How essential is hot food

How cooking made us human.

Bruce

While the 'art of cooking' may be a more recent invention in human terms, I seem to remember it being pointed out to me is some lesson or other that 'cooked' food metabolises much faster than raw food - and as such became the norm once man had 'invented' fire. Whether they realised this fact back then is dubious, but I'm willing to bet that it 'evolved' very quickly into the 'normal' way of getting nutrition into the body quickly.
Edit : I see Bruce has provided a link to a book saying pretty much just that!

This is the summary provided in the link posted by Bruce.

Ever since Darwin and The Descent of Man, the existence of humans has been attributed to our intelligence and adaptability. But in Catching Fire, renowned primatologist Richard Wrangham presents a startling alternative: our evolutionary success is the result of cooking. In a groundbreaking theory of our origins, Wrangham shows that the shift from raw to cooked foods was the key factor in human evolution. When our ancestors adapted to using fire, humanity began. Once our hominid ancestors began cooking their food, the human digestive tract shrank and the brain grew. Time once spent chewing tough raw food could be sued instead to hunt and to tend camp. Cooking became the basis for pair bonding and marriage, created the household, and even led to a sexual division of labor. Tracing the contemporary implications of our ancestors’ diets, Catching Fire sheds new light on how we came to be the social, intelligent, and sexual species we are today. A pathbreaking new theory of human evolution, Catching Fire will provoke controversy and fascinate anyone interested in our ancient origins—or in our modern eating habits.

I didn't appreciate the significance of the question I initially asked. I had just noticed everybody wrapped up this week and wondered what would happen if we didn't get a hot drink every now and again!!

Cheers

Don

Life would be very harsh and cruel. People have survived as we know, and some perish.

Can one survive on sushi and sashimi alone?

> the human digestive tract shrank and the brain grew

Sounds pretty much like nonsense to me.
Cooking your food, which is primarily needed for meat, kills off bacteria etc.
That's all.
Sure, heating food can make certain vitamins etc. more easily accessible, but warm or hot food is by no means necessary and I doubt it had anything to do with our developement as a species other than allowing us to live longer due to killing off whatever harmfull there was on our food.

Same for water. Cook water to disinfect it, to kill off germs.

I can happily live for weeks without warm food. Actually, you can live without what we consider to be "food".
Anything other than water is really just food. Juice, milk, it's all liquid foods.

Our body needs proteins, carbohydrates and fat in addition to water. The body does not care in which form this is supplied.

quote:

Originally posted by GreenAlex:
> the human digestive tract shrank and the brain grew

Sounds pretty much like nonsense to me.
Cooking your food, which is primarily needed for meat, kills off bacteria etc.
That's all.
Sure, heating food can make certain vitamins etc. more easily accessible, but warm or hot food is by no means necessary and I doubt it had anything to do with our developement as a species other than allowing us to live longer due to killing off whatever harmfull there was on our food.

Same for water. Cook water to disinfect it, to kill off germs.

I can happily live for weeks without warm food. Actually, you can live without what we consider to be "food".
Anything other than water is really just food. Juice, milk, it's all liquid foods.

Our body needs proteins, carbohydrates and fat in addition to water. The body does not care in which form this is supplied.

I don't really agree, especially with the last sentence. Cooking food allows certain foodstuffs to be more digestible as well as palatable (especially plant carbohydrates) and safer. It also allows possible storage of cooked/smoked foods. Liberating an animal from the need for continous daily fresh food gathering/hunting gives time and opportunity for other activities. Grazing animals do more or less nothing but eat because the food they consume is marginal for nutrition. If you have more time and calories 'spare' then the space exists for the development of other behaviours; social interaction, shelter construction, tool making and communication for example. Since food is so central to existence it is not a suprise that food gathering and preparation might form a focus for developing social interaction and therefore probably the subject of early communication 'Pass the salt would you' may have been the first words spoken!

Bruce

You are basing your assumptions on the need for meat, which is wrong.
Although many humans like to think so, the human body does not need meat to survive, nor is it the healthiest diat.

On top of being wastefull of course.

Storage of food (which is mainly necessary again for meat) does not require cooking to make it easier to digest, but as I said, to kill of bacteria, germs etc.
By the way, storage is easier and better by keeping meat refrigerated and/or stored in salt.

Ease of digestion is an argument, but it has nothing to do with increasing brain activity. Nor is is necessary. The human digestive system is perfectly capable of digesting food it needs.
The real problem is that people like to eat foods that are not ideal for digestion just because they like the taste or because it is trendy.

There is a big difference between necessity and luxury. And eating meat is the latter. And cooking foods for digestive purposes is the latter as well.


Your analogy to animals is wrong as well. Grazing animals have a poor digestive system to begin with, hence they have to either eat their own waste or re-digeste their foods. This is not the same with humans (haven't met anyone that does either ).
And grass does not contain carbohydrates, proteins and fats. It only has a limited supply of any of those.

The human body needs those three and does not care where it gets it.
If cows were to eat fruit, have some eggs and bread, they would probably not need to eat that much.

By the way, if you weighed 600kg and only ate grass with hardly any carbo/protein/fat, then you would do nothing else but eat either
Cooking grass would surely not help at all!

You misrepresent my post. It specifically mentions carbohydrates, not meat. Plants such as maize, cassava etc become more digestible when processed or cooked. These provide energy dense sources of nutrition.

I also think you are making an error by comparing the modern human digestive system and behaviours with that of an evolving species of early human. I doubt early humans adopted cooking because it was 'trendy', or as a lifestyle choice. Eating meat was not a 'luxury' for early man. We evolved from omnivores and our digestive apparatus and flora has developed as our species has developed. Herbivores are adpated to their evolutionary niche, suggesting they have a 'poor' digestive system is wrong, they have a system that has evolved to work well in their niche. If cows ate fruit eggs and bread then they would not be cows and they would be competing in an new ecological niche, perhaps unsuccesfully.

The point in comparison is that by succesfully gathering and consuming food of higher energy density (which occcurred only partly due to cooking but also due to migration, organisation and later tool making) compared to other species we are liberated from having to continously consume, hunt or graze 18 hours a day. We then have a species with greater accessibility to and flexibility of food consumption. It is argued that this was an important step in the complex cognitive and social development of a species with increasing higher functions such as the hominids, and also that much of this may have focussed around food. Food comsumption for most adult animals tends to be a selfish event, each foraging and eating alone. This is true even in higher apes. Cooking could be seen as a stage in which early human families began to divide roles and therefore have a more collaborative ('social') approach to food consumption, something in whch we are unique in the animal kingdom. I don't think cooking was a luxury for early man as you suggest, just as building shelters or having access to fire was not a luxury. They were part of the evolution of a modern human who is capable of managing his environment in an increasingly sophisticated way.

I sense a vegetarian agenda in your post. Humans evolved, the argument that modern humans do or do not 'need' meat is irrelevant in an evolutionary context-it is what happened. Applying modern arguments regarding farming and economics (valid though they may be today) to a species in evolution tens of millions of years ago seems wrong to me.

The book is interesting and worth a read, not sure I quite grasped all of the subtleties but it made me think.

Bruce

quote:

Originally posted by GreenAlex:
Nor is is necessary. The human digestive system is perfectly capable of digesting food it needs.

If we can ignore meat for the moment - as this is about cooking.

(OK - it was about hot/warm food but warming up a lettuce just makes a limp salad.)

Cooking opens up a wider choice of foods and makes the full value of these, and existing foods, available/more readily available.

E.G. - see carotenes and http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Nixtamalization.

quote:

If we can ignore meat for the moment - as this is about cooking

Japanese people like raw, fresh meat (except Pork & Duck) AFAIK.

Hot food is nice but not essential.

quote:

Naim Audio Main Website forums Naim Users Padded Cell How essential is hot food

My original post had two themes:-

1. Could a modern man survive in sub-zero temperatures without hot food or drink, bearing in mind that body heat escapes through even the best insulated outdoor clothing. Imagine Antarctica, but no fire, no Primus stove, no hot food, no hot drinks.

2. How far back in time has mankind been cooking/eating hot food. Modern man has only been around for c.200,000 years. Neanderthals were around before us and presumably cooked hot meals. Did other, older hominoids cook.

Bruce indicates there is strong case to suggest we have actually evolved into our current form over millions of years as a result of cooking. Seems plausable to me. Could we now survive in an arctic climate without heat and hot food?

Cheers

Don

quote:

Could we now survive in an arctic climate without heat and hot food?

I think we have been brought up to believe whatever we are told to believe. If you grew up in a culture that believes in hot, cooked food is essential to human survival, evolution and civilization then you would not thought otherwise.

Remember that in the 12th & 13rd centuries, the Mongolian solders often took part in several military campaigns during long, extremely cold winters, surviving by drinking warm blood directly from their horses, eating only raw meat (hint: where does the steak tartare come from?), and yet they conquered a vast tract of land and established the biggest empire known to human. On the other end of the extreme, the Japanese bring the art of eating raw fish / meat (sashimi) to a very high point.

So in short, we can of course survive on raw food in extreme climate, if animals can survive then we can. After all we are just another kind of animal.

quote:

So in short, we can of course survive on raw food in extreme climate, if animals can survive then we can. After all we are just another kind of animal.

I don't doubt that we can survive for a period of time without hot food. We might even be able to survive a lifetime. I don't know. I suppose that Inuit manage to a certain extent.

However, just because other animals can do something, doesn't mean modern humans can. For example, cows can eat (and digest) grass. We can't. That's the only part of your post that gives me difficulty.

Cheers

Don

BBC News tonight announced that American scientists have confirmed that Neanderthals not only had a diet of meat, vegetables and pulses - but actually cooked their food.

The news item didn't state whether it was only the last wave of Neanderthals who cooked, or whether they cooked for (say) 500,000 years.

Cheers

Don

quote:

How long could we survive without hot food or hot water?

After 35 miles on my push bike yesterday my conclusion would be - not long!!

Hot food provided a bit of a cure but it was the bath full of hot water which made the difference!

Peter

quote:

it was the bath full of hot water which made the difference!

I know the feeling.

Each day, I try to fit in an hour or two's brisk walk over the Downs. The hot bath when I get home is pure heaven.

The same goes for a week-long backpacking trip in the Rockies. Even though I manage a hot wash each day, that soak in a hot bath at the end makes the world of a difference.

The American scientists didn't mention anything about Neandethals leaving evidence of hot baths or hot tubs, just hot porrige and brussel sprouts - not quite the same.

Cheers

Don

Hot food and drink is nice but not essential wherever you live.

Derry

You seem pretty certain of your stated facts - and I don't doubt they could be right.

What evidence are you able to refer to, to substantiate them

Cheers

Don

I don't see that I have to substantiate what is clearly obvious.

If hot food and drink were essential to human life, life would never have evolved. People survived quite well without the means to cook or heat food and water for millennia.

Are you seriously suggesting that man could not survive now without the means to cook or to heat water? If so perhaps it is for you to evidence that?

quote:

I don't see that I have to substantiate what is clearly obvious.

Well, it isn't obvious to me, which is why I asked the question in the first place.

You seemed to be pretty certain, so I assumed you had some background knowledge or reference that you might wish to share.

Cheers

Don

quote:

Originally posted by Derry:
I don't see that I have to substantiate what is clearly obvious.

If hot food and drink were essential to human life, life would never have evolved. People survived quite well without the means to cook or heat food and water for millennia.

Are you seriously suggesting that man could not survive now without the means to cook or to heat water? If so perhaps it is for you to evidence that?

The species survived OK, but for individuals, life was hard, hungry and short. Enough of them lived just long enough to reproduce. The ability to cook conferred an evolutionary advantage on those who could do so. They (and their children) could get more nutritional benefit (via increased digestibility, killing of bacteria and making food able to be preserved, rather than wasted etc) from a given effort in hunting, gathering or farming. They thus did better for being able to cook and therefore disproportionately were able to reproduce and have their "cooking-able" genes passed on.

The benefits of cooking food made the intelligence/ability to do so a survival benefit, and diminished the RELATIVE benefit of a "cast-iron gut". Thus brains evolved to be larger and digestive systems more specialised. It wasn't that actually eating cooked food made your brain bigger or your gut smaller. It was just that if you did, you were more likely to have more kids, and those kids were more likely to survive. Reduced infant mortality - post breast-feeding phase; and more rapid development of those children may have been a big driver here.

quote:

from a given effort in hunting, gathering or farming.

Good post Winky - much along the lines of the link provided by Bruce.

My only (slight) concern is contained in the extract above. Farming, as I recall, is only about 10,000 years old. The evolutionary changes outlined by Bruce and yourself seem to be associated with a much earlier period of Hominoid development, measured in millions of years.

So I would just stick with hunting/gathering and give farming the miss, this time round. But I could easily be wrong.

Cheers

Don

quote:

Originally posted by Don Atkinson:

quote:

from a given effort in hunting, gathering or farming.

Good post Winky - much along the lines of the link provided by Bruce.

My only (slight) concern is contained in the extract above. Farming, as I recall, is only about 10,000 years old. The evolutionary changes outlined by Bruce and yourself seem to be associated with a much earlier period of Hominoid development, measured in millions of years.

So I would just stick with hunting/gathering and give farming the miss, this time round. But I could easily be wrong.

Cheers

Don

Perhaps a fair call. It does not seem that their could be much evolutionary change in the last 10,000 years, but I imagine that the first farmers may have had some advantage over those still "wasting" effort on hunting and gathering. Therefore, those with the innate ability (intelligence?) to farm may have tended to out-survive and out-reproduce those who did not. Again, infant mortality may have been a huge driver. Possibly easier to keep your kids safe in one spot, rather than wandering through the countryside in-search of game. Same sort of argument as the cooking idea, but in addition to it, rather than as part of it. I might be totally off base here and farming is some sort of learned meme, rather than an ability tied to intelligence that is genetically transferred. I suspect the truth is in the middle. Sons and daughters follow their parents into farming (or not) for all sorts of reasons, and likely always have done so.