[Sca-cooks] Foods native to Britain before the Romans came

[Robert Downie]

kingstaste at mindspring.com wrote:

>Dear Cooks,
>	I am putting together one of my last two classes for my Roman Britain
>class.  This week we are talking about Samhain, and next week is the Roman
>Banquet.  One of the homework assignments is for them to select a food to
>bring.  I have a list of foods introduced to Britain by the Romans, but I
>don't have a good list of what was native before they arrived.  My Hagen
>books have not made it home yet, so I need some help here.
>	Here are the lists I have:
>
>	Foods introduced to Britain by the Romans
>		Pheasants, peacocks, guinea fowl, fallow deer
>		Apples, grape vines, fig, walnut, medlar, mulberry, damsons, pears, plums,
>cultivated 		cherries, sweet chestnut
>		Parsley, borage, dill, fennel, mint, thyme, garlic, leek, onion, shallot,
>rosemary, 		sage, savory, sweet marjoram, radish, thyme
>		Turnips, cabbages, lettuce, endive, peas, lentils, carrots, artichokes,
>cucumber, 			asparagus, parsnip, celery
>
>	Imported Commodities
>		Dates, almonds, olives, wine, olive oil, pine nuts,
>		fish sauce (liquamen or garum), pepper, ginger, cinnamon
>
>	Foods native to Britain before the Romans
>		Hazelnuts,
>
>and now I'm stuck.
>Help?
>
I'm just going to throw out a few quick references before dashing off to 
work:

According to Joan Alcock's "Food in Roman Britain"
-Fruits indigenous to Britain include: raspberries, billberries, 
blackberries, ederberries, wood strawberries and crab apples
-walnuts and hazelnuts are indigenous to Britain
-Caesar said the Britons reared fowls and geese (there was a taboo 
against eating them, but archaological butchery marks suggest otherwise)
-wild chives are native to Britain

got to catch my bus :-)
Faerisa
-Pliny comments that although milk was known to the barbarians, they do 
do not know the blessing of cheeses
-