Vitamins, supplements and other forms of “special foods” are big business these days, but also nothing new. There have been many other examples through the ages and here is one of particular interest from 1899: Vigoral, from Armour & Company out of Chicago. As the ad says, it was both meat AND drink – delicious!

Near as we can tell, Vigoral consisted of concentrated beef extract mixed with some pulverized beef and strongly flavored with celery salt and sported an impressive 60 grams of protein per serving. It was advised that you could guzzle it straight OR put it on a salad, use it as a dipping sauce, etc. Vigoral was one of the first “special foods” to use weightlifters and physical culture imagery in their ads and at one point, had one of the first celebrity endorsements.