Fray Bentos: how a small Uruguayan city has revolutionized the way we eat

"The company said that it had taken advantage of all parts of the cow, with the exception of the bellowing," said Diana Cerilla, while guiding me to the heart of what she's calling " the piece to kill ".

In the 1930s, up to 1,600 cows a day (as well as thousands of sheep, pigs, chickens and other animals) knew their end at the slaughterhouse before d & # 39; be processed, packaged and exported to different parts of the world.

I peeked at the disturbing formation of hooks, pulleys, wheels, chains, conveyor belts and still but disturbing scales, and I started shaking.

At first glance, a long-standing abandoned meat processing factory located on the outskirts of a town in the Uruguayan countryside does not look like a very tempting tourist destination, much less a UNESCO World Heritage Site.

But the industrial landscape of Fray Bentos has had a profound impact on how the world eats, creating one of the most famous British brands of the twentieth century, transforming the Uruguayan economy and helping the production World food to enter the industrial era.

In addition, the venue is an impressive display of avant-garde technologies from the Victorian era, which slowly oxidize. For those who have a pbadion for industrial archeology, it has a mysterious beauty.

A luxury in a can

In 1863, the Liebig Extract of Meat Company founded a factory on the banks of the Uruguay River and began producing "meat extract" using a technique patented by the German pioneer Justus von Liebig.

Cheap meat cuts (available in large quantities in Uruguay through the development of the livestock industry) have been boiled to produce a nutritious broth originally intended for convalescent patients. The process was then refined, the solidified liquid and Oxo – a small bucket of broth – emerged.

With the arrival of workers from Uruguay and 60 other countries, a city began to develop around the factory run by Germans and funded by the British.

Although it originally called Villa Independencia, the city was later renamed in honor of a 17th century hermit named Fray Bentos, who would have lived in a cave nearby.

Shortly after, Liebig started producing another popular product with inexpensive cuts: canned salted beef.

Oxo broth cubes and corned beef became the raw material of popular cuisine in Europe, for whom meat was previously a luxury product.

They also became inexpensive rations, easy to transport and with long expiration dates for British and German soldiers during the First World War, as well as for explorers such as Robert Falcon Scott and Ernest Shackleton.

In 1924, the company was bought by the British group Vestey (British group Vestey) and renamed Frigorífico Anglo del Uruguay.

Thanks to the rapid progress of refrigeration technology, "El Anglo" has started exporting frozen meat to different parts of the world, as well as oxo, corned beef and more than 200 other products, from leather to soaps , including sausages and jams. .

In 1943 alone, 16 million canned beef preserves left Fray Bentos, for the most part, to feed the Allies during the Second World War.

Even members of British royalty have tasted it: "I remember eating salted beef until it came out of my ears," Prince Charles told reporters in 1999 during of his visit to Uruguay.

"Modern times" in Uruguay

Today, the factory is open to the public. The office buildings have been renovated and transformed into a museum featuring artifacts from the glorious factory era, including old typewriters, clbadic posters, rudimentary fire fighting equipment and trucks rickety transport.

In 1924, the company was bought by the British group Vestey (British group Vestey) and renamed Frigorífico Anglo del Uruguay.

Thanks to the rapid progress of refrigeration technology, "El Anglo" has started exporting frozen meat to different parts of the world, as well as oxo, corned beef and more than 200 other products, from leather to soaps , including sausages and jams. .

In 1943 alone, 16 million canned beef preserves left Fray Bentos, for the most part, to feed the Allies during the Second World War.

Even members of British royalty have tasted it: "I remember eating salted beef until it came out of my ears," Prince Charles told the press in 1999 , during his visit to Uruguay.

Another part is occupied by a local university, preserving the technological traditions of the factory. But most of the entangled complex has been kept as it is and wandering around these vast, silent, dimly lit buildings is a fascinating experience.

The engine room looks like a retro-futuristic comic scene, with rusty diesel generators, huge turbines and steam compressors with levers, valves and wheels connected by a multitude of tubes and chimneys.

On the walls of the adjoining room, marble panels covered with meters and switches controlled the production of electricity from the factory: in 1883, it was the first place in Uruguay that produced electricity. # 39; electricity.

"The factory reminds me of Charles Chaplin's" Modern Times "," says Cerilla, the museum's director, during his tour.

On the outside, an imposing water tower dominates a number of buildings built with a mixture of bricks, cement, glbad and corrugated iron. Many can not be visited for safety reasons, especially where 18,000 tonnes of frozen meat were once stored.

But it is possible to see Casa Grande, the wealthy manor where the director lived and which includes stained glbad, parquet, two pianos and a gong to mark the beginning of a meal.

"It was the industrial revolution in Uruguay," said Nicolás Cremella. "Fray Bentos was very important for Uruguay: it was the real capital of the country, not Montevideo, it was the only meat industry and it employed people all over the country", he added.

Closing the refrigerator

The company could have generated jobs all over the country, but the profits were transferred abroad.

Fray Bentos products continued to be popular in post-war Europe, but began to slowly decline as food technology developed and eating habits changed.

At the end of the decade of 1960, the Anglo Frigorifico pbaded in the hands of the Uruguayan government and was finally closed in 1979.

"It was terrible for the people of the city when it finally closed," said Cerilla, whose father and grandfather worked at the factory. "Many people left and many others emigrated directly.

Despite the initial fall, Fray Bentos managed to recover. For more than a decade, it has housed the flourishing UPM pulp mill and received a boost in 2015 when the Anglo refrigerator was declared a World Heritage Site by Unesco.

Meanwhile, worldwide, the Fray Bentos brand now belongs to Baxters, which still uses it for various canned products, such as puddings and meatballs.

And the corned beef?

In the afternoon, I went into the city crossing the neighborhood of Anglo, a suburb of some 300 houses built for the company's command staff.

The smell of freshly cut grbad, blossoming trees and burning smoke floated in the air as she walked through groups of tall houses with corrugated iron roofs and the lush gardens.

Nearby were the golf, tennis, football and rowing clubs that were once the center of expat life.

SW Johnson, the British director of the factory in the 1930s, glanced at this period: "We had the Anglo Club and Social Club, with a ballroom, a footbridge, a pool and a billiard room, a library that he had only books and magazines in English … and a bar (the Uruguayan director also accepted the bets in what was then the illegal trade of bets and lotteries) ".

"As we did not have the blessing and the curse of television and radio, we mainly listened to the BBC, which brought us news of" at home ", we had a very active life", a- he wrote in an article collected in "Uruguay: A Travel Guide and Literature", by Andrew Graham-Yoll.

By the time I reached the city center, it was early in the afternoon and life was starting to resurface as the Fraybentinos woke up from their nap. A group of children played hide-and-seek on the main square, Plaza Constitución, some of which used a pergola iron hideout offered by the company in 1902, which is a replica of the one that had been erected at the Crystal Palace . London

The parents sat on the benches and drank together, while the parrots tasted the branches of the many palms, willows and drunken trees.

For dinner, it seemed appropriate to try the product that puts the city on the map. Uruguayans are the largest per capita consumers of beef in the world (about 56 kg per person per year) and the livestock sector is a key element of the economy.

And although Fray Bentos is still synonymous with canned meat, few people eat it today. "We do not like to eat canned meat, we like fresh meat," Cremella said. "The people of Fray Bentos can have tinned canned meat at home, maybe on the shelves for decoration or souvenir, but not for food."

Of course, none of the restaurants I visited featured salted beef on the menu, nor did the top three supermarkets that I attended. Finally, when I left, I found a small shop with some cans for sale. The labels said: "Marca Uruguay – Made in Brazil".

Read the original note in English on BBC Travel.