I made a crack about gunpowder and kind of expected Rapparee to come up with an old family recipe or something. You guys were in the middle of a philosopher riff, so I'll run it by you again. (I was going to link to it, but the whole damned thread wanted to load if I did that.)

Great preservative also. You can put that rub on the meat and abandon it on the floor of a dry cave (say, Mammoth Cave in Kentucky) and come back in a couple hundred years and find it still there, though a bit dry. Saltpeter is a handy household product, yes?