by Andree Lau, CBCnews.ca

Did you know liquor used to be considered safer to drink than water? Or that French soldiers in the First World War stayed hydrated with wine?

I was lucky enough to attend a free lecture held by my alma mater (wow, when did I get old enough to use that term?) this week on how alcohol evolved through history from being a lifesaver — because water was so unsafe — to a lifestyle choice.

Presented by Carleton University professor and wine columnist Rod Phillips, the hour zipped by pretty quickly from a wine fountain built in Venice to quench shipbuilders of the 17th century to various temperance movements to how pasteurization actually came out of Louis Pasteur’s research into the spoiling of wine and beer

(Courtesy Teatro)

The presentation was held at downtown Calgary restaurant Teatro, which is housed in a former bank. As a bonus, we were given a tour of its incredible wine cellar featuring 10,000 bottles — some costing $1,800 — in the former bank vault.

When I went to Carleton, some of the hardest courses to get into were Introduction to Astrology and Death and the Afterlife.

Not that it had anything to do with most students' mandatory requirements, but they were extremely popular because they were fairly easy, and yet extremely interesting lessons.

These days, Carleton has added a few other courses I’d be clamouring to get into, including the Cultural History of Food and Phillip’s third-year level Social History of Alcohol.

What kind of food or drink-related courses have you taken? What kind of fun facts or lessons have you learned?