In the Stone Age, Neanderthals and modern people not only eat plenty of plants, but also gave their food a - well desired - bitter taste with the help of certain cooking techniques. They also prepared dishes from different plant species. This was found in a team around Ceren Kabukcu from the University of Liverpool by examining the burned remnants of meals up to 70,000 years old, as the researchers report in the archaeological journal "Antiquity".
The working group analyzed the charred food remains under scanning electron microscope that had previously been excavated in the caves of Shanidar in Iraq and Franchti in Greece. At the Iraqi site, 40,000 to 70,000 years ago, Neanderthals cooked food at a hearth; modern humans lived in Franchti about 12,000 years ago. Apparently, hunter-gatherers often mixed legumes such as lentils and peas with nuts – such as almonds and pistachios – or cereals for their food. "Our study clearly shows the advanced age of plant-based foods that consist of more than one ingredient and were prepared in several steps," says archaeobotanist Ceren Kabukcu, according to a press release.
The people of the Stone Age mastered certain cooking techniques to prepare their food tasty. They soaked legumes, washed them and then crushed them. In Franchti, they processed lentil vetch (Vicia ervilia), which was later to be one of the first cultivated plants in the Neolithic period. By crushing, the Stone Age cooks – this technique is proven for the sites of Franchti and Schanidar – reduced the bitter taste that the tannins and alkaloids would cause in the shell. In addition, remains of bread made from grain flour were found in the Franchti cave, although the working group led by Kabukcu could not determine the exact plant type of flour. It may have been oats or barley, both of which have been found elsewhere in Greece.
The Stone Age chefs in Iraq and Greece removed not the entire shell in the legumes, which were mostly platterls (Lathyrus) and lentilwicke. As a result, the food should have tasted slightly bitter. It may have been intentional to give the dishes a certain spice.
Over the past decade, experts have discovered more and more details about the diet of early humans. For example, they identified bacteria of the oral microbiome in prehistoric tartar and discovered microbes that could digest vegetable starch well. They also found food residues between the teeth – from many plants such as wild cereals, legumes and water lilies.
