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A comment on Putting Ancient Recipes on the Plate. Parent comment

Re:Putting Ancient Recipes on the Plate by mywittyname on Monday January 22, 2018 @02:09PM (#16206994)
Depending on how "ancient" you're looking for, Cooking the Roman Way is a very interesting read and focuses on Italian recipes passed down among families over generations. These will tend to be shaped by history and altered as availability of ingredients changed.

Presumably, the person altering the recipe knew what the old version tasted like, so while it won't necessarily be authentic, I think it's probably better than the wild guesses made during translation of actual ancient recipes.

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Re:Putting Ancient Recipes on the Plate by DonaldFisk on Monday January 22, 2018 @02:25PM (#16207116)
That's a modern Italian cookery book. The cuisine of Italy has changed out of all recognition in the past 2000 years. Ancient Romans had none of the new world ingredients which are staples of modern Italian cuisine: tomatoes, courgettes, pepper, maize, potatoes. Nor did they have aubergines or basil despite their trade with India.

We have absolutely no problem translating the original recipes, which are in Latin. The only ambiguity is in ingredient quantities and cooking times, but any competent cook is able to figure those out.

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