Today, Chinese cooking is famous all over the world, but of
course it did not become famous suddenly. China’s civilization is very ancient,
and the art of cooking developed together with it over thousands of
years. In the distant past, our ancestors ate raw meat. They
did not know how to cook their food. When they killed animals, they often did
not even take the skin off them before they ate them. Some specialists believe
that it was forest fires that first introduced man to the art of cooking. Forest
fires were sometimes started by storms, and people ran away from the burning
areas and returned when the fires had gone out. When they came back, they found
that the animals which were caught in the fires and could not escape were
"cooked", and that the cooked meat tasted much better than raw meat. From this,
man began to realize that cooking made his food more tasty. He discovered
different methods of making a fire, and began to collect pieces of wood to
burn. Gradually, the cooking of food became a universally
accepted idea. The Chinese word "peng"(from "peng tiao", meaning the art of
cooking) comes from the use of fire in cooking. So, in this way
people had learned how to cook their food. However, they still did not know how
to flavour(调味) it. How did man first learn to use salt on his
food One theory is that many years ago some people who lived
in a coastal area killed an animal on the seashore. They left the dead animal
there for some time. The salt from the sea-water covered the animal and when,
later, the meat was cooked, it had a very good taste. In time, man learned to
collect salt to flavour his food. The word "tiao" means "flavouring", which
began with the use of salt. The discovery of cooking and
flavouring played a very important part in the development of man and of human
society. The fact that man no longer ate raw meat made him different from other
animals. Cooking and flavouring killed bacteria(细菌) in food and made it more
healthy. People began to eat meals at regular times of the day. Gradually,
cooked food helped people to improve the condition of their minds and bodies,
and finally it helped them to develop their productive abilities, and to move
towards a state of civilization. Some people believe that man first learned to use salt on his food
______.
A. when he found salt on the sea-shore
B. when he cooked the meat from an animal killed in a forest fire
C. when he tasted an animal that had been in sea-water
D. when he cooked his food on the sea-shore