The Roman Empire! The name conjures in our minds many images. The Caesars! Gladiators! Chariot Races! Slaves! Legions! And perhaps, food. And weird food served at long elaborate dinner parties! Like flamingo tongues. Sows’ udders. Stuffed dormice. Yeah, the Romans ate this stuff. At least some of them did. But not all the time. Everyday food, not that ‘put on the ritz’ food eaten and displayed by show-offs at some fancy dinner party, was a lot like what you and I eat everyday. Some of it was fast food eaten at the ubiquitous taverns —the predecessors (in part) of our (fast food) restaurants today. And some of it was prepared at home, again like today. Now the mechanics of any meal preparation back then, whether done at home or in a public eatery were awkward and dangerous by today’s standards. Open fire. Non-existent or poor ventilation. No running water in your home to help in the preparation or in the clean-up. Your stove or gridiron was at times located next to a latrine. Your cooking tools were often earthenware and, therefore, brittle. Your knives weren’t the sharpest. Your food processor was a mortar. All spelled tough work. And yet, according to the sole surviving cookbook and the scattered recipes found in many disparate sources, the meals could be quite good, tasty, and imaginative by creatively using many different herbs and spices, often in a bewildering variety—frequently in the same dish. Like today as well, fresh as well as processed ingredients were used. Some ingredients familiar with us today were unknown to the Romans. For example, tomatoes, potatoes, most beans, peppers, and chocolate. However, they enjoyed some items that have fallen out of favor in our cuisine here in the U.S. Rue and lovage, for example. Fish sauce and laser are others.

Yet regardless of the hardships and pitfalls of putting a meal together in the ancient world, whether you lived in the Mediterranean, the Near East, Africa, Northern Europe, the Far East or the Americas, we humans persevered and indeed consistently demonstrated our talent at combining flavors and textures that resulted in memorable products and fare. Indeed, what our ancient ancestors often developed and enjoyed in their respective cuisines, they in fact laid the foundation for our own current cuisine. The foodstuffs available in the cosmopolitan city of Rome in the century that Jesus lived, for example, showed the same degree of richness and variety—fusion, if you will, albeit with partially different ingredients—that we’re currently experiencing in our cuisine today here in cosmopolitan Southern California. For a little taste of the fare enjoyed and relished by Romans at a notable dinner—not the nearly everyday fare of porridge—please join us at the Whitehouse Restaurant in Anaheim on October 17, 2008.