The Book of Apicius Reflection From the given reading section, I learned many interesting things about The Book of Apicius, including its unknown origin, the possible reasons for its vaguely worded recipes, and the influence it has had on the many Western civilizations that arose after the fall of Rome. The Book of Apicius is somewhat mysterious because historians do not know if it is Roman in origin, Greek, or from some other culture. Once more, there are many people throughout history that were named Apicius, and the name itself began to be used as a brand name because it was believed that Apician dishes were superior to all others. This has led to the debate that the recipes in The Book of Apicius are worded vaguely because they were meant to be used by a professional or because the exact quantities of ingredients and methods of preparation were secret, only known to the original author. Whatever the reason …show more content…
Food history sheds light on the origin of foods, who ate them, why they were eaten, where its ingredients came from, and what impact the food has had on its society of origin― details that are often overlooked in traditional history. Studying the history of food can give insight into a society’s economy, social relations, beliefs, values, and very culture, which traditional history cannot completely do because of its holistic perspective of looking at evidence, as well as the lack thereof. In the study of history, either traditional or food history, the process of writing history is the same, for historians have to take in all the information they gather with a grain of salt and use numerous sources to separate fact from fiction. This can be an arduous task whenever information is limited, therefore the process of writing history can be quite
"On Food and History." 'On Food and History' N.p., 13 May 2008. Web. 25 Oct. 2013.
Mintz, Sidney W. Tasting Food, Tasting Freedom: Excursions into Eating, Culture, and the Past. Boston: Beacon Press, 1996. [secondary source]
This triumphant history is simmering beneath a complicated mixture of endearing and polarizing perspectives. As for many, these are dishes that celebrate a heritage of culinary genius, community-building, and resourcefulness. However, there are many who reach the opposite conclusion and criticize soul food as an exceedingly unhealthy cuisine that needs a warning label, or slave food that is unworthy of celebration (Miller,
Every popular belief of food and nutrition is carefully analyzed and debunked by Pollan using various examples from cultural habits, basic scientific processes and relevant studies and experiments. The vast amount of information from numerous, and likely fraudulent, sources reflect the message he is trying to convey: that food is naturally too complicated to study and perfect in science. Each chapter flows smoothly into the next topic as explanations become clearer and more in-depth. His knowledge in the topic and history is strongly demonstrated as well, building his credibility with his audience.
In Lavanya Ramanathan’s Washington Post article published in 2015 titled “Why everyone should stop calling immigrant food ‘ethnic’”, she discusses about people’s preconceptions on the type of food that should be labelled ethnic. Ashlie Stevens also touched on a similar topic in her Guardian article published in 2015 titled “Stop thinking and just eat: when ‘food adventuring’ trivializes culture”. She talks about how people assume that just by eating food from a certain culture, they are able relate to the culture as a whole. Both authors acknowledge the importance of appreciating authentic cuisines, but takes different approaches to convince the audience. Both authors establish credibility by using a wide range of substantiated evidences. While,
Food means different things to people in different countries of the world; pasta is common in Italy, hamburgers are a favorite in the US and tacos are a typical dish in Mexico. Human existence solely depends on this source of energy. A person’s fundamental need for food makes it a very important item, placing the people who control the food in a very high esteem. Consistency is also important in the delicate balance of life. Erich Maria Remarque, author of All Quiet in the Western Front, and Elie Wiesel, author of Night, both use food in their novels to convey this idea. Many of their thoughts and “meanings” concerning food paralleled one another. Food, one of the quintessential elements of life, plays a significant role in wartime experiences around the world and even in different time periods.
In Michael Pollan’s “The End of Cooking” shares the message of what we are losing something important in this day and age because of all our pre-made and processed foods. This can be compared with Kothari’s “If You Are What You Eat, What Am I?” and her argument that food is part of one’s own identity. By using the examples from these two texts you can analyze the state of food and culture in the United States today. All of the processed and pre-made foods are causing people all across America to lose their sense of Culture. We no longer know what it’s like to make one of our cultures specialty dishes from scratch which can help people identify with their culture. This process helped newer generations see what it was like for those before them to cook on a daily basis and could help them identify your sense of culture.
Rachel Lauden’s essay In Praise of Fast Food presents a fresh point of view by taking a look at the way the poor fed themselves throughout history and comparing it with the reality of today’s fast food industry. The current thinking about fast food is that it is unhealthy and leads to diabetes, heart disease, and obesity, when it is eaten without moderation. The argument Ms. Lauden proposes is that, due to the difficulties in procuring and preparing healthy, sanitary food for the lower classes, fast food is a positive development. She pointed out that as recently as the 1930s, poor children were cooking for themselves in outdoor shanties in extremely unsanitary conditions, and she emphasized the idea that upper classes invented ethnic dishes.
Oedipus Rex is a tragic play from ancient Greece. One of the reasons this play is tragic is because Oedipus’s downfall comes about because he tried to do something moral, and save his people form the plague. When the play starts, the reader knows that Oedipus has killed his biological father, and married his biological mother, but Oedipus doesn’t. This happens because Laios, Oedipus’s father, heard of Oedipus’s fate from the oracle Delphi before Oedipus was born. Laios decided to kill Oedipus, so Oedipus couldn’t kill him.
Since before I took this class I had always been attracted to movies or cooking shows. The way food is prepared and the passion that many of the chefs put into their delicious creations. Many of the recipes are part of the person’s culture and they continue to cook these recipes to commemorate an important part of their history. A good example of this is the film Garlic Is As Good As Ten Mothers, garlic being the center of every recipe but it’s of great importance to the different cultures that represented in this film.
Within the development of Europe, one would think that religion and politics played the key roles in shaping the regions, in which they did, but many individuals don’t realize the true impact of the role spices played in the evolution of the economy and expansion of Europe. Food alone represented a vast field of human experience and shaped peoples’ beliefs and values, aesthetics and most importantly their social attitudes toward one another. Spices contributed to these attitudes, providing a potential window for the individual to change their understanding of the political and social life of certain cultures and nations. The main question that the author, Paul Freedman poses within the text is, why did the Europeans and the Romans before them, maintain such a high demand for spices for almost a millennium?
Oedipal Complex in Oedipus Rex Briefly, an overview of Freud's Oedipus complex (in all its decidedly masculine perspective) is: The sudden outburst of carnal feelings from the child for the opposite sex parent in conjunction with inimical feelings for the parent of the same sex. Freud adamantly asserted, first in The Interpretation of Dreams in 1900 and then later in Three Essays on the Theory of Sexuality (1905), that the Oedipal period of the child's life (from between 3-6 years) was the crucial moment in which adult personality disorders later formed if unresolved. Due to the innate disharmony of the emotions felt towards both parents there is an overwhelming sense of ambivalence in regard to the father figure whom the boy has to identify with yet feel at odds due to the competition for the mother's affections.
Scholliers P (2001) Meals, Food Narratives and Sentiments of Belonging in Past and Present and Chapter Two Commensality and Social Morphology: An Essay of Typology Claude Grignon in Food, Drink and Identity Cooking, Eating and Drinking in Europe since the middle Ages by Berg in New York, America
When examining the background of spices in general, it is very interesting to note how they have shaped our history. Spices were highly valuable commodities both during and before the Age of Exploration. This can be attributed to the fact that they served an important role in the food preservation process. Moreover, they were widely used as a flavor enhancer. As a result, spices emerged as key components of ancient economies, and competitions for the control of the spice trade have led to major consequences that have altered the course of history.
Italian food is the world’s most popular cuisine. It is an essential part of Italian life and very common to non-Italians. The most well-known Italian dishes today are pasta and pizza, but Italian cuisine varies greatly from one region to another. For instance, “the popular Italian-American dishes generally come from the southern region of Campania and the island of Sicily, just off the southern coast” (Traditional Italian). However, many years ago, Italy was made up of different nations, conquered by many, and it experienced vast influences from different countries. These impacts would shape the food of Italy and its’ culture.