While comprising a distinct branch of chemical research and manufacturing, since its origins in the second half of the nineteenth century, the flavor chemical industry has been intimately connected with other chemical industries, most prominently pharmaceuticals and petrochemicals. Developments in the broader chemical marketplace have had profound consequences for synthetic flavor production; for instance, the expanding range of chemical intermediates produced by the postwar petrochemical industry dramatically broadened the chemical palette available to flavor manufacturers. Flavor research has also contributed to chemistry, as in the case of the refinement of GC-MS technologies. Although these relations have been productive, they have also been problematic. Indeed, the “chemical” identity of flavor additives continues to be one of the most potent charges against these substances among a public increasingly concerned with “eating clean.”<br/>This paper examines several key moments of historical entanglement between flavor chemicals and the products of other chemical industries as a way of making sense of the place of this unique industry in the industrial food system. While primarily a history of science and technology, this paper will also consider broader cultural contexts and responses.<br/>

Eating chemicals: The flavor industry and its chemical relations

255th National Meeting (2018)

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