eat food, something that species without access to fire were unable to do. This is in addition to the extra protection that a fire gave early humans in their ability to ward off predators, a very real problem when they were not the top of the food chain.
Another uniquely human trait is that almost all cultures have similar, well-defined meal patterns compared to our primate cousins, who don’t have breakfast, lunch and dinner, unless you are a primate who lives in a zoo. Cooking meant that mealtimes had to be a cooperative and social affair, so that those providing the meat knew when they needed to be present to consume it and those tending the fire knew when to light it and be prepared to watch it. This meant that early pitmasters had to be more static than their ancestors.
One side effect of cooking over a wood fire is that the incomplete combustion of wood releases harmful compounds, namely Polycyclic Aromatic Hydrocarbons (PAHs). Studies of our genome versus that of Neanderthals has revealed that we are able to synthesize PAHs more effectively than our primate counterparts. What this means is that we have effectively evolved to be more resilient to the harmful effects of cooking over a wood fire than our primate counterparts. This then begs the question, are we the only human species still in existence because not only were we able to deliberately barbeque meat, but also evolve to not be effected by the harmful compounds that allowed us to cook it in the first place?
What did the first barbeque look and taste like?
Homo habilis was the first of our ancestors to barbeque meat, but what we do not know was what the first barbeque looked, smelled and tasted like and how it came to be. Homo habilis would have had the ability to keep a log slowly burning on the ground whilst they slept in trees, where perhaps they may have dropped a few morsels of raw meat onto the slowly burning log and found them in the morning. But let’s go back to where we started, A.A. Gill, and see what he thought the first barbeque looked like. He challenges quote that too-often makes an appearance on the walls of gastropubs, “it was a brave man who first ate an oyster”, which he states isn’t the case, and contends that:
“the really brave man was the first man that ate a burnt animal. Can you imagine how terrifying that must have been? All you’ve ever seen of fire is horrifying, and suddenly you come across this thing that stinks of death and burning…and the missus says…I bet you wouldn’t eat that? But he does…and it changes everything. Eating big bits of meat…eating big animals, means cooperation. If you cook it, you can feed old people with bad teeth and young people with no teeth.”
The Author. Jason Wood is an avid backyard barbecue chef, cooking almost solely on his Weber he loves all aspects of barbecue and what it has to offer. He recently completed a Master’s in Business Administration at the University of Northampton where was awarded a distinction for his dissertation on research into the sustainability of the UK barbecue food industry. He runs an emergent blog on barbecue, smoking and what he likes to call ‘barbecology’, an area he aims to blog more on some of the wider aspects of barbecue beyond just the recipes. To find out more go to www.hopsmokefire.com.
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