Today, many charcuterie boards, servings of buffalo chicken and cobb salads feature blue cheese and possibly even a glass of beer. New evidence shows that humans’ taste for a cheese flavored by fungi may have begun as early as 800 B.C.

The Hallstatt salt mines in the Eastern Alps preserved excrement left behind by the workers who extracted salt from underground. Last year, researchers analyzed molecules on four samples of paleofeces, or very old human poop, and found evidence of blue cheese and pale ale consumption as early as the Iron Age nearly 3,000 years ago.

Join Scienceline reporter Delaney Dryfoos on a foray to unearth the dietary habits of European salt miners from the Bronze Age to the Baroque era.

You can also listen to this episode of the Scienceline podcast on Apple Podcasts, Spotify or Stitcher.

Music:
Krainer Waltz - Traditional Austrian and Slovenian Music by JuliusH | Pixabay License

Blue cheese and pale ale have been on the menu for longer than researchers thought

Prescription drugs seep from Manhattan into the Hudson River, where they can wreak havoc on unsuspecting fish. A recent study found drugs at several points along the river, providing one more piece of evidence in a trend found across the nation. Dan Shapley, one of the study’s authors, explains how the drugs made their way into the river, and Jim Meador, an aquatic toxicologist with the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration, describes the potential consequences for fish.

PODCAST: The Hudson River is flowing with pharmaceutical drugs

The Scienceline podcast is produced by the Science, Health and Environmental Reporting Program in the Arthur L. Carter Journalism Institute at New York University. For more information, e-mail us at scienceline@gmail.com.

Blue cheese and pale ale have been on the menu for longer than researchers thought

Scienceline

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