The Rose Cafe talk by Dr. Ziegelman last week was about the diets of those living in the USA during the Great Depression. She discussed her book “A Square Meal” which is about the very simple, and very reductionist, recipes that Americans in food pantries and kitchens put themselves through. Many of these “square meals” were lacking in flavor and some staple ingredients like butter.

One of the consequences of the Progressive Movement was that scientists, and certainly many people, began constructing a great number of grand theories as to why things in the natural world were the way they were. These theories were very focused on health, especially in the case of positive eugenics and prohibition. When it came to diet some number of dietitians adopted the viewpoint that spices and other flavors that “popped” may have been linked with forms of cancer and various diseases. A more serious number were concerned with helping reduce hunger and worked on food that was easy to make but high in calories – and thus the canned and processed meal was born.

Fortified breakfast cereal was one invention that came from Cornell. Another was this “white sauce” actually developed by Flora Rose herself.

Perhaps this movement was partially to blame for the rise in processed food and added sugar in American diets after World War 2. As fat and fiber were taken out of food, they were replaced by salt and sugar. Perhaps important for people who are starving. Less so for a society stricken by obesity and diabetes.