Columbian Exchange Essay

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The Columbian Exchange was a trade system that revolutionized the world. When Columbus first landed in the America’s in the 1400’s, interactions between the natives and the Europeans began. This started the merging of culture between the Eastern and Western hemispheres. Over the next couple of years, Atlantic trade between Europe, Asia, Africa, and America brought crops and items from one half of the world to the other. Europeans discovered foods such as corn and potatoes from the Americas, and livestock such as cows and sheep were introduced to the New World. The need to cultivate these crops coupled with the plentiful farmland of the Americas created the need for a larger work force. Since the agricultural revolution, labor has dictated …show more content…

Bread, tomatoes, cheese, cocoa powder, and sugar are the five main ingredients in this menu. The courses on this menu are eaten all across the U.S, and can easily be made from ingredients found in all grocery stores. Garlic bread is simply made from bread slathered in a butter and garlic mix, then toasted in the oven. Lasagna is a pasta-type dish that consists of large flat noodles laid over each other with tomato sauce, melted ricotta, and mozzarella that gets cooked in the oven. Brownies are made from eggs, butter, cocoa powder, and vanilla extract that are all mixed together and baked. Together, these three foods make up a classically American meal that distinctly shows worldwide connections and cultural blending due to the Columbian …show more content…

They all tell some story about cultural growth across the world. Bread can be traced back to the very foundation of human civilization, and is widely recognized as a main food staple. Growing the bread and eating the bread became a symbol of not only nutrition and sustenance, but also of status. The growing of crops, whether it be wheat, tomatoes, cocoa, or sugar cane, is a defining detail in social structures all over the world. Those who grow the crops necessary for food are laborers or peasants, and those who eat the food are wealthy. The wheat in bread and the milk from cows that are necessary for the creation of bread and cheese originated in the old world. Sugar was also brought over to America from Africa. Livestock, grains, and sugar cane came to the new world through the Columbian exchange. Tomatoes and cocoa are the two main ingredients in the menu on that originated in the Americas. They were cultivated here for a long time before European explorers introduced them to the old

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