the thing i'm really super interested in without knowing whether i'd hate it or not is to eat food from cultures pre age of exploration/colonialism, would be fascinating to see how food tasted before we all got access to all the ingredients from everywhere on the planet.

I would actually bet that one of the biggest differences would be textures in things like bread. Pre-industrial processes can't get the fine grinds we're used to in flour, to say nothing of extruded highly processed foods. Plus more whole grains overall.

I do a little bit of cooking with medieval European recipes from time to time. Most of it has come out pretty well although the mawmeny that I made which was declared to be 'pumpkin spice chicken' has not been requested again.

I took a (zoom) medieval Spanish cooking class through atlas obscura a few years back that involved making kind of a baked eggplant casserole with cheese and a béchamel sauce, flavored with like, nutmeg. Basically inedible, and I have a very tolerant palate and a hatred for wasting food.

This might interest you then: in Europe one can to this day tell pretty clearly the difference in cuisine between places that have been part of the Roman Empire for 200 years or more and those that haven’t.

like shit, pretty sure that's the reason the British got super into India and their spices

I think about this all the time! My family was Irish and they sure weren't eating potatoes 500 years ago. I want to know how they prepared that seaweed! And if there were more interesting varieties of oats.

Every once in a while, just sit with the idea that tomatoes, chocolate, and vanilla are western hemisphere foods.

There would be raisins

It is a fascinating idea. I think Chinese & Japanese food might be much the same. Not Mexican though, even if the ingredients were the same (no pork, chicken, nuts or citrus tho). Their chocolate would be terrible (bitter, full of cornmeal & chilies), & don't know what in heck they did with vanilla.

My partner and I are in the habit of wondering where one ingredient or another comes from, and after researching, we try to imagine various food cultures without that ingredient. It’s super entertaining!