‘The Cook is the Best Doctor’ Plants for Food and Health: Recipes and Prescriptions

In his Tacuinum Sanitatis, ‘Check board of Health’, the Christian Arab Ibn Butlan (d. 1066) gives a detailed systematic overview of all kinds of vegan foodstuff according to the theories of the Greek physicians Hippocrates (fifth century BC) and Galen of Pergamon (second century AD), combined with the early Arabic theory of the six res non naturales, things that are necessary for health but aren’t automatically thought of as such, of which food and drink are the most important. Because a balance of all these elements is the basis of health, the cook who has to care for an appropriate diet is the best physician.