Facts are stranger than fiction. And who doesn't love strange, right? That said, I bring to you 15 food facts that you won't believe are true. So, get ready to be amazed, bewildered and overall confused. This is WhatTheFacts, raiser of eyebrows and teller of facts. Enjoy!

1. In the 1830s, Ketchup was sold as a medicine

2. Honeybee workers must visit 2 million flowers to make one pound of honey

3. Pringles once had a lawsuit trying to prove that they weren’t really potato chips

4. Apples belong to the rose family, as do pears and plums

5. Cocoa beans that are used to make chocolate were once used as currency

6. Castoreum, which is used as vanilla flavoring in different food items, is actually a secretion from the anal glands of beavers

7. One fast food hamburger may contain meat from 100 different cows

8. This is what’s really going on inside a cup of Noodles

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9. Gelatin is made from cattle hides and pork skins

10. Any given banana contains 45 micrograms of radioactive potassium 

11. The common bread ingredient L-cysteine is derived from human hair

12. Canola oil used to be called RAPESEED oil but the name was changed for marketing reasons

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13. Researches in New Zealand have developed a tearless onion. It turns off the gene which produces the enzyme that causes a person slicing an onion to cry

14. The 'TomTato' is a plant that produces both potatoes and tomatoes

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15. Popcorn was the first food cooked in a microwave. The second food was an egg, which exploded in the face of one of the experimenters

 

Note:

Images used are from the public domain unless mentioned otherwise. Attributions have been made where necessary.

'WhatTheFacts' is a series where I present the strangest and most bizarre facts that one might think are false but are actually true.

Other series I blog about:

1. Change Makers (a series about great men and women that have changed the world)

2. Knowledge Base (random topics to provide educational value to the reader)

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