Beer

Bread for breakfast seems totally normal to our modern sensibilities — but beer for breakfast? Not so much. In ancient Egypt, though, beer was a primary source of nutrition, consumed daily by the working classes. (The upper class typically favored wine.) Unlike modern brews, the beer of ancient Egypt was often opaque, thick, and more like a soup or gruel. 

Made from barley or emmer wheat, the beer was typically quite low in alcohol content, around 3% to 4% — but still enough to start the day with a spring in one’s step. (Beer prepared for religious festivals and celebrations was normally of better quality and had a higher alcohol content.) The beverage was also sometimes issued as payment, and laborers — including those who built the pyramids of Giza — were provided with a daily ration of about 10 pints. 

Green Onions

What goes well with bread and beer for breakfast? Green onions, of course. In ancient Egypt, a simple breakfast of bread, beer, and green onions was fairly typical, providing enough energy for a laborer to get through much of the day. Green onions, also called scallions, were among the most common vegetables in ancient Egypt, and were valued for more than just their flavor and nutritional value. The Egyptians believed that onions warded off evil spirits, protected against the evil eye, and also cured most ailments, making them a fine way to start the day. 

Garlic

As they did with green onions, the ancient Egyptians regarded garlic as having culinary, medicinal, and protective qualities. Garlic formed part of the daily diet of many Egyptians, and was considered a key food for maintaining and increasing strength. Because of this, it was given to workers involved in heavy labor, including those who built the pyramids. It’s uncertain whether the Egyptian elites consumed garlic with such frequency, but historians do know that it was used in rituals. Well-preserved garlic cloves were also discovered in the tomb of Tutankhamun.  

Dates 

Egypt is the world’s top producer of dates today, yielding around 1.7 million tons annually. And dates were just as popular back in ancient times. They could be eaten fresh or dried for preservation, and the fruit’s high sugar content made it an ideal sweetener. Dates were sometimes baked into bread, and may occasionally have been added as a flavoring agent in beer — providing some necessary sweetness to counteract the green onions and garlic. When dates weren’t available, figs could serve a similar role in any ancient Egyptian breakfast. 

Honey

While most ancient Egyptians used dates and figs as sweeteners, those who could afford it used honey. Ancient beekeepers collected honey by making cylindrical hives out of mud and clay, which they kept on rafts to allow for seasonal movement along the river. Wealthier Egyptians could afford this superior sweetener, which they would eat for breakfast with their bread, or use to sweeten beer and cakes. Honey nut cakes, made with tiger nuts (a type of tuber), were particularly popular among the aristocracy. 

The ancient Egyptians also valued honey for its medicinal qualities, using it to treat wounds and soothe coughs. And, when mixed with garlic and the âfai plant, honey was considered highly effective at keeping ghosts at bay, making it the perfect breakfast ingredient for anyone looking for a little extra protection for the day.  

Baker’s Chocolate (1764)

Perhaps surprisingly, the baking chocolate in our favorite homemade desserts owes its name to its founder, not its use. Baker’s Chocolate began in 1764 in Dorchester, Massachusetts, when Irish immigrant John Hannon, a chocolate maker, and physician James Baker established a small mill on the Neponset River to grind cacao beans into drinking chocolate. When Hannon disappeared on a cocoa-buying voyage in 1779, Baker assumed full control and began marketing the product under his name. 

In 1823, the company was formally incorporated as Walter Baker & Company, named for Baker’s grandson Walter. At the time, chocolate was consumed primarily as a beverage — Baker’s didn’t start manufacturing sweetened chocolate bars until 1849. The company went through multiple ownership changes during the 19th and 20th centuries but continued producing chocolate under the Baker’s name, which remains in use today as part of the Kraft Heinz Company.

King Arthur Baking Company (1790)

The company now known as King Arthur Baking traces its origins to 1790, when Boston merchant Henry Wood founded Henry Wood & Company to import and distribute flour. In 1896, the company — by then operating as Sands, Taylor & Wood — introduced its own flour brand under the name King Arthur Flour at the Boston Food Fair. 

The company relocated to Norwich, Vermont, in the late 20th century and officially adopted the name King Arthur Flour Co. Employee-owned since 2004, the company updated its name to King Arthur Baking Company in 2020, maintaining continuity of its 19th-century brand name while reflecting its broader range of baking products. 

Keebler (1853)

Keebler began in 1853 when German immigrant Godfrey Keebler opened a small bakery in Philadelphia. From there, he took on business partners and eventually incorporated under the name Keebler-Weyl Baking Company. In 1927, the business became part of the United Biscuit Company of America, which went on to adopt the Keebler brand name for all of its products in 1966. But it wasn’t until 1969 that the first Keebler elf — dubbed J.J. Keebler — was introduced in a television commercial. In 1936, Keebler-Weyl became the first commercial baker of Girl Scout Cookies; today, a division of Keebler, Little Brownie Bakers, continues the tradition.

Campbell’s (1869)

The company now synonymous with tomato soup began in 1869 in Camden, New Jersey, as a partnership between Joseph A. Campbell, a fruit and vegetable merchant, and Abraham Anderson, a commercial canner and packer. The business was initially called Anderson & Campbell and produced canned tomatoes, vegetables, and jellies. In 1895, the company introduced its first jar of ready-to-eat beefsteak tomato soup. Two years later, in 1897, chemist John T. Dorrance developed the firm’s condensed soup process, allowing it to be packaged in cans, and the following year the company introduced its iconic red-and-white soup can label. In 1922, the name changed to The Campbell Soup Company, and in 2024 it became The Campbell’s Company. 

Pillsbury (1869)

At the recommendation of his uncle, Charles A. Pillsbury invested in a struggling Minneapolis flour mill in 1869. The business thrived under his management and he expanded operations along the Mississippi River, renaming the company Charles A. Pillsbury and Co. In 1889, the company was purchased by an English financial syndicate and merged with other holdings to become the Pillsbury-Washburn Flour Mills Company, Ltd. The Pillsbury family eventually regained ownership in the 1920s and incorporated the business as the Pillsbury Flour Mills Company in 1935. Ownership changed hands in subsequent decades and the historic company was acquired by General Mills in 2001. 

Quaker Oats (1877)

The Quaker Oats story began in 1877, when Henry Seymour and William Heston founded the Quaker Mill Company in Ravenna, Ohio, and trademarked the Quaker Oats name and image of a Quaker man to distinguish their oats from competitors. The struggling mill was bought a few years later, in 1881, by entrepreneur Henry Parsons Crowell, who turned the brand into a national name with the first magazine ad campaign for a breakfast cereal. 

In 1888, the Quaker Mill Company joined six other oat producers to form the American Cereal Company, which pioneered modern packaging and marketing. By 1891, Quaker was printing recipes — such as Oatmeal Bread — right on its boxes, another industry first. The company officially became The Quaker Oats Company in 1901, and a century later, after a 2001 acquisition by PepsiCo, the name evolved to Quaker Foods and Beverages.

Eating Black-Eyed Peas on New Year’s Day

In the American South, eating black-eyed peas on New Year’s Day is a common tradition and superstition said to bring luck and prosperity throughout the year ahead. When enslaved Africans brought black-eyed peas to America, the beans were initially used as food for livestock and enslaved people only. Black-eyed peas gained wider acceptance during the Civil War, when they were one of the few foods left untouched by Union troops, who considered them animal feed. Southerners therefore managed to survive on black-eyed peas during the winter, and so began the association with good luck and prosperity, and the tradition of eating them on New Year’s Day. 

Breaking the Wishbone

Breaking the wishbone of a cooked chicken or turkey is a common Christmas practice in the United Kingdom and a Thanksgiving tradition in the United States. Objectively, it’s a very strange thing to do, no matter how much luck might be up for grabs: It involves making a wish while pulling the bird bone in two with another person, and the person who gets the bigger piece will have their wish granted.

The origins of this peculiar superstition are debatable. One common theory goes all the way back to the ancient Etruscans, who saw birds as potent oracles. They extracted wishbones from chickens, dried them in the sun, and then touched the bones as a form of divination. The Romans picked up this practice later, by which time the bone was being snapped in half, possibly to double its power. The Romans then introduced the concept to Britain, and it eventually found its way to the Americas via English settlers. 

It’s hard to say whether the superstition really has such a long and storied history with a direct link all the way back to the Etruscans. We do know that the wishbone-breaking tradition as we know it today existed at least as early as the 17th century or early 18th century, when the bone was known as a “merrythought.” The term “wishbone” first appeared a century or so later. 

Double-Yolk Eggs Bring Good Fortune

Statistically, about one in every thousand eggs has a double yolk. So, if you regularly crack open and cook eggs, there’s a chance you’ll come across one at some point. For the superstitious, an egg with two yolks is widely considered a sign of impending good luck. It’s not known where or when this superstition emerged, but the reasoning behind it is clear to see. Eggs have long been associated with life, rebirth, and potential, making a double yolk a natural candidate for a symbol of abundance, prosperity, and good luck. Double yolks are sometimes regarded as a sign of an upcoming marriage, or that a woman will soon become pregnant with twins. 

Blowing Out the Candles on a Birthday Cake

The superstitious tradition of blowing out candles on birthday cakes has surprisingly ancient origins. Some historians believe it goes as far back as the ancient Greeks, who may have made cakes adorned with lit candles to honor Artemis, the goddess of the hunt and moon. This, in turn, was adopted by the Romans, who helped spread the tradition.

In modern Europe, the ritual of celebrating birthdays with a cake and candles — as we do today — has been around since at least the 18th century. One of the first documented accounts comes from the 1746 birthday party of Count Ludwig Von Zinzendorf, a German bishop, who had a massive cake covered in candles. At this point, in Germany at least, the act of extinguishing the candle flames was seen as a way to carry desires up to the gods — not dissimilar to how we blow out candles and make a wish today. 

Eating 12 Grapes at Midnight on New Year’s Eve

The tradition of eating a dozen grapes on New Year’s Eve comes from Spain, and while the origins are still debated, it dates back to at least the 1880s. According to some historians, the Spanish bourgeoisie decided to imitate the French New Year’s celebration of drinking champagne by skipping the middleman and going straight for the grapes. Others suggest the tradition began as a shrewd marketing tactic by grape growers who had a surplus harvest to unload in the early 1900s. 

Either way, the ritual caught on: By eating one grape at each of midnight’s 12 clock chimes, you are destined for a lucky year, with each grape representing one of the 12 forthcoming months. The custom soon spread throughout Latin America, in countries as diverse as Cuba, Mexico, Puerto Rico, Argentina, and Peru. Some Latino populations in the U.S. have also maintained the grape-eating superstition.

Roman Defrutum

It’s well known that the ancient Romans enjoyed their wine, but it’s possible a component of the winemaking process fueled ill health in a manner that went beyond the typical hangover. The Romans made a sweet, syrupy substance called defrutum, which was prepared by boiling unfermented grape juice. This syrup was used as a preservative for wine and fruit, as well as in sauces for dishes of pork, veal, and lentils, as described in the famed Roman cookbook De Re Coquinaria. 

The problem was in the sweetener’s preparation: Ancient scholars including Cato and Pliny the Elder called for the syrup to be boiled in a lead-lined pot, inevitably resulting in the syrup’s absorption of lead. Although the hazards of lead poisoning were known to the Romans, it apparently never occurred to these great minds that they were endangering the public with their instructions.

Tansies

Nowadays, a typical Easter meal might include a ham and a sampling of the chocolate left by the Easter Bunny, but for Christians in medieval England, the holiday was incomplete without the serving of the tansy. The dish was named for its primary ingredient, the yellow-flowered tansy plant, which was mixed with herbs and a hearty helping of eggs to produce what was essentially a large, sweet omelet. 

Coming on the heels of Lent, the tansy not only provided a welcome change from the strict diet of lentils and fish consumed over the previous 40 days, but also was said to provide relief from the gas-inducing Lenten meals. Despite its purported medicinal qualities, the plant is actually mildly toxic, its pyrrolizidine alkaloids dangerous to humans in high doses. Although the poison didn’t hinder the long-standing popularity of the tansy on dinner tables, people are generally dissuaded from eating the plant today.

Victorian Bread

You could highlight an array of foods in Victorian England that would fail to pass muster under any food safety laws, from the lead chromate found in mustard to the arsenic compounds used to color confectionery. However, given its ubiquity in households of the era, the most egregious example may well be bread. 

Seeking to create thick loaves of an appealing white hue, Victorian bakers mixed in such ingredients as ground-up bones, chalk, and plaster of Paris. Another common additive was alum, an aluminum-based compound that inhibited digestion and contributed to the malnutrition rampant among the poorer population. Although the dangers of adulterated edibles were known among the more educated members of the public, there was little stopping the food producers and distributors who ignored these health risks in favor of profits.

Rhubarb Leaves

Known for its reddish stalk and tart flavor, rhubarb in the hands of a capable chef can be used to create delicious pies, sauces, and jams. That is, the stalks can be turned into such kitchen delights — the thick green leaves are chock-full of toxic oxalic acid and therefore not meant for ingestion. Unfortunately, this fact was not well known a century ago, as rhubarb leaves were recommended as a source of vegetation during the food shortages of World War I. 

Consumed in small but regular doses, the leaves inhibit the beneficial effects of calcium and trigger the buildup of calcium oxalate, leading to kidney stones. While a human would normally have to eat something like 6 pounds of the stuff to experience the more acute effects (including vomiting, diarrhea, and kidney failure), there was at least one reported case of oxalic acid poisoning during the rhubarb leaf’s brief run as a lettuce substitute.