[typon]

Wasn't most meat also salted in the past?

[hypertele-Xii]

Yes; Salt was among the first preservatives discovered and used.

Bacteria landing on salt will quickly find all of their water exiting their insides towards the salt. Life ceases to function sans water.

[Datagenerator]

Great description. Now I'm grossed out but had fun imagining bacteria dying perpetually until it's some sort of additional crust on the dried meat..

[londons_explore]

A lot of meat is salted today... Ham... Bacon....

[marcyb5st]

I think there is a substantial difference as back then the meat was literally "submerged" in salt to preserve it.

Nowadays I believe it's simply lightly coated in salt to only maximize flavor since we have fridges.

[throwaway316943]

You can still buy salt beef. It usually comes in a plastic tub. You must soak it in water before cooking in order to remove most of the salt otherwise it is inedible.

[nsajko]

Depends on the past.

[firecall]

The past is a long time!

[justinator]

And incidentally, seems to always be getting longer