Whilst it may be difficult to believe, there may come a time when the food we eat today is considered primitive  or even vulgar and the chefs of the future shudder at the thought of serving it to their guests. As the human race evolves, so does it’s food which is why the cuisine of tomorrow may be more similar to the creations of chefs like Ferran Adrià, Hervé This and Heston Blumenthal – and our comfortable, large kitchens be replaced by laboratories. On the other hand, we just may be forced to go back to basics, to where we began as a race.

Today we start looking at the origin of food which, thanks to The Food Timeline, really isn’t too difficult at all.  Before fire was used for cooking food, it was eaten raw and was probably rather cold and certainly more unhealthy. About 40,000 to 50,000 years ago humans started using fire to prepare food which “resulted in a great increase of plant food supply. All of the major domesticated plant foods, such as wheat, barley, rice, millet, rye, and potatoes, require cooking before they are suitable for human consumption. In fact, in a raw state, many plants contain toxic or indigestible substances or anti-nutrients. But after cooking, many of these undesirable substances are deactivated, neutralized, reduced, or released; and starch and other nutrients in the plants are rendered absorbable by the digestive tract. Thus, the use of fire to cook plant foods doubtless encouraged the domestication  of these foods and … was a vitally important factor in human cultural advancement.” 1 ” We can only base conjectures on

the customs of existing primitive peoples. Bones and walnut or hazelnut shells have been found on excavated sites, but there is no means of knowing whether they are the remains of cooked meals, the debris of fires lit for heat, or even the remnants of incincerated raw waste matter… we are inclined to think the meat was roasted, from the evidence of Mousterain sites in Spain and the Dordogne...”2  It seems logical that food was  ”baked in coals or under heated rocks, steamed inside animal stomachs and leaves, boiled in rock-pots by heated stones and an oven could be as simple as a hole in the ground or a covering of heated stones …. to keep wild beasts at bay, to trap them, to scare them. People have long used fire to harden wooden weapons and to keep warm at night.”3

BASIC FISH CAKES

Ingredients

• 500 g fish of your own choice, cooked (it can be baked, barbecued, boiled – whatever tickles your fancy) and flaked
• 1 tbsp labneh cheese, finely diced
• 350g floury potatoes, peeled and boiled until they are tender and broken up
• 1 tsp finely grated lemon zest
• 1 tbsp fresh parsley, chopped
• 1 tbsp fresh coriander leaves, chopped (you could also use fresh fennel or mint)
• 1 green chilli, finely chopped
• ¼ tsp cardamom seeds, finely ground
• 1 large egg
• 150 g fresh breadcrumbs – the bread needs to be a day or two old
• Olive oil to fry
• Flour
• Salt and pepper to taste

Method

• Mash the potatoes (you need a dry, fluffy mash) and combine with the flaked fish and all the other ingredients – season with salt and pepper to taste and take care to combine the ingredients well.
• Whisk the egg lightly and place in a large soup tureen or deep plate and then put the fresh breadcrumbs in a similar but separate dish/plate or spread them on a baking sheet.
• Divide the fish cake mixture into fish cakes with floured hands before sitting each fish cake into the egg (making sure all sides are coated and then into the bread crumbs – making sure all sides are lightly covered.
• Transfer onto a plate and put in the fridge for an hour or so.
• Heat the oil to medium heat and fry until both sides are golden and crisp.
• Serve with lemon wedges.

Sumerians, for example, ate “barley, wheat and millet; chick peas, lentils and beans; onions, garlic and leeks; cucumbers, cress, mustard and fresh green lettuce. By the time Sumer was succeeded by Babylon a special delicacy had been discovered that was dispatched to the royal palace by the basketful. Truffles. Everyday meals probably consisted of barley paste or barley cakes, accompanied by onions or a handful of beans and washed down with barley ale, but the fish that swarmed in the rivers of Mesopotamia were a not-too-rare luxury. Over fifty different types are mentioned in texts dating before 2300 BC, and although the number of types had diminished in Babylonian times, the fried-fish vendors still did a thriving trade in the narrow, winding streets of Ur. Onions, cucumbers, freshly grilled goat, mutton and pork (not yet taboo in the Near East) were to be had from other food stalls. Meat was more common in the cities than in the more sparsley populated countryside, since it spoiled so quickly in the heat, but beef and veal were everywhere popular with people who could afford them...”4  We see also that the “Sumerians drank beer often,wine seldom if at all; wine was better known in northern

Mesopotamia and in later times. Animal foods included pork, mutton, beef, fowl including ducks and pigeons, and many kinds of fish. Meats were salted; fruits were conserved in honey; various foods, including apples, were dried.”5 ” Mesopotamian bread was ordinarilly coarse, flat, and unleavened, but a more expensive bread could be baked from finer flour” and examples were found “ in the tomb of Queen Puabi of Ur, stored there to provide her spirit with sustenance in the afterlife. Bread could have been enriched with animal and vegetable fat or  milk, butter and cheese; fruit,  fruit juice and sesame seeds ”were present in the diet and the “ gardens of Mesopotamia, watered by irrigation canals, were lush with fruits and vegetables…like  apples, apricots, cherries, figs, melons, mulberries, pears, plums, pomegranates  and quinces. The most important fruit crop, especially in southern Mesopotamia, was the date” which is and was very rich in “ sugar and iron and easily preserved. Like barley, the date-palm thrived on relatively saline soil and was one of the first plants that farmers domesticated” As far as vegetables go, “the onion was king along with its cousin, garlic ……. lettuce, cabbage and cucumbers;

carrots and radishes; beets and turnips; and a variety of legumes, including beans, peas, and chickpeas…Curiously, two mainstays of the Mediterranean diet–olives and grapes…were seldom found in Mesopotamian cuisine…to appreciate Mesopotamian daily life our imagination must breath in the pungent aroma of the seasonings that once rose from ancient stoves and filled the air…Coriander, cress, sumin,  fennel, fenugreek,  marjoram, mint, and mustard as well as rosemary, rue, saffron, thyme and cumin…Sheep played an important role in the Mesopotamian economy…Like goats and cows, ewes produced milk that was converted into butter and cheese but sheep were also slaughtered for meat. Beef was in short supply but pork, game birds, deer and gazelle were hunted  ……   50 types of fish, a staple of the Mesopotamian diet. Generally, meats were either dried, smoked, or salted for safekeeping, or they were cooked by roasting, boiling, broiling, or barbecuing.“6

1. Cambridge World History of Food, Kenneth F. Kiple and Kriemhild Conee Ornelas [Cambridge University Press:Cambridge] 2000 (p. 1571)
2. History of Food, Maguelonne Toussaint-Samat [Barnes & Noble:New York] 1992 (p. 90)
3. A History of Cooks and Cooking, Michael Symons [University of Chicago:Urbana] 2000 (p. 221)
4. Food in History, Reay Tannahill [Three Rivers:New York] 1988 (p. 47)
5. Food in the Ancient World From A-Z, Andrew Dalby [Routledge:London] 2003 (p. 216)
6. Handbook of Life in Ancient Mesopotamia, Stephen Bertman [Facts on File:New York NY] 2003 (p. 291-293)