Abstract
In addition to the more traditional wines from the fermentation of fruits, and beer from the fermentation of grains, some cultures also developed fermented alcoholic beverages from the milk of various animals. Of course, this required the domestication of animals in order to provide a regular supply of milk. As such, fermented milk products were generally developed at later dates then either beer or wine.
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- 1.
Also known as kifir or khiafar [9].
- 2.
Martinus Willem Beijerinck was born March 16th, 1851 in Amsterdam [15]. He studied chemistry under Van’t Hoff at the Delft Polytechnical School and biology at the University of Leiden. In 1873, he was hired to teach at the Agricultural School in Warffum, but his teaching was found lacking and he lasted only one year [15]. In 1875, he became a part-time teacher at the State Secondary School at Warffum, before taking a teaching position at the Agricultural High School in Wageningen in 1876 [14, 15]. In 1885, he became a microbiologist at the Netherlands Yeast and Alcohol Manufactory in Delft, where he became quite successful [14, 15]. In 1895, he returned to academics when the Dutch government created a special position for him at the Delft Polytechnical School, a position he held until his retirement in 1921 [14, 15]. During his scientific career, he published over 100 articles dealing with a great variety of subjects in the fields of botany, microbiology, and virology. His scientific achievements include fundamental papers on the physiology of luminescent bacteria, the root nodules of Leguminosae, and bacterial nitrogen fixation. [14]. He died January 1, 1931 in Gorssel, Netherlands [15].
- 3.
Also referred to as lactic fermentation, homolactic fermentation, or glycolysis.
- 4.
- 5.
William of Rubruck (ca. 1220–1293) was a Flemish Franciscan monk, missionary, and explorer who set out for the land of the Tartars provided with credentials of King Louis IX of France directed to the Mongol chiefs Sartach and Batu. William returned to Cyprus in 1255 and ultimately presented to the King of France a very clear and precise report of his travels, considered to be one of the great masterpieces of medieval geographical literature, comparable to that of Marco Polo, and quoted by later authors such as Roger Bacon [21].
- 6.
It is generally agreed that the term cosmos used here refers to kumis. It is believed that this is a combination of an incorrect rendering of the intended kumis, combined with a fanciful spelling introduced for the sake of repetition of sound between the two syllables [18].
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Rasmussen, S.C. (2014). Fermented Milk. In: The Quest for Aqua Vitae. SpringerBriefs in Molecular Science(). Springer, Cham. https://doi.org/10.1007/978-3-319-06302-7_5
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