>Around 1880, with the invention of the pizza in Naples, the tomato grew widespread in popularity in Europe.
The most interesting part for me, was that Pizza was invented in ~1900? That is relatively new.
The most interesting part for me, was that Pizza was invented in ~1900? That is relatively new.
It was in occasion of the visit of the King (and Queen) of the recently formed Kingdom of Italy to Naples.
The first pizza (pizza Margherita, so later named after the name of the Queen) "novelty" was not the tomato in itself, but rather the tomato together with mozzarella cheese and basil, as symbols of the three colours of the Italian flag, white, red and green.
Too bad that it is nothing but a story, pizza, including a version with these same toppings existed at least since some 100 years before:
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Pizza_Margherita
though it was not particularly common, because the mozzarella cheese was costly even then.
Plainer pizzas (called by different names), with just tomato or only garlic and oil were common not only in Naples, with the exception of the cheese all ingredients (flour, water, tomato, garlic, olive oil) were ubiquitous and cheap not only in southern Italy, but all aroud the Mediterranean Sea.
I'd buy that we don't have great _evidence_ of its harvesting before that, which seems more like what the article says? But that's not really the same thing at all.
Seems like a fairly complex tech to pass on without some fairly involved language?
I wonder sometimes if we could teach them to make bread or baked plantains or something, idk, and then have that habit passed on to their offspring.
The sticking point could be fire, seems rather hard to make, and even worse - maintain, without all the convenient tools we have today.
They imitate the behavior, and you can easily find some pretty cool pictures of it. However, I'm not sure an orangutan has ever actually caught a fish that way.
Beyond that it's also quite interesting to think that all dishes made with potatoes, tomatoes, chilli peppers, sweet corn, cocoa did not exist before the settlement of the Americas by Europeans (at least outside of the Americas). This is a profound change in diet in Europe and throughout the world.
Related fascinating topic: the oldest known cookbook in Korean was written by a woman and contains no gochujang since it was only becoming available while it was written: https://www.atlasobscura.com/articles/first-korean-cookbook
Ancient soldiers (for example) found it practical to use flatbread as a dish to eat its topping, then the dish itself. The origin of the tradition is in the need for a dish, and in the advantage of not wasting the remainders that savour the dish itself, when edible.