trivia

Honey is believed to be the only food that does not spoil. Archeologists have tasted the honey discovered in the tombs of Egyptian pharaohs and found it to still be edible.

The original filling for a Twinkie was banana. It was changed to vanilla when the United States experienced a banana shortage during WWII.

For every dollar spent by the consumer at the supermarket on produce, five cents of it is returned to the farmer.

The Aztec Emperor Montezuma drank 50 goblets of thick hot chocolate every day. It was spiked with red chilis and ruby red in color.

A new study of high endurance cyclists finds that chocolate milk works just as well as most sports drinks and in many cases, it helps athletes recover from strenuous exercise significantly better.

Our taste buds wear out every week to ten days. They are replaced but not as quickly after we reach the age of 45.

The 57 on the Heinz ketchup bottle represents the number of pickle types the company once sold.

In the 1950s, it took 27 hours to make a single Peeps marshmallow chick. Today it takes six minutes.

The liquid inside young pineapples can be used as a substitute for blood plasma.

An ear of corn always has an even number of rows.

Red eggs come from hens with red earlobes and red feathers. White eggs come from hens with white feathers and earlobes.

The original Russian Dressing recipe contained caviar.

Pearls melt in vinegar.

Almonds are a member of the peach family.

If Jell-O is hooked up to an EEG (heart monitor), it registers movements virtually identical to the brain waves of a healthy adult.

The inside of a banana is a berry.

Popcorn has been a food product for over 6,000 years.

Sardinia developed the canning process for herring. This is why canned herring are better known as sardines.

A raisin dropped in a glass of fresh champagne will bounce up and down continually from the bottom of the glass to the top.

The flavor most commonly associated with bubble gum is a combination of vanilla, wintergreen and cassia, a form of cinnamon.

On average, an American consumes 109 pounds of beef a year. It takes eight pounds of grain to produce one pound of beef.

Cenosillicaphobia is the fear of an empty glass.

Humans can't smell or taste a substance that is not soluble.  Sugar has no taste on a dry tongue.  In a dry nose, the smell of a flower would not be noticed.  

Peanuts are one of the ingredients in dynamite.

Vanilla is the extract of fermented and dried pods of orchids.

Cheddar is the most widely purchased & consumed cheese in the world.

Coffee, as a world commodity, is second only to oil.

Cheese is the oldest of all manmade foods.

It takes ten pounds of whole milk to produce one pound of cheese.

In the 1830's catsup was sold as medicine.

New York's DB Bistro Moderne's hamburger, the "Burger Royale" cost $99USD. It's stuffed with braised short ribs, foie gras and black truffles.

A Hong Kong property tycoon paid $160,406 on an Italian white truffle, the most ever paid for this delicacy.

There are 7500 apple varieties grown in the world.

Blueberry jelly beans were created especially for Ronald Reagan.

If injected intravenously, nutmeg is extremely poisonous.

The average chocolate bar has eight insect legs in it.

One third of the cows used in the United States for food consumption are purchased by the McDonald's Corporation.

In the average restaurant, the customer receives 27 cents worth of food for every dollar they spend.

The largest blue fin tuna ever caught weighed in at 1,496 pounds. It was caught by rod and reel in 1979 off the coast of Nova Scotia.

Cream Cheese was made by mistake in 1872 in an effort to replicate the French cheese Neufchatel in the United States.

The first World's Fair took place at London's Crystal Palace in 1851 inspired by Queen Victoria's husband Prince Albert.

Alaskans eat twice as much ice cream per capita than the rest of the nation.

Coffee is the world's most recognizable smell.

The Incas measured time by how long it took a potato to cook.

To produce one ton of raisins, it takes four tons of grapes.

A quarter of a raw potato placed into a shoe at night will keep the shoe smelling fresh and clean.

The French eat approximately 500,000,000 snails per year.

The onion is a member of the lily family.

The average human produces a quart of saliva a day, about 10,000 gallons in a lifetime.

Carbon dioxide is the element responsible for creating the holes in Swiss Cheese.

Diaka Vodka is the world's most expensive vodka due to its patented diamond filtration system. The spirit is filtered through 100 diamonds, some up to 1 carat in size which results in supposedly unsurpassed clarity and smoothness. The bottle also contains crystals, but not diamonds.

Half the people in the world eat rice on any given day. 

For the party to celebrate the 55 drafters of the  United States Constitution, a bill was issued for the following: 54 bottles of Madeira, 60 bottles of claret, 8 bottles of whiskey, 22 bottles of port, 8 bottles of hard cider, 12 beers and seven bowls of alcohol punch large enough that "ducks could swim in them."

The lifespan of a queen bee is between 2 to 8 years while the average lifespan of a worker bee is between 7 to 8 weeks.

Fresh apples float because 25 percent of their volume is air.

The U.S. Marines’ first recruiting station was in a bar.

If bubbles disappear in champagne, drop a raisin in the glass to get them to return.

There are approximately 350 squirts from a cow's udder in a gallon of milk.

In the next hour, 27 million cans of Coca-Cola will be consumed worldwide, that's 600 million per day.

As late as the mid-17th century, French wine makers did not use corks. Instead, they stuffed oil-soaked rags into the necks of their bottles.

In their collective lifetimes, twelve honey bees produce one tablespoon of honey.

The Granny Smith apple is named in honor of Maria Anne Smith, a woman from Ryde, New South Wales, Australia who discovered it growing in her backyard in 1868. 

As Magellan was preparing for his journey to sail around the world in 1519, he spent more money on sherry than on weapons.

In Greek mythology, the original shape and size of the coupe, or champagne glass, is credited to Helen of Troy. Centuries later, Marie Antoinette's breast mold was used to enlarge the size of the glass. (Of course, these or both myths and neither has enough evidence behind it to make it a fact!) 

The beef from grass-fed, pasture raised cattle has two to four times more omega-3 fatty acids (good fats) than corn/grain fed cattle.

Bees have five eyes - two large compound eyes and three smaller eyes called ocelli.

Research indicates that dark chocolate, like red wine, contains substantial amounts of flavonoid phenolics which may lower the risk of heart disease.

At 400, Belgium holds the record for the most beer brands of any nation.

Some orange trees bear fruit for more than 100 years.

Frederick the Great of Prussia attempted to ban the consumption of coffee and demanded that the populace drink alcohol instead.

If every Oreo cookie ever made were stacked on top of each other, the pile would reach to the moon and back more than five times. If they were all placed side-by-side, they would encircle the earth 381 times at the equator.

When Cortez arrived in Mexico, he found that the Aztecs used cocoa beans extensively for currency when negotiating trade. 

Number of weeks it took a broiler chiken to reach market weight (around six pounds) in 1950: 17. Number of weeks it took a broiler chicken to reach the same weight in 2006: 6.

The familiar phrase 'Mind your P's & Q's originated from bartenders in Victorian England advising their unruly customers to keep an eye on their mugs of beer that were served to them in pint and quart sizes.

The term 'Wet your whistle' originated in Victorian England where whistles were baked into the mugs used by pub customers. When they wanted a refill, they would blow on their whistle to alert the bartender.

African countries produce the world's largest amount of cocoa beans, almost double the tonnage of cocoa beans than South American countries.

Catherine d'Medici introduced the use of a fork to the French Court. They initially thought its use was a strange habit.

The Holstein produces the most milk of any breed.

The citrus soda 7-UP was created in 1929. "7" was selected because the original containers were 7 ounces. "UP" indicated the direction of the bubbles.

Chocolate manufacturers currently use 40 percent of the world's almonds and 20 percent of the world's peanuts.

Five Jello flavors that didn't make the cut include celery, coffee, chocolate, apple and cola.

At the barbecue competition Memphis in May a tractor, airplane and a fire truck have all been used as meat cookers.

Americans drink over a billion pounds of coffee every year and around five million bottles of soda.

Franklin D. Roosevelt was elected president of the United States in 1932 on a pledge to end Prohibition.

According to Henrietta Nesbitt, the White House housekeeper, Franklin D. Roosevelt had very simple American tastes and enjoyed food "he could did into". Some of his favorite dishes and snacks included: scrambled eggs, fish chowder, grilled cheese sandwiches, hot dos, toasted marshmallows and fruitcake.

Julia Child's once said that her secret to a long life was red meat and gin. She was 91 years old when she died.

Coffee was such a staple in the ancient Arab world that a husband's refusal or inability to provide it for his wife made it legal for the wife to separate from him.

The gender of all worker bees is female.

In 1689 the first Parisian cafe opened. 

In the United States in the 1930s, a “cucumber” was slang for a dollar.

Camel milk is the only milk that does not curdle.

7% of Americans eat at McDonalds each day.

In his youth the Naked Chef Jamie Oliver formed a band called Scarlet Division and had his sights on pop stardom. His band was offered a recording contract from Sony and one of their singles climbed to number 42 on the charts.

Strawberries are the only agricultural product that bear its seeds on the outside and on average each strawberry contains 200 seeds.

A champagne cork set a world record when it flew 177 feet and 9 inches.

President Lincoln, when informed that General Grant drank whiskey while leading his troops, reportedly replied "Find out the name of the brand so I can give it to my other generals." 

Chocolate syrup was used to represent blood in the famous shower scene from the movie Psycho, a scene that took 7 days to shoot.

Every person has a unique tongue print.

In ancient Greece, tossing an apple to a girl was a traditional proposal of marriage; catching it was acceptance.

In 1984, honeybees constructed a honeycomb in zero gravity as part of an experiment on a space shuttle.

The glue on Israeli postage stamps is certified kosher.

A miniature onion is added to a martini to transform it into a Gibson.

The melting point of cocoa butter is just below the human body temperature. This explains why chocolate seems to melt in the mouth.

The stomach has to produce a new layer of mucus every two weeks, otherwise it will digest itself.

The soil of one famous French vineyard is considered so precious that vineyard workers are required to scrape it from their shoes before they leave for home each night.

Bee pollen is a source of protein.
 

Cappuccino is so named because the drink's peak of foam resembles the color of the robes worn by the Cappuicine Monks (cowl of a Capuchin friar's habit).

Americans eat on average 18 acres worth of pizza every day.

Two-thirds of the world's eggplant is grown in New Jersey.

Opium was the prominent ingredient in the Victorian concoction 'Mother's Helper'. For more on the history of poppies and opium, go here.

China's Beijing Duck Restaurant can seat up to 9000 people at one time.

Bananas are the world's most prolific food plant with upwards of 300 bananas growing on a single stock.

If your tea is old, don't throw it out. Instead, after brewing a pot of tea, use the leaves for fertilizer in your garden to help condition the soil. Give your fern a drink of tea every once ina while for a more lush looking plant.

A 1948 Smirnoff Vodka ad campaign promises America that drinking Smirnoff will alleviate whiskey breath.

The word sausage is derived from the Latin word salsus which means something that is salted.

Margaret Rudkin built the bakery Pepperidge Farms in her horse stables.

A common scam in 17th century England involved the substitution of a cat for a suckling pig. The ruse involved selling the live animal in a bag to unsuspecting consumers who did not discover the deception until they reached their kitchens and 'let the cat out of the bag'. BONUS: The animals were sold in bags called pokes. The consumer therefore purchased a suckling 'pig in a poke'.

In 1916, the founder of Nathan's Hot Dogs offered a free hot dog to any doctor who arrived in a white medic coat and ate his hot dog in front of Nathan's Coney Island stand as a means of assuring the passing public that the hot dog was a healthy product to consume.

It seems the Roman Emperor Nero was a fan of the snow cone. Records from 62AD document his slave's journeys to the Apennines to collect mountain ice and snow that was used to produce the world's first recorded snow cones.

Annually, 70% of the American supply of antibiotics end up in animal feed.

A sailor's weekly allowance of beer on a standard 16th century English warship was eight gallons, about ten pints per day.

The Jerusalem Artichoke is not an artichoke, nor does it come from Jerusalem. It's from the Americas and is a member of the sunflower family.

At a traditional Finnish wedding the groom's mother or bride's godmother places a china plate on top of her head as the couple dances for the first time, usually to a waltz. After the plate falls, the broken pieces foretell how many children the couple is predicted to have.

If a Canadian gives you a Mr. Big or a Flake theya re offering you a chocolate bar.

The term Brand Name is derived from the practice of American distillers branding kegs with their names and emblems before shipping them.

Lettuce is the only vegetable or fruit that is never sold frozen, canned, cooked, or in any other form but fresh.

Prohibition lasted 13 years, 10 months, 19 days, 17 hours, 32 1/2 minutes.

A cow drinks thirty gallons of water per day.

The milk of a domesticated ass comes closest to human milk than any other kind.

The average American eats 60 pounds of bread per year.

The candies most likely to cause tooth decay are dark chocolate and fudge.  Those least likely to damage the teeth are nut- or coconut covered candies.

Schochu, a spirit distilled from barley, was the favorite beverage of the Japanese man Shigechiyo Izumi, who drank it every day. Mr. Izumi is the world's longest living man. He lived for 120 years and 237 days. He was born on June 29th, 1865 and died on Feb. 21st, 1986.

Buzz Aldrin and Neil Armstrong dined on turkey in foil packets as the first meal eaten on the moon.

The color ultraviolet can be seen by bees but not humans.

A bee can detect events that are separated by 1/300 of a second which is about six times faster than human perception.

Along with contemporary newspapers, Nobel Prize winning papers and other archival materials, Twinkies were also put in a 1998 time capsule by scientists at the Massachusetts Institute of Technology slated to be opened in the year 2020. The scientists said they wanted to test Twinkie's legendary ability to remain eternally fresh.

Pound for pound, a cooked fast food hamburger costs more than a new car.

During the War of 1812, the meat Sam Wilson, a 19th century meat packer from Troy-New York, shipped to the government was stamped 'U.S. Beef'. Soldiers began to call the meat Uncle Sam's beef which paved the way for the iconic Uncle Sam character.

In the 16th century, a teaspoon of sugar coast as much as the equivalent of five dollars in London.

Being intoxicated had desirable spiritual significance to the ancient Egyptians. They often gave their children names like "How Drunk is Cheops" or "How Intoxicated is Hathor."

Coffee was initially called Arabian Wine when it was first introduced to Europe.

Lemons contain more sugar than strawberries.

Over 1000 varieties of tomatoes exist in the world.

Americans initially called French Toast German Toast.

The iconic musician Greg Allman said that for his last meal on earth he would like a menu of catfish and hush puppies, red beans and rice, sweet iced tea and tiramisu and would want his guest list to only include Ray Charles and his entire orchestra.

Ray Charles sang the song 'One Mint Julep' in 1961. It was originally recorded in 1951 and became one of the first popular drinking songs.

Marcel Boulestin became the first television cook when he began presenting the Cooks Night Out series on the BBC on January 21st, 1937.

Rum is filtered through charcoal in order to make it light. 

Seventy-one percent of American chocolate eaters prefer milk chocolate.

The Roman Emperor Caligula once fed the entire Roman Senate a meal comprised entirely of carrots, hoping that their aphrodisiac powers would get them in the mood.

Iceland consumes more Coca-Cola per capita than any other nation.

One third of the ice cream sold in American is vanilla. 

Nearly 85 percent of domestic grape production is processed, two-thirds of which is used for wine.

In general, most cows will give more milk if music is played while they are being milked.

The term hot dog was inspired by a cartoon by Chicago cartoonist Tad Dorgan in 1906 in which he drew a picture of a dachshund inside a frankfurter bun.

The liqueur Midori introduced to America by its Japanese manufacturer in 1978 at the notorious hot spot Studio 54.

The alcohol that evaporates from oak barrels during the maturation of alcohol is known as "the angel's share".

Mosquitoes are attracted to people who just ate bananas.

Broccoli is the only vegetable that is also a flower. 

The tongue is the fastest healing part of the human body.

Lemons contain more sugar than strawberries.

Pork fat melts at human body temperature.

While it is customary to throw rice at weddings in many countries, French brides break an egg on the threshold of their new home before stepping in- for luck and healthy babies.

One plain milk chocolate bar has more protein than a banana.

A can of Coke has 39 grams of sugar and a can of Pepsi has 41 grams of sugar, or about seven teaspoons or 13 lumps of sugar per can.

A mosquito has 47 teeth.

The beverage company Snapple was initially called the Unadulterated Food Corporation.The name Snapple was inspired by the name of a carbonated apple soda that was a part of the original beverage line.

Also known as "The Omelet King" the American Egg Board's Howard Helmer set a new Guinness Book of World record in 1990 after he produced 472 two egg omelets in thirty minutes.

The pressure in a bottle of champagne, at about 90 pounds per square inch, has three times the pressure than that found in an automobile tire.

In a 1775 letter written to John Adams, Thomas Jefferson declared that chocolate was superior to coffee and tea for both health and nutritional value.

A hen must consume four pounds of feed to produce a dozen eggs.

Sugar hardens asphalt. It slows the setting of ready-mixed concrete and glue.

Alcohol is considered the only proper payment for teachers among the Lepcha people of Tibet.

As well as being used for food, butter has been used as a cosmetic, a currency, an ointment and a fuel for lamps.

One in every four trees in Vermont is a maple tree.

One-third of the potatoes grown in the United States wind up as french fries.

Europe has had domesticated hens since 600 BC. 

The name ‘butter’ is thought to come from the Sanskrit word ‘bhutari’, which means “the enemy of evil spirits”.

In the year 1763 there were over 200 coffee shops in Vienna.

Lemonade was a favorite beverage of ancient Chinese emperors.

The olive tree is an evergreen.

The color of natural Cheddar Cheese is white.

The average olive tree lives between 300-600 years with some trees exceeding 1000 years in age. 

Approximately 90 million jars of Skippy Peanut Butter are sold annually, that's almost three jars per second.

Workers in ancient Egypt used olive oil to help move the massive stones that comprise the great pyramids.

The sole ingredient in file powder is powdered sassafras leaves.

During the Middle Ages, butter was mixed with marigold leaves to give it a more golden color. The most popular flower for this use was the marsh marigold which is better known as the buttercup.

The term for the amount of heat required to raise the temperature of one gram of water by one degree Celsius is calorie.

Before the advent of thermometers, brewers tested the temperature of their maturing brews with their thumbs: if it was too cold, the yeast wouldn’t grow, too hot, and it would die. hence the term, 'rule of thumb'.

Cenosillicaphobia is the fear of an empty glass.   

Wine is produced in all fifty states of America. 

By 1810 Spain was consuming one third of the chocolate produced in the world.

Longhorn cattle were the first breed of cattle brought to the United States.

The science of apple growing is called pomology.

The corn plant has both male and female parts. The silk is the female part while the tassel is the male part.

Indians called strawberries "heart-seed berries" and pounded them into their traditional corn-meal bread. Discovering the great taste of the Native Americans bread, colonists decided to create their own version, which became an American favorite - Strawberry Shortcake.

Until the tenth century, coffee was considered a food. Ethiopian tribesmen would mix the coffee berries with animal fat, roll them into balls, and eat them on their nomadic journeys.

The price of the Fortress Aquamarine Dessert served at Wine3 at The Fortress restaurant in Sri Lanka is $14,500.  It is the world's most expensive dessert and includes handmade glass utensils and an 80-carat aquamarine gem presented on a chocolate sculpture designed to resemble a stilt fisherman. For a photo, go here.

Espresso has 1/3 of the caffeine of a regular cup of coffee.

Apple juice was one of the earliest prescribed antidepressants.

Taste is the weakest of the five senses.

The human mouth, including the tongue, palette and cheeks, contains an average of 10,000 taste buds.

'VSOP' on bottles of some brandies stands for 'Very Special Old Pale'.

The 2006 Alba Quercus Reserve is the world's most expensive ham at $160 per pound or $2,100 per leg.

The A & P is America's oldest grocery store.

The color of natural cheddar cheese is white.

Dorothy Jones of Boston was the first American coffee trader. It was in 1670 that she was granted a license to sell coffee.

People on the American east coast prefer creamy peanut butter, while those on the west coast prefer the chunky-style.

Chemical manufacturers use sugar to grow penicillin.

Figs are the sweetest fruit.

Apples bruise easier than eggs break.

The oldest recipe ever found was a 6,000 year old formula for beer written on a cuneiform tablet. The recipe was part of a poem that was devoted to Ninkasi, the Sumerian goddess of beer.

The United States military advises soldiers to use urine in a pinch to rehydrate a packet of dried chicken and rice.

Sometimes called 'poor man's pudding' or 'poor knights of Windsor' in England, french toast is also known as 'pain perdu' in France and was originally created to get rid of stale bread and unwanted crust.

President Bill Clinton, Julia Child, Larry King, Jack Nicholson, Tom Selleck, Kim Basinger, Barbara Walters, Olympian Bonnie Blair, Barbara Bush, Dan Rather, Madonna, Cher, William F. Buckley, Billy Joel, Julia Roberts, Bill Cosby and Michael J. Fox are all members of The Adult Peanut Butter Lovers' Fan Club.

Geophagy is the practice of eating earth.  

An ant's smell is stronger then a dog's.

There are 18 different animal shapes in the Animal cracker zoo.

It takes a chicken between 24-26 hours to form and lay an egg.

An avocado was once known as an alligator pear.

In Babylonia's 1750 BC Code of Hammurabi, death was the penalty if a beer house was found to be watering down their beer.

Some species of sturgeon can live for over 100 years.

The recipe for D.O.M. liqueur dates back to 1510 and is so secretive that only three people know it at any one time. 

There are 180,000 farms in the UK.

An average sheep fleece weighs 3kg.

A cow filters 500 quarts of blood for each quart of milk she produces. 

In the 1600s, thermometers were filled with brandy, not mercury.

It takes almost 850 peanuts to make one 18 ounce jar of peanut butter.

In Quebec, Canada, a law states that margarine must be a different color than butter. Initially, the government tried to require that margarine be blood red but eventually the color white was chosen.

Wild cattle roamed Texas by the millions in the nineteenth century and to take possession of them, all that was required was to catch them and brand them.

One quart of vanilla ice cream contains the same amount of cholesterol as 68 slices of bacon.

Wheat provides 20% of the calories to the world's population.

China is the world's largest producer of wheat.

Oscar Tschirky, the inventor of the Waldorf Salad, was the maître d'hôtel at the hotel when he invented one of the world's most famous salads.

The United States is the world's largest producer of cheese.

The Napa Valley crop hops was described in 1889 newspapers as being the finest of its kind grown in the United States.

Wheat is such a versatile crop that it is being harvested in the world every month of the year.

A honeybee never sleeps.

Beer was not sold in bottles until 1850; it was not sold in cans until 1935. 

There must always be at least two varieties in an almond orchard as almonds must be cross-pollinated by another variety.

There are over 200 breeds of hens.

Film stuntmen use bottles and plate glass windows made of sugar.

It takes the energy of 50 leaves to grow one apple.

A wild turkey can run at speeds of up to 25mph.

In 1974, after 125 years of absence, salmon returned to the River Thames

It takes 200 cranberries to make one can of cranberry sauce.

One family of four can live 10 years off the bread produced by one acre of wheat. 

About 65 percent of American candy brands have been around for more than 50 years.

Banana plants are the largest plants on earth without a woody stem. They are actually giant herbs of the same family as lilies, orchids and palms.

A wild turkey can fly at a speed of 55mph.

In a 1980 interview, John Lennon admitted to repeating over and over again at the end of the song "Strawberry Fields Forever" the words "cranberry sauce".

Before being harvested and sold, an individual cranberry must bounce four inches to ensure that it is not too ripe.

The first American Thanksgiving in 1621 lasted for three days.

Both Canada and America celebrate Thanksgiinv. Canada's Thanksgiving takes place on the second Monday of October, America's on the third Thursday of November.

The sweet potato is the world's sixth principal world food crop, with 90% of it grown in Asia.

Demeter is the Greek goddess of corn.

Monks brewing beer in the Middle Ages were allowed to drink five quarts of beer a day.

Miracle fruit is a little known berry that alters taste buds making bitter things better and sour things sweet. The effect lasts anywhere from 30 minutes to two hours.

The Ancient Egyptians were buried with pomegranates. The Babylonians believed chewing the seeds before battle made them invincible.

The Choctaw Indians of Louisiana were the first to use dried, ground sassafras leaves as a seasoning, what we now call filé, or gumbo filé, used in Creole cooking.

If the gas of ten cows could be captured, it could heat a four bedroom house for an entire year.

A cow produces 20,000 pounds of manure every year. 

ANZAC biscuits were developed to commemorate the efforts of the Australian and New Zealand Army Corps during World War I. They are traditionally eaten on Anzac Day on April 25th. Anzac Day is a tribute to the most famous battle the Anzacs fought, in Gallipoli, Turkey, on April 25 1915.

In 1949 Marilyn Monroe was crowned the Artichoke Queen of California.

The United States cultivates the most artichokes in the world.

Barley is the basis for single malt Scotch.

"Cask Strength" or "Barrel Strength" on a whiskey label means that the whiskey has not been diluted with water.

Tomatoes were first considered to be poison when brought back to Europe by the first Spanish explorers to the Americas.

In 1950, Giuseppe Cipriani, owner of Harry's Bar in Venice named the beef dish Carpaccio, which he invented, for the Venetian painter Vittorio Carpaccio. Vittorio Carpaccio (1450-1525) was a Venetian artist of the High Renaissance period. According to Arrigo Cipriani, the son of Harry's Bar founder Giuseppe Cipriani, his father created Carpaccio for a regular customer, the Countess Amalia Nani Mocenigo. Her doctor had told her to avoid cooked meat, so Giuseppe came up with Carpaccio for her - thin slices of raw beef, pounded to make them even thinner and dressed with a mustard sauce. Giuseppe named it Carpaccio because the colour of the meat reminded him of the particular shades of red favoured by the artist in his paintings.

Onions are toxic to cats and dogs.

George Washington ran the largest whiskey distillery of its time in the United States.

George Washington grew hemp, and it was this that provided the paper used for the Declaration of Independence.

The feeling of euphoria some chile pepper lovers experience can be explained by the burning sensation in the mouth causes the release of endorphins. 

During the Middle Ages, onions were so valuable that they were used to make rent payments and as a wedding gift.

Nikita Krushchev once credited this food with the survival of the World War II Russian Army saying "Without spam, we wouldn’t have been able to feed our army."

Cibophobia is the fear of food.

The oldest recorded soup in human history is a recipe for hippopotamus soup.

Alexander the Great use to washed his hair in saffron and his body was coated in honey when he died.

The average human being consumes one ton of food and drink per year.

The average cup of coffee contains 1000 different chemical components, none of which is tasted in isolation but only as part of the overall flavor. 

One glass of milk can give a person a .02 blood alcohol concentration (BAC) on a Breathalyzer test. This is enough in some states for persons under age 21 to lose their drivers license and be fined.

Fermentation is essential within the body for human life to exist.   

In 2003, Bernard Loiseau was prompted to commit suicide after his Burgundian restaurant was demoted by the Gault Millau Guide from 19/20 to 17/20 and rumors spread that the Michelin Guide was about to take one of its coveted stars away from his three star restaurant. The rumor was false; Michelin did not strip the restaurant of a star and today the La Cote d'Or's, now run by Patrick Betron, is still a three star restaurant.

Prohibition lasted in America for 13 years, 10 months, 19 days, 17 hours and 32 1/2 minutes.

There are so many different varieties of sausage available in Britain that a different one could be eaten every day for ten years without a repeat.

The world's longest sausage ever measured 35 miles.

A cow can detect odors from up to five miles away. 

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