Oldest noodles
Archaeologists push back the date of the invention of noodles to 4,000 BP:
BBC NEWS
The 50cm-long, yellow strands were found in a pot that had probably been buried during a catastrophic flood.
Radiocarbon dating of the material taken from the Lajia archaeological site on the Yellow River indicates the food was about 4,000 years old.
Scientists tell the journal Nature that the noodles were made using grains from millet grass – unlike modern noodles, which are made with wheat flour.
The discovery goes a long way to settling the old argument over who first created the string-like food.
Professor Houyuan Lu said: “Prior to the discovery of noodles at Lajia, the earliest written record of noodles is traced to a book written during the East Han Dynasty sometime between AD 25 and 220, although it remained a subject of debate whether the Chinese, the Italians, or the Arabs invented it first.
Great science writing too–packed with detailed information yet succinct. I’ve never read a molecular biology news article as good.
