EATING AND DRINKING

For as in the days that were before the flood they were eating and drinking, marrying and giving in marriage, until the day that Noah entered into the ark.

—Matt. 24:38

1260 He Existed Only To Eat

The ancients tell of a Montrognon, a man who existed only to eat and drink. He was allegedly a descendant of Esau on his father’s side, and of Gargantua on his mother’s. He once performed a feat of killing six hundred Saracens who happened to get in his way as he was going to a dinner.

He was bandy-legged, could lift immense weights, had an elastic stomach, and four rows of teeth to chew things.

—19th Century Anecdote

1261 Rich Diet For Youths

With vitamin pills a staple on his breakfast table, and well-balanced diet to nourish him all through his youth, the average U. S. college freshman is half an inch taller than his father, and still growing. Green Bay’s Lombardi claims that he can put 15 lbs. of solid muscle on anybody with carefully supervised program of weight lifting and isometric exercise. Florida’s Graves feeds his football players a drink called “Gatorade,” which tastes like weak lemonade, sodium chloride, potassium chloride, sodium bicarbonate, calcium cyclamate and citric acid. It was designed by scientists to replenish the chemicals that are burned up by the human body during strenuous exercise.

—Time

1262 World’s Largest Dish

The largest single dish in the world is whole roasted camel. To celebrate a wedding or honor a visiting dignitary, Mohammedan tribes in the Arabian, Syrian and North African deserts usually give a feast whose main dish is—in size—without an equal. This is how it is “put together”:

The eggs are stuffed in fish, the fish stuffed in chickens, the chickens stuffed in sheep, and the roasted sheep stuffed into an entire camel.

1263 Marco Polo’s Ice Cream

History tells us that Marco Polo brought back a mysterious recipe to the courts of Europe. When the chefs tried this recipe, t hey were so delighted that they intended to keep the recipe secret- – just for the kings and nobility.

For many years, even back in the days of the Roman Empire, chopped ice were colored and flavored, making a favorite dessert for many people. But what Marco Polo is supposed to have discovered was ice cream. By adding milk or cream to ice, what a delicious dessert resulted!

For a few years, the recipe was kept very secret. Then somehow it leaked out, and the common people also began to make this delicious food. They found that by adding beaten eggs to the mixture it was even tastier.

—Gospel Herald

1264 Perfumed Food

Until a short time ago, the most elaborate meal listed on a menu in this country was the Maharaja Dinner which was served by the Taj Mahal Hindu Restaurant in New York City. Owing to the work involved, it had to be ordered three days in advance and for at least two persons. Containing many delicacies from India, some sprayed with expensive perfumes, the dinner consisted of 63 courses with 155 different dishes and cost $100 per person.

—Selected

1265 Lucullus Sups With Lucullus

Lucullus was a rich Roman soldier, noted for his extravagance and self-indulgence. Sometimes over 1,700 pounds was spent on a single meal. Horace reported that he had 5,000 rich purple robes in his house. On one occasion, a superb supper was prepared, and when asked who were to be his guests, he replied, “Lucullus will sup tonight with Lucullus.”

1266 Record Banquets

The largest recorded banquet was given by President Loubet of France to every one of the 22,000 mayors in France in 1900. Indoor banquets, however, is topped by the 10,158-guest, $15-a-plate extravaganza in support of Mayor Richard Daley of Chicago in 1971.

1267 Which Salad Is Mine?

A Dallas businessman tells how one rule of etiquette was written indelibly on his mind. At a dinner he once asked the lady on his right: “Pardon me, but am I eating your salad?”

“Honey,” she said, “it’s very simple. Youse eats to your left and youse drinks to your right.”

It was language, says the man, that youse don’t forget.

—Dallas Morning News

1268 Eating Tools Worldwide

Roughly, one-third of the world eat with a knife and fork, a third eat with chopsticks and a third eat with their fingers.

1269 Mealtimes Down Centuries

In the fourteenth century breakfast hour was five; dinner, nine; supper, four. In the fifteenth and sixteenth centuries the breakfast hour was seven; dinner, eleven; supper, six. Towards the close of the sixteenth century, dinner advanced to noon. In Ireland the gentry dined at between two or three in the early part of the eighteenth century.

—E. Cobham Brewer

1270 Meal Atmosphere Important

A meal is not simply food but also the spirit in which it is eaten. Mealtimes should be the occasions for the happiest kinds of exchanges and learning—for cheerful, not solemn, communion. A bad meal can be redeemed by good conversation, but a good meal can be irretrievably ruined by bad conversation.

—House & Garden

1271 Champion Potato Eater

A six-foot Scotsman laid claim to the salted potato chip eating championship of the world. Richard McLeod downed thirty bags of the crisp delicacy—total of seventy-five ounces—in fifty-six minutes. Previous claimant of the title was Bob Speele, a miner in Northumberland, whose mark was twenty-nine packets in sixty-two minutes in 1956.

1272 Goldfish-Eating Champ

In a goldfish eating contest in Oakland, California, Leonard McMahan swallowed 501 goldfish in about four hours to smash the Guinness’ listed world record of 300 set by John Parker of Los Angeles in 1974. McMahan won a 240-gallon aquarium worth $1,000 for his feat.

1273 Eating-est Swimmer

Ersin Aydin, a Turkish swimmer, may not have set an endurance record during his 43 hours and 20 minutes in the water, but he did set one for eating more in the water than anyone else. While swimming down the Bosporus, Aydin consumed 14 steaks, 12 chocolates, 10 bottles of fruit juice, 8 pounds of peaches, 25 glasses of tea and 4 jars of honey. “I did it for the fatherland,” he said.

—Sports Illustrated

1274 World’s Biggest Hamburger

Australia has supplanted the United States in the battle to build the biggest hamburger, but the problems of getting rid of the creation made organizers wonder whether it was all worthwhile.

The big hamburger—all 1,000 pounds of it—led the grand parade at the 1974 Perth royal show. It measures 28 feet around, compared to a mere 14 feet for the previous record holder, made in Hattiesburg, Mississippi.

Health officials in Perth quickly grounded up a plan to feed the hamburger to all comers, saying its edibility couldn’t be guaranteed.

—Associated Press

1275 Quitting Bananas

An 81-pound junior high school student decided to challenge the record set in 1967 by England’s Anthony Figg, who downed 40 bananas in 39 minutes, 40 seconds, after thumbing through the Guinness Book of Records for a field to conquer. He is 14 years old.

His real specialty—lemon-swallowing and watermelon-eating—unfortunately were not listed.

So Ellis invested $1.86 on 18.6 pounds of bananas and strolled over to the Sepulveda Dam sports center, where a crowd of well-wishers and photographers had gathered.

“I skipped breakfast,” he said.

He peeled the first banana at 1 noon.

Thirty minutes later it was all over. Ellis had eaten 13 bananas. Figg’s record was secure, and the Tobin family was en route to a hospital to have the contender’s stomach pumped.

“Well, I didn’t make it,” Ellis told United Press International later, adding that he was giving up bananas.

1276 Bananas As Novelties

Most every grocery store now carry bananas. But until 1876, bananas were virtually unknown in this country. It was first brought out at the Philadelphia Centennial Exposition, wrapped individually in tin foil and sold as novelties for ten cents each.

1277 Admission: A Metal Case

Doctors at Metropolitan Hospital in New York City operated on a 38-year-old man, and removed more than 500 coins and metal objects from his stomach.

The man, a mental patient, arrived to be treated for an abdominal mass, which they suspected was tumor. The surgeons were told the patient had an enormous appetite and often ate double portions at meals. The surgeons found no damage to the patient’s esophagus or intestinal tract.

During the operation the surgical team counted more than 300 coins, including quarters, dimes, nickels, pennies and subway tokens. They said they found broken thermometers, can openers, knives, forks, spoons, nuts, bolts, chains and car keys.

1278 She Loves To Eat Paper

The Australian medical world heard the incredible story of a 31-year-old nurse who became ill because she habitually ate paper.

The woman started eating paper when she was 12. She began with small amounts of blotting paper and sheets of exercise books. During her nurse’s training, she stopped because she was ashamed of the habit and regarded it as unprofessional. After her marriage. she took up the habit again.

The woman’s usual diet was 5 to 10 kleenex and half a page of newspaper each day, and for variety, an occasional exercise book sheet.

1279 Cruel “Bread” Of China

During the great famine of China, the people made “bread” from a kind of edible earth. But this ingredient was devoid of any nutrients, so those who ate the loaves, starved. Meyer also refers to the nardoo plant which grows in Australia. The spores of this clover fern can be made into bread and porridge. But they contain no proteins, carbohydrates, or vitamins—the essentials for sustaining life. Those who depend upon it for food will have their stomachs filled, but they’ll eventually die.

1280 Alaska Likes Ice Cream

Strangely enough, Alaskan residents consume twice the national average of ice cream. Each Alaskan eats over six gallons of ice cream a year, the largest in per capita consumption of this product. As one says, “People like to sit in front of the fire, watch the snow fly and eat ice cream.”

1281 Sweden Likes Coffee

According to Freling Foster, in 18th-century Sweden, a country-wide controversy arose over the possible injurious effects of tea and coffee. So the King chose two (twin) brothers to act as “guinea pigs,” releasing them from a prison where they were serving life sentences on condition that one would drink a large quantity of tea and the other a large quantity of coffee each day. Decades later, the question was settled, as shown by Sweden’s increased consumption of coffee—the tea drinker having died at the age of 83 from senility and the coffee drinker at 94 from an accident.

And thus, the people of Sweden today are the world’s greatest coffee drinkers—drinking 29.85 lbs. of coffee per person per year!

1282 Revising Your Shopping List?

Interestingly enough, a recent White House-sponsored study noted, “If you classify foods from the most useful to the least useful, you’ll place meat, vegetables, fruits, milk, and eggs in the first category; bread, pastries, and cereals in the second; snacks in the third; and candy, soft drinks, and beer in the fourth.” Yet the bulk of food advertising is for things in categories three and four—the least useful foods.

—C. R. Hembree

1283 Eat First Then Shop

According to Reader’s Digest, women who haven’t eaten for at least 7 hours prior to shopping, spend $5.76 more than their normal supermarket purchase. If they’ve eaten within two hours before shopping, they spend $7.45 less than usual!

So wise husbands, if you want to save money, take your wife out to lunch, spend $2–3, then do your grocery shopping!

1284 Origin Of Canned Food

Leon Lunden, research director of the Amalgamated Meat Cutters Local 56, tells us that when Napoleon’s armies invaded Europe, his general discovered that an “army marches on its stomach” and that foraging for food wastes time. But when the armies tried to carry their food with them it spoiled.

Thus, in 1795, the French government offered a prize of 12,000 francs to any Frenchman who could find a way to preserve food. Alas, it wasn’t until 1810 that Nicholas Appert claimed the money. After years of experiment, he discovered the basic principle of modern canning. He put food into a glass jar, sealed it and then cooked it at a high temperature. The food remained edible after standing many days.

1285 The Microwave Oven

The quick-cooking microwave ovens are now very popular. It was invented by Precy L. Spencer in 1945 when he discovered that he could cook with radio waves. The principle behind the phenomenon:

When microwaves enter food, they cause the liquid or moisture molecules to vibrate 2450 million times a second. The resulting friction causes the food to heat up. And thus, invisible microwaves cook a slice of bacon in one minute—without burning the paper towel covering it! An ordinary oven cooks potato in an hour; it cooks in four minutes.

1286 Toasting “Good Morning”

A mail-order house is touting a new gadget for happy little homemakers. It’s a branding iron which, when heated and pressed on toast, imprints a “Good Morning” greeting on each slice.

—King Features

1287 To Move Village to Meal-Table

The pygmies of West Africa like to bag elephants on their food-hunting expeditions for the village. When successful, they simply move their village to the elephant—far easier than to move the elephant to the village for everyone to get his daily share of the creature.

1288 Wanamaker’s Friend Eats To Excess

John Wanamaker told of meeting a boyhood friend who had experienced nothing but hard luck in his career. He had been locked out of his meager hotel room, and he was half starved. Deeply moved, Mr. Wanamaker fed him in his own restaurant, and urged him to order every delicacy on the menu. Then he handed him enough to pay his hotel bill, and ordered him to report to him for a good job the next morning.

The man never came. The hotel clerk, to whom the jubilant fellow had related the whole incident, called Mr. Wanamaker about noon. The man had died during the night—of acute indigestion.

1289 Florentine Makes Long Story Short

Several young men were seated at the table in an inn, and they ordered some partridges. While the partridges were roasting, they ordered other things, hoping that a Florentine friend who was with them would eat so much that when the partridges were served, he would not be hungry. The Florentine began eating, and the others began reciting one-by-one the misfortunes of their fathers.

When the partridges were brought to the table, it was the Florentine’s turn to tell about his own father; instead he started eating the partridges rapaciously. One of his companions asked him to tell them what had happened to his father at the end of his life; whereupon the Florentine came up with this shrewd reply: “My father dropped dead.”

—Italian Renaissance wit

1290 Thief Can’t Wait To Get Home

In Strasbourg, France, a sweet-toothed thief stole cognac, cookies, chocolates and caramels from his ex-employer, but couldn’t wait to enjoy his loot. Police followed a trail of caramel wrappers to his hideout and arrested the litterbug.

—Philadelphia Inquirer

1291 Macmillan’s Solomonic Decision

When Prime Minister Harold Macillan was British Resident Minister in Algeria during World War II, he was called upon to settle a dispute between British and American officers in the Allied mess. The Americans wanted drinks served before meals, the British after.

Macmillan’s solution was worthy of Solomon: “Henceforth, we will all drink before meals in deference to the Americans, and we will all drink after dinner in deference to the British.”

—Newsweek

1292 National Day Of Fasting

U. S. Senator Mark O. Hatfield presented a resolution designating Monday of Thanksgiving week (24th Nov., 1975) as “National Day of Fasting.” He and Stan Mooneyham, President of World Vision International called on all Americans to experience hunger willingly and to reevaluate their own life-styles and habits.

1293 Epigram On Eat and Drink

•     The golden rule when reading the menu in a restaurant: “If you can’t pronounce it—you can’t afford it.”

—The English Digest

•     From a Winstead, Conn., Church Bulletin: “Pot Luck Supper. Prayer and Medication Follow.”

•     The pearl begins as a pain in the oyster’s stomach.

—Pastor’s Manual

See also: Alcoholism ; Dieting ; Famines ; Ezk. 16:49; Luke 17:28; Rev 18:14.