Pangiallo – yellow bread
In the Latium region to this day, one of the typical Christmas cakes is the so-called yellow bread – pangiallo. Its roots go back to the era of the Roman Empire.
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Curiosities of ancient Rome (Recipes)
Recipes are curiosities dedicated to the cuisine and culinary customs of ancient Rome. This category features interesting facts, lesser-known facts, and historical context about Roman dishes, ingredients, and food preparation methods, offering a glimpse into everyday life in the Roman Empire.
Snails fattened with milk – Roman delicacy
One of the favourite delicacies of the ancient Romans was snails fattened with milk. Varro or Pliny the Elder mention that rich Romans enjoyed snails from their own farms.
Recipe for Roman cream
Cream recipe by Marcus Gavius Apicius, a gastronome from the times of Octavian Augustus and Tiberius.
Bucellatum – Roman biscuit
The late-Roman Codex Theodosianus, which is a collection of Roman laws, mentions that a Roman soldier should be equipped with a buccellatum ac panem, vinum quoque atque acetum, sed et laridum, carnem verbecinam, or “hardtack and bread, wine too and vinegar, but also bacon and mutton”(VII.4.6). Hardtack, vinegar and mutton were to be enough for two days, and then the soldier was to use bread, wine and bacon.
Recipe for real Roman bread
In 1930 in Herculaneum there was excavated from the ground bread (pane), dated to 79 CE. In 2013, the British Museum asked chef Giorgio Locatelli to recreate a recipe for a Roman loaf of bread.
Garum – delicacy of Romans
What is for us today ketchup or mustard, for the Romans was garum. Garum was an addition necessary in exquisite Roman cuisine.
It appears in most of the recipes preserved in the work “De re coquinaria” of Apicius.
