[Sca-cooks] Dutch gray field pea

[Johnna Holloway]

New world peas?

"The genetic origin of peas is thought to be southwest Asia, somewhere in the vicinity of Afghanistan. The ancestral pea is now extinct, although its immediate descendants, the wild pea (Pisum sativum, spp. elatius and spp. humile) survive in the Middle East. …  the wild pea (Pisum sativum, spp. elatius and spp. humile) were recognized for their food value at an early date and were gathered both as a fresh vegetable in June (when the seeds are green and sweet) and as a dry seed for use during the rest of the year.
Wild peas later appear in the remains of Swiss lake dwellings (about 3000 B.C.E.), so it is evident that they were carried out of their native habitat into Europe and maintained either as a cultivated plant or as a managed plant in the wild."

"The next step in the evolution of the pea was the appearance of the field pea, which is written botanically as Pisum sativum, spp. arvense. This is a form of pea that evolved artificially through human intervention and supplied early agricultural societies from China to Ireland with one of the most important staple foods down to the eighteenth century. Pease pottage was a common dish in the Middle Ages, and in India, vatana (dal made from peas) is still an important element of everyday diet. In the southern portion of the United States, people commonly refer to cowpeas as field peas, but the practical point is clear: this is not a plant grown in kitchen gardens; it is an American substitute form for the true field peas of Europe. Field peas, like wild peas, were harvested on the vine and dried in the barn. The peas were threshed as needed and the straw given as fodder to the livestock."

"The tiny, speckled Jämtlands Grä Förder Ärt of Sweden, and the tan-seeded Groch Pomorski (Pomeranian Pea) of medieval Poland are two surviving examples of this type.
Field peas are often referred to in horticultural literature as gray peas, a term that seems to have evolved in the low countries owing to the color of the seed and the flour they yield. During the late Middle Ages, Capuchin monks in Holland and northern Germany devoted considerable energy to the improvement of field peas for agricultural purposes. This has resulted in a group of large-seeded gray peas referred to as Capuchin, especially those from the Netherlands where the breeding of new pea varieties became a national pastime by the early 1600s. One of the classic peas from this group and one which dates from the 1500s is the handsome blue pod Capucijner, a soup pea growing on six-foot (two m) vines."

Weaver, William Woys. "Peas." Encyclopedia of Food and Culture. Ed. Solomon H. Katz. Vol. 3. New York: Charles Scribner's Sons, 2003. 57-60. Gale Virtual Reference Library. Web. 18 Nov. 2013.
Johnnae

On Nov 18, 2013, at 8:29 PM, Stefan li Rous wrote:
> Let me confirm. This is an Old World pea variety, not a New World one, right?
> If so, is it still around? Or did it get extinguished by the introduction of the various New World peas?