What Was on the Menu at the Last Supper? Unleavened Bread for Passover Recipe

The Bible discusses what happened during this dinner at length but the answer one question remains uncertain: What exactly did Jesus and his twelve dining companions eat during this historical occasion?

Unfortunately, there's no definitive answer. However, likely menu items can be gleaned from historical and even artistic record. Scripture, of course, gives us the first clue: Bread (unleavened) and wine were present at the Last Supper. Jesus is said to have passed both around the table, telling his Apostles that the bread was his body and the wine was his blood. This is the scriptural origin of communion.

Jesus also instructs the Apostles to make preparations for the Passover, including sacrificing and preparing the Passover Lamb. But was lamb indeed on the menu? It's up for debate. As explained in this Slate article, some biblical scholars believe that the "lamb" is actually a symbol for Jesus, who the next day would become the sacrificial "Lamb of God." (It should also be noted that lamb and any other meat was food for the rich, which Jesus and his disciples were not.) According to a piece in the Biblical Archaeology Review, while there were many parallels to a typical Seder, the meal also simply had many characteristics of a typical Jewish meal.

What could have been part of the menu? For that we can look to what was typically eaten in mid-spring Israel. Back to the Bible! In Deuteronomy, it is written that "the Lord your God is bringing you into a good land, a land of brooks of water, of fountains and springs, that flow out of valleys and hills; a land of wheat and barley, of vines and fig trees and pomegranates, a land of olive oil and honey; a land in which you will eat bread without scarcity." Out of these items - all native to the region in which Jesus would have been living - what could have been on the table? Wheat and barley might have been on the table, depending on the harvest from the year before (the grains would not have been ready to harvest at the time of the Last Supper, so any grain present would have had to last through the winter). Grapes were also not yet in season, but wine was present. Figs could have been eaten dried. Pomegranates, though, are a fall fruit and therefore would not likely have been present. However, olive oil and honey would have been at the ready.

The position of the guests around the table followed a precise rule, and the the most important were those at the right and left of the main guest.

"Verses from the gospels of John indicate Judas was very close to Jesus, probably to his immediate left. Indeed, we are told that Judas dipped bread into Jesus's dish, following the practice of sharing food from a common bowl," Urciuoli said.

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Urciuoli and Berogno narrowed the search for the food present at the Last Supper by reconstructing two other important meals mentioned in the New Testament, the wedding at Cana, which records the water to wine miracle, and Herod’s banquet, famous for the beheading of John the Baptist.

"The wedding at Cana allowed us to understand the Jewish religious dietary laws, known as kashrut, which established what foods can and cannot be eaten and how they must be prepared. On the other side, Herod's Banquet allowed us to analyze Roman culinary influences in Jerusalem," Urciuoli said.

Apart from wine and bread, tzir, a variant of the Roman fish sauce garum, was likely present both at the wedding of Cana and Herod’s banquet, as well as at the Last Supper, the authors said.

Detailing their research in the book, Urciuoli and Berogno also hypothesize the Last Supper might have occurred during the Feast of Booths or Tabernacles, an autumn feast commemorating the years the Israelites spent in the desert in fragile dwellings after the exodus.

But according to the Gospel of Mark, Jesus prepared for the Last Supper on the "first day of Unleavened Bread, when they sacrificed the Passover lamb."

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If the Last Supper was a Passover dinner, held by Jews then as now to commemorate the exodus from Egypt, the meal would have likely included lamb.

Scripture provides us with another clue: unleavened bread and wine were also on the menu. Jesus broke bread and blessed wine, telling his Apostles that the bread was his body and the wine was his blood — thus laying the basis for the communion.

According to Urciuoli and Berogno, other food on the table would have included cholent, a stewed dish of beans cooked very low and slow, olives with hyssop, a herb with a mint-like taste, bitter herbs with pistachios and a date charoset, a chunky fruit and nut paste.

"Bitter herbs and charoset are typical of Passover, cholent is eaten during festivities, while hyssop was also consumed on a daily basis," Urciuoli said.

Unleavened Bread for Passover

INGREDIENTS

4 cups whole wheat flour

1 cup white flour

2 cups water

1⁄4 cup honey

1 1⁄2 teaspoons salt

1⁄4 cup oil

DIRECTIONS

Roll out to 1/8 inch thick.

Place on greased cookie sheet.

Score into about 1 inch squares.

Cut into 4 x 5 rectangles.

Bake at 400 degrees about 15 minutes.

In the first minutes of baking, prick bubbles that may form.

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