The stone age ended around the year 3000 BC with the discovery of how to use copper. Before this people would have to hunt and farm with nothing but wood and stone, and so were limited to a very small list of foods.
Another thing that people don’t realise when it comes to food we grow in Britain today, is that most of the crops we have didn’t start here. Potato’s came from America, Types of grain came from the middle east and Africa, and many varieties of fruits and vegetables were brought in from all over the world to be cultivated on British soil.
During the stone age people had non of the these things, and combined with their lack of metal farming tools its no wonder they lived hunter-gatherer lifestyles. Here’s a small selection of foods people used to eat in Stone Age Britain:
Meats:
Depending on exactly “when” in the stone age you’re referring to, animals such as the woolly Rhino and cave bear would have been on the menu. The Megalocerus was one of the most sought after stone age animals, often being referred to as the Irish Elk, this creature was basically a giant deer that stood several feet higher than a person.
More widely recognised animals would include wild boar, deer, otters, pigeon, hares, seals and if food was scarce predator animals such as wolves and wild dog would be on the list. They also had access to the eggs of wild birds, though chickens and most types of duck and geese in the country today were brought in from else were after the stone age ended.
Seafood:
Since they didn’t have fabrics, fishing nets were either made very poorly or not at all, leaving people to fish with spears and traps. This meant that only the larger river dwelling fish such as salmon were most often caught, along with lobster, crab, eel and anything else that wandered into their traps.
One thing that’s well known about stone age people is they liked to stay near the coast, and ate large amounts of shellfish and seaweed. There are large piles of empty shells dated to the stone age in Scotland, were people sat on a regular basis and threw the shells of mussels and cockles in the same place.
Fruit and Nuts:
Fruit would have been available in huge quantities but only for a short period of time. Brambles and Elder trees were present during the stone age and both spread like weeds, provide a huge amount of fruit for anyone who wanted it. Apart from this strawberries, raspberries, sloes and plums would provide a nice harvest time sugar boost, and since they couldn’t store them for more than a few days the summer fruit harvest was a time for feasting.
Nuts would have been much more limited, as most of the nuts grown in the UK today were brought in from else were. The 2 main nuts from the stone age would have been Hazelnuts and acorns, both of which were used extensively. Acorns were made into everything from bread to soups, and were also able to be preserved by drying.
vegetables:
Beans, chickpeas and lentils were amongst the first crops to be cultivated at the end of the stone age, but most other vegetables we have today were brought in after the stone age ended.
Various wild vegetables were found here and there by gathering parties, but no type was eaten more than the stinging nettle. Available for a large part of the year in whatever quantity you like, nettles provided an easy to find ingredient that was most likely used in most liquid dishes.
Grain:
The first grains to be cultivated in the stone age were Emmer and Einkorn, which are both types of wheat, and Barley. Corn and oats came much later and for hundreds of years people relied entirely on these 3 grains, learning how to dry and preserve it, and also how to make it into beer.