Bon Appetit Wednesday! An Ancient Roman Salad

This week we’re bringing you a recipe straight out of ancient Rome. The Columella Salad, named for its author, Lucius Junius Moderatus Columella, is the perfect side dish and would fit easily on any modern menu. Yet it was created in the first century CE! Full of scrumptious, fresh ingredients, this salad is light, tasty and ancient.

Columella was a Roman soldier and farmer who was much more interested in writing about the agriculture of the Roman Empire than he was in advancing its borders in battle. He wrote extensively about the subject in his 12 books, De Re Rustica and in his other work De Arboribus. [1] His books include information about everything from wild plants to gardening and even animal husbandry. When you’re spending all of your time studying ingredients, you’re bound to come up with a few recipes, and that’s exactly what Columella did. Today’s recipe…