Food and Drink Atlas
Claims this atlas currently marks as unsettled or as tested and found false. A debated fact is one scholars hold competing positions on; a debunked one has been checked against the record and found not to hold. Both are kept in view rather than quietly smoothed over, with the reasoning that put each one where it stands.
199 statements marked Debated.
Nihari, Origin Period, From (Year)1770
Nihari, Dishes
Standing
Concerns Origin Period, From (Year)
Currently States 1770
One of two competing origin theories (Lucknow vs Delhi); the Lucknow account dates the dish to the late 18th century, under the Mughal Empire.
Source Nihari (Wikipedia)
Nihari, Origin Period, To (Year)1799
Nihari, Dishes
Standing
Concerns Origin Period, To (Year)
Currently States 1799
One of two competing origin theories (Lucknow vs Delhi); the Lucknow account dates the dish to the late 18th century, under the Mughal Empire.
Source Nihari (Wikipedia)
Olive Oil, Earliest Documented Use, From (Year)-6000
Olive Oil, Ingredients
Standing
Concerns Earliest Documented Use, From (Year)
Currently States -6000
Dating for early olive domestication and oil pressing varies by site across the eastern Mediterranean and the Levant; a range is given rather than a single year.
Source The Oxford Companion to Food, Alan Davidson
Olive Oil, Earliest Documented Use, To (Year)-4000
Olive Oil, Ingredients
Standing
Concerns Earliest Documented Use, To (Year)
Currently States -4000
Dating for early olive domestication and oil pressing varies by site across the eastern Mediterranean and the Levant; a range is given rather than a single year.
Source The Oxford Companion to Food, Alan Davidson
Onion, Origin RegionWest or Central Asia (variously described as Iran, western Pakistan and Central Asia)
Onion, Ingredients
Standing
Concerns Origin Region
Currently States West or Central Asia (variously described as Iran, western Pakistan and Central Asia)
The onion has no known wild ancestral form; the article itself calls the geographic origin uncertain and names competing candidate regions.
Source Onion (Wikipedia)
Paella, Origin Period, From (Year)1400
Paella, Dishes
Standing
Concerns Origin Period, From (Year)
Currently States 1400
Marks the 15th century per the theory that Albufera rice farmers near Valencia invented paella; the source frames this as one likely theory, not a settled date, hence Status debated.
Source Paella (Wikipedia)
Pani Puri, Origin RegionVaranasi, Uttar Pradesh, India (one theory)
Pani Puri, Dishes
Standing
Concerns Origin Region
Currently States Varanasi, Uttar Pradesh, India (one theory)
Source Pani puri, Wikipedia
Pho, Origin Period, From (Year)1900
Pho, Dishes
Standing
Concerns Origin Period, From (Year)
Currently States 1900
Sources place the dish emergence anywhere from around 1898 in Nam Dinh province to roughly 1910 in Hanoi, and food historians disagree on whether it crystallized gradually over that span or at one identifiable moment; 1900 is used here as a round midpoint, not a settled date.
Source What Pho Can Teach Us About the History of Vietnam (National Geographic), Ryley Graham
Pho, Origin Period, To (Year)1907
Pho, Dishes
Standing
Concerns Origin Period, To (Year)
Currently States 1907
The modern form is dated by sources to a narrow window between 1900 and 1907 in Nam Dinh province, matching the existing origin-start-year of 1900 used as a round midpoint for the wider 1898-1910 range some sources give.
Source Pho (Wikipedia)
Pierogi, Origin Period, From (Year)1230
Pierogi, Dishes
Standing
Concerns Origin Period, From (Year)
Currently States 1230
Marks one competing theory (13th century, via Saint Hyacinth of Poland from Kievan Rus); a rival theory instead credits a Turkic route through Ukraine. Because the exact origin is stated as unknown and unverifiable, this date is the earliest of the competing theories, not a settled fact.
Source Pierogi (Wikipedia)
Pina Colada, Origin Period, From (Year)1954
Pina Colada, Drinks
Standing
Concerns Origin Period, From (Year)
Currently States 1954
Three competing bartender claims exist for the drink's invention: Ramon 'Monchito' Marrero at the Caribe Hilton in 1954, Ricardo Garcia, also at the Caribe Hilton, in 1953, and Ramon Portas Mingot at the Barrachina restaurant in 1963; none is universally accepted as definitive.
Source Pina Colada (Wikipedia)
Pizza, Origin Period, From (Year)1700
Pizza, Dishes
Standing
Concerns Origin Period, From (Year)
Currently States 1700
Marks the approximate start of the 18th century, the beginning of the period Wikipedia credits for pizza's evolution from earlier Neapolitan flatbread dishes; the source gives only the century range (18th or early 19th), no more precise year.
Source Pizza (Wikipedia)
Pizza, Origin Period, To (Year)1830
Pizza, Dishes
Standing
Concerns Origin Period, To (Year)
Currently States 1830
Marks about 1830, when Naples pizzerias began offering seated stanze, the point sources treat as pizza reaching a recognizable sit-down dish; the source itself says only approximately 1830.
Source Pizza (Wikipedia)
Pizza Margherita, Origin Period, To (Year)1889
Pizza Margherita, Dishes
Standing
Concerns Origin Period, To (Year)
Currently States 1889
Marks the popular legend's date for Queen Margherita's Naples visit and the pizza named for her; Wikipedia's own account notes the story and the name were first promoted only in the 1930s-1940s and its authenticity is doubted.
Source Pizza Margherita (Wikipedia)
Pork, Origin RegionMesopotamia, with an independent domestication in ancient China
Pork, Ingredients
Standing
Concerns Origin Region
Currently States Mesopotamia, with an independent domestication in ancient China
Two independent domestication events are documented in different regions at different times, not a single contested location.
Source Pork (Wikipedia)
Potato, Earliest Documented Use, From (Year)-8000
Potato, Ingredients
Standing
Concerns Earliest Documented Use, From (Year)
Currently States -8000
A more precisely dated anchor exists alongside this broad genetic-domestication estimate: the earliest archaeologically verified potato tuber remains, at the coastal site of Ancon in central Peru, date to 2500 BC, a firmer single point than the range this fact records.
Source Potato (Wikipedia)
Potato, Earliest Documented Use, To (Year)-5000
Potato, Ingredients
Standing
Concerns Earliest Documented Use, To (Year)
Currently States -5000
Closing bound of the same 7,000 to 10,000 years ago domestication estimate; see the start-year note for the firmer 2500 BC archaeological anchor at Ancon.
Source Potato (Wikipedia)
Poutine, Origin Period, From (Year)1957
Poutine, Dishes
Standing
Concerns Origin Period, From (Year)
Currently States 1957
Marks 1957, when poutine (fries and cheese curds, before gravy was added) first appears on the menu of Le Cafe Ideal in Warwick, Quebec, per restaurateur Fernand Lachance's own account; several other Centre-du-Quebec restaurants dispute being first, and no consensus exists.
Source Poutine (Wikipedia)
Poutine, Origin Period, To (Year)1964
Poutine, Dishes
Standing
Concerns Origin Period, To (Year)
Currently States 1964
Marks 1964, when Le Roy Jucep in Drummondville added the combined fries-curds-gravy dish to its menu under the name poutine; food researcher Sylvain Charlebois credits this restaurant, not Le Cafe Ideal, as the true inventor because it was first to combine all three ingredients.
Source Poutine (Wikipedia)
Rakia, Origin Period, From (Year)1300
Rakia, Drinks
Standing
Concerns Origin Period, From (Year)
Currently States 1300
Both Bulgarian and Serbian sources place the earliest confirmed evidence of rakia-making in the 14th century, a Bulgarian pottery inscription and a separate Serbian documentary source, the two countries dispute which came first and Bulgarian archaeologists separately claim an unconfirmed 11th century distillation vessel.
Source Rakia - Wikipedia