A Whole Sheep in a Can
In 1948, the Continental Can Company ran a series of magazine ads presenting "uncanny" facts about the history of canning. One of these facts was the great technological achievement from 1852 of packing an entire sheep into a huge can.
The ad didn't bother to say who exactly did this, but after a bit of googling I figured out that it was the French inventor Raymond Chevallier-Appert (1801-1892). Before Chevallier-Appert, canned food kept spoiling. He figured out that it needed to be cooked at higher temperatures. Here's the rest of the story from the Stravaganza blog:
Studying the problem, [Chevallier-Appert] decided that higher degrees of heat were needed in cooking. The apparatus called the autoclave, a closed vessel in which steam under pressure gave heat much greater than boiling water, had never been used for cooking food, however, and there was danger of over-cooking, because it lacked apparatus to measure and regulate the heat. Chevallier-Appert equipped the crude autoclave with another crude device, a manometer, which had been used for measuring heat in boilers. It would measure differences of only twenty degrees. He made it an instrument of precision, capable of measuring half a degree, and patented the invention in 1852. With greater heat, and an instrument to measure and control it, the difficulties of canning were overcome to such a degree that in June, 1852, Chevallier-Appert exhibited to scientists a whole sheep that had been cooked and sealed in a huge can in his autoclave four months before.
Comments
The way the world and food prices are going it's not a bad idea to can, preserve, and prep. I'm thinking of buying a chicken with the price of eggs anymore. I can get a hen for the price of two dozen eggs now here in the midwest.
Posted by BrokeDad in Midwest US on 07/17/15 at 10:16 AM
The son of a friend of ours figured out how to can potatoes successfully.
@BD: That's a foul idea. Get ducks.
@BD: That's a foul idea. Get ducks.
Posted by Expat47 in Athens, Greece on 07/17/15 at 10:45 AM
Good thing it worked or he'd have felt pretty sheepish!
BD already has a pair of wild ducks that visit his lovely back yard from time to time.
BD already has a pair of wild ducks that visit his lovely back yard from time to time.
Posted by Patty in Ohio, USA on 07/17/15 at 12:24 PM
`You look a little shy; let me introduce you to that leg of mutton,' said the Red Queen. `Alice -- Mutton; Mutton -- Alice.' The leg of mutton got up in the dish and made a little bow to Alice; and Alice returned the bow, not knowing whether to be frightened or amused.
😜
😜
Posted by KDP on 07/17/15 at 03:30 PM
Commenting is not available in this channel entry.
Category: Animals | Food | Technology | Nineteenth Century