The History of Food: How cultural developments over time have changed the food we eat and how we process it.

 As part of our new Inquiry we have been exploring the history of food, how the way human development has changed what, and how we eat. 

                                Timeline of our first thoughts around human development and food.                        

Although we have just started work on this, here are some of the things we found out.

The Paleolithic era, a time of the hunter gatherers saw early hominids eating what they collected; fruit, berries, roots, fungi, grains and occasionally meat including small reptiles and insects. The main form of processing food was cooking using fire. Evidence suggests this began about 2.5 million years ago. As well as this some foods may have been preserved by fermenting, possibly burying it; drying or salting.

                Timeline after some research. 

About 10, 000 years ago the Neolithic era saw people begin to farm. They ceased to roam looking for food but cultivated crops (Horticulture) and began to keep animals (Pastoralism). 

We are going to keep exploring the technologies involved with processing and preparing foods including fermenting, salting and making cheese to preserve milk. 

We are going to learn more about how food is processed and prepared and then we want to have a celebration of food in which we bring and share food connected to us. Keep an eye out for details.