butter would have cost more to get it transported on time to its destination, said Arthur Lough.

Dealers had no stomach for saltless butter and wanted it ‘to stand a certain time'. On the other hand, he thought that there would be a greater market for fresh butter if it could reach the markets faster and be consumed quicker.

He added that there was a difference to how the North and Southern half of Ireland fed cattle during the year and that in the North they ‘practically made butter throughout the winter’ but not so much down South.

The North was more concerned with pasteurisation too and he emphasised the need for this treatment to produce the ‘best butter'. The introduction of cold storage too, was about to become the fashion in Ireland and it could help with the doing away of preservatives, thought Lough.

The other major ‘curse’ they had was the transport situation. Railway wagons were unsuitable for butter and Arthur Lough knew of examples where butter arrived in poor condition to London. He might have recalled the time he discovered butter bound for Scotland that was leaving Killeshandra in a cattle wagon plastered in cow manure. That incident got mentioned in the House of Commons much to the dismay of the creamery.

Further questions were asked about preservatives. Should they be declared to the public? And what if a preservative was harmful? Lough believed that it was quite right that preservatives should be declared. ‘I know that if I were the man eating them, I should like to know,’ exclaimed Lough.

The committee went a little harder with their line of questioning and asked: ‘If it is a fact that borax or boracic acid is added to the food, surely, he (the customer) has a right to know that he is dosed with it? Arthur Lough believed that in most creameries they were ‘prepared to do without it'.

Dr Bulstrode then spoke up: ‘The principal preservative used was borax, and no doubt if preservatives were prohibited, it would give trouble. Still, if the scientific evidence showed that preservatives were harmful and they were prohibited, the trade would have to adapt itself to the change.’

The committee concluded that the cream trade could not continue without the use of additives unless the product could be purchased and consumed quickly.

Today, there is still debate about eating what is artificial and what is natural. We can see this in the food trade and those infamous ‘e-numbers’ come to mind. On newer fronts we will have to contend with genetically modified produce or artificially grown animal meat in laboratory containers.

Perhaps, if man ever reaches Mars, such preservatives and artificially grown flesh will have found a purpose to feed the populations who dare to travel into the unknown. Otherwise, I think I will stick to natural food stuffs myself.