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Fish bad, sugar good, and other medieval ideas about food

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Re: Fish bad, sugar good, and other medieval ideas about food

#21

Post by watwut »

bluGill wrote: post #10

> According to Galen, food “is probably the most important of all medical subjects,” Just remember that in medieval times growing food was the job of the majority of men. Men also were the people most likely to be educated and actually write and talk about things and so food would be something on their mind. They would be growing it and thus writing about it. contrary to modern ideas men actually appeared to have don…

> Even your common peasant farmer man would likely spend a significant amount of time out in the field at lunchtime where the women are not around and so would have to fend for themselves for their lunch.

Womem were in the fields. And kids too. Generally men were doing physically most demanding work, but not all of it is like that.

And people working in the fields would also take the food that does not necessitate cooking with them. And kids were tasked to bring food to people working in fields when necessary.

You cant "fend for yourself" in the fields and also do the fields work.

Re: Fish bad, sugar good, and other medieval ideas about food

#22

Post by b112 »

coldtea wrote: post #12

Considering how fast fish without refrigeration would spoil back then, the rarity of access to sugar and the need for energy dense foods, "fish bad, sugar good" makes perfect sense.

People dried and salted alot of food to preserve it. But fish already live in a world of salt, and so I wonder of worms and parasites still survived this proxess.

And I think a lot of salted food was just eaten, not cooked?

Re: Fish bad, sugar good, and other medieval ideas about food

#23

Post by Ekaros »

b112 wrote: post #22
coldtea wrote: post #12

Considering how fast fish without refrigeration would spoil back then, the rarity of access to sugar and the need for energy dense foods, "fish bad, sugar good" makes perfect sense.

People dried and salted alot of food to preserve it. But fish already live in a world of salt, and so I wonder of worms and parasites still survived this proxess. And I think a lot of salted food was just eaten, not cooked?

Some of the salted food like meat was so salted that even just dragging it in sea water on ships was effective way to lower salt content. So it was definitely cooked most often boiled to remove most of salt content.

I think we largely have not learned just how much salt is needed to properly preserve food outside refrigeration over longer periods.

Re: Fish bad, sugar good, and other medieval ideas about food

#24

Post by vasco »

GuB-42 wrote: post #20

I am sure that in the past, good or bad food was more about conservation and food borne diseases than it was about nutrition. At least, that's the attitude that would make the most sense. That would explain sugar good / fish bad. There is probably a political aspect too, local food is seen as better than the rival neighbor food. The modern, first world attitude must be very unusual towards history. We basically solve…

Not just nutrition, over the last ~30 years there's also been a philosophical shift globally where many people went from thinking about impact on humans as the only thing to assess, to considering the impact on the wider ecosystems.

Today not only we discuss nutritional content we also discuss the externalities to produce those calories.

Re: Fish bad, sugar good, and other medieval ideas about food

#26

Post by alexaholic »

mik1998 wrote: post #16

This article seems unusually misrepresenting of the theory of humours, which was prevalent in medieval Europe, at least in the catholic parts. This theory stated that no food was explicitly bad or good; rather, you should eat food that is suitable for your temperament. In that sense, they did not believe any food is necessarily (at least in terms of the humours) unhealthy; rather, it may be unsuitable or suitable for…

It mentions it:

> Complexion also determined what a person should eat, so that (for example) garlic and pepper were good for the phlegmatic, but “venym” to a choleric person.

Re: Fish bad, sugar good, and other medieval ideas about food

#27

Post by Tangurena2 »

> In thirteenth-century England, Christians were expected to avoid meat every Wednesday, Friday and Saturday during Lent (when eggs and dairy products were also forbidden), Advent and on some saints’ days (or the eves of their feasts)

Every person (back then) could observe farm animals had sex. Since no one had seen fish having sex, it was believed that fish spawned spontaneously from rivers/lakes/oceans and therefore were free from the animal version of "original sin". That's why so much effort was put into catching and preserving fish.

Source:

https://www.amazon.com/Cod-Biography-Fish-Changed-World-eboo...

Also history of food:

https://www.amazon.com/Salt-World-History-Mark-Kurlansky-ebo...

The author has a fascination with Basques & Basque history. Or maybe they really had a large influence in fishing and trans-Atlantic navigation. And that maybe they discovered the huge cod banks by Newfoundland before John Cabot did.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/John_Cabot

Medieval people were not stupid. They observed that pickled vegetables preserved the veggies for months. And they observed that people who ate pickled vegetables got scurvy (vitamin C deficiency disease) at a much lower rate. The recipes didn't travel too far, so while sauerkraut and kimchi are both pickled cabbage, with different spices they are wildly different.

Re: Fish bad, sugar good, and other medieval ideas about food

#28

Post by Tangurena2 »

watwut wrote: post #21
bluGill wrote: post #10

> According to Galen, food “is probably the most important of all medical subjects,” Just remember that in medieval times growing food was the job of the majority of men. Men also were the people most likely to be educated and actually write and talk about things and so food would be something on their mind. They would be growing it and thus writing about it. contrary to modern ideas men actually appeared to have don…

> Even your common peasant farmer man would likely spend a significant amount of time out in the field at lunchtime where the women are not around and so would have to fend for themselves for their lunch. Womem were in the fields. And kids too. Generally men were doing physically most demanding work, but not all of it is like that. And people working in the fields would also take the food that does not necessitate co…

Until the Industrial Revolution, there was nothing even close to what we nowadays call "childhood". As children became old enough to walk by themselves, they'd accompany their parents and help with weeding & cultivation.

Re: Fish bad, sugar good, and other medieval ideas about food

#29

Post by Anonyneko »

Tangurena2 wrote: post #27

> In thirteenth-century England, Christians were expected to avoid meat every Wednesday, Friday and Saturday during Lent (when eggs and dairy products were also forbidden), Advent and on some saints’ days (or the eves of their feasts) Every person (back then) could observe farm animals had sex. Since no one had seen fish having sex, it was believed that fish spawned spontaneously from rivers/lakes/oceans and therefor…

And then there were the barnacle geese that, conveniently for Lent, grew on trees...

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Barnacle_goose_myth

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