Tomatoes - Pick Your Poison!
by
BTW: I have a fever. In case the above didn’t make that screamingly obvious. However, tomatoes were considered to be poison during most of the middle ages in Europe.
Did You Enjoy this Post? Subscribe to SCA Life. It's Free!
July 23rd, 2007 at 6:54 am
Though this idea has been spread around for quite some time, it isn’t really true. While it is true that Europeans didn’t eat tomatoes in the Middle Ages, it isn’t because they thought they were poisonous. The real reason is that tomatoes are a New World plant. No one in medieval Europe ate tomatoes because no one had ever SEEN a tomato.
July 23rd, 2007 at 5:06 pm
I have heard both sides of this arguement, but short of going back in time it’s hard to know what the medievals really thought. My source for this are L.M. Boyd, The History Channel and a lecture given by one of my medieval literature profs at UC Davis.
All I know is that I’m glad we eat tomatoes today! I love them!
January 14th, 2009 at 8:25 pm
Actually The tomato was considered poison due to the wide spread use of lead alloy’s in table ware and settings. The acid in tomatoes(ascorbic acid) caused the lead in the tableware to leech out which caused people to become very ill and hence put the blame on the poor tomatoes. As better and cheaper alloy’s were improved so did the popularity of the tomato.
Cheers
Tiggy