“In many peoples’ book” including the Bible. When the butler tastes the wine, he compares it to the usual custom of serving the good wine first to get the guests too drunk to care about the wine quality later.
Back to the OP, if you go into the Old Testament and in particular the five Books of the Law, there’s a fair bit of detail on how Kosher meat is to be prepared, and there’s even more detail in the traditions parallel to the Law itself, in the Talmud. I’d imagine that the stuff you’d get from a Kosher butcher today would be pretty close to what was eaten back then, since they’re following the same Law.
Boiling the water when making beer is done to assist with extraction of the malt from the grains. That it also sterlilises it is convenient, but a secondary objective, at best.
John 21 describes the resurrected Jesus appearing on the shore while the disciples are out fishing - there’s a bit about a miraculous catch of fish, but pertinent to your question, Jesus calls them to join him for breakfast, described as bread and fish cooked on the embers of a wood or charcoal fire.
I imagine that’s talking about dough baked on a rock either heated in the fire, or placed to face it, and fish cooked either directly on the embers, or on sticks propped over them.
In Biblical times cakes were baked on coals. 1Kings, 19:6.
Chances are good they bore little resemblance to what we think of as cake. But some ambitious person has developed a fruit cake recipe based on items of food mentioned in the Bible:
Mix:
2-1/2 C. flour (Leviticus 2:2)
1t. salt (Job 6:6)
1t. each cinnamon, ginger, nutmeg (Genesis 43:11)
1t. instant coffee
Add:
1 C. honey (Genesis 43:11)
1 C. milk (Genesis 18:18)
1/ 2 C. melted butter (Genesis 18:8)
1 T. water (Mark 9:41)
1 t. soda
2 well-beaten eggs (Job 6:6)
Mix well and add:
1/2 C. almonds, chopped (Genesis 43:11)
1/2 C. walnuts, chopped (Genesis 43:11)
1 C. raisins (1Samuel 25:18)
1/2 C. dried apricots (Genesis 3:6)
Mix well. Pour into 10x14" greased and floured pan.
Bake @ 350 degees for 1-1/2 hours. (Yikes! This sounds too long.)
Interesting that someone would put in the time to specifically make a Biblically-based recipe, and then add an unnecessary ingredient like coffee that certainly wasn’t available in the Middle East in Biblical times.
My two pennorth,Palestine was part of the Roman Empire at the time,international trade was very common and according to some T.V. documentaries the Last Supper for example was conducted Roman style in a Triclinium style setting.
It is quite likely that the wine drunk was imported and that the oil was olive oil.
Roman and Greek wine were drunk in Brittania at the time,the internationalism around the Mediterrainen sea and Europe in general can not be over estimated,Europe wide trade had been going on even before the Pyramids were built.
“Cakes” mostly referred to barley cakes. These were round and baked thin (which conserves fuel). They were essentially cookies that tasted like crackers.
Probably tilipia (the most common food fish in the lake).
All of the above. Broiling over open flames was probably the most common. Salting and smoking were also common. Fish in the ancient mediterranean could also be use in soups or stews.
Matzo is the traditional unleavened bread of Passover. It’s made with only flour and water.
Pretty simple. Wheat, water, leavening. Sometimes ingredients like raisins or nuts or fruit juice might be added for flavor, or eggs for richness. This was baked both as loaves and as flatbreads, with varying quality and coarseness, depending on the quality of the ingredients, the ovens and the bakers.
Local vinyards. As has been mentioned, wine was watered for basic hydration needs, and consumed unwatered to get intoxicated. Yes, it could be honeyed or spiced.
Bread and fish would have really been the main peasant foods, also olive oil, grapes, raisins and dates. but some people were lucky enough to get poultry or beef. The Canaanites, and Philistines and Greek gentiles (depending on the particular Biblical era) raised pigs, but, obviously, these were not consumed by Jews.
Olive oil. Olive oil had a great number of uses, and was highly valued.
Of interest is the novel Millroy the Magician, about someone who starts a health food movement based on eating only foods mentioned in the Bible. Millroy was not a believer in religion, but thought the Bible gave the instructions for health food.
I don’t know for sure, but, from what I’ve read, in the time of Jesus it was baked against the sides of ovens that were heated from the inside with burning dung. Precisely what kind of result (and aromatic influence) that would yield, I don’t really know. Just from my knowledge as a cook, I’ll say that I doubt the results were very pliable. Dry and crispy would be far more likely, but possibly with varying degrees of thickness.
