Food History
FOOD HISTORY - April
April 1 – April Fool’s Day / National Sourdough Bread Day
1755 - Jean Anthelme Brillat-Savarin was born. This French politician was the author of an eight-volume book called ‘Physiologie du Goût, ou Méditation De Gastronomie Transcendante, Ouvrage Théorique, Historique et à l’Ordre du Jour’. The publication treated eating as an art form and contained many delightful and witty observations on the pleasures of dining.
April 2 – National Peanut Butter and Jelly Day
1840 - Emile Zola was born. He was a French writer and critic who was also known as a gourmand. His detailed descriptions of simple meals and banquets in his novels were fastidious and highly entertaining. He was also known for his own luxury dinner parties, often citing: “What will be the death of me are bouillabaisses, food spiced with pimiento, shellfish, and a load of exquisite rubbish which I eat in disproportionate quantities.”
April 3 - National Chocolate Mousse Day
1985 - The Brown Derby Restaurant in Hollywood, California closed after 57 years. Its owner, Robert Cobb, created the Cobb Salad there in 1936.
April 4 – National Cordon Bleu Day
1887 - William Cumming Rose was born. An American biochemist, he researched amino acids, and established the importance of the eight essential amino acids in human nutrition.
April 5 – National Raisin and Spice Bar Day
1994 - Andre Tchelistcheff died. He was a Russian-born U.S. enologist (specialist in the study of winemaking) and a pivotal figure in the revitalization of the California wine industry following Prohibition (1919-33). He used his Paris training in viticulture and winemaking to pioneer such techniques as cold fermentation and the use of American oak barrels for aging. He was also an authority on the types of soil suitable for growing various grape varieties.
April 6 – National Caramel Popcorn Day
1954 - C.A. Swanson & Sons introduced the first TV dinner: roast turkey with stuffing and gravy, sweet potatoes and peas - for 98 cents. An immediate success, this dish is still the most popular Swanson frozen dinner.
April 7 – World Health Day
1948 - The World Health Organization (WHO) was established. This is a specialized agency of the United Nations (UN) that acts as a coordinating authority on international public health. In addition to its work in eradicating disease, the WHO also carries out various health-related campaigns — for example, to boost the consumption of fruits and vegetables worldwide and to discourage tobacco use.
April 8 – National Empanada Day
1992 - Benjamin Eisenstaedt died. He invented the artificial sweetener, ‘Sweet ‘n Low’ (granulated saccharin and dextrose).
April 9 – National Chinese Almond Cookie Day
1850 - William Prout died. An English chemist, he was the first to classify food components into three main divisions - carbohydrates, fats and proteins.
April 10 – National Cinnamon Crescent Day
1752 - William Cheselden died. An English surgeon and teacher, he was one of the first to describe the role of saliva in digestion.
April 11 – National Cheese Fondue Day
1926 - Luther Burbank died. An American horticulturist, he developed many new varieties of fruits and vegetables, including the Burbank Potato, the Shasta Daisy, over one hundred varieties of plums and prunes and ten varieties of berries.
April 12 – National Licorice Day
1988 - The first U.S. patent on an animal life form was issued to Harvard scientists for a genetically engineered mouse.
April 13 – National Peach Cobbler Day
2008 - The National Meats Institute in Uruguay organized a world-record ‘Largest BBQ’, grilling over 26,000 pounds of beef on a mile-long barbeque grill and using 6 tonnes of charcoal.
April 14 – National Pecan Day
1964 - Rachel Louise Carson died. She was an American biologist and the author of ‘Silent Spring,’ a book about environmental pollution, especially the dangers of DDT.
April 15 – National Glazed Ham Day
1955 - The first franchised McDonald’s was opened in Des Plaines, Illinois by Ray Kroc – a hamburger restaurant previously owned by the McDonald brothers. On opening day a two patty hamburger was fifteen cents and french fries were ten cents.
April 16 – National Eggs Benedict Day
1521 - Martin Luther (founder of Protestantism) arrived at the Diet of Worms (a general assembly of the Imperial Estates of the Holy Roman Empire that took place in Worms, a small town on the Rhine river located in what is now Germany). Although other issues were dealt with at the Diet of Worms, it is most memorable for the ‘Edict of Worms’ which addressed Martin Luther and the effects of the Protestant Reformation.
April 17 – National Cheeseball Day
1810 - Lewis M. Norton of Troy, Pennsylvania was issued the first U.S. patent for pineapple cheese.
April 18 – National Animal Crackers Day
1940 – Joseph L. Goldstein was born. He was an American molecular geneticist who, along with Michael S. Brown, was awarded the 1985 Nobel Prize for Physiology or Medicine for their elucidation of the process of cholesterol metabolism in the human body.
April 19 – National Amaretto Day
1904 - Richard Pough was born. An American ecologist, he was the founding president of the Nature Conservancy and helped found the World Wildlife Fund. In 1945, he was one of the first to warn about the dangers of DDT to fish and birds.
April 20 – National Pineapple Upside Down Cake Day
1821 – Franz Karl Achard died. He was a German chemist who invented a process for the large-scale extraction of table sugar (sucrose) from beets, and in 1801, opened the first sugar-beet factory in Silesia (now Poland).
April 21 – National Chocolate Covered Cashews Day
1889 – Paul Karrer was born. He was a Swiss chemist who investigated the constitution of carotenoids, flavins and Vitamins A and B2, for which he shared the 1937 Nobel prize for Chemistry (with Sir Norman Haworth of Great Britain).
April 22 – National Jelly Bean Day
1948 - Prosper Montagne died. Montagne was one of the greatest French chefs of all time. He is mainly remembered as the creator of the ‘Larousse Gastronomique’ (1938), a comprehensive encyclopedia of French gastronomy.
April 23 – National Cherry Cheese Cake Day
1985 - Coca-Cola announced it was changing its 99 year old secret formula – to its own detriment. New Coke was ill-received by consumers.
April 24 – National Pigs-In-A-Blanket Day
1833 - Jacob Ebert and George Dulty patented the first soda fountain. This became a popular place to consume soda beverages, ice cream and sometimes light meals in the late 19th and early 20th centuries.
April 25 – National Zucchini Bread Day
1959 - The St. Lawrence Seaway opened, connecting the Great Lakes with the Atlantic Ocean. Its completion opened the heart of the Canadian and American industrial and agricultural areas to ocean-bound vessels.
April 26 - National Pretzel Day
1986 – The Chernobyl nuclear plant in the Ukraine exploded. It became the worst nuclear disaster in history. In addition to the human devastation that it caused, it contaminated crops and livestock with radiation in large areas of Europe for years to come.
April 27 – National Prime Rib Day
1865 - Cornell University was chartered. Cornell is an agricultural land grant university endowed by Ezra Cornell, one of the founders of Western Union Telegraph Co. Today, Cornell University in Ithaca, New York, offers many programs, including Agricultural and Life Sciences, Hotel Administration, and Nutritional Sciences.
April 28 – National Blueberry Pie Day
1796 - ‘American Cookery’ by Amelia Simmons was published in Hartford. It was the first cookbook written by an American, becoming a U.S. classic.
April 29 – National Shrimp Scampi Day
1768 - Georg Brandt died. A Swedish chemist, he discovered the element cobalt in 1730. Cobalt is used in steel making and is an essential part of vitamin B12.
April 30 – National Oatmeal Cookie Day
1792 - John Montague, 4th Earl of Sandwich died. He is supposed to have invented the sandwich as a quick meal to avoid interrupting his gambling sessions. Captain Cook named the Sandwich Islands after him (now known as Hawaii).
