Swindled: The Dark History of Food Fraud, from Poisoned Candy to Counterfeit Coffee ~ softapps4all

Saturday, July 16, 2011

Swindled: The Dark History of Food Fraud, from Poisoned Candy to Counterfeit Coffee

9:47 PM

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Through a fascinating mixture of cultural and scientific history, food politics, and culinary detective work, Bee Wilson uncovers the many ways swindlers have cheapened, falsified, and even poisoned our food throughout history. Swindled gives a panoramic view of history, from the leaded wine of the ancient Romans to today's food frauds such as fake organics and the scandal of Chinese babies being fed bogus milk powder.

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In the hands of people and corporations who have prized profits above the health of consumers, food and drink have been tampered with in often horrifying ways--padded, diluted, contaminated, substituted, mislabeled, misnamed, or otherwise faked. As Swindled reveals, modern science has both helped and hindered food fraudsters--increasing the sophistication of scams but also the means to detect them. The big breakthrough came in Victorian England when a scientist first put food under the microscope and found that much of what was sold as "genuine coffee" was anything but--and that you couldn't buy pure mustard in all of London. In fact, Wilson suggests, one of our best protections is simply to reeducate ourselves about the joys of food and cooking. Contents Preface 1 German Ham and English Pickles 2 A Jug of Wine, a Loaf of Bread 3 Government Mustard 4 Pink Margarine and Pure Ketchup 5 Mock Goslings and Pear-nanas 6 Basmati Rice and Baby Milk Epilogue: Adulteration in the Twenty-fi rst Century Notes Bibliography Acknowledgments Picture Credits Index