I’m currently reading Salt: A World History and I just read a section on Rome in particular which reminded me of Fish Friday’s for lent. Before I was a vegetarian I remember thinking it was so hard to not eat meat on Fridays. I would always eat meat and then remember I wasn’t supposed to.
I know a lot of Catholics don’t like all the rules of lent etc but according to the book, it is so much easier than it used to be. The medieval Catholic Church forbade eating meat on ALL catholic holidays. The Lenten fast was started in the fourth century, and was increased to 40 days and all Fridays were set as no meat days. These days added up fast and meat ended up being forbidden for about half of the days in a year. Also on “lean days” when meat was forbidden, sex was forbidden too. Fish was allowed though.
Since the Catholics were eating so much fish, it was becoming an important part of the economy. This anecdote was also in the book, and I thought it was really funny.
“At the time when Pope Pius VII had to leave Rome, which had been conquered by revolutionary French, the committee of the Chamber of Commerce in London was considering the herring fishery. One member of the committee observed that, since the Pope had been forced to Leave Rome, Italy was probably going to become a protestant country. “Heaven, help us, cried another member. “What,” responded the first, “would ou be upset to see the number of good protestants increase?” No” The other answered, “it isn’t that, but suppose there are no more Catholics, what shall we do with our herring?” ” – Alexandre Dumas, Le grand dictionnaire de cuisine, 1873
Last night my Alpha Phi Phamily got new members and took them out for sushi! We all love spicy tuna!! I hope you’ve been enjoying fish on Fridays during lent!
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