This story really begins in the 1930s, with Henry Ford, automaker, soybean believer, chemurgist. "Chemurgy" was a sort of technocratic alliance between agriculturalists and industrialists, a movement that perceived America’s farmland as a source not only of food, but also of raw materials for modern industry. Chemists devised new uses for agricultural surplus and farm wastes: wallpaper and glue from peanut shells; synthetic rubbers from soybeans and corn; ethanol fuels from corn, barley, sweet potatoes, and Jerusalem artichokes; milkweed-stuffed life preservers. These new industrial markets were supposed to keep farmers afloat during the lean years of the Depression, while also providing a foundation for national self-sufficiency and continuing prosperity in a world that increasingly seemed on the brink of another war.
“Everything pertaining to an automobile has its origin in the earth,” explained one newspaper article in 1936, describing the Ford Motor Company's chemurgic research efforts. “There is no need, as Mr. Ford sees it, to exhaust the mines and forests if the material required can be grown on the farm.” Ford envisioned efficient farm-factories, where renewable materials could be grown, harvested, and processed into plastics, synthetic rubbers, and fuels, a future where his company would one day be in the business of “growing cars out of the ground.”
In particular, Ford placed a big bet on soy. Soy had been grown commercially in the U.S. since the 1920s, largely as a source of oils and animal feed, but Ford was particularly interested in its uses in phenolic plastics. The scientists at the soybean research laboratory at Ford's vast industrial compound in Dearborn, Michigan were tasked with developing new uses for soy oils and soy meals: in plastics, resins, lubricants, and fuels. Ford automobiles in the 1930s increasingly used soy-based materials in paints and shock absorbers, and featured soy-plastic buttons, knobs, and seats. This project culminated with the “soybean car,” a 1941 prototype whose chassis was (allegedly) made entirely from a soy-based plastic resin. Although the focus was on industrial research,
Ford did not entirely ignore the edible potential of the soybean. A vegetarian, Ford was an avid believer in the vital powers of soyfoods. A smorgasborg of soyfoods — including soybean “steaks,” soy milk, and soybean coffee — accompanied the soybean car’s debut.
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Boyer continued to work on spun proteins after the war, hoping to find a way to create a nutritious edible fiber from material destined for livestock feed or the trash heap. First, though, there was the problem of taste. Earlier attempts to make human foods out of defatted protein-rich soy meal had faltered; traces of soluble carbohydrates and other compounds gave the substance a disagreeably bitter “beany” flavor, and contributed to its unfortunate reputation for causing digestive distress. The introduction of highly refined food-grade soy protein isolates in the 1950s made it possible to produce spun soy fiber without the bitterness or the farting. Purified soy protein isolate produced fibers which were pale, bland, odorless, and highly digestible, an edible blank canvas primed for the application of flavor effects.
Boyer received a patent for his protein-spinning process in the early 1950s, which he then licensed to various food manufacturers. The first taker was Worthington Foods, an Ohio company that made vegetarian foods primarily for Seventh-Day Adventist communities. Worthington introduced the first commercial spun soy protein product: Fri-Chik, chicken-flavored pre-cooked heat-and-serve patties that were available frozen or in cans.
Larger food manufacturing and agribusiness companies, including Archer-Daniels-Midland, Swift & Co., and General Foods, licensed Boyer’s patent. But no company invested as much in the potential of spun protein as General Mills, which put Boyer's method at the heart of its synthetic foods research program. At its peak in the 1960s, General Mills’ Isolated Protein Research & Development Program employed more than 50 scientists and technicians, working on ways to scale up spun protein production and develop new kinds of commercial products.
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Bontrae's second use was as a meat extender, blended with ground beef to reduce meal costs without diminishing nutritional value. Initially, the main market for textured protein meat extenders were institutions, not households.
When the National School Lunch Program approved the addition of textured soy protein to meat dishes in 1971, it was a boon to spun protein manufacturers like General Mills and also makers of a competing product, extruded textured soy flours. (How many of my beloved elementary school sloppy joes were bulked with textured soy?) But a consumer market for these products was envisioned as well.
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More:
http://nadiaberenstein.com/blog/2017/6/5/tastethefuture
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