If You Like it Pink

Salt, or sodium chloride, has been used for thousands of years to preserve foods: remains of salted fish and birds have been found in Egyptian tombs. Salt works by drawing the moisture out of the flesh; it renders microbes inactive by dehydrating them. The impurities found in ancient sodium chloride (namely potassium nitrate, or saltpeter) were also very effective in killing bacteria. In the Middle Ages, saltpeter was used in the extraction of minerals and as an ingredient in gunpowder. Polish hunters preserved their game by rubbing the inside of the animal carcass with a mixture of salt and gunpowder. In the sixteenth century, it was realized that that saltpeter—potassium nitrate—and sodium nitrate added color and flavor to cured meats, but no one understood exactly how.