OTA is mainly found in blood samples in Europe, but its presence in healthy human blood shows that there is still worldwide exposure. An effort has been made in Europe to monitor the OTA levels in foods by creating regulations regarding maximum acceptable levels. Creating guidelines allows for special attention to be paid to local specialties, such as blood puddings and sausages, which are made using pig blood.
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No portion of the animal was allowed to go to waste, resulting in blood puddings, meatballs (isicia), sausages, and stews. Rural people cured ham and bacon, and regional specialties such as the fine salted hams of Gaul were items of trade. The sausages of Lucania were made from a mixture of ground meats, herbs, and nuts, with eggs as a binding ingredient, and then aged in a smoker.Edwards, "Philology and Cuisine in De Re Coquinaria," p. 259.
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The traditional Northern German daily diet is centered around boiled potatoes, rye bread, dairy products, cabbages, cucumbers, berries, jams, fish, and pork and beef. A breakfast specialty is the Crispbread or Knäckebrot, eaten with a variety of toppings such as ham, cheese, fruits, and butter. Lentil stews and soups are very popular as a working lunch. Regional specialties in Schleswig- Holstein, Mecklenburg-Vorpommern and Lower Saxony include Blutwurst or Blood sausage and a variety of Blood puddings commonly eaten for brunch.
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While there were prominent Romans who discouraged meat eating, a variety of meat products were prepared, including blood puddings, sausages, cured ham and bacon. The milk of goats or sheep was thought superior to that of cows; milk was used to make many types of cheese, as this was a way of storing and trading milk products. While olive oil was fundamental to Roman cooking, butter was viewed as an undesirable Gallic foodstuff. Sweet foods such as pastries typically used honey and wine-must syrup as a sweetener.
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Oden was introduced to Taiwanese cuisine during Japanese rule and is referred to in Taiwanese Hokkien as olen (), which has been further loaned into Taiwanese Mandarin as hēilún (). Tianbula () is a common ingredient for oden and is a popular snack at night markets. Tianbula is actually Japanese satsuma-age and was introduced to Taiwan by people from Kyushu (where satsuma-age is commonly known as tempura) when Taiwan was under Japanese rule. Besides the more traditional ingredients, the Taiwanese olen also uses many local ingredients, such as pork meatballs and blood puddings.
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Blood puddings are often supposed to be one of the oldest forms of sausage. Animals are generally bled at slaughter, and as blood decays unless prepared in some way, making a pudding with it is one of the easiest ways of ensuring it does not go to waste. While the majority of modern black pudding recipes involve pork blood, this has not always been the case. Sheep or cow blood was also used, and one 15th-century English recipe used that of a porpoise, in a pudding eaten exclusively by the nobility. Until at least the 19th century, cow or sheep blood was the usual basis for black puddings in Scotland; Jamieson's Scottish dictionary defined "black pudding" as "a pudding made of the blood of a cow or sheep".Jamieson, Supplement to the etymological dictionary of the Scottish language, v1, p.95 As a product of the slaughtering process, eating black puddings was historically associated with Martinmas, when the annual slaughter of livestock took place. By the 19th century black pudding manufacture was linked with towns known for their large markets for pork, such as Stretford,Waugh, E. (1869), Lancashire Sketches, p.78The Encyclopedia Britannica, Volume 20, 1929, p.
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