Food and drink brought to Britain by the Romans
Description
Adam Hart-Davis follows a Roman recipe to create a hamburger and talks about the foods that the Romans introduced to Britain such as turnips, apples, pears, celery, carrots, asparagus, grapes and wine. The Roman words for these foods are also shown. Adam recreates the process of making wine using traditional Roman tools. A historian uses real animal body parts to recreate typical Roman food using liver, pig鈥檚 gut and salmon.
Classroom Ideas
After watching the clip, pupils should be able to identify foods that were introduced to Britain by the Romans, and how Roman food was different to that of the Celts who lived here before the Roman invasion. They might discuss how Roman food is similar, and how it is different to the food they eat today. Is the first recipe really like a hamburger?
Students can research Roman recipes and create a class cookbook. Students can research and find the Roman words for foods we eat today. Can the students spot any words we use today?
Alternatively, students could also research which foods were introduced to Britain by, for example the Tudors (tomatoes, potatoes, chocolate), the Victorians (tropical foods especially) and by recent immigrants to Britain. Finally they could try to decide, from a food point of view, which would be the best period of history to live in, apart from today.
Romans
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