/ck/ - Food & Cooking

[Anonymous No.17037921]

So would food from thousands of years ago taste better than food today?

[Anonymous No.17037928]

it depends if you were very hungry

[Anonymous No.17037931]

>>17037921
Depends, but for the most part I would say yes.

[Anonymous No.17037934]

nope. melons even in the 1700's would have sucked.

[Anonymous No.17037936]

>>17037921
no

[Anonymous No.17037939]

>>17037921
Guarantee it would be more sanitary than modern Indian street food

[Anonymous No.17037946]

no, it would have worse ingredients and cooking equipment

[Anonymous No.17038001]

>>17037921
>taste better
to whom? people from now or people from then?

[Anonymous No.17038009]

>>17037921
Did they have McChickens? If not then no

[Anonymous No.17038018]

>>17037934
This is what I was saying. I'm also guessing chickens tasted the same until the 1950's or so.

[Anonymous No.17038024]

Depends on what you mean by "taste better."
From the modern perspective, I'd speculate no because a lot of additives and processes invented with the rise of civilization simply produce food which most people find more appetizing. Like, imagine your spice choices for anyone in a given area when the spice trade still hadn't been established, or when it was more limited. And that's ignoring scientifically-derived additives like MSG.

You also the effect of plant/animal selection over time on the taste/size of source ingredients. I imagine some fruit/vegetable/animal varieties which would be a tastier variant for many people have disappeared due to competition.

For people of the day, I imagine they would probably take time to adapt to the modern palate, if they did at all. It would probably be a mixed reception.

[Anonymous No.17038059]

>>17038018
That painting shows an unripe melon, melons today have the same looking insides before they're ripe.

[Anonymous No.17038114]

>>17038018
The older chickens taste fucking delicious. Factory chickens are relatively flavorless in comparison. I would imagine most of their meat would taste better than the average grocery store shit, just riddled with parasites.

But I would think most ancient food would be bland as all fuck. Most people take it for granted that they have a spice rack full of spices from literally all around the world.

[Anonymous No.17038142]

>>17038114
>I would imagine most of their meat would taste better than the average grocery store shit, just riddled with parasites.
I think this would the main thing ancient diet would have over modern in terms of quality, along with some fruits/vegetables being more flavorful (if seedier/smaller).
>But I would think most ancient food would be bland as all fuck.
I guess it depends how far OP is going back. Before the rise of societies where upper classes would have constant demand for specialty dishes and the ingredients for them, you would basically be mixing staples that were accessible at the time of year with whatever spices were available to either your tribe or neighboring tribes, with meals being prepared in a much more communal fashion.

[Anonymous No.17038192]

>>17038018
That's just some artist who saw a wedge of watermelon and assumed that's what the whoel watermelon must look like.
he thought what he was seeing was the watermelon supreme

[Anonymous No.17038216]

>meat
Yes
>Fruits
Less sweet and watery, but possibly a stronger flavour
>Veg
Smaller and more fibrous
>Spices
Probably couldn't use as much unless you were wealthy, and then you'd coat roasts in clove powder as a flex
Most importantly you're taste buds wouldn't be as shot as they are these days, no sugar, no msg and no tobacco

[Anonymous No.17038218]

interesting fact: there was less corn syrup and sweetener in the entire world economy in 1901 than the average American eats in one week today

[Anonymous No.17038420]

>>17038018

[Anonymous No.17038647]

>>17038216
The spice game was limited and even the availability of salt wasn't always assured but fresh and dried local herbs more than made up for it from a pure flavor perspective. The sheer biodiversity of greens and herbs wwas on a level that's hard to comprehend. But hops didn't exist and the same herbs were used to flavor beer so...eh.

[Anonymous No.17038668]

>>17038059
>>17038192
>>17038420
I bet you faggots think carrots were originally orange too.

[Anonymous No.17039358]

>>17038420
>22th day

[Anonymous No.17039396]

>>17037921
there was a lot more variety and we have a dig difference in taste
but some evidence points toward atleast alcohol tasting the same if not better
i remember hearing about rich people buying very old rum and it still tasting good
in general i would say their common diet was probably worse than what we normally have in terms of taste, but anything of quality would have been better than today as food products NEEDED to be fresh rather than canned, frozen, having preservatives, etc.

[Anonymous No.17040015]

>>17038216
the sugar trade developed concurrent with the spice trade

[Anonymous No.17040017]

the interesting one for me is unhopped beer, since hops only began being added in the 1600's. prior to that beer was flavored with field herbs like meadowsweet

[Anonymous No.17040099]

>>17037921
depends how many thousands of years ago

10000 years ago agriculture wouldn't have yet gone through millennia of genetic modification yet

5000 years ago when civilization was just beginning to flourish in the fertile crescent there was little wealth disparity and even the poorest families were cooking with complicated recipes.

2000 years ago urban living would have had similar variety to today

1000 years ago you would probably be malnourished no matter your social status

[Anonymous No.17040114]

>>17039358
information discarded!

[Anonymous No.17040164]

It would be highly expired by now so no

[Anonymous No.17040741]

>>17038114
The variety of available spices and herbs used would be smaller than what's available today. But since humans started settling down they've been spicing up their food. Doesn't matter if we're talking kings or peasants, people have spiced up their food whenever they had the option. It would be different from what we do today, but saying it would be bland is an overstatement.

[Anonymous No.17040823]

>>17037921
>Ywn have the ancient Pompeiian poultry and water fowl
What's even the point of eating?

[Anonymous No.17040927]

>>17037921
Meat would have been stronger in flavour and tougher in texture as you wouldn't raise animals just for meat but mostly also for eggs, dairy or wool. So animals have been butchered when they were old. Also keep in mind that male animals probably haven't been castrated at very young age, which results in a very strong and even unpleasant taste. A reason so many historical dishes are stews where the old meat was braised for a long time.
Grains, vegetables and fruits weren't cultured as todays and so would be mostly smaller, less fertile, but probably tastier.
The whole herb and spices subject seems to be pretty complicated. People always talk about all the lost herbs from medieval times that aren't used anymore. Even grandparents used stuff that strongly declined in popularity like savory, mugwort, lovage or borage. Exotic spices existed, but were very expensive. Although people likely had a more sensitive taste compared to today and used less.

[Anonymous No.17040941]

>>17037921
Thousands? No that's grain that hasn't been grinded enough to make flour, meat that's half spoiled and no spices

[Anonymous No.17041984]

ITT: plebs who constantly romanticize everything old.

Your main diet would be local fish, whole grain bread, beans, and some foraged herbs. It all sounds good until you realize:

>You depend a lot on the season. If fish decide not to swim near your local river youre fucked. Your harvest too.
>good luck getting salt lol. Celery salt is your best bet if you dont want to boil 50gl of sea water. The msrkup would be insane beyond coastal cities.
>No decent fruits nor veggies for the most part. Modern juicy plants are relatively sweeter than their old counterparts. Wild bananas are shit, wild rice gets old fast without spices, most wild fruit is fuckfilled with seeds, beans are decent.
>No sweets. Forget about it. Dont be the clown who replies to this with "i can just boil x berry for 7 hours until i get syrup/jam". That shit wasnt common unless you were a woman and practically lived at the kitchen.
>Youre gonna end up eating lots of plain meals. Getting cream, butter, or anything beyond salt is a pain in the ass.
>Youre super prone to famine and pests.
>Theres lots of wild fish though, so theres that

[Anonymous No.17042723]

>>17041984
>all this terrible things
>but you can caatch fish really easily, and probably a smacker too
This is my home, how to time travel?

[Anonymous No.17042833]

>>17041984
t.uninformed conjecturing moron

[Anonymous No.17042850]

>>17040017
There was some brewery in Michigan (I can't remember name) that specialized in ancient beers. Did ales flavored with spruce and pine etc instead of hops. It was interesting. Not as good at hopped beer, but was still very drinkable.

[Anonymous No.17044515]

>>17042833
T. midwit with no degree in anthropology trying to talk shit to someone w one of those.

[Anonymous No.17044545]

>>17038009
Chick-fil-A invented the chicken sandwich in the 1960s so a thousand years ago you couldn't even get a knock-off McChicken.

[Anonymous No.17045318]

>>17041984
Salt was a preservative for fish, butter, meats, and other quickly-perishable foods. Even if it was hard to get for use as a table condiment, your food was so heavily loaded with salt from the preservation that you wouldn't even want to salt it.

[Anonymous No.17045388]

>>17045318
that doesn't mean it was easy to attain. salt only became widely available in the last 100 years.

[Anonymous No.17045625]

>>17038114
Back in the day, when chicken was allowed to get older, the meat was basically only good for stewing or braising.

[Anonymous No.17045627]

>>17044515
>degree in anthropology
An elaborate way of saying "I wasted my life on bullshit social >science"

[Anonymous No.17045644]

>>17045388
>that doesn't mean it was easy to attain
>be me
>live near ocean
>dig small tidal pond to harvest salt
>infinite salt
>live inland
>find hole in ground with salt
>dig salt
>
Salt being a hard to obtain luxury is a History Channel brainlet meme. There are giant fucking hills of salt in the world anon. All historical food processing required salt. Your ancestors and thus your faggot takes wouldn't be here if salt wasn't widely available.

[Anonymous No.17045663]

>>17038647
>beer with no hops
>bad
Sounds cash, hops are for gaynigger redditors

[Anonymous No.17045672]

>>17045644
idk, sounds like bullshit to me

[Anonymous No.17045675]

Absolutely not. People used to get paid in salt for a reason.

[Anonymous No.17045676]

>>17040741
>The variety of available spices and herbs used would be smaller than what's available today
Yes and no. A lot of spices on the market shelf come from the indies so wouldn't be available to a European peasant, but the European peasant foraged for a lot of seeds plants we don't use today. Same for the American pioneer or native tribe or w/e. Some were toxic, some were only toxic during certain times of the year or in certain growth modes which meant a body of local knowledge was required, and most didn't take well to mass cultivation which is why they aren't spread around the world nowadays. A lot of barks, seeds, etc. were used for culinary and medicinal purposes. Stuff like birch bark, pine sap, willow, etc. we only use in very specific forms in modern times.

[Anonymous No.17045701]

>>17045388
Obtaining salt was an every day occurence for the common people because it was literally a matter of survival for them. No salt, no food. It was that simple. People didn't season their food with table salt like we do today because they were too busy using it all to preserve their harvests and animal products. That doesn't mean their food was unseasoned and bland, quite the opposite, it means the average foodstuff would be much saltier than we're used to today (even after soaking a salted food in water to leech the salt out, it's still salty as fuck). For example, salted butter of antiquity would have been much saltier than modern salted butter because they were using the salt to help preserve it in addition to a mere flavoring.

[Anonymous No.17045703]

>>17045672
cope brainlet

[Anonymous No.17045710]

>>17045675
Nobody ever got paid in salt, it's not worth enough by itself. The old meme about legionnaires getting paid in salt is an 18th century myth. Legionnaires got *issued* salt as part of their rations, like cheeses and grains. They were paid in cash.

[Anonymous No.17046969]

>>17038024
Japanese invented msg in 17th century. They made it from seaweed.

[Anonymous No.17047115]

>>17041984
>If fish decide not to swim near your local river youre fucked.
I don't think you realize what pre-modern rivers looked like, they were fucking teeming with fish. Accounts from Roman times of entire rivers being so packed with tuna they could just throw their spear and catch them. Likewise with eels and salmon in rivers during the middle ages. Students and monks literally made contracts saying they couldn't be made to eat salmon more than a few times a week because it was so plentiful. There's a reason fish was the poor people food, it was cheap. Of course, it was probably filled with parasites but that's just how it was.
>>good luck getting salt
Salt was one of the most traded commodities. It was used daily. Salt mines and natural salt deposits off the coast were booming industries in the past.
>Getting cream, butter, or anything beyond salt is a pain in the ass
You own a cow, you produce cream and butter. Your neighbor owns a cow? You buy cream and butter.
>>No sweets.
Just wrong.
>>17044515
Anthropology is the abandoned nigger child of history. They're below even geographers. Anthropology is a desperate attempt to be a social """"""science"""""" and it fails. Go study nigger tribes in africa and tell me how that totally describes how people lived in the bronze age.

[Anonymous No.17047514]

>>17037921
no because it would have spoiled by now

[Anonymous No.17047529]

>>17037921
it would taste similar or blander
the unique part would be uncommon or local herbs you haven't been exposed to.

[Anonymous No.17047546]

>>17038114
It depends on whether you had money or not. For the wealthy spices were used as a bit of a flex and as such certain foods would be spiced pretty heavily and would taste pretty intense from our more contemporary pov.

[Anonymous No.17047554]

>>17045663
IPA is a pox upon humanity

[Anonymous No.17048830]

>>17038001
well we dont give a shit about the ancient peoples opinions