Food in Ancient Egypt |
May 31, 2006 |
In my class at school we are studying Ancient Egypt. We all have to write
end of the year reports on a topic of our choice that has to do with Ancient
Egypt, and make presentations on our topic. Since I love food so much I
decided to do Food in Ancient Egypt for my topic. I think that my report
is interesting and I hope you enjoy it!
The ancient Egyptians ate all kinds of food. In the Tale of Sinuhe, there are many examples:
Loaves were made for me daily, and wine as daily fare, cooked meat, roast fowl, as well as desert game. For they snared for me and laid it before me, in addition to the catch of my hounds. Many sweets were made for me, and milk dishes of all kinds.
Tale of Sinuhe
M. Lichtheim Ancient Egyptian Literature, Vol. 1, p.227
Picture yourself in a large mud brick dining area, sitting on pillows and devouring a feast of fried Nile whitefish, bean soup, Egyptian pita-style flatbread with hummus, onions, and sweet glazed walnuts. Around you are dancers and harpists making the meal into a joyful festival to celebrate the birthday of Re, the great sun god. Now picture your self sitting outside, on the ground, at the edge of a reed mat enjoying a simple meal of salt-dried fish and lentils with a small loaf of Egyptian pita bread while talking with your friends and family about your day at work – whether it was working on the pharaoh’s pyramid or making golden jewelry for a nobleman’s wife – and sharing the special togetherness of mealtime.
Food is a necessity for everyone. And so it was as crucial for the ancient Egyptians as it is for all peoples. All life came from the great Nile river, slicing through the harsh desert heat and sand and bringing rich fertile mud perfect for growing crops as well as providing nourishment for the people and animals of the ancient Egyptians. The people of ancient Egypt believed that the Nile was a gift from the gods because without the Nile, the Egyptians would have not existed.
Bread, Beer, and Grain
Bread
The main staple foods of the ancient Egyptians were bread
and beer. Bread was made from barley, millet, emmer wheat,
or spelt, which was then separated from the husks by the winnowers who
threw the grain in the air and the wind or fans blew away the light chaff
and the heavier grain fell onto the ground. Then the millers ground the
grain with stones (which often chipped off into stone dust and fell in
with the flower, causing the gradual wearing down of the Egyptians teeth)
and the flower was baked into pita style flatbread in large clay ovens.
Beer
The mouth of a perfectly contented man is filled with beer.
Inscription dating to 2200 BCE
Ancient Egyptian beer was made very thick and full of calories so it was very filling and thick. Beer was very common and made out of barley, wheat or millet. First the one part of the grain was coarsely ground and soaked in water, and put in the sun to ferment. The rest was made into bread and lightly cooked, and then crumbled and put in with the soaked grain. Later, water and some old beer were added to the bread/grain mixture to continue to ferment. After the beer concoction was finished fermenting, it was strained and sometimes, sweeteners like dates were added.
Vegetables and Fruit
The farming seasons of ancient Egypt were Akhet, the season of the inundation, where the river floods past the banks, wetting the ground, preparing it for Peret, the season of sowing, planting seeds for the upcoming season, Shemu, where the Egyptians would harvest all of the fruits and grains and vegetables. The Egyptians depended on the Nile for all of their vegetables and meat because the vegetables and animals both need the water and nutrition from the Nile. The Nile valley was called the "black land" because the water created rich fertile black soil that helped grow the food that the Egyptians ate. The Egyptians helped grow more plants by irrigation systems that helped water the crops with systems of canals.
Fruit
The Egyptians ate fruit for snacks, raw, cooked, as sweeteners,
and as parts of larger dishes. For example beer was sometimes
sweetened with fruits. Vegetables were eaten often, cooked or raw as
snacks, for example they ate onions raw and whole like modern people
eat apples.
Meat, Fish and Fowl
Meat
Mostly rich people ate meat because the poor people couldn’t afford
meat and because most animals were needed to help on
the farms. And if they ate large animals it would be hard to preserve the
leftovers.
Fish
Fish were very common in ancient Egypt because the Nile
is full of fish. During the inundation, the fish became
trapped in the shallow floodwaters and people could just wade in and
grab the fish with their hands.
Fowl
In ancient Egypt there was not much chicken but pigeon
and waterfowl from the Nile were more common fowl.
Preparations and Utensils
An ancient Egyptian kitchen was usually on the roof or in the courtyard of a home. The walls were usually mud brick and the roof was lightly thatched to provide shade but to let the smoke from the ovens and cooking fires out. The cooks usually prepared food sitting down at reed mats, or at low tables. Kitchens were usually very hot because Egypt is in the desert and the cooking fires made the kitchen a lot hotter.
In the Egyptian kitchen there would be pots, pans, jugs, baskets and plates for storing and preparing food, along with ovens and fires for cooking the food. The poorer people usually used clay plates but the richer people ate off of copper or other metal plates, and all people ate with their fingers.
The ancient Egyptians had many flavorings for food, some of them include: salt, coriander (commonly called cilantro), cumin (a strong, bitter spice), pepper, and mint. The Egyptians made a spread called dukkah, a combination of all of the available spices and flavorings that they put on bread for more flavor.
Social Class and Food
Lower class
Lower class people were typically farmers who were very
poor and ate a diet of bread, beer and simple vegetable dishes, because
large animals were used for help on the farmland, and if they ate them
they would not have the help on the farm. Also they only ate small animals,
if any, because if they killed a large animal and there was no refrigeration,
how would they save the leftovers, and because smaller animals have a lower
fat content, they were usually not obese.
Pyramid Builders
There have been many pig bones and remains found at Kahun,
a pyramid building site, proving that the pyramid builders
ate pig.
Working Class
Working class people like goldsmiths, stoneworkers, and
ship builders, had a bit better food than the lower class
people, they ate more than the lower class people, for example they ate
more fish and meat, along with better vegetable dishes, and more bread
and beer.
Upper Class
The upper class people in ancient Egypt eat fine food,
plenty of meat, fish and fowl and had entertainment for
most of their meals but according to the pictures
that have been found, did not overeat, because in all of the pictures
found, the Egyptians appear to be physically fit.
Festivals and Feasts
Festivals were greatly and joyously celebrated in ancient Egypt, as there were many, many gods and they had praise days and birthdays, feast days and days of triumph of each god, including "Birthday of Re", "Hanging Out of the Heavens", "Day of Chewing Onions for Bast" and many more. On each festival day there was a separate omen, admonition, or celebration ritual, and a story of the significance of the day, for example, on the day that Horus, the son of Isis and Osiris, overthrew Set, the god of chaos and destruction, everyone eats pig, the animal sacred to Set, and even the people who cant afford pig eat bread loaves baked into the shape of pigs.
Feasts were celebrated not only by eating rich luxurious food but were enjoyed with music and dancers for entertainment. On great feasts rare food from far away places like Punt, a land that the Egyptians made expeditions to for rare ingredients, were eaten.
Conclusion
I love food and I think that exploring different types of food from different cultures is really interesting and fun and it also gives people a more diverse array of knowledge of food and other cultures. I decided to do this project on food because I think that food is very interesting and it is fun to see how ancient peoples used the ingredients that they had, to make food that appealed to them. I have enjoyed discovering new and different flavors and learning to cook with interesting herbs and spices! Discovering new flavors is fun to experiment with.
Isis takes ballet, plays soccer, sings in a choir, and loves to travel. She thinks that if you are going to eat, why not eat well if you can? There seems to be no reason not to. |
Isis (not her real name) is sixteen years old and is really interested in food
because her dad is a good cook. She was practically raised in a Vietnamese
restaurant, and as a baby ate her first solid foods there, which were rice
noodles. She tries most foods that are offered to her and her parents urge her
to also. For example, when she was 7 years old, she was at a French restaurant
and her parents were having snails and they easily talked her into trying them.
They ended up being pretty good! Email questions or comments for these two young women to webmaster@drgourmet.com.