Here’s the Babylonian Pigeon Pie you’ll make in the first session of Recreating Ancient Recipes. Photo by Manoocher Deghati.
Gastro Obscura: Recreating Ancient Recipes. We are long time readers of the Gastro Obscura website devoted to arcane food cultures and history, and we noticed they have started offering virtual “experiences” in these times of less getting together in person. Recreating Ancient Recipes is especially interesting: a three-part series in which you will “become a culinary archaeologist as we recreate dishes from ancient Mesopotamia, ancient Rome, and the Mediterranean Middle Ages.” More blurbage from the website:
“Together, we’ll turn our kitchens into vessels for gastronomic time travel, using historical recipes and modern ingredients to create dishes from ancient Mesopotamia, ancient Rome, and the Mediterranean Middle Ages. We’ll focus on the Middle East, Southern Europe, and the Mediterranean region, tracing ancient foodways and trade routes along the Mediterranean Sea and the lasting legacy they had on several regional cuisines. From Babylonian fowl pie to Mustacei, we’ll treat each recipe we cover as a portal to the past, looking at the traditions, culinary innovations, and societal values it was steeped in. We’ll explore how various foods, cooking methods, and notions of “healthy eating” were viewed across time, and what a profession in the food industry of yore may have entailed. By the end of the course, you’ll not only have a deeper understanding of ancient Babylonian, Roman, and Mediterranean cuisines, but also the knowledge and skills to weave elements of them into your own cooking practice.”
Tuition is $235 for three seminars, each of which lasts two hours with the first one on September 25 with “Babylonian: Fowl pie and Mersu”; registration and more information on this page. The seminar leader is culinary historian Ursula Janssen, whose ancient foods cookbook Garum (affiliate link) can be purchased on Amazon. There’s also an Apple podcast interview with her if you want to brush up on the topic before the seminar (or maybe instead of, if $$ is an issue). Check it out!
