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

[Robert Downie]

kingstaste at mindspring.com wrote:

>Thank you, but I have a question:
>
>Faerisa wrote:
>-Pliny comments that although milk was known to the barbarians, they do
>do not know the blessing of cheeses
>
>
>Milk from what - cows? sheep? goats?  I think I know, but don't want to
>assume.
>
>So far the indiginous foods list is pretty scarce but growing:
>
>Geese,
>hazelnuts, walnuts
>crabapples, raspberries, bilberries, blackberries, elderberries, wood
>strawberries
>wild chives
>milk (but not cheese, according to Pliny)
>
>Thanks to all for helping to compile the list!
>Christianna
>
Here is an excerpt from the Dairy chapter:

"Milk is produced by cows, sheep and goats.  All these animals were 
important both to the Romans and and to the Barbarian tribes.  Strabo 
commented that the Belgae had large quantities of food including milk 
and all kinds of meat.  Columella says that for nomadic tribes that have 
no corn, sheep provide their diet; hence the Gaetae are called 
'milk-drinkers'.  For the Romans, sheep and goat's milk was more highly 
regarded than cow's milk." also - Pliny maintained that the Barbarians 
considered butter their choicest food.  Cow's milk was most commonly 
used, but sheep's milk gave a richer butter.

Here are some more tidbits from the same book:

The main wheat crop of early prehistoric Britain was einkorn ( triticum 
monococcum), a spring sown wheat, but this was suplanted by emmer 
(triticum dicoccum) in Iron Age Britain.  Spelt was introduced into Iron 
Age Britain  by the Belgae.  Rye appears to have become more common 
undwer the Romans, but grains of rye found in the stomach of of the late 
Iron Age man found in Lindow Moss, Wilmslow in Cheshire indicate it was 
pre-Roman.  Oatshad also been grown in  Iron Age Britain originally as a 
wild crop, but soon cultivated).

In Iron Age Britain, the main cattle are believed to have been Bos 
Longifrons, akin to Highland cattle, and Bos Taurus, a short horned 
variety.  Kerry cattle in Ireland and Welsh black cattle would be the 
nearest modern equivalent to the latter.  The nearest equivalent to Iron 
age sheep are Hebridean breds and Soay sheep.  Domesticated goats were 
less common in the Iron Age, and this continued to be the case in the 
Roman period.  On some late Iron Age sites in the South-East, the pig 
bones found reached 50% of the bones of the three main animal species.  
There is some evidence that horses were eaten in Britain, pre-Roman.

Certain types of fungi were native to Britain.  Puffballs were part of 
the vegetation at Vindolanda in the 1st C. AD.  Nettles occur with 
frequency in Britain.  The Britons probably collected the leaves of wild 
plants such as mallow, plantain, docks, black bindweed, dandelion, and 
Good King Henry.   The native Britons had cultivated certain crops such 
as the Celtic bean, a smaller versiion of the broad bean, vetch, used 
for both human and animal consumption, and fat hen, whose ground up 
seeds can  be used in bread making.  This plant, grown since the 
neolithic period, tastes like spinach when cooked.

Honey had been  collected in prehistoric Britain (cheifly for use in mead)

Now it's bed time ;-)
Faerisa