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Use Cases
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Resources
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Pricing
1400 - 1500
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Menus differed according to your status (If a villager, provided for yourself and farming for your own food was a way of life dictated by the work that had to be carried out during the farming year)
Made from scratch (Most people in Medieval England had to make their own food)
Peasents (Most people in Medieval England ate bread… as well as bread, the people of Medieval England ate a great deal of pottage.. relied mainly on pigs for their regular supply of meat)
Middle Class
Nobility (Lords ate much better, of course. Their bread was white, and there were numerous meat and fish dishes at each meal. For the evening meal, they might have pigeon pie. They regularly drank wine or ale) (“The Food Timeline: history notes--Mesopotamia through Shakespeare,” n.d.)
1500 - 1600
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1500’s
Christopher Columbus returned from the new world (foods brought back from the New World enriched the diets of various countries)
Changes palate and trends
1493 Columbus returned from his first voyage to the New World.
The Tudor period was a time of great creativity... but in the kitchen, however, change came more slowly. Bread, meat, fish, pottages and wine continued to form the basis of most diets. People still avoided uncooked fruit and vegetables, believing them to carry disease (indeed, during the plague of 1569 it became illegal to sell fresh fruit) but the wealthy had access to alternative ingredients… explorations to the New World brought all sorts of exotic and unusual delicacies to the tables of the rich… The English had an ever increasing appetite for sugar, now imported from territories in the West and East Indies as well as from Morocco and Barbary…
The late 1500s was the first time that cookery books began to be published on a regular basics
1600 - 1700
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Restaurants and tea/coffee houses
Turbulent (era of war, fire, plague and execution)
Throughout the century there was a growing fascination for food from mainland Europe. It is likely that this was fuelled by political events, such as the marriage of Charles I to the French princess Henrietta Maria in 1625
Foreign food was all the rage
French cuisine enlivened the English palate, flavouring its food with anchovies, capers and wine, and introducing coulis, roux, ragouts and fricassé. Fancy French dishes were nicknamed kickshaws, after 'quelquechose', the French word for 'something'. The influence of the Continent brought a greater taste for savoury dishes, and less of the traditional combinations of sweet and sour flavours. Thanks to the Europeans, the English realised that it was perfectly safe to eat raw fruit and vegetables, and began to enjoy salads with their meals. The first English coffee house was opened in London in 1652 by Pasqua Rosee, a servant to a Turkish merchant, who brought from Turkey his ingredients and his expertise. The drink became a huge hit, as did the coffee houses, which swarmed with fashionable social life throughout the century.
Nonetheless, traditional English food retained its popularity - the English still greedily tucked into their cakes, pies and puddings. Even after the death of Charles I (1649) there was strong nostalgia for pre-war royal traditions, and many recipes were tinged by a reverence for this faded glory.
1700 - 1800
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Traditional Fare
The resources available through local agricultural products are the foremost indicator of any culture’s diet. Staples of the 17th century English diet included foods prepared with greens, vegetables and herbs grown in the kitchen garden, such as spinach and sorrel, as well as fruits and nuts found in the wild. People of this era made these convenient foodstuffs into pottage by combining them in a pot over the fire and thickening them with bread -- a meal comparable to a modern day stew. Pottage could remain over the fire for several days, with additional foods added as its volume diminished. A batch of pottage could change significantly over its lifetime. Poor and rich alike enjoyed pottage, with peasants using inexpensive grains and vegetables like beans, peas and lentils, or acorns foraged from nature. The wealthy class enhanced their pottage with more expensive ingredients such as bacon, jelly and eggs.
Bread and Pudding
Roasted meats and sweet and savory pies and puddings were traditional menu items in 17th century England. Bread was another staple of the 17th century diet. The Assise of Bread, an act of Parliament, regulated the weight, size, type and price of bread and affected the availability and convenience of commercial loaves. Bread was made with a variety of flours. When the harvest was good, Englanders could use flours made with wheat, rye and barley. When these grains weren’t readily available, flours would be made with beans, oats and lentils. More expensive specialty and spice breads were reserved for funerals and religious holidays.
Trending in 17th Century England
A temporary fall of the monarchy in the middle of the century left prestigious cooks without jobs. To supplement their income, they wrote cookbooks and found a market in the non-aristocratic landowners and people who were finding opportunities in a new economy. Food etiquette and good table manners were crucial for maintaining good social relationships, so these books were in demand as the newly wealthy wanted to educate themselves on hospitality. Political marriages opened the door to different cultures, and food imported from mainland Europe became trendy. These trends included French foods such as anchovies and capers. Cooks also began to incorporate French cooking techniques, including rich roux, ragouts and fricassees. European neighbors also taught the English that raw foods were safe to eat, and uncooked fruit and salads made their way to the English meal. Cinnamon, ginger and cloves made their way into the marketplace through the Eastern spice trade route.
Beverages and the Birth of Coffeehouses
The 17th century birthed the first English coffee house. In 1652, Pasqua Rosee, a Turkish merchant’s servant, brought ingredients, recipes and experience from Turkey to establish the first of what would become an icon of London culture. Coffee was here to stay. Missionaries from China, believing that tea was responsible for the long lives of their Chinese contemporaries, brought tea to London, which also became a traditional English drink. Other beverages consumed by the English during the 1600s were beer and wine. Many people brewed their own ale and beer at home, which yielded a low alcohol content and therefore was consumed readily. Landowners seeking to improve their land maintained prized orchards, which resulted in increased cultivation of bees and honey, and subsequently, fruity beverages such as cider and wine as well as mead, which was made by fermenting honey with other fruits and spices.
Political and economic affairs of the 17th century had a significant influence on the evolution of the English diet. Local food crops, political unrest, agricultural advancements and changing social needs established the trends and traditions of the English meal. Government regulations on brewing, bread baking and spice trading also helped determine the dinner table display.
1800 - 1900
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This century was marked by vast industrial development, by factories and gadgets, extravagance and pollution, mass poverty and charity. As life grew more urban diseases and famine did as well. Cookery books became more popular. The invention of the steam engine speeded up the process of food transportation, allowing fresh meat, fish and dairy produce to be sent all over the country on shiny new railways.
1900 - 2000
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Ironically, WWII was a period of relatively healthy eating. The seas around the British Isles were dangerous and, as a result, imported food was highly restricted. At the beginning of the century the English population ate very poorly. In 1917, when 2,500,000 men from across the social spectrum were given medical examinations, over forty per cent of them were found to be unfit for military service - mainly due to mal-nourishment. (“1900s food,” n.d., p. 1)