Phoenicians and their foods

Phoenicia. Kordas, based on Alvaro's work.

Maybe we've become a little sophisticated in our cooking lately, but, we still eat the same food as millenniums ago.

Take the Phoenicians, for example. They ate cereals, especially wheat and barley, often imported from Egypt. They made porridges, breads, and flat cakes that grew in popularity, crossed borders, and survived for centuries. They also had vegetable gardens where they would grow peas, lentils, chickpeas, beans, and a variety of fruits.

The most popular fruits were pomegranates and figs.  The pomegranate fruit was considered a fertility fruit due to its abundance of seed. Figs were considered delicacies and exported to other neighbors (Egyptians). Other fruits they cultivated were dates, apples, quinces, almonds, limes, and grapes.

Grapes were also used to make wine, just as today. The wine-making process was well developed, and there is evidence that wine was “running like water” in a city called Ullaza, meaning that they had a great production of wine. (1) Wine was widely used in religious rituals.

Oils were used in cooking, and it is said that their extraction began in the third millennium B.C.E.
Phoenicians also ate meats (sheep, cattle, rabbits, chicken, doves, and game), milk (a highly appreciated product) and honey (used in cakes and imported from Judah and Israel), fish, salt.

The essential diet in Carthage and the Punic Empire, especially its western territories (Sardinia, Sicily, and Spain), was a dish called puls - a porridge made from mixed cereals. It was embellished with cheese, honey, and eggs.

Here is a simple recipe from Cato, a Roman  who fought in the Punic War and wrote a book called De Agri Cultura:
“Add a pound of flour to water and boil it well. Pour it into a clean tab, adding three pounds of fresh cheese, half a pound of honey, and an egg. Stir well and cook in a new pot”.

1. Food, a culinary history Ed. by Jean-Louis Flandrin and Massimo Montari, 1999, p.57