Love it or hate it

Stanley – Thursday

One of my favourite snacks is Marmite on matzo bread smeared with butter. I love the tangy, zesty taste. Yet many of my friends can’t stand it. There isn’t any middle ground. You love it or hate it – which is why, in 1996, Marmite introduced its new slogan “Love it or Hate it”. Whether you like the slogan or not, you have to admit it’s better than its predecessor “the growing up spread you never grow out of”.

Anyway, I decided to find out more about Marmite and its popular contender Bovril, which I used to enjoy in hot water as a kid – as a winter soup. Both are a nearly-black paste.

The Marmite Food Extraction Company was founded in 1902 in Staffordshire in England. It manufactured the dark paste based on a discovery by a German chemist, Justus von Liebig, who found that brewer’s yeast could be broken down with salt and then concentrated into an edible paste.

Its popularity soared a few years later when it was discovered that it was rich in vitamin B. It was then used to treat beri-beri patients in World War I, mill workers suffering from anaemia in Bombay, and malaria patients suffering from malnutrition in Sri Lanka.

The name comes from a French stockpot, called a marmite (pronounced ‘marmeet`). The marmite bottle copies the shape of the marmite.

I thought that was it for my research on Marmite. Then I dug deeper and found more. For example, the Marmite factory is close to the Bass Beer brewery and originally used the yeast byproduct to make the delicious paste.

And at the time of the General Election in Britain in 2010, Marmite ran its own political campaign by creating the Love Party and the Hate Party which made political pledges via social media. The winner was to be decided by members of the public voting for the party they preferred.

The Hate Party pledged, if it won, to create Marmite zones throughout Britain – the only places one could consume the vile paste. They also pledged to deport Marmite eaters to Guernsey. On the other hand, the Love Party pledged to set up anger management courses for Marmite haters and to criminalise all acts of face-pulling at Marmite lovers.

The Love Party eventually won, and the Marmite Company brought the campaigns to a close by erecting a monument to its product in the centre of Burton-on-Trent near the library. The sculpture - of a Marmite bottle, of course - is carved from Portland stone and is affectionately known as the Monumite.

Over the years, Marmite has produced special editions.

2007: a Guinness edition, using Guinness yeast;

2008: Champaign Marmite containing a touch of champagne for Valentine’s Day;

2009: Marston’s Pedigree to celebrate the Ashes cricket series;

2010: Marmite XO, s a super-strong blend, matured four times longer than regular Marmite; (What have I been missing?)

2012: a special edition celebrating the Diamond Jubilee of Queen Elizabeth II, called Ma’amite.

2015: a Summer of Love special featuring a flower power label; and

2019: a re-release of Marmite XO.

Bovril is another British icon and is older than Marmite by several decades.

 They say that an army marches on its stomach, and the army of Napoleon III was no exception during the Franco-Prussian war of 1870. It needed a million cans of beef to feed its army. Not surprisingly a Scot came to the rescue! (I can hear Caro saying “Of course!”).

John Johnston, a Scottish butcher living in Canada, solved the problem by creating a boiled-down beef extract called “Johnson’s Fluid Beef” to sell to the French. He did have a way with words.

It was very popular and he established a factory in 1888. He called the product Bovril. To quote Andrew Unsworth of the Sunday Times:

“Bo came from bovinus, Latin for ox, and Vril came from a popular science fiction novel of the time. Called The Coming Race, it was written by Bulwer Lytton and featured a race of people, the Vril-ya, who got their superpowers from an electromagnetic substance called vril. So Bovril gave the consumer strength from an ox.

Interestingly, the abbreviated or “boiled down language”, as we commonly use in texting today, was once known as Bovrilese."

Bovril is popular in the way I was introduced to it – as a hot winter drink. It’s also used to enrich stews and soups. War was certainly good for business as it was included in the rations of British soldiers in both world wars.

On Frasier in Season 6, Episode 7, Daphne is upset when Niles throws away a jar of Bovril because it smelled rancid. Daphne exclaims: "That's how it's supposed to smell; it's English!"

Douglas Adams, author of The Hitchhiker's Guide to the Galaxy, stated that he relied on frequent baths, Bovril sandwiches and very loud guitar playing as excuses to avoid writing.

Bovril has had some interesting advertising campaigns. One paired it with a pope!

And, of course, the burning question is “Which do you prefer?”