European cuisine

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Italian pizza. Pizza is considered one of the national dishes of Italy and its variants are among the most popular foods in the world.

European cuisine (also known as Continental cuisine) comprises the cuisines originating from the various countries of Europe.<ref>Template:Cite book</ref>

The cuisines of European countries are diverse, although some common characteristics distinguish them from those of other regions.<ref name="Kwan 1988">Kwan Shuk-yan (1988). Selected Occidental Cookeries and Delicacies, p. 23. Hong Kong: Food Paradise Pub. Co.</ref> Compared to traditional cooking of East Asia, meat holds a more prominent and substantial role in serving size.<ref name="Lin 1977">Lin Ch'ing (1977). First Steps to European Cooking, p. 5. Hong Kong: Wan Li Pub. Co.</ref> Many dairy products are utilised in cooking.<ref>Kwan Shuk-yan, pg 26</ref> There are hundreds of varieties of cheese and other fermented milk products. White wheat-flour bread has long been the prestige starch, but historically, most people ate bread, flatcakes, or porridge made from rye, spelt, barley, and oats.<ref>Alfio Cortonesi, "Self-sufficiency and the Market: Rural and Urban Diet in the Middle Ages", in Jean-Louis Flandrin, Massimo Montanari, Food: A Culinary History from Antiquity to the Present, 1999, Template:Isbn, p. 268ff</ref><ref>Michel Morineau, "Growing without Knowing Why: Production, Demographics, and Diet", in Jean-Louis Flandrin, Massimo Montanari, Food: A Culinary History from Antiquity to the Present, 1999, Template:Isbn, p. 380ff</ref> Those better-off would also make pasta, dumplings and pastries. The potato has become a major starch plant in the diet of Europeans and their diaspora since the European colonisation of the Americas. Maize is much less common in most European diets than it is in the Americas; however, corn meal (polenta or mămăligă) is a major part of the cuisine of Italy, the Balkans and the Caucasus. Although flatbreads (especially with toppings such as pizza or tarte flambée) and rice are eaten in Europe, they are only staple foods in limited areas, particularly in Southern Europe. Salads (cold dishes with uncooked or cooked vegetables, sometimes with a dressing) are an integral part of European cuisine.

Formal European dinners are served in distinct courses. European presentation evolved from service à la française, or bringing multiple dishes to the table at once, into service à la russe, where dishes are presented sequentially. Usually, cold, hot and savoury, and sweet dishes are served strictly separately in this order, as hors d'oeuvre (appetizer) or soup, as entrée and main course, and as dessert. Dishes that are both sweet and savoury were common earlier in Ancient Roman cuisine, but are today uncommon, with sweet dishes being served only as dessert. A service where the guests are free to take food by themselves is termed a buffet, and is usually restricted to parties or holidays. Nevertheless, guests are expected to follow the same pattern.

Historically, European cuisine has been developed in the European royal and noble courts. European nobility was usually arms-bearing and lived in separate manors in the countryside. The knife was the primary eating implement (cutlery), and eating steaks and other foods that require cutting followed. This contrasted with East Asian cuisine, where the ruling class were the court officials, who had their food prepared ready to eat in the kitchen, to be eaten with chopsticks. The knife was supplanted by the spoon for soups, while the fork was introduced later in the early modern period, ca. 16th century. Today, most dishes are intended to be eaten with cutlery and only a few finger foods can be eaten with the hands in polite company.

History

Medieval

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A restored medieval kitchen inside Verrucole Castle, Tuscany, Italy

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The Antica trattoria Bagutto in Milan, Italy, the oldest restaurant in Italy and the second in Europe<ref name="localistorici"/>

In medieval times, a person's diet varied depending on their social class. However, cereal grains made up a lot of a medieval person's diet, regardless of social class. Bread was common to both classes; it was taken as a lunch for the working man, and thick slices of it were used as plates called trenchers.<ref>Template:Cite web</ref> People of the noble class had access to finely ground flours for their breads and other baked goods. Noblemen were allowed to hunt for deer, boar, rabbits, birds, and other animals, giving them access to fresh meat and fish for their meals.<ref>Template:Cite web</ref> Dishes for people of these classes were often heavily spiced.<ref>Template:Cite web</ref> Spices at that time were very expensive, and the more spices used in dishes, the more wealth the person needed to purchase such ingredients. Common spices used were cinnamon, ginger, nutmeg, pepper, cumin, cloves, turmeric, anise, and saffron.<ref>Template:Cite web</ref> Other ingredients used in dishes for the nobility and clergy included sugar, almonds and dried fruits like raisins.<ref>Template:Cite web</ref> These imported ingredients would have been very expensive and nearly impossible for commoners to obtain. When banquets were held, the dishes served would be very spectacular: another way for the noblemen to show how rich they were. Sugar sculptures would be placed on the tables as decoration and to eat, and foods would be dyed vibrant colors with imported spices.<ref>Template:Cite web</ref>

Milan in Italy is home to the oldest restaurant in Italy and the second in Europe, the Antica trattoria Bagutto, which has existed since at least 1284.<ref name="localistorici">Template:Cite web</ref> The diet of a commoner would have been much simpler. Strict poaching laws prevented them from hunting, and if they did hunt and were caught, they could have parts of their limbs cut off or they could be killed.<ref>Template:Cite web</ref> Much of the commoners' food would have been preserved in some way, such as through pickling or by being salted.<ref>Template:Cite web</ref> Breads would have been made using rye or barley, and any vegetables would likely have been grown by the commoners themselves.<ref>Template:Cite web</ref> Peasants would have likely been able to keep cows, and so would have access to milk, which then allowed them to make butter or cheese.<ref>Template:Cite web</ref> When meat was eaten, it would have been beef, pork, or lamb. Commoners also ate a dish called pottage, a thick stew of vegetables, grains, and meat.<ref>Template:Cite web</ref>

Early modern era

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File:CLAESZ Still life with a peacock pie.jpg

Still life with a peacock pie, 67, by Dutch artist Pieter Claesz, showing various dishes from the 17th century including roast meat, breads, nuts, wine, apples, dried fruits, along with an elaborate meat pie decorated like a peacock. While common in the warmer climates of Southern Europe, lemons would have been a relatively new introduction to the Netherlands, requiring growing in a orangery.

The cuisine of early modern Europe (c. 1500–1800) was a mix of dishes inherited from medieval cuisine combined with innovations that would persist in the modern era.

The discovery of the New World, the establishment of new trade routes with Asia and increased foreign influences from sub-Saharan Africa and the Middle East meant that Europeans became familiarized with a multitude of new foodstuffs. Spices that previously had been prohibitively expensive luxuries, such as pepper, cinnamon, cloves, nutmeg, and ginger,<ref>Template:Cite book</ref> soon became available to the majority population, and the introduction of new plants coming from the New World and India like maize, potato, sweet potato, chili pepper, cocoa, vanilla, tomato, coffee, and tea transformed European cuisine forever.

Though there was a great influx of new ideas, an increase in foreign trade and a Scientific Revolution, preservation of foods remained traditional: preserved by drying, salting, and smoking or pickling in vinegar. Fare was naturally dependent on the season: a cookbook by Domenico Romoli called "Panunto" made a virtue of necessity by including a recipe for each day of the year.<ref>Romoli, La singolar dottrina, Venice, 1560.</ref> Everywhere both doctors and chefs continued to characterize foodstuffs by their effects on the four humours: they were considered to be heating or cooling to the constitution, moistening or drying.

There was a very great increase in prosperity in Europe during this period, which gradually reached all classes and all areas, and considerably changed the patterns of eating. Nationalism was first conceived in the early modern period, but it was not until the 19th century that the notion of a national cuisine emerged. Class differences were far more important dividing lines, and it was almost always upper-class food that was described in recipe collections and cookbooks.

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European cuisine by regions