Ancient Roman Garum Fish Sauce
From mystic_river1 16 years ago
- 40 minutes to make
- Serves 5
Real Roman Recipes by Carla Raimer . . . for a day at the baths Roman baths were much more than public places to bathe. They also were social centers where friends, families, and business colleagues came to meet—and to eat. Read more Snack food and drink were an essential part of these gatherings, with Roman philosopher Seneca writing of the noisy "cake sellers, the sausage man and confectioner" who each hawked food to hungry bath patrons. This is the recipe for Garum Fish Sauce As they are with modern Romans, sauces and marinades were an essential element in ancient Roman cuisine. One of the most popular was garum, a salty, aromatic, fish-based sauce. Like so many other Roman treasures, it was borrowed from the ancient Greeks. Apicius used it in all his recipes, and the poet Martial wrote of it: "Accept this exquisite garum, a precious gift made with the first blood spilled from a living mackerel." See less
Ingredients
- Garum fish sauce shopping list
- I won't recommend you try the ancient version . Instead, try the easier modern recipe. shopping list
- Ancient Garum Recipe shopping list
- -------------------------------------------------------------------------------- shopping list
- Use fatty fish, for example, sardines, and a well-sealed (pitched) container with a 26-35 quart capacity. Add dried, aromatic herbs possessing a strong flavor, such as dill, coriander, fennel, celery, mint, oregano, and others, making a layer on the bottom of the container; then put down a layer of fish (if small, leave them whole, if large, use pieces) and over this, add a layer of salt two fingers high. Repeat these layers until the container is filled. Let it rest for seven days in the sun. Then mix the sauce daily for 20 days. After that, it becomes a liquid. shopping list
- - Gargilius Martialis, De medicina et de virtute herbarum, reprinted from A Taste of Ancient Rome shopping list
How to make it
- Modern Garum Recipe
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- Cook a quart of grape juice, reducing it to one-tenth its original volume. Dilute two tablespoons of anchovy paste in the concentrated juice and mix in a pinch of oregano.
- - reprinted from A Taste of Ancient Rome
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