Ancient Living: Roman Food

Okay, so today we're learning about Romans. Well, Roman food, actually.

Firstly, lets talk about their courses.

The first meal was made up of bread and fruit. This was the breakfast. Both it and the lunch were light. The lunch was made up of a verity of  dishes made with cold meats, fish, vegetables, and bread. Though, many of the Romans didn't eat much. This is because of the third and final meal. Dinner.

There  were  multiple  courses within this large meal.  There was a great diversity in dishes made with meat, vegetables, and bread. These included stuffed dormice, slugs fattened on milk, cheese,  and countless others. The  final course was made up of fanciful desserts and fresh fruit. Throughout all of the courses, wine slightly diluted with water and honey, would be  served  in generous prepositions. 

During the length of these elaborate dinners, poets would read poems aloud, jugglers would juggle, dancers would dance, singers would sing, and many other people were assigned to entertain. People would laugh and joke and talk with friends. There was always something else; new food to try, new people to preform (and more performances to watch), and new people to meet and/or talk with. Many people were invited to these rich feasts, so there were plenty of friends to make.

Servants whisked about the room, replacing empty plates with full plates of freshly-made dishes. There was no need to get up, lying on comfortable couches and plucking food from the tables and being waited on by slaves.

Many Romans ate until the tipping point, and would get very sick from overeating. In fact, there was often a whole room built for sick Romans to vomit and lay back in.

During the meal, Romans would lounge in comfortable couches, eating from low tables covered in rich and not-so-healthy foods. These couches were lengths of wood or stone covered in fat pillows. This rested on four stands that were often elaborately-carved marble or bronze.

-KittyLover8

© 2012