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Mesopotamia, final thoughts (for now)
Jul. 9th, 2022 09:11 pmWhile I was away from this blog, I cooked the Tuh'u Beet Broth twice for other people; once at a potluck and once at a camping event; both went well, though I will have to try it with a different root vegetable than beetroot at some point.
I've also read a book on cuneiform writing ("Cuneiform", by Irving Finkel and Jonathan Taylor), watched a good handful of videos of lectures by Irving Finkel who is an utter delight to listen to, read up on Mesopotamian mythology, and took an Open University free course on Babylonian mathematics, because why not. There are also a lot of intriguing youtube videos. I'm certainly not the only one trying ancient Mesopotamian cuisine!
There are things I didn't know before I read "The Oldest Cuisine in the World". Meat was cooked ("prepare water; add fat"); roasted meat was reserved for the gods as the older way of preparing meat. Pepper doesn't seem to have been known in the area at the time the tablets were written - although of course those tablets only give a brief glimpse into the cookery of Mesopotamia. If I really wanted to go down that particular branch of food and cooking history, I would start researching indirect sources, ie other translated cuneiform tablets and other writings to find mentions of food / dishes, including religion (the Old Testament comes to mind) and mythology.
I didn't realise how old the tannur is, the clay oven where bread was baked on the hot inside, like a tandoor, or clay ovens of very similar names all over the region.
I love that the wild man Enkidu in the Gilgamesh stories is tamed not only through sex with a Temple prostitute, but also by eating bread and drinking beer - and lots of both, in fact. Processed food divides human from animal.
There is also the Hymn to Ninkasi, Goddess of Beer, which is an instruction for brewing beer, and it would be interesting to follow those instructions.
There are still recipes in "The Oldest Cuisine in the World" which I want to try, especially the one that reads like a chicken pie, one of the pigeon dishes with mint and vinegar, and one of the porridges cooked with beer that were served with cooked birds, together with thin buttermilk breads and honey. But for now, I'm putting this one aside.
For Ningirsu, the champion of Enlil,
Entemena, the Prince of Lagash,
The elect of the heart of Nanse,
The son of Eanatum,
Had this pitcher of pure silver made,
So that Ningirsu could enjoy his butter in it."
(dedication on a silver vessel by Entemena, king of Lagash, ca 2400 BCE. This Silver Vase of Entemena is now in the Louvre. As for any translation of writings from that time, YMMV.)
I've also read a book on cuneiform writing ("Cuneiform", by Irving Finkel and Jonathan Taylor), watched a good handful of videos of lectures by Irving Finkel who is an utter delight to listen to, read up on Mesopotamian mythology, and took an Open University free course on Babylonian mathematics, because why not. There are also a lot of intriguing youtube videos. I'm certainly not the only one trying ancient Mesopotamian cuisine!
There are things I didn't know before I read "The Oldest Cuisine in the World". Meat was cooked ("prepare water; add fat"); roasted meat was reserved for the gods as the older way of preparing meat. Pepper doesn't seem to have been known in the area at the time the tablets were written - although of course those tablets only give a brief glimpse into the cookery of Mesopotamia. If I really wanted to go down that particular branch of food and cooking history, I would start researching indirect sources, ie other translated cuneiform tablets and other writings to find mentions of food / dishes, including religion (the Old Testament comes to mind) and mythology.
I didn't realise how old the tannur is, the clay oven where bread was baked on the hot inside, like a tandoor, or clay ovens of very similar names all over the region.
I love that the wild man Enkidu in the Gilgamesh stories is tamed not only through sex with a Temple prostitute, but also by eating bread and drinking beer - and lots of both, in fact. Processed food divides human from animal.
There is also the Hymn to Ninkasi, Goddess of Beer, which is an instruction for brewing beer, and it would be interesting to follow those instructions.
There are still recipes in "The Oldest Cuisine in the World" which I want to try, especially the one that reads like a chicken pie, one of the pigeon dishes with mint and vinegar, and one of the porridges cooked with beer that were served with cooked birds, together with thin buttermilk breads and honey. But for now, I'm putting this one aside.
For Ningirsu, the champion of Enlil,
Entemena, the Prince of Lagash,
The elect of the heart of Nanse,
The son of Eanatum,
Had this pitcher of pure silver made,
So that Ningirsu could enjoy his butter in it."
(dedication on a silver vessel by Entemena, king of Lagash, ca 2400 BCE. This Silver Vase of Entemena is now in the Louvre. As for any translation of writings from that time, YMMV.)