Remember that 'Crisco' was created as a machine lube! Tractor parts if memmory serves.
Discussion
actually it was candles. But neither makes for food.
"Around this time, William Proctor and James Gamble realized that the rise of electric lighting was about to put their candle-making company out of business. But Proctor and Gamble made a key scientific breakthrough: they discovered that hydrogenating the process to make their cottonseed oil candles would turn the candles into a white, lard-like substance. They called this invention Crisco vegetable shortening (the vegetable was cotton)."
I assumed it had multiple uses but the candle story is what I initially heard.