- Mar 26, 2015
- 65
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Can't attest to the verity of this one, but I found it fascinating:
Anchovies are the reason chicken is so abundant in America.
"You see, back in the 1920s and 30s, chicken breast cost as much as steak. Meanwhile a bunch of fishermen off the coast of South America were catching tons and tons of anchovies because they were so plentiful, and didn't know what to do with them all. They shipped the anchovies up to the states and it was so cheap and high in protein a bunch of it was turned into chicken feed. The new anchovy chicken feed drove the cost of raising chickens down, which in turn drove the price down, thereby making chicken much more available for average American families to consume on a regular basis.
The anchovies were replaced with corn feed after corn became cheaper, but the price of chicken never went back up. By that time, American families were used to eating chicken on a regular basis.
On a related note, before this happened most American families would eat some form of meat only once or twice per week at max. Poorer families would get some form of meat maybe once per month. The rest was fruits, vegetables, and grains. Once chicken became less expensive, people would eat it much more often. This meant children were getting lots more protein than any generation before them had ever gotten, and some people attribute increased growth and physical development of children to the increase in protein. We, as a species, have been getting significantly taller in the last 100 years, and the availability of chicken may be to blame.
TLDR You are taller than your great grandfather because of anchovies, even though you may never have eaten one. "
Anchovies are the reason chicken is so abundant in America.
"You see, back in the 1920s and 30s, chicken breast cost as much as steak. Meanwhile a bunch of fishermen off the coast of South America were catching tons and tons of anchovies because they were so plentiful, and didn't know what to do with them all. They shipped the anchovies up to the states and it was so cheap and high in protein a bunch of it was turned into chicken feed. The new anchovy chicken feed drove the cost of raising chickens down, which in turn drove the price down, thereby making chicken much more available for average American families to consume on a regular basis.
The anchovies were replaced with corn feed after corn became cheaper, but the price of chicken never went back up. By that time, American families were used to eating chicken on a regular basis.
On a related note, before this happened most American families would eat some form of meat only once or twice per week at max. Poorer families would get some form of meat maybe once per month. The rest was fruits, vegetables, and grains. Once chicken became less expensive, people would eat it much more often. This meant children were getting lots more protein than any generation before them had ever gotten, and some people attribute increased growth and physical development of children to the increase in protein. We, as a species, have been getting significantly taller in the last 100 years, and the availability of chicken may be to blame.
TLDR You are taller than your great grandfather because of anchovies, even though you may never have eaten one. "
