Ancestral Cuisine and Cooking Rituals

Abstract

SynonymsAncient cooking; Archetypical food; Cooking customs;Iconic dishes; Prehistorical recipes; Ritual food; TraditionalcuisineIntroductionAll over the world today, different peoplescarry out culinary practices and methods of preparing food thatbelong to and denote earlier and often particularly ancientforms of cooking (Civitello 2011). Anthropological andethnological studies show that the cuisine of our ancestors isfar more than a long-standing system of preparing food developeddown through the ages. Bio-archaeology and ethnobiology alsoreveal that the cuisine of our ancestors is not a simple clusterof remote culinary habits or customs but involved specialartifacts, technical expertise, and basic skills related tonutrition and environment. Moreover, it reflects archetypicalimages and ideas about the origin and identity of individualsand groups. In addition, traditional concepts of gender areembedded in the most ancient culinary practices. Ancestralcuisine is also a m ...