The Jar That Conquered Time: A History of Canning
- Jan 17
- 4 min read
History:
In comparison to drying, curing, pickling, salting, cold storage, and freezing, canning is a relatively new method of food preservation. During canning, food is preserved through heat processing and storage in sealed airtight containers. This process was developed by Nicolas Appert of France during the Napoleonic Wars. In 1795, Napoleon’s government offered an award of 12,000 francs for the invention of a food preservation method suitable for sustaining large quantities of French troops both on land and at sea. Appert won the award in 1809.
Nicolas Appert, a French confectioner, invented the process of canning food in the early 1800s by sealing it in airtight containers and heating them, winning a prize from Napoleon's government for a method to preserve food for the French army. Later, Peter Durand of England patented the use of tinplate cans, and Bryan Donkin opened the first canning factory in England, marking the start of modern canning.
"A candy maker helped popularize canning by bottling everything from eel to eggs to peaches”
In 1815, explorer and botanist Sir Joseph Banks wrote to a tinned-food manufacturer raving about the canned two-year-old veal he'd just eaten.
He called canned food "one of the most important discoveries of the age we lived in." He also requested a supply of concentrated consummé, as it was better than the soup he usually ate "at home or abroad." At the time, commercial canned food was practically brand-new — nearly the same age as Bank's veal. Finding a reliable means of preserving food was essential for colonizing and warring nations. That included Napoleon Bonaparte's France.
The search for food preservation methods
Napoleon witnessed the effects of hunger and thirst as he led his army through the Egyptian heat in 1798.
When he took power in France, Napoleon elevated doctors and scientists to positions of power to solve problems like this.
Those men then formed organizations and "supported research related to food preparation and preservation that might benefit France's armies and navies," historian Jennifer J. Davis wrote in "Defining Culinary Authority."
In 1809, one such organization, the Société d'encouragement pour l'industrie nationale, held a contest searching for food preservation methods.
Nicolas Appert — who had been sealing food in corked jars for several years and had already been experimenting with heating and bottling food for over a decade — took the prize.
The Appert method of food preservation
Appert had been in the food industry practically since childhood. His father was an innkeeper and brewery owner, and he'd worked in distilleries and wine cellars before opening his own confectionery shop.
The heating process needed to make candy as well as the bottling process for wine and beer may have influenced his method for preserving food. He described himself as reared "in the art of preparing and preserving" and "having lived, as it were, in pantries, in breweries, in store-rooms, and in the cellars of Champagne."
In 1795, he started trying to preserve different foods. He used empty Champagne bottles, then specially made glass containers. After sealing them, he'd boil the entire bottle and its contents in a water bath.
Appert wasn't precisely sure why his method worked, but he believed limiting its contact with air and the water's heat were "both indispensable." He was correct on both counts.
In addition to bottling vegetables and fruit like asparagus, cauliflower, peaches, and cherries, Appert also partially cooked some dishes before bottling and heating them. He made seasoned eel, mutton tongue, meat broth, and egg in bechamel sauce.
To make sure his food retained the proper color, aroma, and taste, he tested different times and temperatures for heating different dishes. Many probably wouldn't pass food-safety inspections, like the beef jelly that only needed heating for 15 minutes.
Each jar of preserves could cost a day's wage. For those who could afford it, they could open the can (which was actually quite a chore until the can opener was invented decades later) and enjoy almost-fresh green vegetables in the middle of winter.
From Glass bottles to Tins:
Bryan Donkin purchased the patent for £1,000, and it was he and his partners who made the consummé Banks so enjoyed. The cans could weigh as much as 20 pounds, but they were hardier than Appert's bottles.
The industry started spreading almost immediately. By the 1820s, the US had a few canneries, and the country's first patent for tin cans was granted in 1825.
An engraving from the 1870s shows a busy French cannery.
This all happened decades before Louis Pasteur's groundbreaking work on pasteurization, which finally revealed the role of bacteria in spoilage. Pasteur’s method drastically reduced bacterial loads, though it didn't achieve full sterilization—the complete eradication of all microorganisms.
Among these dangerous microbes is the source of botulism, often labeled "a disease of civilization." While historically linked to sausages and smoked meats, the botulism bacteria found a perfect home in improperly canned foods. This persistent threat is a key reason for the fluctuating public trust—and shifting popularity—of commercially canned goods in the centuries following Appert's pioneering work.
Despite his revolutionary contribution, Appert spent his later years grappling with debt. Facing eviction from his own laboratory in 1824, he made a desperate plea to the Ministry of the Interior: "I gave my life to science and to mankind. You're taking away the premises I thought ought to be mine." His appeal was not entirely in vain; the Restoration government later acknowledged his service, granting him a modest pension of 4,000 francs annually for a decade.
Comments