[Sca-cooks] Ancient Indian Food

[Patrick Levesque]

Stumbled upon this in McGill Library, I just had to borrow it:

Om Prakash, "Food And Drinks in Ancient India (from earliest times to c.
1200 A.D.)". Munshi Ram Manohar Lal, Delhi. Date unspecified, byt probably
published around 1961.

I've read through most of it and it is mostly an overview of available
foods, methods of preparation and eating customs, divided by era and (to a
lesser extent) by region. No exact recipes are provided, although a few
quotes make reconstruction possible (there might be more to it -- a good
number of the quotes are in sanskrit, which I can't read)

Dr. Prakash seems to base his work on information gained in various written
documents of the various periods (Indian or Foreigns) but is scant in
archeological evidence, except when discussing prehistory.

Fortunately, appendices include food preparation and beverages (once again,
no recipes provided, but it does give enough detail to attempt a
reconstruction. Hours of fun ahead!!) as well as historical information on
food provenance, frying, betel chewing, sugar and smoking. A decent
bibliography is included.

Now I'm far from an expert in Indian cuisine or Indian history, so I plan
to put a bit more research into it before I plan a feast around this
(especially if I can find English or French translations of some primary
sources --- I haven't started research on this topic yet, however). Has
anybody worked on period Indian food so far? (Haven't found a Food--India
section in the florilegium).

YIS

Petru 'cel Paros' Voda