- Oh, how the dining tables of the world have turned…
Tastes, fashions, and fads come and go. What’s hip and cool today might be completely passé tomorrow.
It’s the same story with food — or perhaps even more so. Many of the finest delicacies we pay outrageous amounts for today used to be considered filth that was only fit for the poorest of poor.
But throw in an economic or environmental change, or just the food’s name to a more exotic one, and suddenly the peasant’s survival food becomes a luxury product. Here are six examples of sought-after delights that once were eaten by nobody but the common rabble.
1. Portobello Mushrooms
There’s really nothing special about portobello mushrooms. They’re just fully matured button mushrooms — or cremini mushrooms, or baby Bellas, or whatever name you know them by.
Because of that, people didn’t use to think much about them. For the longest time, they were considered so ugly and unpleasant to eat that farmers would throw away perfectly good mushrooms if they happened to grow big enough.
But then came the 1980s and some marketing wizard — possibly coked out of his skull while trying to think of how to sell this fungus — had a stroke of genius. Just give them a fancy Italian-sounding name (it’s not what real Italians call them) and ride the rising whole foods wave.
And that’s how we got the portobello, one of the most popular meat substitutes at hip vegan restaurants.
2. Salmon
Salmon may not be the rarest food in the world, but you still get to pay a decent sum for a nice fillet. But it wasn’t always so, at least not everywhere.
In some parts of the world, salmon is (or was) so plentiful that people are sick of eating it. That was definitely the situation on the British Isles.
Until the 1950s, house servants in the UK and Ireland had a clause in their contracts that prohibited their masters from feeding them salmon more than once a week. If it was up to them, the servants would’ve been eating salmon and nothing else — it was so dirt cheap.
But then overfishing, development along rivers, and climate change started taking their toll and salmon stocks plummeted. Together with some smart marketing moves, salmon producers turned their fish into a luxury treat.
3. Lobster
Today, lobster is almost synonymous with luxurious decadence. Roll the clock back a couple of hundred years, though, and it was everything but.
Lobsters were so common on the coast of New England that people considered them pests. There were so many of them that they’d pile up on the shores — not exactly a rare treat.
On top of them being common, the rich and powerful found their appearance unappealing. As such, they were food for the poor, who at least could eat them in abundance.
But as the U.S. spread westward, lobsters became rarer and rarer the further people went. Eventually, a lobster could cost so much that only the richest could afford them.
And if it costs a lot, rich people will want it.
4. Oysters
Oysters’ story begins similarly to that of the lobster. Once upon a time, there were so many oysters in the seas that you could throw a bucket into the water and haul it back full.
And then the Industrial Revolution happened. Ever more advanced factories began pumping pollution into the oceans and the oysters didn’t like that at all.
Oyster stocks around the world plummeted and they’ve been falling ever since. Suddenly, oysters disappeared practically overnight and the price of the now-rare mollusks skyrocketed.
The poor simply couldn’t afford oysters anymore. But the elite, who so far had scoffed at the slimy bivalves, now found them much more palatable — because they were expensive.
5. Sushi
Sushi’s rise to glory is rather different from many other foods. It didn’t experience a change in rarity — the entire dish has changed completely over the past few hundred years.
Sushi is a very old dish, but you wouldn’t recognize the oldest versions of it. Japanese fishermen (who were poor) used to wrap raw fish in rice and leaves and let it ferment to preserve it.
But sushi began to change around the 17th century. Chefs started to flavor the rice with vinegar and sake instead of fermenting it and topping this tasty morsel with slices of fresh fish.
People loved it and the prestige of chefs who could prepare both yummy and pretty sushi began to rise. By using rarer and more delicate seafood on their sushi, they could ask for a high price for the mouthfuls — resulting in the expensive sushi we know today.
6. Foie Gras
Foie gras — fatty goose liver — has had quite a roller coaster ride over the years. It’s gone from infamy to the ultimate luxury good and back several times, and it continues to do so.
Foie gras originates with ancient Egyptians who gave their Jewish slaves the “garbage” parts of a goose — including the liver. The Jews ate it, quite simply because the option was to eat nothing at all.
Then the Romans discovered foie gras and they loved it. For a while, it enjoyed the reputation of an elegant treat. But when the Middle Ages rolled around, people started associating the liver with sinful Roman decadence, and it became shunned again.
During Renaissance, French aristocracy learned of foie gras and it turned the delicacy we know now. But recently foie gras’ has started to fall out of favor once more due to its admittedly rather cruel production methods.
But is history has shown us anything, it’s that foie gras will rise again. Just wait a couple of hundred years.
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