About 4,500 years ago the Israelites crossed the Jordan River and entered what they thought was going to be their Promised Land. Since that day those people and their descendants have been arguing about whether or not the nation has developed its own unique cuisine. The truth of the matter is that the period in which the people came closest to having their own cuisine occurred before they crossed the Jordan. The people of Israel probably never dined as uniquely or as well as they did during the forty years when they were wandering in the Sinai Dessert.

The Sinai is a harsh environment, but at least according to the Old Testament, food came easily during those days. Every morning, shortly after dawn, delivered directly from the heavens, the ground was laden with as much of the wafer-like delicacy known as manna as the people could eat. All that had to be done was for each person to gather their share, eat as much as they liked and then look forward to the next day's crop. To make things even better, every evening huge flocks of quails flew into their camps, simply waiting to be caught, put on a spit and grilled over hot charcoals.

While the fine flavor of manna remains unquestioned, many have devoted their thoughts to the issues of just what it was and from whence it came. Some etymologists suggest that the Israelites, puzzled over the mysterious substance, called it man, the name of a sweet with which they had become familiar when in Egypt. Even today this sticky, honey-like juice exudes in heavy drops in May and June from certain shrubs found in Sinai. In the Rashbam commentaries, however, it is noted that while this may account for the naming of the miraculous provender, it cannot account for the feeding of so many people, for man is found only in miniscule quantities.

Since the 4th century, scholars and monks at Saint Catherine's monastery at the foot of Mount Sinai have held that manna originated from the secretions of insects that made their homes on the tamarisk shrubs that are common to the Sinai. Modern scientists concur with this as a possibility and speculate that a massive swarm of the insects known as Trabutina mannipara had invaded the Sinai during this time, thus allowing for large quantities of their secretions to be "harvested" each morning.

Although grilled quails are still considered prestigious dining, once they entered the Promised Land, the people quickly adopted to the local diet. Four thousand years ago, as today, the main starch staples of the diet were wheat, rice, lentils and humous beans. The most popular vegetable was eggplant; spices and herbs such as cardamom, parsley, rosemary, thyme, coriander, cumin and mint were used lavishly as were the various members of the onion family, including garlic. Lemons, peppers and tomatoes were popular; the principal cooking oil was olive oil; yogurt was widely used; and even though fresh fruits were the most popular dessert, sweets were much appreciated. Even then, eggplant was roasted, stuffed, fried or pureed; humous and tchina were already popular; and any vegetable large enough to have been stuffed was likely to have been filled with some combination of meat, vegetables and rice.

The Maccabees

The first conquerors who tried to change the local dietary habits were the Greeks. Everybody knows of the revolt of the priestly family of the Maccabees. What has not become part of knowledge is that when the Maccabees were not fighting to restore their birthright, they attached special meaning to the quality of the foods they ate. The simple truth is that the Maccabees and their comrades enjoyed devoting their time to the pleasures of the dinner table even more than they enjoyed going off to war.

Like the Greeks, the favorite meals of the Maccabees consisted of huge quantities of roast meat spread on simple wooden tables. In fact, there were few activities more pleasing than gathering together enough wood to start a fire and cooking several lambs so that the people might share a feast. The Maccabees may have taken themselves and their religion seriously, but there was also a lighter side to life and the aroma of roasting meat on the open spit soon to be consumed with generous portions of wine invariably added to their good humor and appetites.

Although no cookbooks have survived from those days, a variety of essays have come down to us by Greek authors such as Glaucus of Locris and Heraclitus both of whom visited the Holy Land and later wrote treatises on subjects as diverse as the gastronomy, pickles and vegetables of the region. The only recipes that survive the age are those of Archestratus, a disciple of Epicurus, who wrote a charming little book entitled The Luxurious Way of Living. One recipe may be taken as typical: "When roasting a fish caught in the sea, be certain to season it with cumin, be sparing of salt and add nothing but some sea-green olive oil and whatever fragrant herbs the garden yields. Take special care of the heat of the flame so that the flesh does not burn before it reaches the plate". The Greeks had not discovered anything new. The Amorites, Canaanites and Babylonians had been cooking fish that way for a thousand years before Athens was even built. As for the impact of history, the recipe remains appropriate for preparing nearly any Mediterranean fish today.

On To The Romans

Less than 150 years after the Maccabees enjoyed their heroic Greek-style feasts, the Romans had conquered the land and a new style of eating came into fashion. In about 30 B.C.E., when Herod moved into the fortress he built at Massada, he decided that his new home would be a palace where pleasures of every sort might be freely pursued.

The pleasure of wealthy Romans involved three things: food, wine and sexual promiscuity. Masada became renowned for its ten hour banquets - orgiastic feasts where dinner might begin with hors d'oeuvres of chickens, ducks, geese, hares, pigeons, turtledoves, partridges and young goats. This was followed traditionally with entertainment provided by naked girl dancers and then by a second course of pigs stuffed with thrushes, ducks, warblers and pea puree, all consumed to the acompaniment of troupes of acrbats tumbling among swords, breathing fire from their mouths and acting out obscene parodies. Later courses included roast boars and sheep and then, when the eating tapered off, the drinking began in earnest and the dancing girls did far more than dance. "Apples and fornication" wrote one of Herod's guests, "were the most popular of last courses."

As Roman decadence ascended, tastes became more jaded (pigs that had died of overeating were considered a great delicacy), and dinners for friends deteriorated into little more than orgies. Even though some of the dishes enjoyed by the Romans were actually quite delicate and have maintained their popularity to the current day, most of these will be found in Rome, Sicily and Naples. None can be found within Israel.

The Middle Ages

The Crusaders also tried to make their mark on the dining habits of the people. Whether most of the men and women who joined the Crusades were motivated by Christian zeal or the prospects of loot and adventure will never be fully understood but it is known that during the thirty years following the first Crusade in 1097 more than half of the knights of France set of for the Holy Land. Small port towns like Caesaria and Atlit became such crowded way stations for Crusaders that they soon became thriving metropolitan areas.

When the Crusaders first landed in the Holy Land they found the cooking style of the region so alien to their palates that huge industries developed, especially in Italy, all with the purpose of dispatching food to the hungry armies and the rabble that had followed them. For more than a century, hundreds of ships departed weekly from Genoa, Pisa and Venice, each bearing huge amounts of food.

It took about forty years but the Crusaders finally developed an appreciation of the foods of the region. They became specially fond of local herbs such as coriander, basil and rosemary, all of which were unknown in European cookery. Many also found that the use of pulverized almonds in cooking added a delicate touch to dishes with which they were already familiar. More than anything, however, the Europeans fell in love with the Arabic system of cooking that allowed cooks to hang a large cauldron permanently over a low burning fire and to daily add to the pot whatever happened to be at hand. In every Crusader castle and camp, these cauldrons became a permanent part of the scenery and from them came thick soups, stews and dumplings made of rye flour. The Crusaders even learned that they could make puddings in these pots if the ingredients were first tied in a flaxen cloth before suspending it in the pot from a hook. The most adored foods were roasts served with thick sauces; puddings served with watery sauces; and poultry and fish served in cream sauces. There were also soups and a variety of very large pies, all of which consisted of meat and sauce in the same package.

Rightly or wrongly, the Crusaders thought of themselves as civilized people and the new foods they found on their plate offered them a special problem. While most men and women still carried daggers with which to eat, the dinner fork was still unknown and most people continued to eat primarily with the most handy tools available to them - their fingers. All of which was complicated by the fact that only men of the highest ranks had their own dishes, plates and cups, while others ate in groups of four, five or six. If there was a plate or wooden board, it was shared by at least four people.

Considering the mixture of food and fingers, cleanliness, at least of the hands, was considered important. Giovanni della Casa wrote, "before meals it is only right to wash the hands openly so that those who dip their fingers in the same dish as yourself know for certain that your hands are clean". Fra Bonvicino, in his book of etiquette went further, acknowledging the problem of the ubiquitous fleas found on every body. "One should not", wrote Bonvicino, "put the fingers in the ears or the hands to the head, nor should a man who is eating scratch his private parts". The good brother also warned against blowing the nose with the fingers when at table. In a footnote he acknowledged that "it is true that there are those itches that must be scratched". He said that if this could be done surreptitiously, all would be fine, but that "to remove one's fingers from the shared bowl of food and to be seen picking one's nose or scratching one's private parts or hind side would not be acceptable". Even though Crusader food eventually proved too heavy and too greasy and thus fell from popularity everywhere, many would still do well to make themselves familiar with the rules of courtesy that the Crusaders applied to their dining habits.

If the truth be told, the greatest influences on modern Israeli cuisine come not so much from ancient history or from its occupiers, but from the various ethnic groups that settled in the country in the last 100 - 150 years. To read about those ethnic influences, click here.

© Daniel Rogov