The Huns are notorious for lacking a written legacy, despite their impacts on history. I am working on a YouTube cooking series called Meals of Empires focusing on vegan meals that could have occurred in each of the 45 civilizations present in the video game Age of Empires 2.

My best guess is that the Huns would eat a lot of meat from domesticated animals, paired with what they could forage or raid. Please share any more insight or leads you might have. Thanks!

How did these wines from these very different eras differ in taste, production and distribution?

They'll last a bit in their shells but start to rot in certain conditions, and animals will go after them

Alright folks, you did me solid last time so here I am again! I'm looking for any wild drinks that time may have forgotten. Anything from the 1800's to the 1980's would be great. The only real criteria is that I'd like it to have more than 3 ingredients, and ideally ingredients I can actually get being someone living in this century. Bonus points if you have sources! (newspaper clippings, random magazine submissions, old bartender books, etc).

Basically tl;dr: think Dylan Hollis but alcoholic.

Most local cuisines across China, Korea, southern and southeastern Asia feature a great deal of spiciness through liberal use of ingredients such as black pepper, chili pepper, tumeric, garlic, and other similar strong flavours. Japanese cuisine on the other hand tends to be more "delicate" and "balanced" by our western standards (one might say umami?). Ingredients like wasabi or soy sauce are generally only used in moderation to add that little extra touch. I was wondering why that is - I read that one of the reasons why spicy food is so common is because it would make you sweat and therefore fight the humid heat, but Japan is also quite humid.

EDIT a possibly misguided theory I came up with is that the modern Japanese cuisine, much like the French one, is a result of central efforts at codifications which favour dishes where all flavours are balanced and identifiable, as opposed to the cuisine from other places which is more practical and reflects the habits of "the people".

I've just finished Madrid: A Culinary History and am planning to read Delicioso: A History of Food in Spain next, but any other recommendations would be greatly appreciated! Books in English are ideal, but I'm happy to tackle ones in Spanish as well.

Was watching a medievalesque show and genuinely wondered this. People generally say sheep and pigs were not common staples but I think they may be overgeneralizing. Could a medieval peasant have access to say sheep especially if the economy of the city he lived in relied on it ?

*SOME

Southeast Asian cuisines have been heavily influenced by Chinese (noodles, stir fry, tofu) and Indian (curry, steamed rice cakes like puto). What did ancient pre-Indianized/Sinicized Southeast Asian food look like and are there highland peoples that preserved cooking methods similar to those eaten in the distant past?

Ok, so hear me, out I came up with this insane idea for a chart:

and I know it's neither comprehensive or even entirely accurate, but it got me wondering, like, why is curry so weird and so many different things? Did all curry originate in India? And my understanding is curry is also a plant, but I think I have seen "curries" that don't even involve that plant. Help I am confused and need a history for dumb people.

This is a menu that shows it listed:

https://imgur.com/a/RfpbC6D

Sushi has been around before refrigeration and was eaten in Japan in inland areas. Did a lot of people die or get ill from eating sushi pre-modern times? I would think so. If so, how did they mitigate the risk?

Recipes for ancient roman cuisine uses coriander/cilantro and it grows wild all across southern Europe since ancient times.

But its not used in modern Italian cuisine

Other than maybe some green peas here or there or possibly a split pea soup occasionally it seems that unlike most other regions of the world where beans or lentils play an important role (like soy in East Asia, the chickpea/garbanzo in west Asia, or the black bean in Latin america) that there is very little use of these high protein plant foods in what Europeans consume. Why is that?

Hi, everyone. I’m a theatre prop designer and I need to make a wedding cake that would be appropriate for 1830s French lower middle class. I’ve done some poking around online and I’m thinking of going with two tiers, the larger 12” and I’m not quite sure on sizing for the smaller layer. I know foods in the Victorian era were like super white, would that be appropriate for this as well even though obviously it’s not England? I don’t need to be entirely historically accurate, just enough that it won’t be out of place and the audience won’t question it.

Thank you!

Having read the article of the dog festival in China and the kidnappings of local pets to supply for the dog dishes, I am quite curious why Japan is quite unique in that it never developed dog dishes as a tradition or even a thriving underground delicacy?

I mean even other Asian countries that make dog meat taboo and illegal such as the Philippines and Indonesia has underground markets that cook dog meat. They may not be mainstream and indeed these countries have a tradition of taboo dog meat because the populace sees dog as disgusting to cook and eat, but somehow subcultures and regions even in these countries have it thriving enough to at least have a big feast and some small places in these countries' outskirt may even eat dog daily (despite the main nations' culture being anti-dog meat).

Considering all of Japan's nearby neighbor across the East Asian stratosphere still have restaurants that openly sell cook dog without facing controversy, how come Japan never went this path? I mean I wouldn't be surprised if there are Yakuza and other criminal groups who engage in a black market dog trade with something like a small isolated mountain community of less than 100 does eat dog and maybe a household in the forest regions eat dog secretly........ But an entire subculture or even regions of over 200+ people (often reaching thousands as Indonesia and Philippines) people eating it for a yearly delicacy? I haven't heard anything like this in Japan.

Indeed even before modernization, as early as Imperial Japan doesn't seem to have this dish in contrast to Korea, China, and the rest of East Asia. Even culinary documentaries I watched on Asia don't mention dog being delicacy in Japan while they frequently highlight dog on menu in China and Korea and local holidays eating dog meat, etc.

Why is this? Why didn't Japan go the way of its neighbors esp with China influencing all across Asia up until the Indian and Afghani/Iranian borders?

From hearsay I heard that you could ask butchers in the Industrial age (~17th to 19th centuries), and before that, to package and sell meat within a pie at no extra cost. Is this true?
Also, I've read that working class would cook and eat the pie whole, as opposed to upper class which ate only the fillings. How did the working class cook it, I assume boiling? Community ovens? Would the middle class do the same, and eat it whole too?
One more question, I've seen some of Townsends' videos on pies and they all put butter on top of fillings before covering the pie. Other forms on food storage use butter and lard as a form of protective layer, but the pies in the videos did not have enough butter/lard for this purpose. What was the purpose, flavour, gravy or storage?

Hey. I saw a documentary, Or part of one years ago about Louis XVI and him and Marie Antoinettes eating habits at versailles. Cant find it. Any ideas?

I once ran into an upper class Mexican gentleman, an executive in a major airline. He would be in place on Cape Cod or Westmount. He mentioned his mother's once a year flan. Is there such a thing as elite family cuisine that has taboos on "commonness" and "vulgarity" like for example the Boston Brahmins?".

When or how did these pair became the norm in every food? How was it decided to be use almost in everything? How did we think that we should fry it before putting the other ingredients?

Hi, lovely people!

I’m thinking about phd in food studies in the US, choosing between NYU Steindhart and Indiana Bloomingtoon. I’m interested into food politics/identity/class/digital etnography.

Any thoughts on those schools or in general recs for other schools focusing on it?

I’m in my 30s with a graduate degree from Europe and a lot of research experience.

I’m talking Paleolithic hunter-gatherer era, what kinds of foods were people “gathering” in this region? Or do you the suspect diet was more animal-based? Interested as paleo diets that incorporate a lot of non-animal based foods seem to be based on Paleolithic diets likely closer to the equator? Any insight appreciated!

I found my grandmother's fruit cake recipe, probably from the 1940s/50s, calling for 3 c of "seeded raisins" and 6 cups of seedless raisins. What are "seeded raisins"? Would you actually use both? Thanks!

I’ve been reading through some recipes, and the author often specifies using things like “good apples” or “good vinegar”.

Was that just the writing convention at the time?

Or are there recipes that specify using “worse” ingredients? Sort of like how we make banana bread with overripe bananas?

Hey everyone! We’re developing a new Youtube  series of documentaries about food history. Think Tasting History with Max Miller https://www.youtube.com/@TastingHistory, but with longer, documentary-style episodes where we really dive deep into the fascinating stories behind historical dishes, cooking techniques, and food traditions from all over the world.

Right now, we’re in the early stages, and we’re looking to connect with writers who have a passion for history, food, or ideally both.

If you’re into researching ancient recipes or telling the stories of how certain foods shaped cultures, we’d love to hear from you.

If you think you’d be a good fit or know anyone or just want to share your thoughts on the concept (like whether you’d watch something like this), please drop a comment or send a DM.

Thanks in advance!

Despite many Arab countries being located next to the sea it doesn't seem like fish plays an important role in many Arab countries. Why is this. Im asking because many countries like Lebanon, Syria, Iraq, Yemen, Oman, Saudi Arabia, the Gulf states and the countries in north Africa don't seem to have much fish in their cuisine. Other than Egypt which ahs plenty of fish in their cuisine the other ones despite being next to the sea dont have seafood as an important part of their cuisine.

Hi all,

I'm a history grad student researching how people engaged with cooking shows before the internet. Today, if you see a recipe on television, you just go to the website and there it is. Before that, I'm assuming people wrote down recipes in notebooks as they watched, and I'm interested in how television created a space for handwritten recipe notebooks of tv recipes during this period, and examples. Think Julia Child, Galloping Gourmet, anything up to and including the Martha era which straddles pre and post internet.

Did you or someone you know write down tv recipes between 1960-1995? Can you share your experience, what happened to your notebooks, and any pics you may have?

I can find absolutely nothing on this but I know it must have happened!

The American military has meals ready to eat (often referred to as MRE's) for when troops are in the field and I was wondering which ancient people did it the best. Taste takes a back seat to more important concerns like sustenance, portability, etc. Many thanks!

A few years ago, I tried garum for the first time and it tasted really delicious. My friend, who made it, told me how he made it and I wrote down the summary of the ancient recipe. But unfortunately the recipe wasn't very detailed.

The recipe required the addition of salt to the fish (not specified which fish in the recipe, so he guessed with mackerel), which causes the fish to liquify for a few days, during which time it must be stirred.

When the liquifaction stops, the stirring doesn't need to be as frequent but it must be constantly exposed to the direct rays of the sun, so the liquid must evaporate.

Then more salt is added. The process is repeated two more times, until 3 lots of salt have been added in total.

Unfortunately there is not enough information provided to easily replicate this recipe unfortunately, so I was wondering if anyone perhaps knew the original recipe?

Another piece of information which may be useful, is that I had added the words '6 weeks' underneath this recipe. But I can't remember if that's 6 weeks to make the whole recipe, or just until the second addition of salt, or whatever.