With their supplies of garum cut off, it’s been suggested communities across Asia began making their own versions. Small pockets of production survived, including colatura di alici, a fish sauce still produced in rural Southwest Italy, but the heyday of European fish sauce had definitively ended. In Europe, heavy taxes on salt and an increase in pirates in the Mediterranean meant it almost entirely disappeared across the West. (Though some argue that Asian communities invented fish sauces independently.)īut with the fall of the empire, around the beginning of the fifth-century, fish sauce supplies to Asia were cut off. Garum may have found its way to Asia via the Silk Road, giving a whole new continent a taste for the fishy stuff. And at times the stench from factories could be so pungent that local governors had to temporarily halt production - though this didn’t stop it spreading across the Roman empire and beyond. Seneca, the philosopher and statesman, branded it ‘poisonous fish’ that ‘burns up the stomach with its putrefaction’. Apicius, the renowned epicure, records nearly 350 recipes that use fish sauce, while Pliny the Elder hailed it an ‘exquisite liquid’.īut like most foods, not everybody was a fan. According to Galen, the Roman physician, for those suffering from diarrhoea, a bowl of lentils and garum made ‘a very pleasant and useful medicine’. It was so popular that they even made special varieties for religious ceremonies. By the time of Augustus, the first Roman Emperor, garum sociorum, a fish sauce made in Cartagena and Cadiz, Spain, was considered the best and could be retailed at a thousand sesterces for twelve pints - the equivalent of 2000 loaves of bread.Įvery level of Roman society was obsessed with fish sauce, and they applied it liberally to all kinds of dishes, from lettuce salads to sausages. Excavations have found numerous remains of fish-salting sites along the Atlantic and Mediterranean coasts in Spain, Portugal, France, North Africa and the Black Sea, with each port producing a different kind of fish sauce. In fact, entire factories were dedicated to its production. While garum wasn’t as big an industry as olive oil, it was still widespread and an important part of early history of Italian food. But this process also enabled the tissues to ferment, transforming the flavour into something seemingly irresistible to Roman palates. The use of salt or salt brine helped remove water from the tissue of the fish and prevented the growth of mould. Garum was a culinary solution to the problem of preserving fish, which, once dead, are highly susceptible to decomposition and putrefaction, especially in the hot climes of the Mediterranean. Delicious.Īccording to Pliny, garum could be made with a variety of fish or shellfish, including maena, murena, tunny, mullet, oysters, and sea urchins, although mackerel was the most popular. The mixture was then left to ferment under the sun for two to three months. Garum, also know as liquamen, muria or allec (see DeFINitions below for a breakdown), was made by mixing fish blood, guts and heads with copious amounts of sea salt. It was the Romans, however, who had an obsession with garum, their version of fish sauce. The Greek communities called it garos, and it was mentioned by ancient writers, including Aristophanes, Sophocles and Aeschylus. Little is known about the first fish sauce, though it’s thought to have been produced along the Black Sea coastline by the ancient Greeks, or perhaps by the Carthaginians along the coast of the Lake of Tunis, in modern-day Tunisia. In fact, it’s possible it was born in Europe. Yet if you look into the history of fish sauce, it becomes clear that it’s lineage may not be Asian afterall. An umami-rich condiment made from the fermentation of fish with sea salt, it’s a staple ingredient in Vietnamese, Cambodian, Lao, Thai, Burmese and Filipino cooking. You can find the ingredient in countless dishes from the Vietnamese dipping sauce, nước chấm, to mohinga, a rice noodle soup considered the national dish of Myanmar. We don’t use a lot of it the West, but visit Southeast Asia and you’ll be hard pressed to avoid the pungent, fishy odour that wafts from nearby street food stands and kitchens. You might not be that familiar with fish sauce - but you’ll know it when you smell it. From ancient Greece to modern-day Southeast Asia, we trace the history of fish sauce across the globe.
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