Historical challenge prizes

• 1
• 2
• 3
• 4
• 5
• 6
• 7
• 8
• 9
• 10

8. Napoleon III butter substitute prize

Year: 1869
Promoter: Napoleon III
Prize: Patent provided
Winner: Hippolyte Mège-Mouriés

The French government was looking for a reasonably priced nutritive fat as a substitute to butter which at the time was expensive. The challenge was to award for successful manufacturing of a substitute to butter.  

This prize was won by Hippolyte Mège-Mouriés, a French pharmacist and chemist who invented margarine after mass experimentation. His winning recipe was mixture beef tallow and skimmed milk, he called oleomargarine.