[Sca-cooks] OT - A little history

[jenne at fiedlerfamily.net]

> What does appear clear, though, is that until the early 19th Century, when
> Jefferson "proved" their safety and made a big deal of feeding them to his
> ambassadorial guests, the Tomato did not appear as a common European
> foodstuff, even in Italy.

Well, Gerard was of the opinion that they were commonly eaten in Italy
when he wrote his herbal, and that was in the late 16th century, or if it
was an unmarked addition by Johnson, it was early 17th century.

So I think it's NOT clear that Europeans didn't eat tomatoes.

-- Pani Jadwiga Zajaczkowa, Knowledge Pika   jenne at fiedlerfamily.net
"History celebrates the battlefields whereon we meet our death, but scorns
to speak of the plowed fields whereby we thrive. It knows the names of the
king's bastards but cannot tell us the origin of wheat. This is the way of
human folly." -- Jean-Henri Fabre