Food

The pop-top is a patently American invention.

How Popping Open a Can Became the Sound of Summer

More than 60 years ago, an unfortunate picnic set Ohioan Ermal C. Fraze on a path to inventing the first pop-top tab opener for canned beverages

A Southern Barbecue, a wood engraving from a sketch by Horace Bradley, published in Harper’s Weekly, July 1887.

The Evolution of American Barbecue

How America's meaty tradition grew from Caribbean roots to the four distinct styles we know today

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Can American Craft Sodas Save the Soft Drink Industry?

The sector is one of the few in the industry that are forecast to grow

Spam musubi, a Japanese-American dish created in Hawaii, is made of Spam, rice and seaweed.

How Spam Became a Staple of Asian Cuisine

When American G.I.s fought abroad in wars in the 20th century, they left behind an unlikely legacy: canned meat

Edna Lewis gathers ingredients in the garden behind Ellerslie Plantation west of Charlottesville, Virginia, 1975.

Women Who Shaped History

What Made Edna Lewis the Mother of Soul Food

The Virginia-born chef did more than anyone to elevate Southern food to haute cuisine

The Luxury Picnic Company in London launched in April 2020 to a rush of orders over social media, and the enthusiasm for the luxury picnic continued to rise.

Picnics Are Back

Gen-Z is spurning restaurants to enjoy hot dates outdoors—echoing the picnic's racy beginnings

A candlelit dinner in Scandinavia

Mimi Sheraton’s 10 Most Memorable Meals

From dinner by candlelight in Denmark to Peking duck in China, the celebrated food critic reveals her most memorable culinary experiences

Salmon spread is a common snack across Alaska.

Alaska

Salmon Spread Might Just Be the Most Alaskan Food

The smoky snack captures the state’s love for both salmon and preserved foods

Paczki made by Chicago bakery Delightful Pastries

What Is Paczki Day?

The Fat Tuesday tradition centered around eating fried, filled Polish pastries is celebrated across the Midwest, but especially in Chicago

The cabbage soup diet of the 1950s allowed the indulgence in as much cabbage soup as one could consume.

The Seesawing History of Fad Diets

Since dieting began in the 1830s, the ever-changing nutritional advice has skimped on science

Soup joumou is a savory, orange-tinted soup that typically consists of calabaza squash, beef, noodles, carrots, cabbage, various other vegetables and fresh herbs and spices.

Haiti's Beloved Soup Joumou Serves Up 'Freedom in Every Bowl'

Every year, Haitians around the globe eat the pumpkin dish on January 1 to commemorate the liberation of the world’s first free Black republic

After 30 years of research, a Greek archaeologist can tell today’s fishery biologists how bountiful the Mediterranean Sea once was.

Unearthing the Original Mediterranean Diet

An archaeologist works to find out how much fish ancient Greeks ate

Fungi and bacteria play a big part in shaping the flavor and texture of cheese.

The Science Behind Your Cheese

The food is not just a tasty snack—it’s an ecosystem

This year's titles include Watermelon and Red Birds, To Boldly Grow, Budmo! and Diasporican.

The Best Books of 2022

The Ten Best Books About Food of 2022

From cookbooks to memoirs to food history, these ten titles will fill you up

Under the right conditions, researchers say, some crop yields could increase by 50 percent or more.

Is Hacking Photosynthesis the Key to Increasing Crop Yields?

It’s an agricultural moonshot, but scientists hope to make plants like corn, wheat and barley as heat and drought resistant as cactus

Truffles have spread around the world, including to countries in South America.

How Truffles Took Root Around the World

For centuries, the wild delicacy grew only in Europe. But improved cultivation techniques have enabled the pricey fungus to be farmed in new places.

Prickly pear fruit growing on cactus

Is There a Market for Edible Cactus in the United States?

Often treated as a weed, the versatile prickly pear cactus could be the next big specialty crop

Two Hadza men in Tanzania carry bows and their catch.

Our Ancestors Ate a Paleo Diet, With Carbs

A modern hunter-gatherer group known as the Hadza has taught researchers surprising things about the highly variable menu consumed by humans past

Market research firm Fact.MR estimated that global nonalcoholic wine sales reached $1.6 billion in 2021 and will double in the next decade.

The Science Behind Nonalcoholic Wine

Drinking habits are changing, and vintners are exceeding tasters' expectations with new options stripped of their alcohol

An experimental vineyard at Cornell AgriTech’s McCarthy Farm in Geneva, New York, where researchers are studying hybrid grapes

Are Hybrid Grapes the Future of Wine?

Scientists, growers and winemakers are working with experimental varieties to adapt to the effects of climate change

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