Zyobot
Just a time-traveling robot stranded on Earth.
Compared to war, culture, and geopolitics, food and food preparation tends to be overlooked in AH circles.
But as in all things, the butterflies let loose by different PODs — such as farmland being either developed or destroyed, economic booms and busts, and different trade routes that pass along new items and ingredients along being opened or closed — would no doubt affect the supply chains and agricultural wherewithal of peoples and cultures the world over, too. Eventually, this would trickle down into different tastes, recipes, and ingredients that might catch OTL observers by surprise.
One OTL example I can think of is Cambodia's Kampot Pepper, which nearly went extinct under the Khmer Rouge alongside a host of other recipes and traditional culinary wisdom, no thanks to Pol Pot's purges wiping out lots of chefs, farmers, and knowledgeable elders, while his "Super Great Leap Forward" left farmland either rotting away or ruined by idiotic farming practices enforced at gunpoint. Only after Pol Pot was deposed did farmers who had fled return to restore the vines that grew Kampot Peppers. Fortunately, they're making a gradual comeback now, though progress is slow-going.
Naturally, it's easy to imagine ATL where Pol Pot never seizes power enabling Cambodia to not only develop much more nicely, but also ensuring that Kampot Peppers (and lots of other recipes and culinary wisdom wiped out IOTL, for that matter) remaining widespread and in no immediate danger of going extinct. Certainly, I doubt Vietnamese "counterfeit" peppers would have nearly as much success as IOTL, which is already a preeminent pepper producer in the region, as is.
Could probably imagine similar differences in other places, too, if the examples pertaining to Polish cuisine in the General AH Thread here are any indication.
In any case, there's actually a lot of ways you can tinker with ATL cuisine and culinary practices, since tastes, recipes, and the availability of certain items and ingredients would vary wildly, depending on the POD and its runoff consequences for agriculture, hunting, and supply chains — all of which determine which foods make it and which ones don't.
Thank you in advance,
Zyobot
But as in all things, the butterflies let loose by different PODs — such as farmland being either developed or destroyed, economic booms and busts, and different trade routes that pass along new items and ingredients along being opened or closed — would no doubt affect the supply chains and agricultural wherewithal of peoples and cultures the world over, too. Eventually, this would trickle down into different tastes, recipes, and ingredients that might catch OTL observers by surprise.
One OTL example I can think of is Cambodia's Kampot Pepper, which nearly went extinct under the Khmer Rouge alongside a host of other recipes and traditional culinary wisdom, no thanks to Pol Pot's purges wiping out lots of chefs, farmers, and knowledgeable elders, while his "Super Great Leap Forward" left farmland either rotting away or ruined by idiotic farming practices enforced at gunpoint. Only after Pol Pot was deposed did farmers who had fled return to restore the vines that grew Kampot Peppers. Fortunately, they're making a gradual comeback now, though progress is slow-going.
Naturally, it's easy to imagine ATL where Pol Pot never seizes power enabling Cambodia to not only develop much more nicely, but also ensuring that Kampot Peppers (and lots of other recipes and culinary wisdom wiped out IOTL, for that matter) remaining widespread and in no immediate danger of going extinct. Certainly, I doubt Vietnamese "counterfeit" peppers would have nearly as much success as IOTL, which is already a preeminent pepper producer in the region, as is.
Could probably imagine similar differences in other places, too, if the examples pertaining to Polish cuisine in the General AH Thread here are any indication.
In any case, there's actually a lot of ways you can tinker with ATL cuisine and culinary practices, since tastes, recipes, and the availability of certain items and ingredients would vary wildly, depending on the POD and its runoff consequences for agriculture, hunting, and supply chains — all of which determine which foods make it and which ones don't.
Thank you in advance,
Zyobot