the cuisine in all of these places. However, the fi rst printed recipe
involving chili peppers is from the late 17th century. They were
clearly food for the poor. In addition, it was the combination of not knowing what to do with
it and being told not to eat it that caused the tomato not to be used
in Europe for a few hundred years after its discovery. In 1690, the
earliest recipes involving tomato salsa arose. When they get to Europe, almost all New World foods are used in
completely different ways than among the Aztecs or Inca. Maize is
the perfect example of this. It was planted in Spain and Northern
Italy. Maize is easy to grow and fi lled a niche formerly taken by other
grains, like barley and millet. That is, it was ground up and made into
polenta and was adopted almost everywhere polenta was eaten. However, Europeans never soaked the corn with lime and
never ground it and baked it into tortillas. As a rule, they never
combined it with beans. The result was serious vitamin B
defi ciency and pellagra. The globalization of food has all sorts of
unexpected consequences.Albala, Beans.
Crosby, Ecological Imperialism.
Crosby, The Columbian Exchange.
Diamond, Guns, Germs, and Steel.
Fussell, Corn.
Kiple, Moveable Feast.
Kurlansky, Cod.
Norton, Sacred Gifts.
Sokolov, Why We Eat What We Eat.
Suggested Reading