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Early Europeans ate seaweed for thousands of years

smithsonianmag.com

221–230 of 268 posts

Re: Early Europeans ate seaweed for thousands of years

#222

Earlier quoted context omitted.

It's news for the "modernized" people, that scoff at offal, weird mushrooms and "unusual" foods. Only a few peoples stopped consuming traditional foods, as one might expect.

It's the consequence of the food industry becoming hyperindustrialized in which uncommon ingredients and "off-cuts" no longer fit with the goal of pursuing economy of scale. Ultraprocessed food is efficient to produce and distribute and formulated to specifically target innate human cravings (high sugar/sodium/carb/fat) in ways that were not possible before. This is a trend that started in the U.S. and gradually spre…

...hence the obesity crisis.

Re: Early Europeans ate seaweed for thousands of years

#224
post #200

Earlier quoted context omitted.

How do you know that "ancient people" never thought of animals as having feelings? Seems an extraordinarily broad claim given all the cultures and ages that encompass "ancient people"

Because I read some of their writings? The concept of a "Pet" was foreign to them. Animals - even dogs, were there to work. The concept of how an animal was feeling simply didn't occur to them. An animal was a tool, and you took good care of the tool, but not because of the tool, but because then it was more useful. It was the 18th century when animal rights started becoming a thing, which exactly corresponds with th…

You read some writing by some "ancient" people (post writing 'ancient it seems) and you're launching into broad sweeping generalisations about all "ancient people" ?

Wow.

Meanwhile, I've travelled a lot for work - mostly to odd corners of the world, and I've yet to meet people that didn't have stories about animals and animal behaviours.

Famously, for example, Australian Aboriginal Dreamtime stories are largely about animals, Tiddalick the Frog, Emu and the Jabiru, etc.

They encapsulate the place of animals in the environment, and as hunter gatherers attuned to where next years meal will come from, attention is paid to breeding and caring for the young so that there are full grown adults to breed again and to eat.

Rightly or wrongly the stories are about the imagined feelings of animals, the things that make them happy and plentiful, the bad things that cause numbers to dwindle.

Various people had various relationships with various animals, not as "pets" but as other beings in the world.

For example: Ngarritj - the Yolngu speaking bird

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ZbSxc6Y1aVA

Re: Early Europeans ate seaweed for thousands of years

#225

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> All the rage at Italian/Japanese fusion joints Im going to take a wild guess and say this is not in Italy.

I'm from Naples, in the south of Italy and, while pasta with seaweed is indeed not existing here (I can't even imagine why you should do that to pasta), fritter with seaweed are common, here --> cfr. https://blog.giallozafferano.it/studentiaifornelli/zeppoline...

> I can't even imagine why you should do that to pasta

it's all about that umami

Re: Early Europeans ate seaweed for thousands of years

#226

Some of us still do! In Northern Ireland, we have a lesser-known seaweed dish called Dulce. https://www.bbc.com/travel/article/20180522-the-renaissance-... It's tricky to find it fresh, you usually only get it in small greengrocers or at the Auld Lammas fair. Used to be quite cheap for a bag. Very salty but quite edible and said to be nutrient-dense.

And in Portugal we make soup out of it, and use them as vegetable in costal regions.

Re: Early Europeans ate seaweed for thousands of years

#227
post #137

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Interestingly the Netherlands is actually one of the biggest markets for vegan cheese altnernatives. Many people here, even if they aren't vegan, try to limit their reliance on animal products for health, climate related or other moral reasons.

Moving here from London was a shock: I thought London was one of the better places for vegetarian food, I wasn’t prepared for the huge selection of vegan alternatives in everyday Dutch supermarkets

Lol we really aren't as unique as we think, are we? I had the inverse experience.

After a few years living in the NL I was travelling home via London. I'd come to love vegan food while living here and expected London would be beyond my wildest dreams for choices, being so big and so diverse.

Imagine my dissappointment when I went to the shop and the closest thing to a vegan option I could find was a cheese and egg sandwich!

Ended op going to Boots where I found mint and sweetpeas.

Re: Early Europeans ate seaweed for thousands of years

#228
post #178

Earlier quoted context omitted.

By the standards of modern "meatlovers" they might as well have been, given just how rarely they had meat.

It depends on where you lived whether you had large supplies of meat.

And even more on when you lived! Who are my "ancestors?" Big difference if we're talking about the ice age or the 18th Century.

Re: Early Europeans ate seaweed for thousands of years

#229

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> Cheese will save us all. Except vegans, of course.

When you're starving to death in the middle of winter everyone is an omnivore.

Thankfully fewer and fewer of us are regularly facing starvation. Yay for choice and luxury!

Re: Early Europeans ate seaweed for thousands of years

#230

Seaweed is one of those incredibly delicious items[1] that for some strange reason isn't more popular. I'd love it if it became more common, and more cuisines (outside Japan) incorporated it into their existing dishes. I'm imagining like an Indian curry with seaweed mixed in, or an Italian pasta with seaweed mixed in (in addition to existing ingredients)..... [1] if you buy it from a good brand, so YMMV.

In Portugal, you can get fish soups and açorda variations (a kind of breadcrumbs soaked in broth and seasoned with olive oil and garlic) based dishes, with seaweeds.
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