1.
Afghanistan
–
Afghanistan, officially the Islamic Republic of Afghanistan, is a landlocked country located within South Asia and Central Asia. It has a population of approximately 32 million, making it the 42nd most populous country in the world. It is bordered by Pakistan in the south and east, Iran in the west, Turkmenistan, Uzbekistan, and Tajikistan in the north and its territory covers 652,000 km2, making it the 41st largest country in the world. The land also served as the source from which the Kushans, Hephthalites, Samanids, Saffarids, Ghaznavids, Ghorids, Khiljis, Mughals, Hotaks, Durranis, the political history of the modern state of Afghanistan began with the Hotak and Durrani dynasties in the 18th century. In the late 19th century, Afghanistan became a state in the Great Game between British India and the Russian Empire. Following the Third Anglo-Afghan War in 1919, King Amanullah unsuccessfully attempted to modernize the country and it remained peaceful during Zahir Shahs forty years of monarchy. A series of coups in the 1970s was followed by a series of wars that devastated much of Afghanistan. The name Afghānistān is believed to be as old as the ethnonym Afghan, the root name Afghan was used historically in reference to a member of the ethnic Pashtuns, and the suffix -stan means place of in Persian. Therefore, Afghanistan translates to land of the Afghans or, more specifically in a historical sense, however, the modern Constitution of Afghanistan states that he word Afghan shall apply to every citizen of Afghanistan. An important site of historical activities, many believe that Afghanistan compares to Egypt in terms of the historical value of its archaeological sites. The country sits at a unique nexus point where numerous civilizations have interacted and it has been home to various peoples through the ages, among them the ancient Iranian peoples who established the dominant role of Indo-Iranian languages in the region. At multiple points, the land has been incorporated within large regional empires, among them the Achaemenid Empire, the Macedonian Empire, the Indian Maurya Empire, and the Islamic Empire. Archaeological exploration done in the 20th century suggests that the area of Afghanistan has been closely connected by culture and trade with its neighbors to the east, west. Artifacts typical of the Paleolithic, Mesolithic, Neolithic, Bronze, urban civilization is believed to have begun as early as 3000 BCE, and the early city of Mundigak may have been a colony of the nearby Indus Valley Civilization. More recent findings established that the Indus Valley Civilisation stretched up towards modern-day Afghanistan, making the ancient civilisation today part of Pakistan, Afghanistan, in more detail, it extended from what today is northwest Pakistan to northwest India and northeast Afghanistan. An Indus Valley site has found on the Oxus River at Shortugai in northern Afghanistan. There are several smaller IVC colonies to be found in Afghanistan as well, after 2000 BCE, successive waves of semi-nomadic people from Central Asia began moving south into Afghanistan, among them were many Indo-European-speaking Indo-Iranians. These tribes later migrated further into South Asia, Western Asia, the region at the time was referred to as Ariana
2.
Central Asia
–
Central Asia stretches from the Caspian Sea in the west to China in the east and from Afghanistan in the south to Russia in the north. It is also referred to as the -stans as the five countries generally considered to be within the region all have names ending with the Persian suffix -stan. Central Asias five former Soviet republics are Kazakhstan, Kyrgyzstan, Tajikistan, Turkmenistan, Central Asia has historically been closely tied to its nomadic peoples and the Silk Road. It has acted as a crossroads for the movement of people, goods, the Silk Road connected Muslim lands with the people of Europe, India, and China. This crossroads position has intensified the conflict between tribalism and traditionalism and modernization, in pre-Islamic and early Islamic times, Central Asia was predominantly Iranian, peopled by Eastern Iranian-speaking Bactrians, Sogdians and Chorasmians and the semi-nomadic Scythians and Parthians. Central Asia is sometimes referred to as Turkestan, the idea of Central Asia as a distinct region of the world was introduced in 1843 by the geographer Alexander von Humboldt. The borders of Central Asia are subject to multiple definitions, historically built political geography and geoculture are two significant parameters widely used in the scholarly literature about the definitions of the Central Asia. The most limited definition was the one of the Soviet Union. This definition was also used outside the USSR during this period. However, the Russian culture has two terms, Средняя Азия and Центральная Азия. Since then, this has become the most common definition of Central Asia, the UNESCO general history of Central Asia, written just before the collapse of the USSR, defines the region based on climate and uses far larger borders. An alternative method is to define the region based on ethnicity and these areas include Xinjiang Uyghur Autonomous Region, the Turkic regions of southern Siberia, the five republics, and Afghan Turkestan. Afghanistan as a whole, the northern and western areas of Pakistan, the Tibetans and Ladakhi are also included. Insofar, most of the peoples are considered the indigenous peoples of the vast region. Central Asia is a large region of varied geography, including high passes and mountains, vast deserts. The vast steppe areas of Central Asia are considered together with the steppes of Eastern Europe as a geographical zone known as the Eurasian Steppe. Much of the land of Central Asia is too dry or too rugged for farming, the Gobi desert extends from the foot of the Pamirs, 77° E, to the Great Khingan Mountains, 116°–118° E. Central Asia has the following geographic extremes, The worlds northernmost desert, at Buurug Deliin Els, Mongolia, the Northern Hemispheres southernmost permafrost, at Erdenetsogt sum, Mongolia, 46°17′ N
3.
Balkans
–
The Balkan Peninsula, or the Balkans, is a peninsula and a cultural area in Eastern and Southeastern Europe with various and disputed borders. The region takes its name from the Balkan Mountains that stretch from the Serbia-Bulgaria border to the Black Sea, the highest point of the Balkans is Mount Musala 2,925 metres in the Rila mountain range. In Turkish, Balkan means a chain of wooded mountains, the name is still preserved in Central Asia with the Balkan Daglary and the Balkan Province of Turkmenistan. A less popular hypothesis regarding its etymology is that it derived from the Persian Balā-Khāna, from Antiquity through the Middle Ages, the Balkan Mountains had been called by the local Thracian name Haemus. According to Greek mythology, the Thracian king Haemus was turned into a mountain by Zeus as a punishment, a reverse name scheme has also been suggested. D. Dechev considers that Haemus is derived from a Thracian word *saimon, a third possibility is that Haemus derives from the Greek word haema meaning blood. The myth relates to a fight between Zeus and the monster/titan Typhon, Zeus injured Typhon with a thunder bolt and Typhons blood fell on the mountains, from which they got their name. The earliest mention of the name appears in an early 14th-century Arab map, the Ottomans first mention it in a document dated from 1565. There has been no other documented usage of the word to refer to the region before that, there is also a claim about an earlier Bulgar Turkic origin of the word popular in Bulgaria, however it is only an unscholarly assertion. The word was used by the Ottomans in Rumelia in its meaning of mountain, as in Kod̲j̲a-Balkan, Čatal-Balkan, and Ungurus-Balkani̊. The concept of the Balkans was created by the German geographer August Zeune in 1808, during the 1820s, Balkan became the preferred although not yet exclusive term alongside Haemus among British travelers. Among Russian travelers not so burdened by classical toponymy, Balkan was the preferred term, zeunes goal was to have a geographical parallel term to the Italic and Iberian Peninsula, and seemingly nothing more. The gradually acquired political connotations are newer and, to a large extent, after the dissolution of Yugoslavia beginning in June 1991, the term Balkans again received a negative meaning, especially in Croatia and Slovenia, even in casual usage. A European Union initiative of 1999 is called the Stability Pact for South Eastern Europe, and its northern boundary is often given as the Danube, Sava and Kupa Rivers. The Balkan Peninsula has an area of about 470,000 km2. It is more or less identical to the known as Southeastern Europe. As of 1920 until World War II, Italy included Istria, the current territory of Italy includes only the small area around Trieste inside the Balkan Peninsula. However, the regions of Trieste and Istria are not usually considered part of the Balkans by Italian geographers, the Western Balkans is a neologism coined to describe the countries of ex-Yugoslavia and Albania
4.
Caribbean
–
The Caribbean is a region that consists of the Caribbean Sea, its islands and the surrounding coasts. The region is southeast of the Gulf of Mexico and the North American mainland, east of Central America, situated largely on the Caribbean Plate, the region comprises more than 700 islands, islets, reefs and cays. These islands generally form island arcs that delineate the eastern and northern edges of the Caribbean Sea, in a wider sense, the mainland countries of Belize, Guyana, Suriname and French Guiana are often included due to their political and cultural ties with the region. Geopolitically, the Caribbean islands are usually regarded as a subregion of North America and are organized into 30 territories including sovereign states, overseas departments, and dependencies. From December 15,1954, to October 10,2010, there was a known as the Netherlands Antilles composed of five states. The West Indies cricket team continues to represent many of those nations, the region takes its name from that of the Caribs, an ethnic group present in the Lesser Antilles and parts of adjacent South America at the time of the Spanish conquest. The two most prevalent pronunciations of Caribbean are KARR-ə-BEE-ən, with the accent on the third syllable. The former pronunciation is the older of the two, although the variant has been established for over 75 years. It has been suggested that speakers of British English prefer KARR-ə-BEE-ən while North American speakers more typically use kə-RIB-ee-ən, usage is split within Caribbean English itself. The word Caribbean has multiple uses and its principal ones are geographical and political. The Caribbean can also be expanded to include territories with strong cultural and historical connections to slavery, European colonisation, the United Nations geoscheme for the Americas accords the Caribbean as a distinct region within the Americas. Physiographically, the Caribbean region is mainly a chain of islands surrounding the Caribbean Sea, to the north, the region is bordered by the Gulf of Mexico, the Straits of Florida and the Northern Atlantic Ocean, which lies to the east and northeast. To the south lies the coastline of the continent of South America, politically, the Caribbean may be centred on socio-economic groupings found in the region. For example, the known as the Caribbean Community contains the Co-operative Republic of Guyana. Bermuda and the Turks and Caicos Islands, which are in the Atlantic Ocean, are members of the Caribbean Community. The Commonwealth of the Bahamas is also in the Atlantic and is a member of the Caribbean Community. According to the ACS, the population of its member states is 227 million people. The geography and climate in the Caribbean region varies, Some islands in the region have relatively flat terrain of non-volcanic origin and these islands include Aruba, Barbados, Bonaire, the Cayman Islands, Saint Croix, the Bahamas, and Antigua
5.
Rice
–
Rice is the seed of the grass species Oryza sativa or Oryza glaberrima. As a cereal grain, it is the most widely consumed staple food for a part of the worlds human population. It is the agricultural commodity with the third-highest worldwide production, after sugarcane and maize, wild rice, from which the crop was developed, may have its native range in Australia. Chinese legends attribute the domestication of rice to Shennong, the emperor of China. Genetic evidence has shown that rice originates from a single domestication 8, previously, archaeological evidence had suggested that rice was domesticated in the Yangtze River valley region in China. From East Asia, rice was spread to Southeast and South Asia, Rice was introduced to Europe through Western Asia, and to the Americas through European colonization. There are many varieties of rice and culinary preferences tend to vary regionally, in some areas such as the Far East or Spain, there is a preference for softer and stickier varieties. Rice, a monocot, is grown as an annual plant, although in tropical areas it can survive as a perennial. The rice plant can grow to 1–1.8 m tall, occasionally more depending on the variety and it has long, slender leaves 50–100 cm long and 2–2.5 cm broad. The small wind-pollinated flowers are produced in a branched arching to pendulous inflorescence 30–50 cm long, the edible seed is a grain 5–12 mm long and 2–3 mm thick. Rice cultivation is well-suited to countries and regions with low costs and high rainfall, as it is labor-intensive to cultivate. However, rice can be grown practically anywhere, even on a hill or mountain area with the use of water-controlling terrace systems. Although its parent species are native to Asia and certain parts of Africa, centuries of trade, the traditional method for cultivating rice is flooding the fields while, or after, setting the young seedlings. The name wild rice is used for species of the genera Zizania and Porteresia. The Greek word is the source of all European words, the origin of the Greek word is unclear. It is sometimes held to be from the Tamil word அரிசி, however, Krishnamurti disagrees with the notion that Old Tamil arici is the source of the Greek term, and proposes that it was borrowed from descendants of Proto-Dravidian *wariñci instead. The varieties of rice are typically classified as long-, medium-, the grains of long-grain rice tend to remain intact after cooking, medium-grain rice becomes more sticky. Medium-grain rice is used for dishes, for risotto in Italy
6.
Spice
–
A spice is a seed, fruit, root, bark, or other plant substance primarily used for flavoring, coloring or preserving food. Spices are distinguished from herbs, which are the leaves, flowers, sometimes, spices may be ground into a powder for convenience. Spices are sometimes used in medicine, religious rituals, cosmetics or perfume production, the spice trade developed throughout South Asia and Middle East by at least 2000 BCE with cinnamon and black pepper, and in East Asia with herbs and pepper. The Egyptians used herbs for mummification and their demand for exotic spices and herbs helped stimulate world trade. The word spice comes from the Old French word espice, which became epice, and which came from the Latin root spec, by 1000 BCE, medical systems based upon herbs could be found in China, Korea, and India. Early uses were connected with magic, medicine, religion, tradition, archaeological excavations have uncovered clove burnt onto the floor of a kitchen, dated to 1700 BCE, at the Mesopotamian site of Terqa, in modern-day Syria. The ancient Indian epic Ramayana mentions cloves, the Romans had cloves in the 1st century CE, as Pliny the Elder wrote about them. In the story of Genesis, Joseph was sold into slavery by his brothers to spice merchants, in the biblical poem Song of Solomon, the male speaker compares his beloved to many forms of spices. The earliest written records of spices come from ancient Egyptian, Chinese, the Ebers Papyrus from Early Egyptians that dates from 1550 B. C. E. Describes some eight hundred different medicinal remedies and numerous medicinal procedures, historians believe that nutmeg, which originates from the Banda Islands in Southeast Asia, was introduced to Europe in the 6th century BCE. Indonesian merchants traveled around China, India, the Middle East, Arab merchants facilitated the routes through the Middle East and India. This resulted in the Egyptian port city of Alexandria being the trading center for spices. The most important discovery prior to the European spice trade were the monsoon winds, sailing from Eastern spice cultivators to Western European consumers gradually replaced the land-locked spice routes once facilitated by the Middle East Arab caravans. Spices were among the most demanded and expensive available in Europe in the Middle Ages. Given medieval medicines main theory of humorism, spices and herbs were indispensable to balance humors in food, in addition to being desired by those using medieval medicine, the European elite also craved spices in the Middle Ages. An example of the European aristocracys demand for spice comes from the King of Aragon and he was specifically looking for spices to put in wine, and was not alone among European monarchs at the time to have such a desire for spice. Spices were all imported from plantations in Asia and Africa, which made them expensive, from the 8th until the 15th century, the Republic of Venice had the monopoly on spice trade with the Middle East, and along with it the neighboring Italian city-states. The trade made the region rich and it has been estimated that around 1,000 tons of pepper and 1,000 tons of the other common spices were imported into Western Europe each year during the Late Middle Ages
7.
Meat
–
Meat is animal flesh that is eaten as food. Humans have hunted and killed animals for meat since prehistoric times, the advent of civilization allowed the domestication of animals such as chickens, sheep, pigs and cattle. This eventually led to their use in production on an industrial scale with the aid of slaughterhouses. Meat is mainly composed of water, protein, and fat and it is edible raw, but is normally eaten after it has been cooked and seasoned or processed in a variety of ways. Unprocessed meat will spoil or rot within hours or days as a result of infection with and decomposition by bacteria, most often, meat refers to skeletal muscle and associated fat and other tissues, but it may also describe other edible tissues such as offal. The word meat comes from the Old English word mete, which referred to food in general, the term is related to mad in Danish, mat in Swedish and Norwegian, and matur in Icelandic and Faroese, which also mean food. The word mete also exists in Old Frisian to denote important food, differentiating it from swiets, paleontological evidence suggests that meat constituted a substantial proportion of the diet of even the earliest humans. Early hunter-gatherers depended on the hunting of large animals such as bison. Several breeds of sheep were established in ancient Mesopotamia and Egypt by 3500–3000 BC, today, more than 200 sheep-breeds exist. Cattle were domesticated in Mesopotamia after settled agriculture was established about 5000 BC, modern domesticated cattle fall into the groups Bos taurus and Bos indicus, both descended from the now-extinct aurochs. The breeding of cattle, cattle optimized for meat production as opposed to animals best suited for draught or dairy purposes. Domestic pigs, which are descended from boars, are known to have existed about 2500 BC in modern-day Hungary and in Troy, earlier pottery from Jericho. Pork sausages and hams were of commercial importance in Greco-Roman times. Pigs continue to be bred intensively as they are being optimized to produce meat best suited for meat products. Other animals are or have raised or hunted for their flesh. The type of meat consumed varies much between different cultures, changes over time, depending on such as tradition and the availability of the animals. The amount and kind of meat consumed also varies by income, horses are commonly eaten in France, Italy, Germany and Japan, among other countries. Horses and other mammals such as reindeer were hunted during the late Paleolithic in western Europe
8.
Vegetable
–
In everyday usage, a vegetable is any part of a plant that is consumed by humans as food as part of a meal. The term vegetable is somewhat arbitrary, and largely defined through culinary and it normally excludes other food derived from plants such as fruits, nuts, and cereal grains, but includes seeds such as pulses. The original meaning of the vegetable, still used in biology, was to describe all types of plant, as in the terms vegetable kingdom. At first, plants which grew locally would have been cultivated, nowadays, most vegetables are grown all over the world as climate permits, and crops may be cultivated in protected environments in less suitable locations. China is the largest producer of vegetables and global trade in agricultural products allows consumers to purchase vegetables grown in faraway countries, the scale of production varies from subsistence farmers supplying the needs of their family for food, to agribusinesses with vast acreages of single-product crops. Depending on the type of vegetable concerned, harvesting the crop is followed by grading, storing, processing, and marketing. Vegetables can be either raw or cooked and play an important role in human nutrition, being mostly low in fat and carbohydrates. Many nutritionists encourage people to consume plenty of fruit and vegetables, the word vegetable was first recorded in English in the early 15th century. It comes from Old French, and was applied to all plants. It derives from Medieval Latin vegetabilis growing, flourishing, a change from a Late Latin meaning to be enlivening, quickening. The meaning of vegetable as a plant grown for food was not established until the 18th century, in 1767, the word was specifically used to mean a plant cultivated for food, an edible herb or root. The year 1955 saw the first use of the shortened, slang term veggie, the broadest definition is the words use adjectivally to mean matter of plant origin to distinguish it from animal, meaning matter of animal origin. More specifically, a vegetable may be defined as any plant, part of which is used for food, a secondary meaning then being the edible part of such a plant. A more precise definition is any plant part consumed for food that is not a fruit or seed, falling outside these definitions are edible fungi and edible seaweed which, although not parts of plants, are often treated as vegetables. In everyday language, the fruit and vegetable are mutually exclusive. Fruit has a precise meaning, being a part that developed from the ovary of a flowering plant. This is considerably different from the words culinary meaning, while peaches, plums, and oranges are fruit in both senses, many items commonly called vegetables, such as eggplants, bell peppers, and tomatoes, are botanically fruits. The question of whether the tomato is a fruit or a vegetable found its way into the United States Supreme Court in 1893
9.
Dried fruit
–
Dried fruit is fruit from which the majority of the original water content has been removed either naturally, through sun drying, or through the use of specialized dryers or dehydrators. Dried fruit has a tradition of use dating back to the fourth millennium BC in Mesopotamia, and is prized because of its sweet taste, nutritive value. It is also part of a mixture of distilled spirits and spices, today, dried fruit consumption is widespread. Nearly half of the dried fruits sold are raisins, followed by dates, prunes, figs, apricots, peaches, apples and these are referred to as conventional or traditional dried fruits, fruits that have been dried in the sun or in heated wind tunnel dryers. Many fruits such as cranberries, blueberries, cherries, strawberries, some products sold as dried fruit, like papaya, kiwi fruit and pineapple are most often candied fruit. Dried fruits retain most of the value of fresh fruits. The specific nutrient content of the different dried fruits reflects their fresh counterpart, traditional dried fruit such as raisins, figs, dates, apricots and apples have been a staple of Mediterranean diets for millennia. Drying or dehydration also happened to be the earliest form of preservation, grapes, dates. Early hunter-gatherers observed that these fallen fruit took on an edible form, the latest recorded mention of dried fruits can be found in Mesopotamian tablets dating to about 1700 BC, which contain what are probably the oldest known written recipes. These early civilizations used dates, date juice evaporated into syrup and they included dried fruits in their breads for which they had more than 300 recipes, from simple barley bread for the workers to very elaborate, spiced cakes with honey for the palaces and temples. Because cuneiform was very complex and only scribes who had studied for years could read it, it is unlikely that the tablets were meant for everyday cooks or chefs, instead they were written to document the culinary art of the times. Many recipes are quite elaborate and have rare ingredients so we may assume that they represent Mediterranean haute cuisine, the date palm was one of the first cultivated trees. It was domesticated in Mesopotamia more than 5,000 years ago and it grew abundantly in the Fertile Crescent and it was so productive that dates were the cheapest of staple foods. Because they were so valuable they were recorded in Assyrian and Babylonian monuments. The villagers in Mesopotamia dried them and ate them as sweets, whether fresh, soft-dried or hard-dried, they helped to give character to meat dishes and grain pies. They were valued by travelers for their energy and were recommended as stimulants against fatigue, Figs were also prized in early Mesopotamia, Israel and Egypt where their daily use was probably greater than or equal to that of dates. As well as appearing in paintings, many specimens have been found in Egyptian tombs as funerary offerings. In Greece and Crete, figs grew very readily and they were the staple of poor and rich alike, grape cultivation first began in Armenia and the eastern regions of the Mediterranean in the 4th century BC
10.
Middle Eastern cuisine
–
Middle Eastern cuisine is the cuisine of the various countries and peoples of the Middle East. The cuisine of the region is diverse while having a degree of homogeneity, some popular dishes include Kebabs, Dolma, and Doner Kebab. The Middle East includes the formerly known as the Fertile Crescent. Fermentation was also discovered here to leaven bread and make beer in Mesopotamia, as a crossroads between Europe, Asia, the Caucasus and North Africa, this area has long been a hub of food and recipe exchange. During the Persian Empire, the foundation was laid for modern Middle-Eastern food when rice, poultry, figs, dates and nuts were brought by merchants to conquered lands, and spices were brought back from the Orient. Religion has also influenced the cuisine, neither Jews nor Muslims eat pork, chateau Ksara is also very popular for its arak, an alcoholic drink produced in the Levant and Iraq. Al-Maza is Lebanons primary brewery, which was also, at one time, Lebanon has always been well known in the region for its wines and arak, making it an exception when it comes to lack of alcohol in the region. Under the Ottoman Empire, sweet pastries of paper thin phyllo dough, cereals constitute the basis of the Middle Eastern diet, both historically and today. Wheat and rice are the major and preferred sources of staple foods, barley is also widely used in the region and maize has become common in some areas as well. Bread is a universal staple – eaten in one form or another by all classes, aside from bread, wheat is also used in the forms of bulghur and couscous. Burghul is cracked wheat, made by cooking the wheat grains in water, drying it in an oven or in the sun, then breaking it into pieces. Typically, it is cooked in water, with flavorings, much like rice, burghul is also used in making meat pies and as an ingredient in salads, notably in tabbouleh, with chopped parsley, tomato, lemon, and oil. Freekeh is another common grain, made from green wheat. There are many types of produced and consumed in the region. Plain rice is served under grilled meats or with meat/vegetable stews, in more complex rice dishes, there are layers of meat, vegetables, sauces, nuts, or dried fruits. Butter and clarified butter are, traditionally, the medium of cooking. Olive oil is prevalent in the Mediterranean coastal areas, christians use it during Lent, when meat and dairy products are excluded, and Jews use it in place of animal fats such as butter to avoid mixing meat and dairy products. Most regions in the Middle East use spices, typically, a stew will include a small amount of cinnamon, nutmeg, cloves, cumin, and coriander
11.
African cuisine
–
Traditionally, the various cuisines of Africa use a combination of locally available fruits, cereal grains and vegetables, as well as milk and meat products, and do not usually get food imported. In some parts of the continent, the traditional diet features a lot of milk, curd and these foodstuffs have had a large influence on the local cuisine, if perhaps less on the preparation methods. Central African cooking has remained mostly traditional, nevertheless, as in other parts of Africa, Central African cuisine presents a variety of dishes. The basic ingredients are plantains and cassava, fufu-like starchy foods are served with grilled meat and sauces. A variety of ingredients are used while preparing other dishes like spinach stew cooked with tomato, peppers, chillis, onions. Cassava plants are consumed as cooked greens. Groundnut stew is prepared, containing chicken, okra, ginger. Another favorite is bambara, a porridge of rice, peanut butter, beef and chicken are favorite meat dishes, but game meat preparations containing crocodile, monkey, antelope and warthog are also served occasionally. In the inland savannah, the cuisine of cattle-keeping peoples is distinctive in that meat products are generally absent. Cattle, sheep, pigs and goats were regarded as a form of currency and a store of wealth, in some areas, traditional peoples consume the milk and blood of cattle, but rarely the meat. Elsewhere, other peoples are farmers who grow a variety of grains, maize is the basis of ugali, the local version of West Africas fufu. Ugali is a dish eaten with meats or stews. In Uganda, steamed green bananas called matoke provide the starch filler of many meals, around 1000 years ago, Omani and Yemeni merchants settled on the Swahili Coast. Some common ingredients used in this region include oranges, lemons, limes, chillis, capscium peppers, maize, the main traditional dishes in Ethiopian cuisine and Eritrean cuisine are tsebhis served with injera and hilbet. Eritrean and Ethiopian cuisine are similar, given the shared history of the two countries. Eritrean and Ethiopian food habits vary regionally, in the highlands, injera is the staple diet and is eaten daily among the Tigrinya. Injera is made out of teff, wheat, barley, sorghum or corn, when eating, diners generally share food from a large tray placed in the centre of a low dining table. Numerous injera are layered on this tray and topped with various spicy stews, diners then break into the section of injera in front of them, tearing off pieces and dipping them into the stews
12.
Latin American cuisine
–
Latin American cuisine refers to typical foods, beverages, and cooking styles common to many of the countries and cultures in Latin America. Latin America is a diverse area of land that holds various cuisines that vary from nation to nation. Some items typical of Latin American cuisine include maize-based dishes and various salsas, thus, this leads for a variety across the land. Sofrito, a term that originally referred to a specific combination of sauteed or braised aromatics. It refers to a sauce of tomatoes, roasted peppers, garlic, onions. Latin American beverages are just as distinct as their foods, some of the beverages can even date back to the times of the Native Americans. Some popular beverages include mate, hibiscus tea, horchata, chicha, atole, cacao, desserts in Latin America are generally very sweet in taste. They include dulce de leche, alfajor, rice pudding, tres leches cake, teja, information about Native American cuisine comes from a great variety of sources. Modern day Native peoples retain a body of traditional foods. Foods like cornbread are known to have been adopted into the cuisine of the United States from Native American groups. In other cases, documents from the periods of contact with European, African. The main crops Native Americans used in Mexico & Central America were corn and beans such as Pupusas, Tamales, Pozole, Chuchitos, Corn tortilla and these influence is less seen in the southern cone of South America however. Africans brought and preserved many of their traditions and cooking techniques and they were often given less desired cuts of meat, including shoulder and intestines. Menudo, for example, was derived from the habit of the Spaniards of giving the slaves cows intestines, slaves developed a way to clean the offal and season it to taste. Slaves in the southern United States also did the thing to the pigs intestines given to them. Europeans brought their traditions, but quickly adapted several of the fruits. Europe itself has been influenced by other cultures, such as with the Moors in Spain, the European influence for many Latin American cuisine mainly comes from Spain. A wave of immigrants from Asia, such as China and Japan, the Chinese brought with them their own spices and food-styles, something that the people of Latin America accepted into their tables
.JPG)
.JPG)
The dictionary definition of pilaf at Wiktionary
Pulao at Wikibook Cookbooks
