Foods in the ancient world must have been pretty boring.
No potatoes, tomatoes, corn, strawberries, blueberries, bananas, pineapples, vanilla, chocolate, no spices except what was imported from Asia, just to name a few.........................
They loved pepper.
https://freerepublic.com/focus/chat/3985128/posts
They had strawberries:
https://ncstrawberry.com/what-is-the-history-behind-strawberries/
The first mention of strawberries occurred sometime between 234-149 BC in the writings of Cato, a Roman Senator. The first descriptions published were mostly for the medicinal uses of the plant and not for the benefits of the fruit.
There’s a mosaic that appears to show the pineapple, which is a bromeliad that apparently got domesticated in Precolumbian Peru.
https://eyesofrome.com/blog/eyes-on-storytelling/mystery-in-an-ancient-mosaic
https://search.brave.com/search?q=bromeliad
I enjoy vanilla as well, but wouldn’t put it high on the list of excitement in cuisine.
https://www.thedailymeal.com/1278869/ancient-origins-vanilla/
Romans enjoyed plenty of tasty foods, some of which have fallen out of fashion or are expensive to cultivate or otherwise produce.
I had to investigate the history of bananas:
https://abgc.org.au/our-industry-old/history-of-bananas/
Bananas are believed to have originated up to 10,000 years ago and some scientists believe they may have been the world’s first fruit.
The first bananas are thought to have grown in the region that includes the Malaya Peninsula, Indonesia, the Philippines and New Guinea.
From here, traders and travelers took them to India, Africa and Polynesia. There were references to bananas from 600 BC when Buddhist scriptures, know as the Pali Canon, noted Indian traders travelling through the Malaysian region had tasted the fruit and brought plants back with them. In 327 BC, when Alexander The Great and his army invaded India, he discovered banana crop in the Indian Valleys. After tasting this unusual fruit for the first time, he introduced this new discovery to the Western world.
Strawberries were grown in Europe at the time of the Roman Empire-they also had access to some tropical fruits early on from sea trade...
The main reason spices such as black pepper were in demand in centuries gone by was there was no refrigeration available. That caused meat and fish to go bad quickly. Spices helped disguise the bad taste & odor.
OTOH, the addition of the tomato, potato, peppers, corn (maize), and certain squash (well, and tobacco for that matter) to world cuisine has been transformative to nutrition, agriculture, and the economy.