[Sca-cooks] Medieval and/or Middle Eastern Recipies containingTomatoes

[ekoogler1 at comcast.net]

Interestingly enough, I'm currently reading a book about the Chinese voyages possibly to and around the New World...during the 15th century.  It's by Gavin Menzies, and is quite fascinating...and quite logical in its conclusions.  

I mention it here because it indicates that many new world plants were brought to China by these voyages...and vice versa.  I don't recollect, off the top of my head, any reference to tomatoes, specifically.  Most of the references were to maize...and the grinding stones used to turn corn into flour...as well as peppers, etc....and how these have been found in the holds of ships that seem to date to this period.  It also discusses how Chinese things made their way to the New World...things like the variety of chicken...which did not exist in Europe at the time...and, according to the book, could only have come from China.  

I'm going to check the book tonight...I did bring it with me on my trip to NYC...and see if there is any mention of tomatoes.  

Kiri


> I don't have the time to dig into this at the moment. I have another 
> medical appointment
> this am and I have to leave for that.
> 
> There has always been this nagging bother that certain reference books
> have listed that they had pomidoros (the tomato) in Italy in like the 
> 12th century.
> Sources like Theodora Fitzgibbon's The Foods of the Western World.
> An Encyclopedia of Food from North America and Europe.
> New York: Quadrangle/the New York Times Book Company, 1976 say this.
> Some monks are credited with its introduction; I think Fitzgibbon said that
> it came from China. I don't have this book out at the moment so perhaps
> someone else can pull it off their shelf and  repeat the entries. Of 
> course if one looks
> up the entry under tomoto, it says New World!
> My best guess is that it was another plant with a name that came to be given
> to the tomato later. We see this done with various of the beans and 
> pumpkins.
> 
> There are of course 16th century references in Gerald to the tomato 
> where it is
> said that they ate them in warm places like Spain.
> 
> Johnnae
> 
> 
> >  
> >
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