this post was submitted on 10 Sep 2025
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Mexican and Italian. Both have very rich regional traditions with a ton of variety. Of course, Mexican food is a blend of Native American and European traditions, and Italian food (often) depends heavily on New World crops like tomatoes and corn, so these strict delineations are not real
It's so curious-- so what was late-stage Western Roman food like, anyway?
Max Miller is a dang-ol' genius at this stuff, but he always has to make a huge production about it, y'know..?
I can only assume they just drank gallons of garam!
In all seriousness though, we have a very dedicated restaurant near us run by a couple from the Verona area in far-northern Italy, and they use no tomatoes or corn. Pretty much every dish they make would've been possible pre-Columbus. This includes many styles of pasta, sauces based in olive oil or butter, and other things like beef, shrimp, mushrooms, pistachios, peas, and a variety of cheeses.
Wow, that's... yeah!
So, hehe, I've been to Italia a grand total of , when we visited my aunt in Firenza, many years ago. (One of the things I really loved about Italia is how it busted our mindset about 'American expectations')
Fair! But we also came up with potatoes, chiles, and quite a number of spicy meatballs, not just of the polpette piccanti variety, eh?
It seems to be a belief many Americans have, but usually they are mainly familiar with American Italian cuisine, which is quite different from mist actual Italian cuisine.