Dinner Time!

[Os-Q]

Maybe a little bit out of the timeframe, but I have this paragraph from "The Totally Useless History of the World" (I couldn't find my copy of the "Horrible Histories: The Rotten Romans" which actually has some reciepes it it, but I'll keep a lookout for it)

"Sow's womb and Mackerel Guts - by the 1st century AD only one in ten people in Rome had access to a hearth where they could cook - so the purveyors of takeaway food did a roaring trade. For the wealthy who dined at home, popular items included roast dormouse, kale covered in saltpetre, and sow's womb (served with or without udders). Spattered over everything was a ubiquitous fish sauce called garum, made from slow cooked mackerel guts (production of the pungent, salty sauce within the city was prohibited on account of the stench). A disk for special occasions was the porcus troianus (Trojan pig), a whole roasted pig stuffed with fruit and sausages. Brought to the table standing on its legs, its belly was then cut open, letting spill the sausages as if they were the animal's entrails. By this time the earlier fashion of allowing one's fish to expire at table (preferably in a sauce) had gone out of favour."

From "The Totally Useless History of the World" by Ian Crofton