[Sca-cooks] Sugar beets

[David Friedman]

I've been reading Boswell's memoirs, and came across a mention of his 
meeting with a German chemist. The footnote identified the chemist as 
the first person to extract sugar from beets. The meeting is in the 
1760's, so that suggests that beet sugar was unknown prior to the 
18th century, which I thought interesting.

Beet sugar is generally associated with Napoleon's response to 
blockade by Britain, but I had seen it suggested that it was known 
long before, just uncommon.
-- 
David/Cariadoc
www.daviddfriedman.com