GRADE 7 · WORLD HISTORY AND GEOGRAPHY
Food as a Window
into Daily Life
Two kitchens before the Columbian Exchange
TODAY'S FOCUS
What we are doing today
Learning target
I can compare a dish from medieval Damascus with an Aztec dish to explain how geography and trade shaped each kitchen, and what neither cook could make before 1492.
1
Intro
2
Model
3
Compare
4
Write
5
Share
One class period (about 50 minutes) · Standards: CA HSS 7.2 and 7.7
Food as a Window into Daily Life
2
HOOK
Two ingredients, two worlds
One of these a Damascus cook in 1250 had never tasted. One an Aztec cook in 1450 had never tasted. Which is which, and why?
Food as a Window into Daily Life
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WORD BANK
Words you will need
cuisine
manner of preparing food : style of cooking
staple
something having widespread and constant use or appeal
trade route
a route followed by traders (as in caravans)
hemisphere
one half of the Earth
Columbian Exchange
the commingling of Old and New World plants, animals, and bacteria after 1492
banquet
a formal dinner for many people usually to celebrate a special event
Food as a Window into Daily Life
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MODEL — I DO
Read a recipe like a historian
Sort each ingredient. Is it local, or did trade bring it here?
Ask about the source.
Who wrote this, and for whom?
Notice the difference.
A cookbook is written inside a culture. An account written after a conquest is an outsider looking in.
The big idea
Before 1492, the two halves of the world had never shared a pantry. What a cook could use depended on where they lived and what trade could reach them.
Food as a Window into Daily Life
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DISH 1 · DAMASCUS, AYYUBID SYRIA
Sanbūsak, a stuffed pastry
What to notice
Food as a Window into Daily Life
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DISH 2 · THE AZTEC WORLD
Turkey tamal (totolnacaquimilli)
What to notice
Food as a Window into Daily Life
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YOUR TASK — WE DO
Compare the two dishes
On your packet, for each ingredient decide:
Food as a Window into Daily Life
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CRITICAL-THINKING CHECK
What can each source NOT tell you?
Scents and Flavors
It records elite Ayyubid banquet food, written within the culture. So it shows what wealthy people ate, not what everyone ate every day.
The Florentine Codex
It also records elite food, served to nobles, but written down by a Spanish friar after the conquest, with Nahua elders. An outsider's record, not the cooks' own words.
Both sources reflect elite dining. A good historian always asks what a source leaves out.
Food as a Window into Daily Life
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WRITE — YOU DO
Make your claim
Sentence starter: “Before 1492, an Aztec cook and a Damascus cook could not have made each other's dish because ______.”
Claim: State what kept the two kitchens apart.
Evidence: Name specific ingredients from each dish.
Reasoning: Explain how geography and trade caused it.
Food as a Window into Daily Life
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SHARE
Share and name the skill
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IF TIME PERMITS + HOMEWORK
What happens when the worlds meet?
Finished early?
Homework
Find one food you eat that mixes Old World and New World ingredients (for example, pizza: wheat from the Old World, tomato from the New). Trace where each came from.
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SOURCES
Works Cited
Big History Project (BHP). "Consequences of the Columbian Exchange." Infographic. OER Project. Accessed July 29, 2026. https://www.oerproject.com/OER-Materials/OER-Media/PDFs/SBH/Unit-8/8-2-The-Columbian-Exchange/Consequences-of-the-Columbian-Exchange.
Perry, Charles, trans. Scents and Flavors: A Syrian Cookbook (Kitāb al-Wuṣlah ilā al-Ḩabīb). New York: New York University Press, 2020. Chapter 6, “Sautés and Related Dishes,” recipe 6.1, p. 41.
Sahagún, Bernardino de. Historia general de las cosas de Nueva España (Florentine Codex). Ms. Mediceo Palatino 218–20, Biblioteca Medicea Laurenziana, Florence, 1577. Book 8, fol. 23r. Available at Digital Florentine Codex, edited by Kim N. Richter et al. Los Angeles: Getty Research Institute, 2023. https://florentinecodex.getty.edu/.
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