THE HISTORY OF
The Internation alization of Plant Foods Agriculture helped humans develop stable societies. In turn, many plants we eat today evolved because of the cultivation practices made possible by that stability. Early hunter-gatherers had to move seasonally to find new sources of plant foods and game. As agriculture arose, it allowed people to stay in one place, and as it became more efficient, it supported increasing populations, from cities to societies to civilizations. The plants we eat developed along this route of efficiency. Few modern plant foods resemble the wild versions they were bred from, and surprisingly few plant foods are native to the areas we think of as their birthplaces. Many "traditional " plant foods aren't traditional at all. Wheat developed in the Fertile Crescent before spreading across the globe. Polenta is not Italian but South Americanas are tomatoes. (The number of Italian plant foods that originated in Italy is surprisingly small: white truffles are the shining exception.) Imagine Chinese food without chili peppers, which originated in South America. The Sichuan province does have native Sichuan pepper plants (not to be confused with chili peppers), which lend a trademark buzzing, numbing quality to dishes like mapo tofu, but the dishes we now think of as traditionally Sichuan-loaded up with hot chilies-did not exist until chiles were imported from South America. Throughout history, traveling humans brought worthwhile plants along to new homes. The discovery of the New World infused Europe with new plant foods. From the 14th to the 16th century, much exploration was driven by the hunt for spices. Prized spices like clove and nutmeg are native to equatorial climates and could not be cultivated in Europe. Plants tend to move most successfully through "horizontal " transport to the same latitude (i.e., east to west and the reverse) and climate, as jared Diamond noted in Guns, Germs, and Steel. Changes in latitude (i.e., north to south or vice versa) are more difficult because of differences in climate and
Teosinte (above) is a grass found in Mexico that is the original source of corn or maize. Selective breeding by human farmers has changed it almost beyond recognition to its modern form (below).
length of growing season. Many plants that we think of as wild aren't as genetically unmodified as we think. Although so-called wild strawberries aren't as domesticated as hothouse varieties, most come from a strain that humans deliberately cultivated.
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VOLUME 3 路ANIMALS AND PLANTS